mouth, as we do, Fair. One can never afford to gratify a generous impulse,” sighed Sadie, as she went down on her knees to pack a calico wrapper and a change of underclothing into a hand valise. “It is very hard, but there are some things harder,” answered poor Fair, who was thinking that she would not mind anything, hardly, if only she were free of the terrible incubus that weighed upon her like iron chains—the hated bond that gave Carl Bernicci liberty to persecute her with his unwelcome love, and to hound her footsteps, watching his opportunity to waylay and carry her off. “How I hate and despise him now, and how could I ever have fancied that I could tolerate him as a husband?” she thought, in bitter self-reproach and self-disgust. And then the knowledge that Sadie must leave her, and that she would be compelled to traverse the streets of New York alone, in danger every[Pg 92] moment of encountering Carl Bernicci, overcame her with horror, and she sobbed aloud. [Pg 92] “Dear Fair, please do not give way like that,” pleaded Sadie, who had now packed the valise, and was doing up her hair before the small toilet glass. She had her good-natured mouth full of hairpins, which she took out one by one and stuck in her brown hair, as she proceeded: “I’ve thought of a good plan: Get Lucy Miller or Alice Stevens to come here and stay with you while I’m gone; then you can have company to and from work. I don’t think Carl Bernicci will approach you in the street if you have some one with you. Both those girls dote on you, and would take your part like wild cats if any one molested you.” “Yes, I think they would,” Fair answered. “But how am I to get them here? I dare not venture out alone to-morrow.” “Write a note to Mrs. Jones, explaining the circumstances, and ask her to speak to the girls for you, and have one to come to-morrow evening to stay all night; then you could go to work the next morning,” said Sadie, whose brain was very fertile in resources, and who, being almost[Pg 93] ten years older than Fair, felt somewhat in the light of a mother toward the unhappy girl. [Pg 93] Fair immediately fell to work to write the letter, and had it ready for Sadie to put in a letter box when she left the house. The two girls parted with a fond kiss and embrace, mutually promising to
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