"Do you confess?" The question broke through the haze that fogged up his mind. He opened his eyes, blinking slowly at the figure outlined by the sunrise, a bloody red and beautiful sunrise. It could only be that cursed Sheriff, come to pester him again. ***** He didn't believe it. They took Martha. He watched, speechless, as Thomas and Peter escorted her out the hickory doorframe and into the mule-drawn wagon, to take her to the …showed first 75 words of 1069 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1069 total…looked a Sheriff Corwin. He barely had the strength to turn his head. He wanted to laugh in his face, and say that God wouldn't decide his fate, people would, and he felt it more merciful to leave this world than stay with nothing to show for it, but he had no more strength. The weight was finally too much. He didn't feel it, but he heard it. A loud rattling gasp. God was merciful.