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Conrad, Joseph, 1857-1924

"Chance"

And that woman was forcing the
words through her set teeth: "You say I mustn't, I mustn't. All the
world will be speaking of him like this to-morrow. They will say it, and
they'll print it. You shall hear it and you shall read it--and then you
shall know whose daughter you are."
Her face lighted up with an atrocious satisfaction. "He's nothing but a
thief," she cried, "this father of yours. As to you I have never been
deceived in you for a moment. I have been growing more and more sick of
you for years. You are a vulgar, silly nonentity, and you shall go back
to where you belong, whatever low place you have sprung from, and beg
your bread--that is if anybody's charity will have anything to do with
you, which I doubt--"
She would have gone on regardless of the enormous eyes, of the open mouth
of the girl who sat up suddenly with the wild staring expression of being
choked by invisible fingers on her throat, and yet horribly pale. The
effect on her constitution was so profound, Mrs. Fyne told me, that she
who as a child had a rather pretty delicate colouring, showed a white
bloodless face for a couple of years afterwards, and remained always
liable at the slightest emotion to an extraordinary ghost-like whiteness.


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