I tried to go back to my den, but found it more difficult to go up than I had to come down.  Now that my mission was fulfilled, the little strength that had supported me through it was gone, and I sank helpless on the floor.  My grandmother, alarmed at the risk I had run, came into the storeroom in the dark, and locked the door behind her.  “Linda,” she whispered, “where are you?”

“I am here by the window,” I replied.  “I couldn’t have him go away without emancipating the children.  Who knows what may happen?”

“Come, come, child,” said she, “it won’t do for you to stay here another minute.  You’ve done wrong; but I can’t blame you, poor thing!” I told her I could not return without assistance, and she must call my uncle.  Uncle Phillip came, and pity prevented him from scolding me.  He carried me back to my dungeon, laid me tenderly on the bed, gave me some medicine, and asked me if there was any thing more he could do.  Then he went away, and I was left with my own thoughts—­starless as the midnight darkness around me.

My friends feared I should become a cripple for life; and I was so weary of my long imprisonment that, had it not been for the hope of serving my children, I should have been thankful to die; but, for their sakes, I was willing to bear on.

XXV.  Competition In Cunning.

Dr. Flint had not given me up.  Every now and then he would say to my grandmother that I would yet come back, and voluntarily surrender myself; and that when I did, I could be purchased by my relatives, or any one who wished to buy me.  I knew his cunning nature too well not to perceive that this was a trap laid for me; and so all my friends understood it.  I resolved to match my cunning against his cunning.  In order to make him believe that I was in New York, I resolved to write him a letter dated from that place.  I sent for my friend Peter, and asked him if he knew any trustworthy seafaring person, who would carry such a letter to New York, and put it in the post office there.  He said he knew one that he would trust with his own life to the ends of the world.  I reminded him that it was a hazardous thing for him to undertake.  He said he knew it, but he was willing to do any thing to help me.  I expressed a wish for a New York paper, to ascertain the names of some of the streets.  He run his hand into his pocket, and said, “Here is half a one, that was round a cap I bought of a pedler yesterday.”  I told him the letter would be ready the next evening.  He bade me good by, adding, “Keep up your spirits, Linda; brighter days will come by and by.”