Thank you in advance.
All the people in that castle town by the sea must have been in mortal fear, hearing the rumbling of those cannons. But I, not knowing what it was and half mad with concern for my sister, believed I was hearing the drums of the netherworld and sat there in the meadow for a long time, crying, afraid even to look up. Not till evening began to fall did I finally stand and walk, in a deathlike trance, back to the temple.
My sister called to me when I got home. She was by now terribly thin and weak, and she seemed to be becoming vaguely aware that she didn’t have long to live. She no longer asked me to cater to her whims, to mother and spoil her, and that was only making it all the more painful for me.
“When did this letter come?” she said.
The question gave me such a start, so pierced my soul, which I felt the blood drain from my face.
“When did it come?” she asked again, all innocence.
I pulled myself together and said, “Just a while ago. While you were sleeping. You were smiling in your sleep, I put it there by your pillow. You didn’t notice, did you?”
“No, I didn’t.” Darkness was falling and her smile was pale and beautiful in the dim light of the room. “I read the letter, though. It’s odd. I don’t know this person.”
Oh, you don’t don’t you? I thought.
I knew who the sender was – a man named “M.T.” Oh, I knew who he was, all right. No, I’d never met him, but five or six days before this I’d been arranging the things in my sister’s wardrobe when I came across a bundle of letters tied with a green ribbon and hidden in the bottom of one of the drawers. It wasn’t the right thing to do, I suppose, but I untied the ribbon and looked at the letters. There were about thirty of them, and they were all from Mr. M.T. Mind you, his name wasn’t written on the envelopes, but the letters were signed by him.
On the envelopes were the names of various girls, all of whom were actual friends of my sister’s. Father and I never dreamed that she was carrying on sure voluminous correspondence with a man.
Thank you for your recording, Pasokon!