"It won't do to kill her," said Miss Tildy. "I don't care much if I do." "We would be tried for murder." "Who would be our accusers? Who the witnesses? You forget that Jones is not here to testify." "Ah, and so we are safe." "Oh, I never premeditate anything without counting the cost." "But then the loss of property!" "I'd rather gratify my revenge than have five hundred dollars, which would be her highest market value." Tell me, honest reader, was not she, at heart, a murderess? Did she not plan and premeditate the deed? Who were her accusers? That God whose first law she had outraged; that same God who asked Cain for his slain brother. "Now," said Miss Jane, after she had given the poor creature only a few moments relief, "now let me go and see what that wretch has to say about the forks." "More lies," added Miss Tildy. "Then her fate is sealed," said the human hyena. Turning to me, she added, in the most authoritative manner, "Come with me, and mind that you obey me; none of your impertinent tears, or I'll give you this." And she struck me a lick across the shoulders. I can assure you I felt but little inclination to do anything whereby such a penalty might be incurred. Taking the key of the "lock up" from her pocket, she ordered me to open the door. With a trembling hand I obeyed. Slowly the old, rusty-hinged door swung open, and oh, heavens! what a sight it revealed! There, in the centre of the dismal room, suspended from a spoke, about three feet from the ground, was the body of Amy! Driven by desperation, goaded to frenzy, she had actually hung herself! Oh, God! that fearful sight is burnt in on my brain, with a power that no wave of Lethe can ever wash out! There, covered with clotted blood, bruised and mangled, hung the wretched girl! There, a bleeding, broken monument of the white man's and white woman's cruelty! God of my sires! is there for us no redress? And Miss Jane--what did she do? Why, she screamed, and almost swooned with fright! Ay, too late it was to rend the welkin with her cries of distress. She had done the deed! Upon her head rested the sin of that freshly-shed blood! She was the real murderess. Oh, frightful shall be her nights! Peopled with racks, execution-blocks, and ghastly gallows-poles, shall be her dreams! At the lone hour of midnight, a wan and bloody corse shall glide around her bed-side, and shriek into her trembling ear the horrid word "murderess!" Let me still remain in bondage, call me still by the ignoble title of slave, but leave me the unbought and priceless inheritance of a stainless conscience. I am free of murder before God and man. Still riot in your wealth; still batten on inhumanity, women of the white complexion, but of the black hearts! I envy you not. Still let me rejoice in a darker face, but a snowy, self-approving conscience.