“madge?” mimi said, putting her arm around her. she was wide awake now. “you’re shaking like a leaf.”
“i—know—it but i can’t stop. every time i close my eyes i hear them—thump—thump—thump. oh mimi it’s awful! you don’t know unless you’ve heard them.”
“what’s up?” betsy whispered. she scrawled over jill and poked her head between theirs. “am i missing something?”
“sh—sh—” mimi said to betsy, but she had her arm around madge, patting her shoulder. “madge—er, madge doesn’t feel well.”
“sumpthin’ she et?” betsy asked with small boy impudence.
“i wouldn’t make fun of you! i’d b-b—be ashamed!”
she was sobbing in earnest now.
“i’m sorry, madge. i was just joking. if there’s really something the matter i want to help.”
“i wish you’d go back to sleep. i was about to tell mimi something. i won’t tell you, because you’d laugh.”
there was a thin crescent moon tonight; the stars were shedding more light than it. the dim light made the figures of the tired girls look like discarded rag dolls that had been thrown helter-skelter on the junk pile. arms and legs tangled. a patchwork of pajamas.
mimi took it all in at one glance. the pale moon seemed to be casting a ghostly spotlight on madge. she was pale as the young moon and her eyes were unnaturally bright. mimi wondered why madge had to be so different from those healthy, sound sleepers; why she was so tortured with her strange superstition? mimi had never heard of anything like it before. she wouldn’t hear now unless madge volunteered. she wouldn’t ask or beg her to tell. death bells? the very name made goose bumps up her spine.
“please, don’t you all think i’m queer, but it runs in my family. my grandmother always heard them when someone in our family died—i heard them when she died!”
suddenly madge put her hands to her ears and buried her head in mimi’s lap.
“this doesn’t make sense to me,” betsy said.
“to me either. but maybe it will.”
they were whispering over madge.
mimi felt madge’s body grow rigid; heard her voice, hoarse and half choked.
“seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty——”
“if she thinks she hears a bell ringing, she’s goofy,” betsy whispered. she tapped her forehead as she finished and made a spinning gesture with her hands.
madge sat up as suddenly as she had flopped down. she clutched mimi’s wrist on one side and betsy’s on the other.
“they’ve stopped!” she announced dramatically, but in the same breath added piteously, “but they’ll come back. they always do. once they start, i always hear them—until somebody dies.”
betsy was dumbfounded. mimi was speechless.
“what do they sound like?” betsy asked, moving closer to madge. she wriggled around in front of her and the disturbed look on madge’s face convinced her that whatever death bells were, madge believed in them heart and soul.
“they don’t ring. i don’t know why they’re called bells at all unless they started calling them that way back when people used to toll the bell on the tower of the church when someone died. they’re mournful like that but more like a dull thud. when i first used to hear them, before granny and mama told me what they were, i thought someone was under the floor thumping with the end of a broomstick or tapping with a hammer which had a piece of cloth tied over the hammer head. they go thump, thump, thump, just as regular as that.”
neither mimi nor betsy could utter a word by now. mimi felt that if she moved as much as an inch things would crack and pop or icy hands would seize her from behind. she tried to tell herself this was tommyrot, but look at madge. she was holding her head and counting again.
“twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three——”
then for a terrible minute there was silence; mimi’s heart was thumping loud enough to be mistaken for death bells.
“i’ll never forget the first time i heard them. we were at granny’s because grandpa was sick. mother and i were sleeping upstairs in the room mother had when she was a girl. we were so tired i couldn’t go to sleep. i tried counting sheep but it didn’t help. soon i heard this dull tapping, so i began to count just for something to do. after i counted seventy-nine, they ceased. not another one sounded. next morning grandpa was dead and he was seventy-nine years old!”
“two years ago at school, i had a headache, so i leaned my head over on my desk. i had no more than settled down when a thump-thump-thumping began. i shook my head but i could still hear it. they were the clearest i ever heard. sounded like someone was tapping on your desk with a ruler. i counted forty-three. that afternoon we had a telegram that my uncle had been killed in an automobile wreck and he was forty-three years old.”
“don’t ever count fourteen!” mimi giggled. she was so scared she was getting silly. ridiculous, all of it, she kept telling herself, but every time she said ridiculous she believed madge’s story truer and truer.
“i’d be afraid to make fun of it,” betsy said so seriously mimi knew she believed madge, too.
“i used to not hear them for anyone but my family, but i get more and more of them all the time. in the last year i have counted them three different times and the next day found in the paper that a person as old as i had counted, was dead. gee! my head aches.”
mimi’s common sense was returning by degrees.
“i’ll get you an aspirin and then we’ll go to sleep.”
she hoped she would. right now she was more wide awake than ever she had been since the wild cat screamed at camp.
it took a great deal of nerve for her to tiptoe across the tin roof, climb in the window, and feel her way across the sitting room to the bathroom. she did not dare turn on a light until she reached the bathroom. click! the light was on and, in some miraculous way, fear fled with the darkness. mimi was almost herself when she reappeared on the roof, aspirin in one hand and a glass of water in the other.
madge’s head was in betsy’s lap. she was stroking her forehead with her finger tips.
“she counted to twenty-nine while you were gone.”
betsy was weak with fright.
mimi lifted madge’s weary head and gave her the aspirin.
“now we’re going to sleep. betsy, get over there where you belong. now madge, honey, close your eyes and rest.”
mimi began humming softly as mammy cissy would. poor little madge! thank goodness mother dear never let her believe a lot of old wives’ tales. madge was relaxing.
finally all on the roof but mimi were quiet. she could not get comfortable. she could not turn to cuddle down for fear of waking madge who had dozed off against her. mimi began to cramp from being so long in such an uncomfortable position. she sat up to ease madge over. there was a queer light now.
had the party lasted all night?
the town clock answered. it boomed out two o’clock. no, it wasn’t dawn. what could the light be?
standing up slowly, mimi tiptoed to the edge of the porch roof. the tin roof crackled under her bare feet but she went on toward the increasing brightness. climbing on the rail and leaning over, she saw.
the kitchen roof was on fire!
