AC dBooks

If she did not meet him at a certain hour on a
certain night my father would be dead in the morning."
The Reverend Mother paused again. The boy's voice had ceased; the
daylight was dying out.
"My sister could not bring herself to sacrifice either her father or
her lover. Hence she saw only one way left--to sacrifice herself."
"Herself?"
The Reverend Mother patted my hand. "Isn't that what women in tragic
circumstances are always doing?" she said.
"By some excuse--I don't know what--she persuaded our father to change
rooms with her that night--he going upstairs to her bedroom in the
tower, and she to his on the ground floor at the back, opening on to the
garden and the pine forest that goes up the hill.
"What happened after that nobody ever knew exactly. In the middle of the
night the servants heard two pistol shots, and next morning my sister
was found dead--shot to the heart through an open window as she lay in
my father's bed.
"The authorities tried in vain to trace the criminal. Only one person
had any idea of his identity.


Pages:
154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178