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" 'Because the woman disappeared under violent circus and heaved them into the trunk And besides, the old madman had been absent when the affair of the poetry took place, and who kne much he knew? He didn't see the book, or care about it, that's plain enough, and he didn't bother to save the cah he did save five cameos as I'll explain ¡¯

" 'How did Rebecca disappear? What were the violent circumstances?' I pushed

" 'She tried to set fire to this house ¡¯

" 'Ah, of course ¡¯

" 'She did it with the oil lamps ¡¯

"I gasped 'So that's why everybody believed me!' I said 'Jasmine and Lolly and Pops They knew the story of what Rebecca had done in the past ¡¯

"Aunt Queen nodded 'Rebecca set the lamps on the sills of the front rooms She had a blaze started in four places when Ora Lee and Jeroht her in the act, and Jerome struck her and shouted for the farmhands to come in and put out the fire Now you knohat a risk that was for Jerome, a black man, to haul off and slap a white wo to burn down this house

" 'The gossip was that Jerome knocked her unconscious And that she had al before they caught it, and the repairs costing a mint

" 'Now, ier fire was in those times, Quinn We didn't have the pumps on the banks of the swamp in those days, Quinn, we didn't have the water out here froone up But it didn't Blackwood Manor was saved

" 'Of course Jerome kept Rebecca under close watch in the room without candles or lamps until Manfred came back from the swamp

" 'You can i on this responsibility, and Rebecca being locked up there in the dark, calling hi to have hih the door There were lynchings in those days, too They didn't happen hereabouts that I know of, but they happened

" 'The Irish poor were never great lovers of the black man, I can tell you, Quinn, and the threats Rebecca h to scare Jerome and Ora Lee and Pepper and all their folks

" 'But they couldn't let her out, and they wouldn't let her out, so scream and rant in the dark she did

" 'Well finally Manfred cae and the extent of the repairs, when he realized that the house had almost been lost, he ild

" 'He grabbed Rebecca up off the bed where she'd been , and he beat her with his hands and his fists He slapped her back and forth and punched her until Jerome and Ora Lee screamed to make him stop