The Struggle Read Online Free PDF Page B

doctor. He looks like he’s dying!” said Bonnie.
    “He can’t. I can’t explain right now. Let’s just get him home, all right? He’s wet and freezing out here. Then we can discuss it.”
    The job of getting Stefan through the woods was enough to occupy everyone’s mind for a while. He remained unconscious, and when they finally laid him out in the backseat of Matt’s car they were all bruised and exhausted, in addition to being wet from the contact with his soaking clothes. Elena held his head in her lap as they drove to the boarding house. Meredith and Bonnie followed.
    “I see lights on,” Matt said, pulling in front of the large rust-red building. “She must be awake. But the door’s probably locked.”
    Elena gently eased Stefan’s head down and slipped out of the car, and saw one of thewindows in the house brighten as a curtain was pushed aside. Then she saw a head and shoulders appear at the window, looking down.
    “Mrs. Flowers!” she called, waving. “It’s Elena Gilbert, Mrs. Flowers. We’ve found Stefan, and we need to get in!”
    The figure at the window did not move or otherwise acknowledge her words. Yet from its posture, Elena could tell it was still looking down on them.
    “Mrs. Flowers, we have Stefan,” she called again, gesturing to the lighted interior of the car. “Please!”
    “Elena! It’s unlocked already!” Bonnie’s voice floated to her from the front porch, distracting Elena from the figure at the window. When she looked back up, she saw the curtains falling into place, and then the light in that upstairs room snapped off.
    It was strange, but she had no time to puzzle over it. She and Meredith helped Matt lift Stefan and carry him up the front steps.
    Inside, the house was dark and still. Elena directed the others up the staircase that stood opposite the door, and onto the second-floorlanding. From there they went into a bedroom, and Elena had Bonnie open the door of what looked like a closet. It revealed another stairway, very dim and narrow.
    “Who would leave their—front door unlocked—after all that’s happened recently?” Matt grunted as they hauled their lifeless burden. “She must be crazy.”
    “She
is
crazy,” Bonnie said from above, pushing the door at the top of the staircase open. “Last time we were here she talked about the weirdest—” Her voice broke off in a gasp.
    “What is it?” said Elena. But as they reached the threshold of Stefan’s room, she saw for herself.
    She’d forgotten the condition the room had been in the last time she’d seen it. Trunks filled with clothing were upended or lying on their sides, as if they’d been thrown by some giant hand from wall to wall. Their contents were strewn about the floor, along with articles from the dresser and tables. Furniture was overturned, and a window was broken, allowing a cold wind to blow in. There was only one lamp on, in a corner, and grotesque shadows loomedagainst the ceiling.
    “What happened?
” said Matt.
    Elena didn’t answer until they had stretched Stefan out on the bed. “I don’t know for certain,” she said, and this was true, if just barely. “But it was already this way last night. Matt, will you help me? He needs to get dry.”
    “I’ll find another lamp,” said Meredith, but Elena spoke quickly.
    “No, we can see all right. Why don’t you try to get a fire going?”
    Spilling from one of the gaping trunks was a terry cloth robe of some dark color. Elena took it, and she and Matt began to strip off Stefan’s wet and clinging clothes. She worked on getting his sweater off, but one glimpse of his neck was enough to freeze her in place.
    “Matt, could you—could you hand me that towel?”
    As soon as he turned, she tugged the sweater over Stefan’s head and quickly wrapped the robe around him. When Matt turned back and handed her the towel, she wound it around Stefan’s throat like a scarf. Her pulse was racing, her mind working furiously.
    No wonder he