Darkest Hour (Cutler 5)

His words effectively choked off my sobs, even though I couldn't stop my body from shaking. He gave Mamma the pills I was to take and then left. She followed him out, still seeking reassurance that what was wrong with me was not very serious. I heard them mumbling in the hall and then I heard Doctor Cory's footsteps die away. I closed my eyes, the tears behind my lids burning. Mamma returned with the medicine. After I took it, I fell back against the pillow and slept.

I slept for a long time because when I woke up, I saw it was very dark outside. Mamma had left a small kerosene lamp lit in my room and assigned one of the chambermaids, Tottie, to sit and watch me, except she had fallen asleep herself in the chair. I felt a little better, the chills now gone, although my throat felt as dry as hay. I moaned and Tottie's eyes snapped open,

"Oh, yer up, Miss Lillian? How do ya feel?"

"I want something, to drink, please, Tottie," I said.

"Right away. I'll go tell Mrs. Booth," she said and hurried off. Almost immediately afterward, Mamma came charging through the door. She turned up the light and put her hand on my forehead.

"It feels better," she declared, and released a long-held breath of concern.

"I'm very thirsty, Mamma:"

"Louella's on her way with some sweet tea and some toast and jam, darling," she said and sat down on my bed.

"Mamma, I hate not going to school tomorrow. It's not fair."

"I know, honey, but you can't go if you're sick, can you? You'll only get sicker."

I closed and opened my eyes as Mamma tried to make my bed more comfortable and pounded the pillows. When Louella arrived with my tray, they fixed it so I could sit up. Mamma remained seated beside me as I sipped my tea and nibbled on my toast.

"Mamma," I said, now remembering what it was that made me feel so terrible, "what did Emily mean when she said I wasn't her sister? What were you going to tell me?"

Mamma sighed deeply as she always did whenever I asked her too many questions. Then she shook her head and fanned herself with the lace handkerchief she kept in the right sleeve of her dress.

"Emily did a very bad thing, a very bad thing when she said those things to you. The Captain's furious with her too and we've sent her to her room for the night," Mamma said, but I didn't think that was much of a punishment for Emily. She liked being in her room more than she liked sitting with the family.

"Why was it a bad thing, Mamma?" I asked, still very confused.

"It was bad because Emily should know better. She's older than you are and was old enough at the time to know what had happened. Back then, the Captain sat her down and impressed upon her how important it was that you not be told until you were old enough to understand. Even though Emily was only a little younger at the time than you are now, we knew she understood the importance of keeping something secret."

"What's the secret?" I asked in a whisper, never more intrigued with anything Mamma had told me. Henry was always saying that houses and families in the South had closets full of secrets. "You could open a closet door kept closed for years and have skeletons fall out over you." I didn't know exactly what he meant, but for me there was nothing more delicious than a mystery or a ghost story.

Reluctantly, her hands on her lap, her beautiful soft blue eyes filled with pain, Mamma took a deep breath and began.

"As you know, I had a younger sister Violet. She was very pretty and very delicate . . . as delicate as a violet. All she had to do was stand in the afternoon sun for a few minutes and her cherry-blossom-white skin would turn crimson. She had your blue-gray eyes and your button nose. In fact, her features were only slightly larger than Eugenia's. My papa used to call her his little pickaninny, but my mamma hated it when he said that.

"Anyway, when she was a little more than sixteen, a very handsome young man, the son of one of our closest neighbors, began to court her. His name was. Aaron and everyone said he worshipped the ground Violet tread upon, and she was very fond of him. People thought it was a dream romance, the kind of love affair they read about in story books, as sweet and as fascinating as Romeo and Juliet, but unfortunately, just as tragic.

"Aaron asked my papa for permission to marry Violet, but my papa was very possessive when it came to his favorite. He kept promising to think seriously on it, but he put off a decision for as long as he could.

"Now," Mamma said sadly, sighing and dabbing at her eyes with her lace handkerchief, "when I think about what happened, it was as if Papa knew the future and wanted to protect Violet from unhappiness and catastrophe as long as he could. But," Mamma added, "it was even more difficult for a young woman to do anything but marry back then. This was to be Violet's destiny, just as it was mine . . . to be courted and promised to a man of good stature, a man of property and respect.

"And so Papa finally relented and Violet and Aaron were married. It was a beautiful wedding. Violet looked like a child bride, looked no more than twelve in her wedding dress. Everyone remarked about it.

"Shortly afterward, she became pregnant." Mamma laughed. "I remember that even after five months, she hardly showed." Mamma's smile evaporated. "But while she was in her sixth month, a great calamity befell her. Her young husband Aaron was thrown from his horse during a rainstorm and hit his head on a rock. He died instantly," Mamma said, her voice cracking. She swallowed before continuing.

"Violet was devastated. She wilted quickly, like a flower without sunlight, for her love was her sunlight; it was what brightened her world and filled it with promise. By this time, our papa had passed away, too, so she felt very alone. It was painful to see her dwindle in little ways: her beautiful hair grew drab and dull, her eyes were always dark, her complexion became more and more pallid and sickly and she stopped caring about what she wore.

"Women who become pregnant," Mamma said, "usually look the healthiest they ever look. If the pregnancy goes well, it's as if the baby inside is enriching their bodies. Do you understand, Lillian?"

I nodded although I didn't really understand. Most of the pregnant women I had seen all looked big and awkward, groaning when they sat

down, groaning when they stood up and always holding their stomachs as if the baby would fall out any moment. Mamma smiled and stroked my hair.

"Anyway, weakened by tragedy, weighed down by sadness, poor Violet didn't grow stronger and healthier. She carried her pregnancy as a burden now and spent long hours of each day mourning her lost love.

"The baby, feeling the sorrow throughout her body, decided to be born sooner than she was supposed to be born. One night, Violet was taken with great pain and the doctor was rushed to her bedside. The struggle to give birth was seemingly endless. It went on all through the night and into the morning. I was there at her side, holding her hand, wiping her forehead, comforting her as best I could, but the effort was too much.