“John!” she screamed, “give me my child! Where have you put her? Where is my child?”
Her husband started. “Woman, are you mad?” he cried.
“Give me my child!”
“Wife, be calm.”
“I will not be calm. My child! You spoke coarsely to me the other night for nothing, John. She was a burden on you, was she? But why did you take her from me? I would have worked for her—drudged, slaved, to win her bread. Oh, why did you kill my child?”
The man looked stupidly upon his wife, and sank into a chair. The room was filled with neighbors; they looked at him, and then to one another, and whispered.
“Give me my child!” the mother screamed. He sat buried in thought, and covering his face with both his hands.
“Take him away!” she cried, and the people laid their hands upon him.
He started to his feet, and dashed the foremost to the ground. There was a look about the man that terrified, and they quailed before him. He strode before his wife. “Woman,” said he, “your lips accused me. Bitterly, ay, bitterly, shall you rue this night’s work. Come, neighbors, I am ready.” And they took him to a magistrate.
“My child!” the wretched woman shrieked, and swooned away. Before a few hours had passed, she was writhing in the agonies of a burning fever.