I struck a match and looked at her again. Her face was blotchy with makeup, smeared with dirt and death. She seemed vaguely familiar and yet not. She lay as if asleep in the blanket. Not strangled, I decided.
Strangulation leaves the eyes popping and the tongue protruding.
I'd seen our stable boy after he hanged himself in the barn when he was fourteen. What Whit and I'd both thought to be a red cord was the slash across her throat. She'd bled to death, her blood mingling with the rain and filling the courtyard where the dip in the cement formed a valley. Before long, Max and Mary appeared, then Rae with Merrill and Emma, and Edward Hall. Edward has such a quick mind.