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Book, page 31 / 145 "And then out came the whole truth. As soon as I had left, she set about finding a situation, for she was very clever with her needle and scissors. Her mother could easily do without her, as her elder sister was at home; and her absence would relieve their scanty means. She had been more fortunate than she could have hoped, and had found a good situation with a dressmaker in Bond Street. Her salary was not large, but it was likely to increase, and she had nothing to pay for food or lodging; while, like myself, she was well provided with clothes, and had, besides, facilities for procuring more. And to make a long story as short as now may be, there she remained in her situation as long as I remained in mine; and every quarter she brought me all she could spare of her salary for the Jew to gorge upon." "And you took it?" I said, rather inadvertently. "Took it! Yes. I took it--thankfully as I would the blessing of heaven. To have refused it would have argued me unworthy of _her_. We understood each other too well for anything else. She shortened my purgatory by a whole year--my Lizzie! It is over now; but none of it will be over to all eternity. She made a man of me." A pause followed, as was natural, and neither spoke for some moments. The ends of our cigars had been thrown away long ago, but I did not think of offering another. At length I said, for the sake of saying something: "And you met pretty often, I daresay?" "Every Sunday at church." "Of all places, the place where you ought to have met." "It was. We met in a quiet old city church, where there was nothing to attract us but the loneliness, the service, and the bones of Milton." "And when you had achieved your end--" "It was but a means to an end. I went at once to a certain bishop; told him the whole story, not in quite such a lengthy shape as I have told it
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