"Let her go," was the only answer. "Loose Bessie's hand, child: you
cannot succeed in getting out by these means, be assured. I abhor
artifice, particularly in children; it is my duty to show you that tricks
will not answer: you will now stay here an hour longer, and it is only on
condition of perfect submission and stillness that I shall liberate you
then."
"O aunt! have pity! Forgive me! I cannot endure it--let me be punished
some other way! I shall be killed if--"
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"Silence! This violence is all most repulsive:" and so, no doubt, she
felt it. I was a precocious actress in her eyes; she sincerely looked on
me as a compound of virulent passions, mean spirit, and dangerous
duplicity.
Bessie and Abbot having retreated, Mrs. Reed, impatient of my now frantic
anguish and wild sobs, abruptly thrust me back and locked me in, without
farther parley. I heard her sweeping away; and soon after she was gone,
I suppose I had a species of fit: unconsciousness closed the scene.
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