Waterbury evening Democrat., 1891-09-14
FAITHFUL UNTO DEATH.
The Story of a Servant Girl Who Always
 Kept Her Word.

Say" answered the man, you just wait till call my wife. This business is sort of in her department more'n mine. I'll call her down and you and she can talk the matter over." Then the man stepped out into the hall and shouted: Maria! Maria!''
 Whats the matter now?" answered back woman's voice.
 Say, Maria, you just come down and tell this lady what you know about Julia. She wants to know if Julia is faithful"
 Down came Maria so quickly that it seemed as though she must have slid down the balustrade. But, of course, she hadn't; she was too old for that, sixty years old if she was a day. She jumped into the middle of things, as the old Romans used to say, straight off. Faithful We'll, there isn't no faith fuller house girl in Brooklyn" That is the way that she began.
 And it wasn't her fault that she left | here, neither; I'm bound to say that" continued Maria. Ut was all my fault, | every bit of it, and know you'll say so when you hear the story. But then perhaps you don't care to hear the story | May be you are in an awful hurry to | get home"
 "Oh, no," answered the caller. 'T | should like very much to hear the story. I'm sure that it will interest me-" "All right" said Maria, apparently very much pleased "I'll tell you the whole business It's cat story. I'm 8 cat hater, am. I didn't use to be- but of late years we've had so many of 'em in our back yard that I've been forced to hate 'em and to make war on 'em. I reckon I've killed hundred cats inside of a year; haven't I, Aaron2"
 Well, yes, 1 should think so. Maria, all of that" answered the man. "You're some on cat killing, Maria, they's no use sayin' that you ain't."
 'I've method of my own" continued Maria. "I put the cat in a box and chloroform him to death, and then l throw his carcass in the ash barrel. I sent out all of a half barrel of cats one morning. It scared the ashman so that he almost tainted.
 Well, here the other day I caught a | big yellow fellow that had been howl ing and yawling about in my back yard | for over a year. He was a monster cat and he had a voice on him like a steam cats. The minute caught him I yelled for Julia to come out and help me put him into the box. We had to work, I tell you, but finally we did it. Then I put the big soapstone on top of the box that I generally use to hold it down. But, Lordy mercy! the stone didn't amount to anything. never saw a cat thrash round so in all my life.
 "Look here, Julia,' said I, you'll ! have to sit on the box till can give him little chloroform to quiet him..
 "'Al right, ma'am,' said Julia and down she sat.
 II ran into the house for the chloro- 'orm and do you know couldn't find irop? It was all gone. So I stepped 70 the window and called out: Julia, you will have to sit there awhile till can go to the druggists and get some chloroform.
 All right, a'am,' said Julia.
 Promise me, Julia,' said I, that YOU won't get off the box till come back
 |" "'You know very well,' Julia an swered, in a sort of a grieved way, that I won't get off the box till you come back, When I say I'll not do a thing, l generally doesn't do it.
 'I didn't stop to say any more, but put on my bonnet and shawl and started for the druggists. I hadn't gone four feet from the house when I met Miss Bartlett an old friend of mine, and perhaps you won't believe it, but it's a fact just the same, forgot what I was out on the street for, entirely forgot it. | I always was an a5sent-minded creature, wasn't I, Aaron?"
 "Yes, Maria, you always was little given that way"
 Miss Bartlett told me-" resumed Maria, 'that she was going up town shopping, and asked me to go along with her, and I went. Then asked her to take lunch with me in restaurant, and she accepted the invitation. We had a real nice lu1ch-chicken soup, lobster salad, ice cream and coffee.
 Won't you have something more, , I asked Miss Bartlett.
 Oh, no,' she said, I couldn't
 "So I called for the check, and wher the man gave it to me put my hand in to my pocket for my purse. The first thing I touched was the chloroform bottle. Then I thought of Julia at } home sitting on the cat box. I knew that she hadn't stirred, for she had promised that she would stick till ] | SnOulu get Dack. Ana nad actually been gone four hours!
 'Of course I hurried home. When got there I was forced to ring the door
 bell, for had left my key in the house
 But, though l rang a dozen times, no
 body came. All at once it occurred tc
 me that Julia couldn't sit on the cal
 box and answer the bell call too, anC f then decided to go into neighbor': ~ 1 yard and climb the fence between hi.
 yard and our back ard, and l did it. e tore my petticoat awfully, though, be Is fore l got through with the operation d "I had to turn a corner of the house l. before I could reach the place where l. had left Julia, but that was quickly o done, and then I stood in her presence She gave me a look that made me tur1 !; cold all over, but she said nothing unti the cat had been killed and deposited il