Read Cutler 05 - Darkest Hour for Free Online Page A

in bed. My protests went unheeded. She was full of stories about children who didn't listen and got sicker and sicker until they had to be taken to the hospital.
    After she left, the door was slowly opened and I turned to see Emily standing there, gazing in at me, her eyes more full of fury than I had ever seen them.
    Suddenly, though, she smiled, a cold smile that stretched her lips thin and sent a cold shudder up my spine.
    "You know why you're sick," she said. "You're being punished."
    "I am not," I replied without even asking her for what I was being punished. She held her smile.
    "Yes, you are. You had to go whining to Mamma about what I said. You brought more trouble to the family. We had a terrible time at dinner with Mamma whimpering and Papa snapping at both of us. And all because of you. You're just like Jonah."
    "No, I'm not," I protested. Even though I was not sure who Jonah was, I knew from the way Emily spoke that he wasn't someone good.
    "Yes, you are. You brought this family bad luck from the day you were taken in. A week after you came, Tottie's father was run over by the hay wagon and had his chest crushed, and then we had the fire in the barn and lost the cows and horses. You're a curse," she fired. I shook my head, my tears hot and continuous now. She took a few steps into my room, her eyes fixed on me with such hate I cowered back in my bed and pulled the blanket up to my chin again.
    "And then when Eugenia was born, you had to go in and look at her. You had to be the first one, ahead of me, and what happened? Eugenia's been sick ever since. You cursed her too," she spat.
    "I did not!" I screamed back. Blaming me for my sister's illness was too much. Nothing was more. painful to me than watching Eugenia struggle to breathe, watching her tire quickly after a short walk, watching her struggle to play and do the things all young girls her age were doing. Nothing broke my heart more than seeing how she gazed out the windows of her room, longing to go running over the fields, laughing and chasing after birds or squirrels. I was there for her as much as I could be, entertaining her, making her laugh, doing the things for her that she couldn't do for herself, while Emily barely spoke to her or showed the slightest concern.
    "Eugenia's not going to live long, but you are," Emily sneered. "And it's all your fault."
    "Stop it! Stop saying those things!" I screamed, but she neither faltered nor retreated an inch.
    "You shouldn't have told on me," she replied calmly, revealing that was the sole cause of her venom. "You shouldn't have turned Papa against me."
    "I didn't," I said, shaking my head. "I haven't seen Papa since I came home from school," I added, and sobbed harder. Emily stared at me in disgust for a few moments and then she smiled.
    "I pray," she said. "I pray every day that God will spare us the curse of Jonah. Someday, He will hear my prayers," she promised, looking up at the ceiling, her eyes closed, her arms at her side, her hands clenched in small fists, "and you will be tossed overboard and swallowed by a whale, just like Jonah in the Bible."
    She paused a moment, then lowered her head and laughed at me before pivoting quickly to exit my room and leave me shivering with fear instead of with fever.
    All that morning I thought about the things Emily had said and wondered if any of it could be true. Most of our servants, especially Louella and Henry, believed in good luck and bad luck. There were charms and there were signs of evil; there were specific things to do to avoid bad luck, too. I remembered Henry bawling out a man who, while waiting for something to do in the barn, stood there killing spiders.
    "You bringin' bad luck on all of us," Henry charged. He sent me in to Louella to fetch a fistful of salt. When I returned with it, he made the man turn around three times and cast the salt over his right shoulder. Even so, he said he didn't think it was enough because too many spiders were killed.
    If