Read Online A White Room by Stephanie Carroll - Free Book Online
Authors: Stephanie Carroll
Tags: Literary, Romance, Historical, Literature & Fiction, nonfiction, Mystery; Thriller & Suspense, Women's Fiction, Literary Fiction, New Adult & College
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days that they’d quiver all through dinner and I feared I might drop the pitcher of water on John.
Tuesdays we ironed, starched, and mended. We would also start baking food to last the entire week, which meant we had to plan all meals in advance. We finished baking on Wednesdays. Then we’d beat the rugs and scrub the floors. Every time we scrubbed, I wondered, who scuffed all these floors? Doing the floors drained me of energy, but I enjoyed the freedom from the basement.
Thursdays, John would bathe at 5:30 a.m., before work, and I would bathe after he left. I had to lug buckets of water from the well down into the basement to heat on the range and then haul them back up to the tub. Of course, I would fill the tub with only an inch or so of warm water, and then we used a sponge to draw the warm liquid over our bodies. Whenever I bathed, I wondered what it would look like if the raven-footed tub could really take flight and if it could, whether or not it would do so with me still in it? My hair was so long that it took all day to dry by the fire, so I washed it very rarely, using perfumed soaps made from animal fat and lemons. Afterward, I cleaned the tub and brushed my teeth with a horsehair toothbrush and bicarbonate of soda. I would have liked to save our bathing day for when Mrs. Schwab could assist with the water, but I needed her too much for the other chores, and there just wasn’t enough time on those days for bathing.
I dreaded Thursdays when I had to face the house alone. I would spend at least an hour fiddling with self-cinching and skirt-clasping tools as I tried to dress myself, but usually I still couldn’t do it quite right. Worse, when I prepared breakfast and cleaned the dishes in the basement, there were constant noises above and around me, as if something lurked there. I told myself that what I heard in the basement had to be a scurrying mouse or another critter, but I couldn’t speculate what the thumping and clacking from above could be unless it was the furniture moving around of its own accord—scuffing the floors, no doubt.
Although I despised the basement, other areas of the house were just as disturbing. I constantly sensed a presence when I was alone, especially in the parlor. Whenever I would clean mirrors in there, I’d see a flash or a blur in the reflection. I’d spin around and search among the clusters of tables and chairs, the web of bric-a-brac that could easily conceal a tiny trickster. I’d eye the grouping in the left corner, the china cabinet on the wall with the curved sides and glass doors like eyes. Or I’d peer at the middle cluster with the game table and gangly treelike figurines, a lopsided vase practically dripping off the table. Or I’d study another cluster of seats surrounding the window-box garden. The cabinet for gardening supplies lingered nearby. Its appendages swirled, too. Could the inky sliver I’d see out of the corner of my eye have been one of those winding arms?
Thankfully, I didn’t lose all my sanity on Thursdays because, when I didn’t have wet hair, our driver and stable hand, Mr. Samuel Buck, would take me into town to make calls and weekly purchases. I ordered many things by catalog, even groceries, but I still had to visit the milkman, the egg man, the butcher, and a provisionary for apples, butter, potatoes, and the like. The first time I visited the little town, I expected to see long drooping trees and a jungle of foliage overwhelming chipped and worn buildings. To my surprise, Labellum actually appeared to be clean and kempt, with little white shops and bushy trees lined up in neat little rows. I could see grassy hills in the distance. The trees were mostly oak, the type with rounded tops. Little patches of forest were interspersed throughout the valley but cleared from the town center.
Labellum’s original inhabitants situated the town on a crisscrossed grid, with narrow alleys. The white buildings were square, with flat fronts and
Tuesdays we ironed, starched, and mended. We would also start baking food to last the entire week, which meant we had to plan all meals in advance. We finished baking on Wednesdays. Then we’d beat the rugs and scrub the floors. Every time we scrubbed, I wondered, who scuffed all these floors? Doing the floors drained me of energy, but I enjoyed the freedom from the basement.
Thursdays, John would bathe at 5:30 a.m., before work, and I would bathe after he left. I had to lug buckets of water from the well down into the basement to heat on the range and then haul them back up to the tub. Of course, I would fill the tub with only an inch or so of warm water, and then we used a sponge to draw the warm liquid over our bodies. Whenever I bathed, I wondered what it would look like if the raven-footed tub could really take flight and if it could, whether or not it would do so with me still in it? My hair was so long that it took all day to dry by the fire, so I washed it very rarely, using perfumed soaps made from animal fat and lemons. Afterward, I cleaned the tub and brushed my teeth with a horsehair toothbrush and bicarbonate of soda. I would have liked to save our bathing day for when Mrs. Schwab could assist with the water, but I needed her too much for the other chores, and there just wasn’t enough time on those days for bathing.
I dreaded Thursdays when I had to face the house alone. I would spend at least an hour fiddling with self-cinching and skirt-clasping tools as I tried to dress myself, but usually I still couldn’t do it quite right. Worse, when I prepared breakfast and cleaned the dishes in the basement, there were constant noises above and around me, as if something lurked there. I told myself that what I heard in the basement had to be a scurrying mouse or another critter, but I couldn’t speculate what the thumping and clacking from above could be unless it was the furniture moving around of its own accord—scuffing the floors, no doubt.
Although I despised the basement, other areas of the house were just as disturbing. I constantly sensed a presence when I was alone, especially in the parlor. Whenever I would clean mirrors in there, I’d see a flash or a blur in the reflection. I’d spin around and search among the clusters of tables and chairs, the web of bric-a-brac that could easily conceal a tiny trickster. I’d eye the grouping in the left corner, the china cabinet on the wall with the curved sides and glass doors like eyes. Or I’d peer at the middle cluster with the game table and gangly treelike figurines, a lopsided vase practically dripping off the table. Or I’d study another cluster of seats surrounding the window-box garden. The cabinet for gardening supplies lingered nearby. Its appendages swirled, too. Could the inky sliver I’d see out of the corner of my eye have been one of those winding arms?
Thankfully, I didn’t lose all my sanity on Thursdays because, when I didn’t have wet hair, our driver and stable hand, Mr. Samuel Buck, would take me into town to make calls and weekly purchases. I ordered many things by catalog, even groceries, but I still had to visit the milkman, the egg man, the butcher, and a provisionary for apples, butter, potatoes, and the like. The first time I visited the little town, I expected to see long drooping trees and a jungle of foliage overwhelming chipped and worn buildings. To my surprise, Labellum actually appeared to be clean and kempt, with little white shops and bushy trees lined up in neat little rows. I could see grassy hills in the distance. The trees were mostly oak, the type with rounded tops. Little patches of forest were interspersed throughout the valley but cleared from the town center.
Labellum’s original inhabitants situated the town on a crisscrossed grid, with narrow alleys. The white buildings were square, with flat fronts and
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