come back this way, shall we? I can carry it quite well. Gentlemen don't
like carrying things.'

"I feared lest the tone the conversation had assumed, might lead me away
from the resolution I had formed while kneeling in the lane. So, as
usual with me, I rushed blindly on the performance.

"'Miss Lizzie, I am a hypocritical and unhappy wretch.'

"She looked up at me with a face full of compassionate sympathy. I could
have lost myself in that gaze. But I would not be turned from my
purpose, of which she had no design, though her look had almost the
power; and, the floodgates of speech once opened, out it came, the whole
confession I have made to you, in what form or manner, I found, the very
first time I looked back upon the relation, that I had quite forgotten.

"All the time, the sun was sending ever so many sloping ladders of light
down through the trees, for there was a little mist rising that
afternoon; and I felt as if they were the same kind of ladder that Jacob
saw, inviting a man to climb up to the light and peace of God. I felt as
if upon them invisible angels were going up and down all through the
summer wood, and that the angels must love our woods as we love their
skies. And amidst the trees and the ladders of ether, we walked, and I
talked, and Lizzie listened to all I had to say, without uttering a
syllable till I had finished.

"At length, having disclosed my whole bondage and grief, I ended with
the question:

"'Now, what is to be done?'