Sunday to receive her answer.

I did not forget my appointment, and her answer was that the abbe being
her tyrant, she would consider herself happy to escape out of his
clutches, but that she could not make up her mind to follow me unless I
consented to marry her. She concluded her letter by saying that, in case
I entertained honest intentions towards her, I had only to speak to her
mother, Jeanne Marchetti, who resided in Lusia, a city thirty miles
distant from Venice.

This letter piqued my curiosity, and I even imagined that she had written
it in concert with the abbe. Thinking that they wanted to dupe me, and
besides, finding the proposal of marriage ridiculous, I determined on
having my revenge. But I wanted to get to the bottom of it, and I made up
my mind to see the girl's mother. She felt honoured by my visit, and
greatly pleased when, after I had shewn her her daughter's letter, I told
her that I wished to marry her, but that I should never think of it as
long as she resided with the abbe.

"That abbe," she said, "is a distant relative. He used to live alone in
his house in Venice, and two years ago he told me that he was in want of
a housekeeper. He asked me to let my daughter go to him in that capacity,
assuring me that in Venice she would have good opportunities of getting
married. He offered to give me a deed in writing stating that, on the day
of her marriage, he would give her all his furniture valued at about one
thousand ducats, and the inheritance of a small estate, bringing one
hundred ducats a year, which lie possesses here. It seemed to me a good
bargain, and, my daughter being pleased with the offer, I accepted. He
gave me the deed duly drawn by a notary, and my daughter went with him. I
know that he makes a regular slave of her, but she chose to go.