The Count of Monte Cristo

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"I, your excellency?"

"Yes; you. How comes it, that having both a sister and an adopted son,
you have never spoken to me of either?"

"Alas, I have still to recount the most distressing period of my life.
Anxious as you may suppose I was to behold and comfort my dear sister,
I lost no time in hastening to Corsica, but when I arrived at Rogliano I
found a house of mourning, the consequences of a scene so horrible that
the neighbors remember and speak of it to this day. Acting by my advice,
my poor sister had refused to comply with the unreasonable demands of
Benedetto, who was continually tormenting her for money, as long as he
believed there was a sou left in her possession. One morning that he had
demanded money, threatening her with the severest consequences if she
did not supply him with what he desired, he disappeared and remained
away all day, leaving the kind-hearted Assunta, who loved him as if he
were her own child, to weep over his conduct and bewail his absence.