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Where could I go? I was afraid to return to my master's. I walked on
recklessly, not caring where I went, or what would become of me. When I had
gone four or five miles, fatigue compelled me to stop. I sat down on the
stump of an old tree. The stars were shining through the boughs above me.
How they mocked me, with their bright, calm light! The hours passed by, and
as I sat there alone a chilliness and deadly sickness came over me. I sank
on the ground. My mind was full of horrid thoughts. I prayed to die; but
the prayer was not answered. At last, with great effort I roused myself,
and walked some distance further, to the house of a woman who had been a
friend of my mother. When I told her why I was there, she spoke soothingly
to me; but I could not be comforted. I thought I could bear my shame if I
could only be reconciled to my grandmother. I longed to open my heart to
her. I thought if she could know the real state of the case, and all I had
been bearing for years, she would perhaps judge me less harshly. My friend
advised me to send for her. I did so; but days of agonizing suspense passed
before she came. Had she utterly forsaken me? No. She came at last. I knelt
before her, and told her the things that had poisoned my life; how long I
had been persecuted; that I saw no way of escape; and in an hour of
extremity I had become desperate. She listened in silence. I told her I
would bear any thing and do any thing, if in time I had hopes of obtaining
her forgiveness. I begged of her to pity me, for my dead mother's sake. And
she did pity me. She did not say, "I forgive you;" but she looked at me
lovingly, with her eyes full of tears. She laid her old hand gently on my
head, and murmured, "Poor child! Poor child!"
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