The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 120, October, 1867: A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and PoliticsVarious
General
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 120, October, 1867: A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics
Various
American periodicals
thing, but I could feel the hole into my nightgownd-sleeve, and my arm all
burnt into a light blister. 'Dan'l!' says I again; but Dan'l did n't
answer, and then I was full sure it was him, and I scraped with a steadier
hand, and the match--it was one of them nasty lucifers, may be you know--"
"Yes, I 've heerd tell on 'em," says John.
And the wretched woman went on: "It was one of them nasty lucifers, and it
choked me so I could not find the candle; and though I could just see a
ghostly object at the door, I could not tell at all whether it was Dan'l or
not, for he never looked like himself when he walked into his sleep; and
the match--they are nothing but splinters, you know--was burning closer and
closer to my fingers, and I just dabs it wiolently into the washbowl, and
puts it out. And then says I, 'Dan'l! Dan'l!' again; and this time he
answers, and says he, 'You wixen,' says he, 'shut up your mouth!'
"There was no mistaking that, and all in the dark I wentered after him, and
grabbed and ketched him by the end of his neck-tie, and hild with all my
might; and at that he began to wociferate at the top of his woice, and,
thinks says I, better than rouse all the neighbors and have them broke o'
their rest, I 'll just let him go and walk into his sleep till he 's
satisfied. I took the key out of the door, and then I tried to find my way
back, for, thinks says I, I 'll retire and take my rest anyhow, and, if you
believe it, I was so turned round I could n't find the piller! So I went
feeling here and there, and every minute I come back to him, and every time
I touched him he wociferated at the top of his woice; and then I 'd say,
'Dan'l, it was n't woluntary!' and then I 'd feel and feel by the chairs
and the wall, and by one thing and another, as a body will when they can't
see, and the first thing I 'd know I 'd be right back to him agin. My
blistered arm, meantime, was a-burning like fire, but, thinks says I, it 's
no use, I can 't find the water-pitcher, I 'm so turned round; and I just
sot down where I was, and there I sot till daylight, blowing all my breath
away onto my arm, and the minute I could see I made for the pitcher; but,
happening to take it by the snout instead of the handle, away it went, and
spilt all the water, and broke the pitcher past all mending,--and a fine
pitcher, too!--one that my own father give me in cholera times, when his
business was at the best."
"I declare," says John Chidlaw, "it 's enough to make a body's blood run
cold!" And then he says he does n't wonder she 's agin matrimony!
Now the widow had said nothing of the sort, and stoutly protested that she
had not, but that, on the contrary, she thought it an adwantage to any
woman to be married, prowided she could find an indiwidual that had a warm
heart toward her; to which John replied that she had found such a one; and
she answered, "How you do go on!" and resumed her story.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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