Chapter 14. Too frightened to scream, Hannah felt the warm creature slide over her leg

T oo frightened to scream, Hannah felt the warm creature slide over her leg. She forced herself not to move. Not to breathe.

It curled itself around her ankle. Then she felt it uncoil.

“Ohhh.” She uttered a low, terrified moan and leapt from the bed.

In the flickering light from the dying fire she tossed back the bedclothes and searched the shadows of her bed.

She heard a hiss, then saw the flash of dark eyes.

“A snake!” she cried in a tiny, frightened voice.

Rising up on the wrinkled sheet, the snake arched its head and bared its pointed fangs, preparing to attack.

Hannah stood frozen in terror. “How did a snake get into my bed?” Hannah asked aloud. “How?”

Then, with a short cry, Hannah sprang into action and threw the covers over the hissing creature. And started to scream for help.

Hannah’s brothers were blamed for the prank. They had been riding in the woods. They must have captured the snake and hidden it in Hannah’s bed.

They all denied it. But Simon ignored their protests and punished them. He had little patience for jokes and pranks. “They do not lead anyone closer to success,” he warned sternly.

The next evening Hannah was in her room dressing for dinner. Having pulled on a simple white linen frock, high-collared with a delicate red velvet ribbon at the throat, she brushed her long blond hair and tied it back with a matching red ribbon.

She heard a scrabbling at the door and turned to see Fluff, her tiny white terrier, prance into the room, a red ball clamped in his teeth.

“Not now. No ball playing,” Hannah told the dog. “You will make me late for dinner, Fluff.” She gave the disappointed dog a gentle shove toward the door.

Then she pulled open her wardrobe door to search for her white shoes. “Where are they?” she said, bending to search the bottom shelf.

Lucy had straightened Hannah’s room that afternoon. She must have moved the shoes, Hannah thought.

She finally found them on the floor at the foot of her bed.

Holding on to the bedpost, Hannah balanced on her left foot and slid her right foot into the low pump.

“Ohhh!” she cried out as a sharp pain shot up her leg.

Looking down, Hannah was horrified to see bright red blood trickling over the white heel of the shoe.

As the sharp pain shot up from her foot, Hannah dropped to her knees on the bedroom floor and pulled off the shoe. Blood had already stained the inside of the shoe.

Hannah bent to examine her foot. Wiping away the bright trickling blood with her fingers, she found a deep cut nearly an inch long on her heel.

Stuck in the cut was a shard of clear glass.

“Oh!” Grimacing with pain, Hannah pulled the piece of glass from the cut with trembling fingers.

The blood flowed more rapidly from the open cut. Balancing on one leg, Hannah screamed for help.

Mrs. MacKenzie appeared a few seconds later. She guided Hannah to the bed. Hannah hopped on one foot, leaving a trail of blood. Then the housekeeper hurried out for gauze bandages.

“Hannah, what has happened?” Julia entered the room breathlessly, a frightened expression on her face. Seeing the trail of blood across the floor, Julia gasped.

“I’m all right, I believe,” Hannah told her, watching the blood flow from her heel. “I—I cut my foot.”

“How?” Julia demanded, stepping over the blood-covered shoe to get to Hannah’s bedside.

Hannah held up the piece of glass that she had kept tightly gripped in her hand. “It was in my shoe,” she said, grimacing from a shot of pain that traveled up her leg.

“How dreadful!” Julia declared, staring at all the blood.

“Lucy cleaned my room today,” Hannah added darkly. “I believe you may be right about her, Julia. She—” Hannah stopped as Mrs. MacKenzie returned with the gauze bandages.

Julia watched as the housekeeper expertly cleaned and then bandaged Hannah’s injured foot. “The bleeding will stop soon,” Mrs. MacKenzie assured Hannah, patting her shoulder as if she were still a little girl. “You will be able to come down to dinner in a few minutes. But I would not advise any long hikes for a few days, Miss Hannah.”

Hannah thanked Mrs. MacKenzie. As soon as the housekeeper had left the room, Hannah turned back to Julia. “Lucy cleaned my room and moved my shoes. I believe you were right about her. She deliberately—”

Julia raised a hand to stop her sister’s accusation. “Are you really sure that Lucy put the glass in your shoe?”

“Who else could have done it?” Hannah demanded impatiently, staring down fretfully at the bandaged foot. “We must tell Father at once. That girl must go. She must be dismissed today. She is a menace! Ow!” She cried out, feeling another stab of pain.

Julia lowered herself to the bed beside her sister and put a comforting arm around Hannah. “Try to calm yourself, sister,” she said in a whisper. “We do not want to accuse Lucy if she is innocent.”

“Innocent?” Hannah cried shrilly.

“We have no proof,” Julia said, playing with Hannah’s blond hair, soothingly braiding and unbraiding it as she had done when they were younger. “We do not know that Lucy put the glass in the shoe.”

“No one else was in my room!” Hannah exclaimed.

“But the glass may have fallen from Lucy’s dustpan,” Julia said. “It may have been an accident, a bit of carelessness.”

“But, Julia—”

“I have my own suspicions about Lucy, as you know,” Julia continued, ignoring her sister’s protest. “But I do not think we should accuse her in front of Father until we have proof.”

Hannah stared hard at her sister. Father is right about Julia, she thought with some sadness. Julia is too timid. She has no backbone. She is reluctant to stand up even to a servant girl.

But Hannah decided to back down. “Very well,” she said softly. “I will give Lucy one more chance.”

“Can you walk down to dinner, or will you need help?” Julia asked, getting to her feet.

“I can walk,” Hannah replied softly. “Go ahead. You know Father hates to be kept waiting for his dinner.”

“Mother has actually left her room and is joining us tonight,” Julia announced.

“How nice!” Hannah declared. “I shall be right down. Give me a few moments to brush my hair and straighten my dress.”

As soon as Julia had left the room, Hannah gingerly climbed to her feet. She found that if she stepped lightly on her cut foot, standing nearly on tiptoes, she could walk with little pain.

Putting most of her weight on the uninjured foot, she made her way across the room to her small dresser mirror and began to brush her hair.

She had finished and set down the brush when she felt another presence in the room—someone to the side of her, staring at her.

Hannah spun around quickly and cried out in surprise.

Lucy was standing in the room, her cheeks bright red, a frightening wild-eyed expression on her face.

As Hannah shrank back against the dresser, Lucy darted forward quickly to attack her.

Дата добавления: 2015-07-20