rest of them?"

"Reckon I'd done gone kill myself, s'pose Miss Daisy leave me there,"
the girl said gloomily. "If dey send me down South, I _would_."

"Send you South!" I said; "they would not do that, Margaret."

"Dere was man wantin' to buy me--give mighty high price, de overseer
said." In excitement Margaret's tongue sometimes grew thick, like
those of her neighbours.

"Mr. Edwards has no right to sell anybody away from the place," I
insisted, in mixed unbelief and horror.

"Dunno," said Margaret. "Don't make no difference, Miss Daisy. Who
care what he do? Dere's Pete's wife--"

"Pete's wife?" said I. "I didn't know Pete was married! What of Pete's
wife?"

"Dat doctor will kill me, for sure!" said Margaret, looking at me.
"Do, don't, Miss Daisy! The doctor say you must go right to bed, now.
See! you ain't got your clothes off."

"Stop," said I. "What about Pete's wife?"

"I done forget. I thought Miss Daisy knowed. Mebbe it's before Miss
Daisy come home."

"What?" said I. "What?"

"It's nothin', Miss Daisy. The overseer he done got mad with Pete's
wife and he sold her down South, he did."

"Away from Pete?" said I.

"Pete, he's to de old place," said Margaret, laconically. "'Spect he
forgot all about it by dis time. Miss Daisy please have her clothes
off and go to bed?"

There was nothing more to wait for. I submitted, was undressed; but
the rest and sleep which had been desired were far out of reach now.
Pete's wife?--my good, strong, gentle, and I remembered always
_grave_, Pete! My heart was on fire with indignation and torn to
pieces with sorrow, both at once. Torn with the helpless feeling too
that I could not mend the wrong. I do not mean this individual wrong,
but the whole state of things under which such wrong was possible. I
was restless on my bed, though very weary. I would rather have been up
and doing something, than to lie and look at my trouble; only that
being there kept me out of the way of seeing people and of talking.
Such things done under my father and mother's own authority,--on their
own land--to their own helpless dependants; whom yet it was _they_
made helpless and kept subject to such possibilities. I turned and
tossed, feeling that I _must_ do something, while yet I knew I could
do nothing. Pete's wife! And where was she now? And _that_ was the
secret of the unvarying grave shadow that Pete's brow always wore. And
now that I had quitted Magnolia, no human friend for the p