"You're not going to bury him here?" said Stephen as they reached it.
"Yes, I am. He may have been an honorable man, and he may not. But he
died among us, and among us he will lie."
"Us?"
"Master Purceville, you have a nasty habit of questioning the
inevitable. We are in a place of burial, because a man is dead. I am a
Scot with a pistol, and you are a Brit with a spade. There is the
earth; now dig
. I will ask the questions." Muttering, but having no choice, Stephen
did as he was told.
Michael leaned back wearily against a tree. And shaking off the
melancholy of both the place and the task at hand, he forced his mind
to think. He must unravel the mystery of the man before him.
So speaking with the half-truths and feigned ignorance which had
become habitual with him among strangers, he began.
"The first question is simply put, and simply answered. I expect
nothing less than the truth....." Nothing. "I have heard it said that
Mary is your half-sister. Is that true?"
Bluntly. "Yes."
"You have been less than kind to her.
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