CHAPTER SEVENPaola opened her eyes.
She thought that she had been praying for so long that she must have dozed off. She was still sitting on the chair beside the table.
The Big Man had left on it the ink that she had used for the letter to the Marchese and also a lantern that had burnt out.
Then Paola realised that there was some light in the room.
She saw what she had not noticed before.
That in the wall at the far end there was an arrow-slit aperture.
It had been dark outside when she had been brought here and it had never struck her for a moment that there was a window or any way of looking out from the enormously thick walls that enclosed her.
Now she saw that there was a faint light coming through the arrow-slit and it was dawn.
It was then, as if someone had struck her a blow
