Petals on the Wind Read online

suffer, suffer, suffer."

  "I have nothing," whispered Carrie honestly. "The dolls, the pretty little china dolls, give us

  those," intoned the austere voice of the speaker. "Your

  little clothes won't fit us; we don't want those; give us

  your dolls, your pretty man, woman and child dolls." "They're gone," cried Carrie, fearful they would

  set fire to her. "They turned to wooden sticks." "Ho-ho! A likely story! You lie! So now you

  must suffer, little owl, to become one of us--or die.

  Take your choice."

  It was an easy decision. Carrie nodded and tried

  not to sniffle.

  "All right, from this night forward you, Carrie

  Dollanganger, funny name, funny face, will be one of

  us."

  It hurts to write of how they took Carrie and

  blindfolded her, then tied her small hands behind her

  back, then pushed her out into the hall, then up a flight

  of steep stairs, and suddenly they were outside. Carrie

  felt the cool night air, the slant of the support beneath

  her bare feet, and guessed correctly the girls had taken

  her onto the roof! There was only one thing she feared

  more than the grandmother and that was the roof--any

  roof! Anticipating her bellowing screams the girls had

  gagged Carrie. "Now lie or sit still as a proper owl should," said the same harsh voice. "Perch here on the roof, near the chimney under the moon, and in the

  morning you will be one of us."

  Struggling and frantic now, Carrie tried to resist

  the pull of so many who forced her to sit. Then, even

  worse, they suddenly took away their hands and left

  her there in the darkness on the roof--all alone. Far

  away she heard the whispering titters of their retreat

  and the slight click of a door latching down.

  Cathy, Cathy, she screamed to herself, Chris,

  come save me! Dr. Paul, why did you put me here?

  Don't nobody want me? Sobbing, making small

  mewing sounds while blindfolded, gagged and bound,

  Carrie braved the steep incline of the huge, strange

  roof and began to move toward where the latching

  sound had come from. Inch by inch, sitting up and

  sliding along on her bottom, Carrie moved forward,

  praying every time she moved an inch not to fall. It

  seemed from her faltering report that she gave me

  much, much later that she was not only guided by

  instinct, but she could hear, above and from behind the

  oncoming spring thunderstorm, the sweet and distant

  voice of Cory singing as he strummed his melancholy

  song of finding his home and the sun again.

  "Oh, Cathy, it was so strange way up there high, and the wind started to blow, and the rain began to fall, and the thunder rumbled and the lightning struck so I could see the brightness through the blindfold-- and all the time Cory was singing and leading me to the trapdoor that opened when I used my feet to force it upward, and somehow I wiggled through. Then I fell down the stairs! I fell into blackness and I heard a bone break. And the pain, it came like teeth and bit me so I couldn't see or feel anything or even hear the rain

  anymore. And Cory, he went away."

  .

  Sunday morning came and Paul, Chris and I

  were at the breakfast table eating brunch.

  Chris had a hot, homemade buttery roll in his

  hand, his lips parted wide to put at least half inside

  with one bite, when the telephone in the hall rang.

  Paul groaned as he put down his fork. I groaned too,

  for I had made my first cheese souffle and it had to be

  eaten right away. "Would you mind getting that,

  Cathy?" he asked.

  "I really want to dig into your souffle. It looks

  delicious and it smells heavenly."

  "You sit right there and eat," I said, jumping up

  and hurrying to answer, "and I'll do what I can to

  protect you from the pesky Mrs. Williamson. . . ." He softly laughed and flashed me an amused

  look as he picked his fork up again. "It may not be my

  lonely widow lady with another of her minor

  afflictions." Chris went right on eating.

  I picked up the phone and in my most adult and

  gracious way I said, "Dr. Paul Sheffield's residence." "This is Emily Dean Dewhurst calling," said the

  stern voice on the other end. "Please put Dr. Sheffield

  on the phone immediately!"

  "Miss Dewhurst!" I said, already alarmed. "This

  is Cathy, Carrie's sister. Is Carrie all right?"

  "You and Dr. Sheffield are needed here

  immediately!"

  "Miss Dewhurst--"

  But she didn't let me finish. "It seems that your

  younger sister has disappeared rather mysteriously. On

  Sundays those girls who are being punished by

  weekend liberty denial are required to attend chapel

  services. I myself called the roll and Carrie did not

  respond to her name." My heart beat faster,

  apprehensive of what I was to hear next, but my finger

  moved to push a button that would put Miss

  Dewhurst's message onto the attached microphone so

  Chris and Paul would hear even as they ate.

  "Where was she?" I asked in a small voice,

  already terrified.

  She spoke calmly. "A strange hush came in the

  air this morning when your sister's name was called

  and when I asked where she was. I sent a teacher to

  check your sister's room and she wasn't there. I then

  ordered a thorough search of the grounds and the

  entire school building from basement to attic, and still

  your sister wasn't found. I would, if your sister was of

  a different character, presume she'd run off and was on

  her way home. But something in the atmosphere

  warns that at least twelve of the girls here know what

  has happened to Carrie and they refuse to talk and

  incriminate themselves."

  My eyes widened. "You mean you still don't

  know where Carrie is?"

  Paul and Chris had stopped eating. Now both

  stared at me with mounting concern. "I'm sorry to say

  I don't. Carrie hasn't been seen since nine o'clock last

  night. Even if she walked all the way home she should

  have reached there by now. It's almost noon. If she is

  not there and she is not here, then she is either injured,

  lost or some other accident has befallen her. . . . I could have screamed. How could she speak so

  dispassionately! Why, why every time something

  terrible came into our lives was it a flat, uncaring

  voice that told us the bad news?

  Paul's white car sped down Overland Highway

  toward Carrie's school. I was sandwiched in the front

  seat between Paul and Chris. My brother had his bag

  so he could catch a bus and go on to his school after

  he found out what had happened to Carrie. He had my

  hand squeezed tight in his to reassure me that this

  child of ours was going to live! "Stop looking so

  worried, Cathy," said Chris as he put an arm about my

  shoulder and drew my head to his shoulder. "You

  know how Carrie is. She's probably hiding and just

  won't answer. Remember how she was in the attic?

  She wouldn't stay even when Cory wanted to. Carrie'd

  take off to do her own thing. She hasn't run away.

 
; She'd be too afraid of the dark. She's hiding

  somewhere. Somebody did something to hurt her

  feelings and she's punishing them by letting them

  worry. She couldn't face the world in the dead of

  night."

  Dead of night! Oh, God! I wished Chris hadn't

  mentioned the attic where Cory had almost died in a

  trunk before he went on to meet Daddy in heaven.

  Chris kissed my cheek and wiped away my tears.

  "Come now, don't cry. I said all of that wrong. She'll

  be all right."

  "What do you mean you don't know where my

  ward is?" fired Paul in a hard voice as he coldly eyed

  Miss Dewhurst. "It was my understanding the girls in

  this school were properly supervised twenty-four

  hours a day!"

  We were in the posh office of Miss Emily Dean

  Dewhurst. She was not seated behind her impressive,

  large desk, but restlessly pacing the floor. "Really, Dr.

  Sheffield, nothing like this has ever happened before.

  Never have we lost a girl. We make a room check

  every night to see the girls are tucked in bed with

  lights out, and Carrie was in her bed. I myself looked

  in on her, wanting to comfort her if she'd let me, but

  she refused to look at me or to speak. Of course it all

  began with that fight in your ward's room and the

  demerits that resulted in their loss of their weekend

  liberty. Every member of the faculty has helped me

  search and we've questioned our girls who profess to

  know nothing about it--which I imagine they do--but

  if they won't talk, I don't know what to do next." "Why didn't you notify me when you first found

  her missing?" Paul asked. I spoke up then and asked to

  be taken to Carrie's room. Miss Dewhurst turned

  eagerly to me, anxious to escape the doctor's wrath. As

  we three followed her up the stairs she spilled forth lengthy excuses so we'd understand how difficult it was to handle so many mischievous girls. When we finally entered Carrie's room several students trailed behind us, whispering back and forth about how much Chris and I looked like Carrie, only we weren't "so

  freakishly small."

  Chris turned to scowl at them. "No wonder she

  hates it here if you can say things like that!"

  "We'll find her," assured Chris. "If we have to

  stay all week and torture each little witch here we'll

  make them tell us where she is."

  "Young man," shot out Miss Dewhurst,

  "nobody tortures my girls but me!"

  I knew Carrie better than anyone and around the

  grooves of her brain I ambled. Now, if I were Carrie's

  age, would I try to escape a school that had unjustly

  kept me from going home? Yes! I would do exactly

  that. But I was not Carrie; I would not run away in

  only a nightgown. All her little uniforms were there,

  custom sewn by Henny, and her small sweaters, skirts

  and blouses, and pretty dresses, all there. Everything

  she'd brought to this school was in its proper place.

  Only the porcelain dolls were missing.

  Still on my knees before Carrie's dresser, I sat

  back on my heels and looked up at Paul and showed him the box that contained nothing but cotton wadding and sticks of wood. "Her dolls aren't here," I said dully, not comprehending the sticks at all, "and as far as I can tell the only article of her clothing that's missing is one of her nightgowns. Carrie wouldn't go outside wearing only her nightgown. She's got to be

  here--someplace no one has looked."

  "We have looked everywhere!" Miss Dewhurst

  spoke impatiently, as if I had no voice in this matter,

  only the guardian, the doctor, whose favor she sought

  even while Paul turned on her another of his stern,

  hard looks.

  For some reason I can't explain I swiveled my

  head about and caught a cat-who's-eaten-the-canary

  look on the pale and sickly face of a frizzled, rusthaired, skinny girl whom I detested merely from

  hearing the little Carrie had told me about her

  roommate. Maybe it was just her eyes, or the way she

  kept fingering the big square pocket of her organdy

  pinafore that narrowed my own eyes as I tried to

  pierce the depths of hers. She blanched and shifted her

  green eyes toward the windows, shuffled her feet

  about uneasily and quickly yanked her hand from her

  pocket. It was a lined pocket and it bulged

  suspiciously.

  "You," I said, "you're Carrie's roommate, aren't

  you?"

  "I was," she murmured.

  "What is that you have in your pocket?" Her head jerked toward me. Her eyes sparked

  green fire as the muscles near her lips twitched. "None

  of your business!"

  "Miss Towers!" whiplashed Miss Dewhurst.

  "Answer Miss Dollanganger's question!"

  "It's my purse," said Sissy Towers, glaring at me

  defiantly.

  "It's a very lumpy purse," I said, and suddenly I

  lunged forward and seized Sissy Towers about the

  knees. With my free hand, as she struggled and

  howled, I pulled from her pocket a blue scarf. From

  that scarf tumbled Mr. and Mrs. Parkins and baby

  Clara. I held the three porcelain dolls in my hand and

  demanded, "What are you doing with my sister's

  dolls?"

  "They're my dolls!" said the girl, her gimlet

  eyes narrowing to slits. The girls gathered around

  began to snicker and made whispering remarks to one

  another.

  "Your dolls? These dolls belong to my sister." "You lie!" she fired back. "You are stealing

  from me and my father can have you thrown in jail!" "Miss Dewhurst," ordered the small demon, her

  hand reaching for the dolls, "you make this person

  leave me alone! I don't like her, no more than her

  dwarf sister!"

  I got to my feet and towered threateningly

  above her. Protectively I put the dolls behind my back.

  She'd have to kill me to get to them!

  "Miss Dewhurst!" shrieked the imp as she

  attacked me. "My mommy and daddy gave me those

  dolls for my Christmas!"

  "You lying little devil!" I said, itching to slap

  her defiant face. "You stole those dolls and the crib

  from my sister. And because you did Carrie is at this

  very moment in extreme danger!" I knew it. I felt it.

  Carrie needed help and fast. "Where is my sister?" I

  raged.

  I stared hard at that red-haired girl named Sissy,

  knowing she had the answer to where Carrie was but

  knowing she'd never tell me. It was in her eyes, her

  mean, spiteful eyes. It was then that Lacy St. John

  spoke up and told us what they'd done to Carrie the

  night before.

  Oh, God! There was no place in the world more

  terrifying to Carrie than a roof--any roof! I went reeling back into the past, when Chris and I had tried to take the twins out on the roof of Foxworth Hall so we could hold them in the sunlight and keep them in the fresh air so they'd grow. And like children out of

  their minds from fright they'd screamed and kicked. I squeezed my eyelids very tight, concentrating

  fully on Carrie, where, where, where? And behind my

  eyes I saw her crouched in a dark corner in what

  seemed a canyon rising tall on either side of
her. "I want to look in the attic myself," I said to

  Miss Dewhurst, and she quickly said they'd already

  thoroughly searched the attic and called and called

  Carrie's name. But they didn't know Carrie like I did.

  They didn't know my small sister could go off to a

  never- never land where speech didn't exist, not when

  she was in shock.

  Up the attic stairs all the teachers, Chris, Paul

  and I climbed. It was so much like it used to be, a

  huge, dim and dusty place. But not full of old furniture

  covered with dusty gray sheets or remnants of the past.

  Up here were only stacks upon stacks of heavy

  wooden crates.

  Carrie was here. I could sense it. I felt her

  presence as if she reached out and touched me, though

  when I looked around I saw nothing but the crates. "Carrie!" I called as loudly as possible. "It's me, Cathy. Don't hide and keep quiet because you're afraid! I've got your dolls and Dr. Paul is with me and so is Chris. We've come to take you home, and never again are we going to send you away to school!" I

  nudged Paul, "Now you tell her that too."

  He abandoned his soft voice and boomed,

  "Carrie, if you can hear me, it's just as your sister says.

  We want you to come home with us to stay. I'm sorry,

  Carrie. I thought you'd like it here. Now I know you

  couldn't possibly have been happy. Carrie, please

  come out, we need you."

  Then I thought I heard a soft whimper. I raced

  in that direction with Chris close at my heels. I knew

  about attics, how to search, how to find.

  Abruptly I drew to a halt and Chris collided

  with me. Just ahead, in the dim shadows created by the

  towers of heavy wooden crates, still in her nightgown,

  all torn, dirty and bloody, gagged and still blindfolded,

  I spied Carrie. Her spill of blond hair gleamed in the

  faint light. Beneath her a leg was twisted in a

  grotesque way. "Oh, God," whispered Chris and Paul

  at the same time, "her leg looks broken."

  "Wait a minute," Paul cautioned in a low voice,

  clamping both his hands down on my shoulders when I would heedlessly run forward and rescue Carrie. "Look at those crates, Cathy. Just one careless move on your part and they will all come crashing down on

  both you and Carrie."

  Somewhere behind me a teacher moaned and

  began to pray. How Carrie had managed to drag

  herself down that close passageway while blind and

  bound was unbelievable. A fully adult person couldn't

  have done it--but I could do it--I was still small