Page:Weird Tales Volume 5 Number 6 (1925-06).djvu/86

Rh A cord attached to Lavinia’s single piece of raiment was drawn. With a swish, the wrapper left the girl. It was an awful moment. The charm of her body was exposed to prove to the people that she was sound and beautiful.

The frightful sight of her nudity stunned the spectators. Women screamed and covered their faces with their aprons. Men turned away. A wild cry went up to heaven. The nobility stood up in a body. Daramkoff swore shamefully. Before he could remonstrate, before his agonized cry, “Away, away with her!” had left his mouth, the sacrifice was completed.

His words came too late. By some misapprehension, the rostrum was prematurely destroyed. It crashed into the excavation ready for it and the suspended giant buckets suddenly precipitated tons of earth upon the body of beautiful Lavinia, smothering her last and only cry. Some said it was a prayer for mercy. Some said it was a burning curse.

Simeon hid himself. His foresight had selected a place several days previous.

The amazed multitude dispersed in fearful awe. They blessed themselves repeatedly. The women affirmed their suspicions. Like fire spread the gossip, “Truly she was a witch.”

In the brief time of exposition the populace well saw Lavinia’s body. The skin was that of a leopard’s. Ugly, irregular black spots disfigured the whiteness of her body. And the naive peasants called it witchcraft. The physician in attendance, a guest of the count, later explained to Daramkoff: “The woman was suffering a condition known as melanosis, in which the skin becomes abnormally crowded with dark pigmentation. In some cases the entire body is covered with this hideous discoloration. Save for the spot below her ear, Lavinia was fortunate to be able to keep her condition a secret, except, of course, from the man who married her.”