Charlotte Bacon The Twisted Thread (v5.0) (epub

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.That she was a lithe, instinctive athlete, captain of lacrosse, a more than competent student, and a volunteer at the Greenville animal shelter combined to create an irresistible package for most schools.Add to that what was known as a “heavy leg,” four generations of relatives who’d gone and contributed mightily to Harvard, and Claire had been a shoo-in.But in what counted as a rebellious move only at Armitage, Claire had chosen to go to Yale.She’d gotten in early and had done approximately nothing since then in most of her classes.She was close to failing calculus, Alice Grassley had said to Madeline at a faculty meeting.“And while I wouldn’t call her a genius, behind that perfect nose she’s no dummy,” Alice added.Far worse from most people’s perspectives, the girl had refused to go out for lacrosse during this, her last year at Armitage.There had been hand-wringing about it at the lunch table.Grace snapped her phone closed.Madeline stood up, shivering.One of the girls huddled at the doorway started to wail.It was Sally Jansen, a reedy, neurotic senior bound for Skidmore.Others gathered round and tried to hush her.“It shouldn’t have happened!” Sally was screaming.“What’s she talking about?” Madeline asked.“What’s Sally saying?” From the corner of her eye, she saw Porter, handsome and rugged in a groomed, patrician way.All he was doing was talking to a man in a suit, but even from this distance, Porter gave off a palpable impression that he could handle the job before him.He was almost universally considered competent.Even with her limited exposure to places like this, Madeline knew how rare it was to find someone as respected as he was, especially in an environment where stakes were so small and entitlements so large.Madeline always had a hard time calling him by his first name.Sally was screaming louder now.“She shouldn’t have died.It shouldn’t have happened!” Porter appeared to see the girl for the first time.At almost the same moment, he glimpsed Madeline and motioned with his hand that she was to go and deal with Sally.He so rarely noticed her, his brief gesture had the weight of a touch.Just then, Sally broke free and dashed inside the dorm.Madeline felt her own knees unlock as she went to do Porter’s bidding.She tore through the door, past police and students, and up the stairs, following the sound of Sally’s quick feet.Claire had been a prefect, and as such had scored herself a large single with an attached bathroom.Sally was lunging toward Claire’s room, but two uniformed officers pinned her firmly by the arms.“Slow down, sweetheart,” said the older one.“Take it easy,” said the other as Sally collapsed in the hallway.The cops were used to Armitage students.These men, large, local, unimpressed with privilege, knew exactly how to handle kids like Sally Jansen, and they frequently did when the more hapless were caught smoking pot in the graveyard or trying to buy liquor in Greenville’s package stores.Madeline panted up the last stairs and went toward the trembling girl.As she did, she couldn’t help but glance inside the room, known in the dorm as Claire’s Lair.Drawers were open, and expensive clothes were flung everywhere on the dhurrie rugs that she’d used to mask the tile.Her desk was piled with books and binders.A bulletin board was covered with snapshots and Post-its and her acceptance letter from Yale.Madeline could see the school’s name from where she stood.The room of a spoiled girl.A girl who had openly considered herself superior to others and been admired by her peers for her beauty and confidence.A girl whose social connections intimidated most teachers and made stark the gap between the origins of the students and the adults meant to guide them.But none of that had protected her from dying.All of a sudden, Madeline spied Claire, her almost naked body not even six feet away, sprawled on the floor near the desk chair.She was on her back, head tilted to the side.No wound or mark was visible from here; she looked almost as if she were sleeping, but there was no mistaking the absolute lack of life in the angle at which her neck was bent and in the pallor of her skin.The policemen moved protectively in front of the door but hadn’t closed it yet, unwilling apparently to alter the scene before photographers arrived.Everything had to be frozen as it had been found.Even Madeline knew that.Still, the cops’ wide legs couldn’t block her view entirely.Holding Sally to her chest, trying to still the girl, she couldn’t help but stare.It struck her how little she had been around the dead.Americans kept death at arm’s length, as if it were a country they would never visit.Yet even in places where mortality was less crudely separated from life, people would be stunned at the extinction of the young and lovely.No one could make Claire Harkness on the floor, her skin the color of a candle, turn into something normal.Sally kept sobbing, Madeline kept holding her.And then she realized something else that was not normal about Claire.It was her breasts.They were full, and rigid with veins, their tips wide, rosy caps.Something about them made her think of Kate.Her sister had been complaining about her newly huge nipples and had to be reassured by several doctors that they would eventually revert to small, delicate pinkness.She had nursed because it was what was best for Tadeo, she said, but after six months, that was it.She needed her body back.At the tip of each of Claire’s breasts was a grayish pearl of what could only be milk.One of the officers had had enough of Sally, the crying, and Madeline’s sweaty presence and was trying with gentle insistence to get them going.“Miss, take the young lady downstairs now, please,” he said.But Madeline, arms still wrapped around Sally, was rooted to the floor.“No, no, that’s not possible.Sally, did Claire just have a baby?” Madeline said sharply, still holding the girl, but lifting her chin so she could stare into the narrow face.“Where’s the baby?” Madeline found that she was almost shaking Sally’s bony shoulders.Abruptly, a number of details came into focus: Claire’s refusal to participate in sports this spring, her low grades, her sickly color the last week, the eerie buzz that had run through the dorm this weekend that Madeline had thought was only end-of-the-year jitters.A baby.And none of the community’s adults had even known she was pregnant.Or had they? Madeline’s stomach felt as if a stone had landed in it [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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