The Mirk and Midnight Hour Read Online Free PDF

thick cream on top.”
    I sat up and took the milk, warmed as much by her consideration as by the cup. “Thank you.”
    “Mr. Dancey told us what’s going on, and I’m sorry,” Laney said, lowering herself to the bed beside me. She gave a rueful grin and nudged me with her elbow. “Of course, I’m the one you should feel sorry for if I’m expected to tend to that boy and wait on the women too.”
    I pulled myself together enough to reassure her. “Don’t you worry about that. I’ll be in charge of Cousin Seeley, and there’s no way we’ll let you turn into those Sluders ’ handmaiden. They’ll have to shift their own weight.”
    Laney gave a low chuckle. “The way you said Sluders made it sound like you were calling them a dirty name.”
    My lips curved into a reluctant smile. “What will I do with a little boy, though? I’ll have no idea how to handle him.”
    “Do the things we used to do with Rush. Let him run wild in the woods. Any child would love that. If we help each other,” Laney said, rising, “it won’t be nearly as bad as we fear.”
    After she left, I began sipping the sweet, pale gold honey milk.
    Eventually I rose and lit a candle. From under my pillow I drew a fat volume covered with crimson cloth—my journal. To it I took every extra agonizing or extra beautiful thought or occurrence, writing them out until the intensity ebbed. If any of my descendants were to read it, they would think me a creature of great extremes of emotion, because that was when I wrote.
    I dipped my pen in the inkstand on my rickety bedside table andwrote and wrote and wrote. After I had exhausted myself, I pried up the loose floorboard and stashed my journal with the soldier’s items; if the Sluders really were coming to live here, I must be extra careful with my privacy.
    I closed my eyes and tried to forget about my father’s news. I tried to forget about the expression in the VanZeldt’s eyes as he had looked at me, and the fact that he must be out there somewhere still, half naked and dripping wet.

Maybe I can’t go to the wedding tomorrow because I have diphtheria .
    Scratchy throat, aching head, sneezing constantly—could be, but probably no such luck. It was most likely just a nasty, oozing, forever-lasting cold.
    I was sitting on Rush’s bed, rubbing my forehead, when Sunny poked her nose in the doorway.
    “Oh. This is where you got to,” she said in her sweet, tinkling voice, which immediately brought on my stomach-clenching reaction. “We wondered.”
    Years ago, back when we were small together at Miss Reed’s little school, Johnny Croft had described Sunny’s nose as being arrowhead-shaped. He had been an observant child. It still stabbed out sharp as ever.
    She flicked her eyes over Rush’s playthings spread out on the bed, waiting to be packed away—the lead horses and soldiers that had carried out so many adventures for Laney and Rush and me. She made a face and said, “Is that all you’re going to do this afternoon?I’d help, of course, except I won’t handle dead people’s things. Why on earth did your brother still have toys around? Wasn’t he our age?”
    Of course she knew he was my twin. I didn’t try to explain that Rush was loyal to his old friends and would never have gotten rid of these belongings. “He left them under his bed,” was all I said.
    She raised her eyebrows and withdrew. I sneezed and finished packing up.
    Rush’s bedroom felt bare and empty of his possessions, but the bed was comfortable, everything was clean, and it was good enough for an eight-year-old boy. Except … I snatched off the bright, beautiful Eye of Heaven quilt. It was what Rush always used to wrap himself in when he came down to breakfast, even when it was ninety degrees out. I draped it tightly around me and sank to the floor. Dust motes floated about in the light streaming from the windows. I exhaled a long breath to send the close ones frantically dancing, and closed my