Then I met Mary herself --
and met her again. Then she would meet me no more. But the
other day I had a notice that I was to start on my voyage within
a week, and I determined that I would see her once before I left.
Theresa was always my friend, for she loved Mary and hated this
villain almost as much as I did. From her I learned
the ways of the house. Mary used to sit up reading in her own
little room downstairs. I crept round there last night and
scratched at the window. At first she would not open to me,
but in her heart I know that now she loves me, and she could not
leave me in the frosty night. She whispered to me to come round
to the big front window, and I found it open before me so as to
let me into the dining-room. Again I heard from her own lips
things that made my blood boil, and again I cursed this brute
who mishandled the woman that I loved. Well, gentlemen, I was
standing with her just inside the window, in all innocence,
as Heaven is my judge, when he rushed like a madman into the room,
called her the vilest name that a man could use to a woman, and
welted her across the face with the stick he had in his hand.
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