Judge Starkins has decided that your manumission is unlawful; your marriage a bad precedent, and inimical to the welfare of society; and that you and your children are remanded to slavery." Marie stood as one petrified.

She seemed a statue of fear and despair.
She tried to speak, reached out her hand as if she were groping in the dark, turned pale as death as if all the blood in her veins had receded to her heart, and, with one heart-rending cry of bitter agony, she fell senseless to the floor.

Her servants, to whom she had been so kind in her days of prosperity, bent pityingly over her, chafed her cold hands, and did what they could to restore her to consciousness.

For awhile she was stricken with brain fever, and her life seemed trembling on its frailest cord.
Gracie was like one perfectly dazed.

When not watching by her mother's bedside she wandered aimlessly about the house, growing thinner day by day.