"Exactly. Well, don't go to sleep, my boy. I'll come up to you after you are in bed, and see if you remember it any better. Go back to your desk." I crept back, watching him the while, as he stood balancing the poker in his hand, and smiling at me in a way that made my blood turn cold. Then, throwing the poker back with a crash into the grate, he went out as silently as he had come, and I sat there thinking for quite two hours. At the end of that time, I took a sheet of paper, and wrote upon it as well as my wet trembling hands would let me-- "My dear Mary,-- "Please don't think me a very ungrateful boy, but I cannot, and I dare not, stay here any longer. When you read this I shall be gone, never to come back any more. Please tell Miss Hetty I shall never forget her kindness, and I shall never forget yours. "I remain, your affectionate friend,-- "Antony Grace. "P.S.--Some day, perhaps, we shall meet somewhere. I am very unhappy, and I cannot write any more. Mr Blakeford frightens me." This letter I doubled and sealed up in the old fashion, and kept in my pocket, meaning to post it, and at last, when I went into the kitchen to tea, I was half afraid to meet Mary. She noticed my pale face, and I told her the truth, that I had a bad headache, making it an excuse for going up to bed at eight o'clock, feeling as if the greatest event in my life were about to take place, and shaking like a leaf. I felt that I had an hour to spare, and spent part of the time in making a bundle of my best clothes and linen. I tied up in a handkerchief, too, some thick slices of bread and butter, and some bread and meat that I had found that afternoon in my desk. Then, as the night grew darker, I sat thinking and asking myself, after placing my bundles ready, whether I should go at once, or wait till I heard Mr Blakeford coming. I had just decided to go at once, feeling that I dare not face Mr Blakeford again, when I heard his voice downstairs, and started up, trembling in every limb. "Where's that boy?" "Gone to bed," said Mary surlily. Then I heard a door shut directly after, and breathed more freely. I felt that I must go at once, and stood in the middle of the room, shivering with nervous excitement, as I thought of the madness of the step I was about to undertake. A dozen times over I felt that I dare not go, till the recollection of Mr Blakeford's dark threatening face and sneering smile gave me strength, and made me call up the picture of myself before the magistrates telling all I knew about the assault, of course not saying anything about the poker, or my employer's injuries; and then I began to think about meeting him afterwards. "He'll half kill me," I thought; and stopping at this, I nerved myself for what I had to do, and putting on my cap, went to the door and listened.