Read Online A New Dawn Over Devon by Michael Phillips - Free Book Online Page B

added, “close it tight. Good girl . . . be still, not a whisper.”
    She let down the door.
    â€œPapa,” she whimpered through the final crack of disappearing light from the room below as she began to cry. “Papa, I love you.”
    But he did not hear the poignant words. Already he had turned and was making for the street to continue his escape.
    It was too late.
    Before he reached it, the door burst open with a terrible crash, and instantly the small flat was filled with angry voices. In terror Elsbet lay down on the floor, peering through a narrow slit between two ceiling boards. She recognized two or three of her father’s worst companions.
    Terrible yelling and fighting and accusations broke out.
    â€œLet’s have it, Conlin!” shouted one.
    â€œI had nothing to do—!”
    â€œIt’s no use lying. We saw you with him!” A violent curse filled the air.
    The man suddenly cried out in pain from a blow delivered by Sully’s fist cracking his jaw. Two of his companions surged forward. The burly sailor stumbled back, splintering the table on which his daughter had been preparing to set his breakfast, and crashed onto the bed behind it. The two pounced on top of him. One pulled a pistol from his pocket.
    The next instant a great explosion sounded. From where she watched, Elsbet leapt out of her skin at the deafening sound. As the echo from the gunshot faded, none of the men below heard the terrified shriek above them that had accompanied it.
    â€œNow you’ve done it—let’s get out of here!” cried the ringleader through his broken jaw. Footsteps bounded across the floor even as the dying echo of gunfire reverberated off the walls.
    For several long seconds Elsbet waited.
    â€œPapa,” she whimpered at length.
    No sound answered.
    â€œPapa,” she called out again a little louder. Still he did not answer. A terrible coldness, as of an icy hand, gripped the girl’s heart.
    She sat up and raised the door of the loft. With great effort she managed to drag the ladder across the boards, lift one end and maneuver the other through the hole. It took all her strength to lower it to the floor without dropping it. When the bottom was securely on the floor, she climbed down. It did not take long for her to see the horrible truth of what the dreadful sound had been.
    Shock at the horror of the sight silenced her lips. She crept forward and reached out a tentative hand toward the warm pool of blood that drenched her father’s chest.
    She had never seen death before this moment. But she knew from the empty stare of his open eyes that her father was no longer the man she had known, and that her life with him was over.
    The silence of her tongue lasted but a moment. At the touch of the blood upon her hand, suddenly the streets for blocks rang with the despairing shriek of the little orphan.
    The days of innocence for Elsbet Conlin were gone. Though she had never before felt such an emotion toward others of her kind, hatred now rose within her toward the men who had done this evil thing. Through clenched teeth and with a heart of stone, she vowed that she would kill every one of them if ever she had it in her power. She would remember their faces, their voices, and when she was older she would return and find them.
    But she could not tarry long. They might be back. And she could not kill them now. Impulsively she pried apart her father’s fingers and withdrew what they had clutched in the last moment of his life, cast one last tearful look into his face, then stole carefully out the door. Looking to the right and left, she bolted along the street and away from the house that had become a place of death. Behind her the slice of meat slowly curled into smoky blackness on the stove.
    Where she ran she hardly knew; only that she ran until her lungs ached. Still she ran. The streets and the houses of the town grew farther apart. On she ran, not