It won't do for you and I to quarrel. I meant it for a marriage portion
for Mary; surely you don't wish to rob her?"
"It's just the same as appropriating it to yourself," growled the
villain; "you know that she can't keep anything from you."
"Mary, my pet," said Godfrey, now half intoxicated with the brandy he
had drank, taking up a handful of the money and going up to the bed, "I
heard you say a few days ago that you wanted a new frock; look, here is
plenty of money to buy you a score of smart dresses. Will you not give
me a kiss for all this gold?"
The girl turned her wide wandering eyes upon him, glanced at his hands,
and uttered a wild scream.
"Why, Mary! what the deuce ails you?"
"What's that upon your hands, Godfrey? What's that upon your hands? It's
blood--blood! Oh, take it away! don't bring to me the price of blood!"
"Nonsense; you are dreaming, girl--gold can gild every stain."
"I have been dreaming," said Mary, rising up in the bed, and putting
back the long hair which had escaped from under her cap, and now fell in
rich neglected masses round her pallid face. "Yes. I have been
dreaming--such an awful dream! I see it before me yet."
"What was it, Mary?" asked her brother, with quivering lips.
"It was a lonesome place," continued the girl, "a dark lonesome place;
but God's moon was shining there, and there was no need of the sun, or
of any other light, for all seemed plain to me as the noon day.
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