"What if he returns tonight, looking for the scarf?" Rose asked, the thought searing across her forehead, forming one deep line of worry and anxiety.
"If you hear anyone out there. Rose, come and get me," Cinnamon said.
"Come get us all," Ice added.
I looked toward the window. Something from above dropped a sheet of dim light over the darkness, enough light to silhouette someone standing on the fire escape if someone was actually there. I thought.
"No one will be out there anymore tonight." I said in nearly a whisper. It was really more of a prayer.
Ice walked to the window and stood there a moment.
"What makes it glow out here?" she asked. Cinnamon stepped up beside her.
"Light from a window above. I imagine."
And then, almost as if every word we spoke could be heard, the light went off.
And the world outside the window was dark.
As dark as it would be if a curtain had closed. I heard an audible gasp from Rose's lips.
Or was it coming from my own?
5 The Room Upstairs
I remember a line I once read in a famous short store, calling truth "a hard deer to hunt." If ever sleep was a "hard deer to hunt," it was so this night. I closed my eyes and turned on my side with my back to my bedroom door. but I couldn't help anticipating the sound of it opening, and then seeing either Cinnamon or Ice or Rose herself there to tell me he had returned. At times my eves popped open and I stared at my own window. The darkness played tricks, metamorphosing into someone's silhouette and then turning back to nothing.
Steven had been right about the house itself. It was so well built, sounds familiar to me from my own home back in Ohio were not audible here. Pipes didn't groan, boards didn't creak, shutters didn't tap a beat to the marching wind. At night this house tightened like a fist, not to open again until the first light of morning,
The silence was not welcome, however. It caused me to feel shut up, entombed with my own childhood fears. I heard my own little groans, heard myself breathing. For hours I tossed and turned and fought with my pillows. Every once in a while, I glanced at the illuminated face of my clock and panicked a bit at the hour. I would get no sleep whatsoever, I thought, and tomorrow. I would be a mess and make one mistake after another during my violin lesson.
Once. before I actually did fall asleep -- or, rather, pass out-- I heard what sounded like approaching footsteps in the hallway and lifted my head from the pillow, expecting the door to open. Whoever it was paused, but then turned and descended the stairs. Stillness overtook the echo of those steps, and once again. I was drowning in silence. I let out a breath, closed my eyes, and tried desperately to think only good thoughts, to visualize my beautiful little lake back on the farm. remember Chandler's laughter and smile and all the wonderful things we whispered to each other so I could drift into sleep.
Sleep finally came, but like it would if I had been anesthetized. When sunlight streaked in. it stood at my bedside and waited impatiently for me to acknowledge morning. I knew that was true because when I finally did wake up. it was more than a half hour later than I needed to make my new schedule. After all. I had promised Mr. Bergman I could manage the earlier session. I had even bragged about how easy it was for me to be an early riser. Now what would he think of me?
I literally threw off my covers and leaped off the bed, rushing around to get myself showered and dressed, and did it all in less than half the usual time. I practically flew down the stairs.
There was still no one else at breakfast vet. Except for Mrs. Churchwell, there were no servants around either. Before I was finished eating, however, the girls and Howard began to stream into the dining room. I could see from the sleepy eves on all the girls that I was not the only one who had been in a desperate battle for some rest.
Steven, who looked like a somnambulist himself and who was the last to come to breakfast, was oblivious to how the rest of us looked, but I could see Howard had suspicious eyes. He continually glanced from one of us to another and asked delving questions like. "Anyone hear a lot of moving about in the hallway last night?"
Rose was the most obvious, turning constantly to Cinnamon for the answers. Finally, Howard came right out and asked what we were all up to.
"Who says we're up to anything. Howard?" Cinnamon returned,
"You look like a pack of conniving
conspirators. Roman senators planning the
assassination of Julius Caesar or someone of similar
importance . "
"Maybe you?" Ice said, smiling coolly. "Very funny. What's up. girls? What am I
missing here? The silence speaks volumes." "We stayed up late comparing notes about old
boyfriends," Cinnamon replied. "And decided that