It don't look right to go and live with a married man; but you knows,
miss, how I'm situated, and you knows that I'm only doing it because it
seems for the best."
"What did he say to that?"
"Nothing much, miss, except that I might get left a second time--and, he
wasn't slow to add, with another child."
"Have you thought of that danger, Esther?"
"Yes, miss, I've thought of everything; but thinking don't change nothing.
Things remain just the same, and you've to chance it in the end--leastways
a woman has. Not on the likes of you, miss, but the likes of us."
"Yes," said Miss Rice reflectively, "it is always the woman who is
sacrificed." And her thought went back for a moment to the novel she was
writing. It seemed to her pale and conventional compared with this rough
page torn out of life. She wondered if she could treat the subject. She
passed in review the names of some writers who could do justice to it, and
then her eyes went from her bookcase to Esther.
"So you're going to live in a public-house, Esther? You're going to-night?
I've paid you everything I owe you?"
"Yes, miss, you have; you've been very kind to me, indeed you have,
miss--I shall never forget you, miss. I've been very happy in your
service, and should like nothing better than to remain on with you."
"All I can say, Esther, is that you have been a very good servant, and I'm
very sorry to part with you.
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