HEARTTHROB Read Online Free PDF Page B

comfortable
allowing her to complete her mission by herself. Unknown to her he
had followed. And now it was his sword, which flashed and took from
the Rajah's shoulders in one sweep the horrible monster-head. It
rolled to a high lacquered cabinet which, when opened, was found to
contain the bodies of the two servant girls... their blood-drained
bodies.
    Ah! A hideous
story, I admit... not one, which perhaps should be told over dinner.
And I have been remiss on not mentioning the excellence of your
salad, my dear. The dressing, especially. There is something... well, different about it.
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DON'T KILL THE LITTLE LAMB
The story
of the Fletcher family
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    I
see the way your child plays with his pet. A warm, homey scene, isn't
it? And it teaches the child affection as well as a sense of
responsibility, true? Of course, there might be such a thing as a
child becoming a little too attached to an animal — yes, there might
be. The Fletcher family just might be a case in point...
    The Fletcher farm was located in New Hampshire,
in a rather isolated area of that state. Gareth, age eight, and
Libby, age six, had to walk for more than forty-five minutes to get
to school. That was, of course, when they walked fast and didn't
linger along the way. The point was that recently their parents had
been getting reports from the school that the children were showing
up very late, and there were one or two days when they did not come
to school at all, days when there was no excuse to be made such as
sickness. The parents had a rather firm idea of what was
behind it all. It was the black lamb.
    Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher had given it to the
children as a pet. In the beginning it had been an extremely sickly
creature, but Gareth and Libby cared for it so well that its black
coat turned full and its overall energy level surpassed the norm for
such animals at its age. Yet there was a disturbing quality about the
little creature. Not only did Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher feel, well, uncomfortable about the black lamb, but the other animals on
the farm seemed to shun it. The two dogs, for example, would go
nowhere near the lamb, and whenever it came near one of them, the dog
would promptly disappear. The children, however, loved
their little black lamb and wanted it to go with them everywhere,
even to school. The famous nursery rhyme to the contrary, schools are
no place for little lambs, regardless of how much the children might
enjoy their presence, so the practice was put to a halt. That was, of
course, the time that Gareth and Libby began to attend classes with
less regularity than before.
    The decision was a difficult one, but it had to be made. Mr. Fletcher
announced it gravely: the lamb had to go. There were tears and
pleadings, but both parents stood firm. Before the end of the week,
the lamb would be gone from the farm. It was then that Gareth told
his father that several times they had been asked by an old woman if
they wanted to sell their pet and, since she had said that they could
visit the animal at her place, this might be a solution. Mr. Fletcher
did not comment at that point, but the next day, when a thin old
crone presented herself at their door, he decided it might well
provide the best solution. For one thing, she lived quite far from
the Fletcher farm, far enough that the children would soon tire of
the long walk to see their former pet. He was sure of it.
    But, he was less sure; a week after the lamb
had been sold. It was a dark night in October when Mrs. Fletcher
reported that the children's beds were empty, and that earlier she
had heard them whispering about the lamb. She definitely had heard
the word party mentioned. So it was that the Fletchers drove
their truck to the place where the old woman lived. The house itself
was dilapidated and dark, but from the barn there appeared to be some
light... and the sound of voices singing softly. A strange song it
was and, as Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher came nearer, the sound of