Darkness Falls Read Online Free Page B

a sweet for her tooth?
    “Edna got to go to the Tooth Lady,” Mary said.
    Sarah smiled, glad that her sister was helping. Mother listened to her more because she was older.
    “But—”
    “And so did Matthew and Lucas and Freddie and—”
    Mother turned to Father. “John, please, tell them they can’t go.”
    Father just laughed. “Oh, don’t be such a fussbudget, Mildred.”
    “But, John, that—that woman is so—so—”
    “So what, darling?”
    “Have you ever met her?”
    Father scratched his chin. “Can’t say as I have. Met her husband once, before that awful storm. Damn shame, that. Seemed a good fellow, all things considered. Solid, Christian man. Good head on his shoulders. Thought the world of her, I can tell you that. And if Captain Dixon thought his wife was a good woman, then that’s a good enough testimonial for me.”
    Sarah hated when adults went on like this, because she had no idea what they were talking about. She clutched the tooth in her small hand. It didn’t look anything like it did when it was in her mouth. It had these weird spiky things at the end of it. Sarah wondered if growing those spiky things were why it fell out of her mouth.
    “John, I swear to you, sometimes—oh!” Mother got that look on her face that she usually got whenever Sarah or Mary did something wrong. “Very well, you can go see the Tooth Lady, but only if you go before it gets dark!”
    “Yay!”
    Sarah started skipping her way down the road. She was going to get her sweet! She wasn’t a baby anymore!
    Later that afternoon, Mary and Sarah went up to Lighthouse Point. It had gotten cloudy, which Sarah didn’t like, but at least they were nice fluffy clouds. Mother had wrapped Sarah’s tooth in a handkerchief and tied it with a nice ribbon. “If you must go, you shouldn’t lose the tooth,” Mother had said.
    Before Sarah could even see the Tooth Lady’s house, she could smell the gingerbread. She and Mary had already been practically skipping, but as soon as they smelled the gingerbread, they started running.
    Gingerbread was Sarah’s favorite thing in the whole world.
    Mother had always made good gingerbread, but this was much, much better smelling. It was the best gingerbread Sarah had ever smelled.
    She just hoped it tasted as good.
    Mary had longer legs, so she made it to the front door first. Usually, this close to the water, Sarah could smell the ocean, but all she had in her nose was the gingerbread. She decided that she really liked not being a baby anymore if it meant all this gingerbread!
    By the time Sarah caught up to Mary at the front door, yelling, “Wait for me, wait for me!” the whole way, the big wooden door started to open.
    Sarah had been worried, after all the stories Mary had told about how the Tooth Lady was an old woman who’d lost her husband and didn’t have any children, that she was going to be a crazy old lady like Auntie Margie.
    Instead, the door opened to a beautiful woman. She had long blond hair that was tied back and looked as if the sun were coming out of her head.
    She smiled down at the girls. “Yes?”
    Sarah couldn’t make her mouth work. She could talk just fine when her mouth hurt because she wasn’t going to be a baby anymore, but now she couldn’t say anything. The Lady was just too beautiful. She looked like the faerie, like in the stories that Grandmama used to tell her before she went to sleep at night. Didn’t the faerie used to have sweet food, too?
    Mary, as usual, came to her rescue. “My baby sister lost a tooth.”
    “I’m not a baby no more!” Sarah found her voice again. She held up the bundle Mother had made. “I lost my baby tooth!”
    “Well, good for you,” the Fairy Lady said. “It’s so good to see children growing up.”
    The Fairy Lady sounded sad about that. “Is something wrong?” Sarah asked.
    “No,” the Lady said, smiling again. “Nothing at all, you dear, sweet child. You’re John and Mildred Orne’s girls,