TE17 Mysterious Montenegro

wretched as I am, alone in this world, and then something like this befalls me, through no fault of my own, only because I’m a hungry, forlorn wool spinner, whom some man wanted to ruin because of his shameless desires, and now I’ll come straight back to the story, forgive me for being so agitated, but when I think back to everything, when I remember him at the door with a candle in his hands, he was standing there icily, then he looked mestraightintheeyesandsaidinaresolutevoice,Comedownstairs with me, my beauty, and I went after him, I followed him down the steps, while the candle threwshadows on thewalls, he hurried me along, we came to another door on the first floor, another dark room, which we entered, and the windows were shut there too, of course, I couldn’t see well if there was dirt or dust in there, only that the roomwas smaller than the previous one, with a bed in the corner, and he slammed the door behind him and said to me, Come on, girl, off with your clothes, I asked him, Why? and he said, For a bit of fun, I’m going to have some fun with you, and I swallowed and objected, Sir, I may be poor, but I’m certainly an honorable woman, I haven’t come here for those sorts of things, you can’t force me, that’s what I told him—no, not “told him,” I flung it at his face—and he, until then calm, flew into a rage, his eyes opened wide, hands ready to slap, he looked at me with a terrible hatred, You don’t want to, huh? You think you’re not that typeof woman, that’swhathesaid tome, If youdon’tgetundressed I’ll kill you right here and now, I won’t take any more of your antics, either you obey me or I personally will bury you down in the garden, no one will look for you, no one will shed a tear for you, and then I started to cry, and he went out and banged the door, I had nochoice,whenhe lookedatmewith those frightening eyes I knew he was speaking the truth, that he’d kill me if I didn’t obey, and so, pouring bitter tears, I started to take off my clothes, 106 Aleksandar Bečanović