At this unequivocal confirmation of our kinship, I was overcome with an acute sense of vertigo. My knees tottered—my vision swam—and it was only by a violent effort of will that I prevented myself from sinking to the floor in a swoon.

Quickly darting out a hand, my black-clad counterpart seized me by my uninjured arm and led me to the crate upon which she herself had been perched prior to my arrival. “Come, brother,” said she. “Seat yourself here, while we converse. I cannot, I am afraid, offer you much in the way of hospitality—though perhaps there is still enough water in the jug for you to drink.”

“But h-how is it that you are dwelling in this sombre, this dismal place?” I stammered as she passed me the water jug. Grasping it by its handle, I raised it to my parched and trembling lips and greedily quaffed the small, remaining quantity of the revivifying fluid.

“Dismal?” she replied. “No, brother. Desolate, perhaps—but is there not something sublime in such sepulchred ruins? These catacombs—which I discovered while exploring the still-smoldering ashes of the great, fallen house—are well suited to my temperament. And to my purpose. Here, I can dwell in undisturbed solitude, emerging only at night to pursue my retributive mission. A mission that is now nearly complete.”

The tone and content of this utterance—as well as the maniacal expression of its speaker’s countenance—made it sufficiently plain that she was in the grip of a particularly dangerous form of lunacy. My mind raced as I sat there and considered what course of action to pursue. With Crockett to assist me, it would be a simple matter to take the murderous madwoman captive. My goal, then, was to keep her attention diverted until such time as the frontiersman returned from his undertaking. To this end—as well as to satisfy my natural curiosity about my father’s ultimate fate—I inquired:

“And why have you felt it necessary to devote yourself to such a dire and implacable mission? What precisely was the nature of the ‘ruin’ that befell our common progenitor?”

“Too terrible for words!” wailed my maddened half-sibling, clutching at the bosom of her long, sable gown. “Insulted beyond endurance—vilely taunted by those with no ability to appreciate his genius—he, with his new wife at his side, fled this benighted land for London. My poor mother perished while bringing me into the world. He alone raised me—educated me—inspired me with his love of poetry, philosophy, and the arts. By twelve years of age, I could recite the entirety of Lear!”

I smiled thinly. “No doubt. And I assume that you imagined yourself in the rôle of Cordelia!”