She gave a little laugh as she added,
“It will be no hardship as far as I am concerned, for I find it most enjoyable!”
Alida did not answer.
She heard the door of the sitting room close behind Mary, but she lay where she had fallen, feeling as she had felt after one of her uncle’s whippings – humiliated and degraded.
She thought of the General and of his hard cruel face.
‘I will die rather than let him touch me,’ she told herself.
At the same time she knew how afraid she was of being whipped!
Every nerve in her body shrank from the physical agony of the blows, while mentally she despised herself for not showing more fortitude and for screaming when a braver person could have controlled herself in shame.
“Oh, Mama! Mama!” she sobbed. “If only I could have died with you! How can I st
