The Long Secret by Louise Fitzhugh

Author:Louise Fitzhugh
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: For the Benefit of Mr. Kite
Published: 1964-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Thirteen

There were three mattresses on the upstairs sleeping balcony over the living room, so when there were too many children for Harriet’s room, they slept up there. When they were all in bed, Harriet said, “Listen, I want to ask you something, both of you. Do you believe in God?”

Beth Ellen thought immediately of a dark night, long ago, when she had been only four years old. She had been with her grandmother and grandfather in the back of the long black car. A great storm raged and thundered around the car as it slid along the dark country roads. The rain beat against the windows. Mrs. Hansen had said something about God. Above the banging of the storm Beth Ellen had asked her grandmother a question. “Is God good?”

There had been a silence and then her grandmother had said, “Yes,” very quietly.

“Why does he make storms that scare us, then?” Beth Ellen had asked promptly.

It had made her grandfather laugh. Beth Ellen had loved the moment because she liked to make him laugh. “You’ve got a very logical mind, little girl,” he had said, and she had felt proud. The memory flew swiftly, taking only a second.

“I don’t know,” she answered Harriet. “I think I do.”

“Janie?” asked Harriet.

“What?” said Janie loudly.

“What do you think of God?”

“Nonsense,” said Janie promptly.

“What?”

“It’s all a lot of nonsense. I don’t believe a word of it. I told my mother that the other day and she fainted dead away.”

Beth Ellen could almost feel Janie smiling fiercely in the dark. “A lot of people believe in it,” she said timidly.

“Who?” said Janie. “Anyway,” she continued, “that’s their problem. A lot of people thought the world was flat too. So what? What do they know?”

“Well…how do you know?” said Harriet.

“I just know,” said Janie emphatically. “There isn’t any God and there never was one and that’s that.”

“Well…where did the idea come from, then?” Harriet persisted.

“Who knows where rotten ideas come from? Just throw them out, that’s what I say,” Janie snapped.

You couldn’t help but admire Janie, thought Beth Ellen. She never seemed to be in doubt about anything.

“After all, you don’t believe in Greek gods, do you? Well, they did, and then the idea got thrown out because it wasn’t any good. I mean, after all, all those people supposed to be sitting on top of that mountain. Ridiculous!” Janie sounded furious. There was a small silence. “I guess,” continued Janie, in a musing voice now, “that people made up God to make themselves feel better. After all, when you think about space, I mean all that space out there, it is pretty ghastly.”

It sure was. Beth Ellen felt attacked by space like the slap of a hand. The thought was horrible. Space. Just empty space and her floating around in it.

Janie snored once briefly.

“Look at that,” said Harriet loudly. “She knocked herself right out!”

Beth Ellen kept thinking about space. Was that what happened when the bomb dropped and the world was destroyed? Did it split in half like an orange and everyone just float around? Lonely, so lonely, it would be.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.