The Gate House   ::   Demille Nelson

Well, I could see where this was going – Ethel was playing Cupid at the end, just as she’d done when I’d visited her. Why, I wondered, did she care about Susan and me getting together again? Well, she liked Susan, and I was sure they’d bonded again since Susan had returned, and Ethel knew that Susan wanted to reunite with me. So, Ethel, with not much else to do while waiting for the end, had gotten it into her head to make a final pitch on Susan’s behalf.

I put the letter aside for later. Okay, Ethel. But you forgot about William Stanhope. Actually, she hadn’t, which was why she’d mentioned him. Also, Ethel never liked William, and this was her chance to… what?

I picked up the letter again and continued reading:

What I am about to write is very difficult for me to put into words. Therefore, let me be direct. William Stanhope is a man who has shown himself to be morally corrupt, depraved, and sinful.

Whoa. I sat down and turned to the next page.

His shameless and dissolute behavior began when he was a college student, and continued throughout his military service, and beyond, and did not cease even after his marriage. I have difficulty, even now, so many years later, allowing my mind to return to that time. I do not wish to be explicit in my descriptions of his behavior, but I will tell you that he forced himself on the youngest and most innocent of the female staff at Stanhope Hall-

I stopped reading and drew a deep breath. My God. I reread the last line, then continued:

He fancied the foreign born girls, those being the most unlikely to resist him. Before and during the war, it was the Irish girls who fell prey to him, and one of them, Bridget Behan by name, attempted to take her own life after he had his way with her. And after the war, there were a number of displaced persons, mostly German and Polish girls who could hardly speak English, and who were terrified of being deported, and this caused them to bend to his will. One of these girls, a Polish girl of no more than sixteen, whose name I am sorry I cannot recall, became pregnant by him, and he had her returned to her country.

I cannot tell you here all that happened during those years, but I can tell you that his disgraceful behavior continued, unabated, until he and Mrs. Stanhope departed for Hilton Head.

And now, Mr.