"You needn't be 'fraid no more, chile. I goin' to sleep with you every night now."
"No, 'Mandy," I said; "I can't stay here now. I've got to get away somehow."
"Dat's all right, chile," she said. "Jus' you tek you li'l' bag and slip out right now. No one's stirring in dis house yet. You won't be missed till after you sure am gone."
I was sitting on the side of the bed, feverishly turning the matter over in my mind.
"I wish I could do that," I said, "but I have no place to go, and I have no money."
'Mandy comforted me as best she could, and told me to wait till after breakfast, when I'd feel better; then I could talk to the doctor about it, and perhaps he'd give me some money; and if he wouldn't, said the colored girl, shrewdly, "you tell him you goin' ask his wife."
I felt I could not do that. I would have to find some other solution. One thing was certain, however, I could no more stay here than I could in Jamaica. There are times in my life when I have been whipped and scorched, and nothing has healed me save to get away quickly from the place where I have suffered. I felt like that in Jamaica. I felt like that now. There came another time in my life when I uprooted my whole being from a place I loved, and yet where it would have killed me to remain.
The doctor met me in the lower hall as I came down-stairs. His manner was affable and formal, and he said he would take me to his wife. I found myself unable to look him in the face, for I felt his glance would be hateful.
Mrs. Manning was in bed, propped up with pillows. At first glance she seemed an old woman. Her pale, parched face lay like a shadow among her pillows, and her fine, silvery hair was like an exquisite aureole. She had dark, restless, seeking eyes, and her expression was peevish, like that of a complaining child. As I came in, she raised herself to her elbow, and looked curiously at me and then at the doctor, who said:
"This is Miss Ascough, dear. She is to be my new secretary."