Page:Adventures of Susan Hopley (Volume 1).pdf/134

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SUSAN HOPLEY.
121

only get him to put me in an honest way of getting my living."

"Well, I'll see what I can do," said the man; "and now, d—n it, do let me get a little sleep!"

Here the conversation terminated; and much as Susan was impressed with it, her fatigue soon put an end to her reflections; and in a few minutes she was again buried in a profound sleep; from which she did not awake till she was roused by the joyous infantine laugh of the child in the morning. The mother was dressing it, and between every article of clothes she put on, it was running away and hiding itself behind the curtains of the bed. "It would have been a pretty sight to look on," Susan would say, "the fair young mother and the lovely child, if I had not had in my mind the conversation I had overheard in the night—but that spoiled the picture; and I could have wept to think of the misery that was gathering round them. 'And that sweet face of thine,' thought I, as I looked at the infant, 'may be but a snare to thee, as thy poor mother's has doubtless been to her!' She was a pretty young creature, the mother, with delicate features, and soft dove-like eyes, but already, although she was not more than twenty years of age, there were traces of melan-

VOL. I.
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