Chapter 25. “Quick—someone’s coming!” Nora whispered

“Q uick—someone’s coming!” Nora whispered. She grabbed Daniel’s arm and pulled him off the road into the trees.

Daniel laughed. “It’s just a rabbit. Look.” He pointed to the large brown rabbit that scampered over the carpet of dry leaves at the edge of the woods.

Nora laughed and pressed her forehead against the sleeve of Daniel’s jacket.

I love her laugh, he decided.

I love everything about her.

As they walked hand in hand toward the river, Daniel found it hard to believe they had met just five days earlier. He had never felt this way about anyone.

Each afternoon he had waited around the corner from her father’s store for her to finish work. Then, trying to make it appear that they weren’t walking together, they would make their way up the broad Park Drive to the Conononka River, which flowed through the woods north of the village.

There they would sit side by side and hold hands under a shady tree. As the sun lowered itself behind the cliffs across the river, they talked quietly, getting to know each other, discussing whatever popped into their heads.

Daniel had explained to Nora that he was visiting his grandparents. But he still hadn’t worked up the courage to tell her that his grandparents were Simon and Angelica Fear.

“Do your grandparents not wonder where you go every afternoon?” Nora asked. Her dark hair shimmered in the patches of sunlight that filtered down through the tree leaves.

“My grandparents show little desire for my company,” Daniel told her. “Most days they do not come out of their rooms. When I do see them, they ask me little. In fact, they hardly speak to me at all.”

“How strange,” Nora murmured thoughtfully.

“My grandmother lives in a world of her own,” Daniel said sadly. “I am not sure she even knows I am her grandson. And my grandfather … he spends his days in his wheelchair by the fire, muttering dreamily to himself.”

“You must be lonely,” Nora remarked, squeezing his hand.

“Not when I see you,” Daniel replied boldly.

She smiled at him, her green eyes catching the light of the lowering sun. He realized that Nora must be lonely, too.

Her mother had died in childbirth. Nora was an only child. She spent her days working in her father’s general store. She spent her evenings cooking and caring for her father. They lived in rooms above the store.

“My dream is to move away some day,” she had revealed to Daniel. “To a town with wide, paved streets and buildings as tall as the trees, a town filled with people I don’t know.”

As the red sun flattened against the dark cliffs above them, Daniel worked up his nerve, leaned forward, and kissed Nora.

He expected her to resist. But when she returned the kiss with enthusiasm, he realized that perhaps she was as in love with him as he was with her.

I have to reveal to her that I am a Fear, he thought, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her again. But will she react with horror? Does she believe the frightening stories about my family? When she learns I am a Fear, will it drive her away?

The thought made him shudder. Daniel knew he couldn’t bear to lose Nora.

As they walked holding hands back to her father’s store, Daniel decided he had to learn the truth. Before he revealed his identity to Nora, he had to find out if there really was a curse on his family, if the terrifying tales the villagers told about the Fears were true.

Once I know they are not true, once I know they are all silly fairy tales, then I will be able to tell Nora that I am a Fear with a clear heart, he decided.

He said good night at the edge of town, reluctant to let go of her soft, warm hand. Her eyes glowed happily as she whispered good night. Then she turned and ran to the store, her silky dark hair trailing gently behind her.

Her heart fluttering, the taste of Daniel’s lips still on hers, Nora brushed through the dark store, humming to herself. Thinking happily about Daniel, she started up the narrow stairs that led to the rooms she shared with her father.

Nora gasped, startled to find her father waiting for her at the top of the stairs, an angry expression on his face.

James Goode, Nora’s father, was a short, wiry man with shiny slicked-down black hair and a black pencil mustache beneath his long, pointed nose. He was normally quiet and good-tempered. But when his anger got the better of him, he would explode with rage and lose control so that he frightened Nora.

Now she hesitated halfway up the stairs, staring up at his angry frown, his blazing eyes.

“Where have you been?” he demanded, struggling to keep his voice low and steady.

“Just out for a walk,” Nora told him blankly.

He glared at her, his face set in an angry scowl. He motioned for her to come the rest of the way up the stairs. Then he followed her into the small sitting room.

“Just out for a walk with whom?” he demanded, crossing his thin arms over the chest of his undershirt.

“With a friend,” Nora replied uncomfortably.

“He is no friend,” James Goode said through clenched teeth. “The boy you have been sneaking out with is no friend at all—he is a Fear!”

Nora gasped. She dropped down onto the straight-backed wooden chair by the fireplace. “He never told me, Father.”

“Of course he didn’t!” Mr. Goode snapped. “He knew that no decent girl would be seen walking with a Fear in this town!”

“But, Papa—” Nora’s mind whirled in confusion. Why hadn’t Daniel been honest with her? Was he afraid?

“Papa, Daniel is wonderful,” she said finally. “He is kind and gentle. He is intelligent and considerate and—”

“He is a Fear,” her father interrupted with a scowl. He stood over Nora, his hands tensed awkwardly at his sides. “I will not have you seeing a Fear. You know the history of that cursed family. Everyone in Shadyside knows.”

“I don’t care about that!” Nora cried, “They are just wild stories.”

“Wild stories?” James Goode exclaimed. “Wild stories? Why, Simon Fear’s own daughters were murdered when they were about your age. Murdered!”

“Papa, that was so long ago!” Nora cried. “No one knows what really happened—”

“The two girls were found in the woods with their bones removed!” James cried. “They found only their skins. Their bones were gone! Gone!”

“You know that’s just an old story,” Nora screamed. “No one but silly children believes that, Father!”

“Maybe not, but Simon’s wife, Angelica, she is mad, Nora. She practices evil magic. People have disappeared in the woods behind the Fear mansion. They were Angelica’s human sacrifices. They—”

“Papa, stop! These are all wild tales! Gossip and rumors! You cannot believe such insane stories!”

James groaned in exasperation, running both hands back through his slicked-down hair, scowling at his daughter. “I do believe them,” he said, his voice trembling. “I believe them all. This is why I cannot allow you to see that Fear boy again, Nora.”

“No!” Nora shrieked, jumping to her feet, her eyes wild. “I love Daniel, Father! I love him! You cannot forbid me to see him!”

“Nora, listen to me,” James insisted, his pencil mustache twitching in anger, his slender face reddening. “Listen to me! For your own good, you cannot see him again! I forbid it!”

“No!” Nora shrieked, her anger matching her father’s. “No! No! No!”

James Goode’s eyes narrowed angrily. His words came out slowly, deliberately, through clenched teeth: “Then, Nora, you have given me no choice….”

Дата добавления: 2015-07-20