"But don't you read to her?"
"Yes, the 'Children of the Abbey' and let her cry herself to sleep. She is a child."
"Titine, there is strange blood in you; you are Cleopatra come to earth again; and the serpent of slavery is at your breast."
She shuddered.
"And it may suck out my life, but mine alone," she said.
"Titine, a week ago I could not have believed it possible to be placed in such a position; I could not have believed that a creature like you existed in the world. The knowledge of slavery has always been a burden; you make it a snake and it bites me. But tell me, what are you going to do? Are you going to spend your life in servitude?"
"Who is there to take me away?" she asked, and the look she gave me stilled my blood, but it flowed again with a spurt, and leaping to my feet I ran to the edge of the cliff and looked far below, at the lengthening shadows, the crows sailing round and round, the cattle feeding in a distant meadow. I turned back to her. She did not look at me. I sat down beside her, sought to take her hand, but she moved and motioned me away.
"Titine, once I thought I saw a hangman's rope—the maids have told you a part of the story—and money was thrown at me, but I would not run away so deeply was I devoted to Bob Gradley. I thought that the devil was trying to tempt me, but now I believe that the temptation comes from God."
"You have misunderstood me," she said, and her words were freezing. "I would not suggest a temptation; I would not run away with you. I will be frank—I don't love you, and if I did, I would not run away to be brought back in shame. Let us be fellow servants, Dan?"
"But is there no hope left in the world?"