but they couldn't help themselves. 
They were owing money; and there was some way, I can't tell how,
that a man had a hold on them, and they were obliged to give him
his will.  I listened, and heard him telling mistress that, and
she begging and pleading for me,--and he told her he couldn't
help himself, and that the papers were all drawn;--and then
it was I took him and left my home, and came away.  I knew 't
was no use of my trying to live, if they did it; for 't 'pears like
this child is all I have."

"Have you no husband?"

"Yes, but he belongs to another man.  His master is real hard
to him, and won't let him come to see me, hardly ever; and
he's grown harder and harder upon us, and he threatens to sell him
down south;--it's like I'll never see _him_ again!"

The quiet tone in which the woman pronounced these words might
have led a superficial observer to think that she was entirely
apathetic; but there was a calm, settled depth of anguish in her
large, dark eye, that spoke of something far otherwise.

"And where do you mean to go, my poor woman?" said Mrs. Bird.

"To Canada, if I only knew where that was.  Is it very far off,
is Canada?" said she, looking up, with a simple, confiding air,
to Mrs. Bird's face.

"Poor thing!" said Mrs. Bird