Bitter Passage

by Colin Mills

man’s ingenuity and courage determined his fate, of that Robinson was certain. Absolute faith unsettled him. He thought it lazy for a man to submit so utterly to an invisible power, especially one so capricious.

Never have I seen so much of nothing.

“They vanish, they leave us clues, but none that make any sense.” He spread his arms. “There is nowhere to hide, yet they are nowhere to be found.”

He marvelled at the ability of the pious to discern the presence of the divine in the merely peculiar.

The summer colours were leaking from the landscape, each day more a pencil sketch than a watercolour.

He touched the Bible in his pocket. It felt puny and impotent against the enormity of his crime—a weapon so paltry, it could only bounce off the thick hide of his remorse.

Her beauty would go, never to be re-created. That is when I understood—beauty’s temporary nature is what makes it exquisite. We desire it so, for we know it will not last.”

Robinson had told him his faith was a strength. He now suspected it sustained and blinded him in equal measure.