A clear and cold starry night Painting

Francine Slabbert was forced (sold) to take and marry a man many years her senior. He was heartless and beat her when she wouldn't submit to his demands – especially when he was drunk, which was practically every day. Finally, one bitterly cold night in July, bruised and bleeding, Francine decided to escape into the night – away from her pitiful existence. It was a decision made in desperation and as the man lay drunk and blathering on the bed, she opened the window and began to climb out of it. At that moment, in a haze of something resembling clarity, the man surfaced from his stupor and realised Francine was running away. He lurched forward and reached out, just in time to grab the trailing end of her nightgown and tore it from her body. With her nightgown clenched in his fist, he fell back on the bed and his eyes closed. In the time that the man dozed, Francine untied her sorrel 'Copper' and led him out of the stable. The icy night air cut into her naked body like scalpels made of glass, but the cold was of no importance to her, escape was all she focused on. She mounted Copper and softly walked him past the house. The man slowly awoke and trapped in his memory, he saw her disappear through the open window. He hurriedly clambered off the bed, stumbled towards the gun rack and grabbed the .303. Whatever happened, she had to be stopped. When Francine had passed the house and felt safe enough to let Copper fly she urged him onwards into the night. The man heard the horse, the sound of hooves and roared in a fit of uncontrollable fury. On legs that wouldn't heed his intentions, he careened towards the front door and threw it open. He heard and caught a fleeting glimpse of the horse galloping away and stumbled along the stoep for a better view of the road and the possibility of bringing his errant wife down with his rifle. With his eyes glued on where expected his target to appear, he failed to see the end of the stoep and suddenly had air beneath his feet, The rifle hit the ground before his body and the sound of a shot tore through the cold night air echoing as it flew away into the distance. The man was dead before he knew he had been shot. Francine heard the shot and urged Copper to run even faster. After a few minutes when no further shots were fired she slowed him down to a walk. The night was clear as crystal and the shimmering blanket of stars felt so close Francine felt she could reach out and touch them. As she rode, she looked up. Occasionally an errant star would escape from the galaxy and slip away towards the horizon but, Francine looked at the stars because Copper was taking her there and with every step the horse took she was getting nearer to the end of her journey. When Francine finally looked away from the stars, it was when she started to slip off Copper's back. She fell very slowly and briefly saw the twinkling lights of Bethlehem, the nearest town to where she lived, and then she crumpled like thin tissue paper as she fell onto the ground and didn't move. Rudy Taljaard first saw the horse in the distance. As he got nearer he saw the body. He took a tarpaulin out of his bakkie and covered her. Then he drove to the farm where she had come from and found the man. In death he was still at war; his face ashen and frozen twisted in rage. He went into the house found the telephone and called the police. It was 07:52, Sunday, 14 July 1915.