The String of Pearls (1850), p. 149

which there is no end save with life, and in which there is no one mitigating circumstance—all is bad and dark. God help me!'
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"However, my dream of happiness was soon disturbed. By some means my parents had got an idea of this, and the young man was dismissed the house, and forbidden to come to it again. This he determined to do, and more than once we met, and then in secret I told him all my woes. When he had heard
all I said, he expressed the deepest commiseration, and declared I had been most unjustly and harshly treated, and thought that there was not a harder or harsher treatment than that which I had received. He then advised me to leave
home.
"'Leave home,' I said; 'where shall I fly? I have no friend.'
"'Come to me, I will protect you; I will stand between you and all the world; they shall not stir hand or foot to your injury.'
"'But I cannot, dare not to do that; if they found me out, they would force me back with all the ignominy and shame that could be felt from having done a bad act; not any pity would they show me.'
"'Nor need you; you would be my wife—I mean to make you my wife.'
"'You ?'
"'Yes! I dreamed not of anything else. You shall be my wife; we will hide ourselves, and remain unknown to all until the time shall have arrived when you are of age—when you can claim all your property, and run no risk of being poisoned or killed by any other means.'
"'This is a matter,' said I, 'that ought to be considered well before adopting anything so violent and so sudden.'
"'It does; and it is not one that I think will injure by being reflected upon by those who are the principal actors; for my own part my mind is made up, and I am ready to perform my share of the engagement.'
"I resolved to consider the matter well in my own mind, and felt every inclination to do what he proposed, because it took me away from home, and because it would give me one of my own. My parents had become utterly estranged from me: they did not act as parents, they did not act as friends, they had steeled my heart against them; they never could have borne any love to
me, I am sure of it, who could have committed such great crimes against me. As the hour drew near, that in which I was likely to become an object of still greater hatred and dislike to them, I thought I was often the subject of their private thoughts, and often when I entered the room my mother and father, and the rest, would suddenly leave off speaking, and look at me, as if to ascertain if I had overheard, them say anything. On one occasion I remember very well I heard them conversing in a low tone. The door happened to have opened of
itself, the hasp not having been allowed to enter the mortise. I heard my name
mentioned: I paused and listened.
"'We must soon get rid of her,' said my mother.
"'Undoubtedly,' he replied; "if we do not, we shall have her about our ears: she'll get married, or some infernal thing, and then we shall have to refund.'
"'We could prevent that.'
"'Not if her husband were to insist upon it, we could not; but the only plan I can now form is, what I told you of already.'
"'Putting her into a madhouse?'
"'Yes: there, you see, she will be secured, and cannot get away. Besides, those who go there die in a natural way before many years.'
"'But she can speak.'
"'So she may; but who attends to the ravings of a mad woman? No, no; depend upon it, that is the best plan: send her to a lunatic asylum—a private madhouse. I can obtain all that is requisite in a day or two.'
"'Then we will consider that settled?'
"'Certainly.'