Page 109 of The Sinner and the Gunslinger
One by one, everyone gives me a guilty look. They all think it’s my cooking. Zeke is the only other one who realizes something is wrong. Alarm enters his eyes as he whispers, “Leila’s baking always tastes good.”
I glance around the room and study the nuns closely as they eat. They’re all playing with their food, shifting vegetables and meat around, filling and draining spoons. But not eating.
“Shit. Oh shit.”
I run to the Rev’s table, where her soup is untouched. I lift it to my lips and drink.Cardboard. I bite a carrot from Sister Agnes’s plate but spit it out.Ash. When I finally face our table, all Sinners and Saints have risen to their feet, a grim look in their eyes.
One word comes out of my mouth: “Famine.”
Epilogue
Ahomeless woman huddles in a desolate alleyway, her gaunt frame barely clinging to life. Her lips are cracked, and her stomach is in knots. But she is out of energy to shout warnings.
“Hungry,” she begs. “So hungry.”
No one stops to feed her. No one cares. Food rots in the street.
Hastily scrawled words on the long-forgotten signboard at her feet read:When the soul starves, it is because evil feeds.
