Elizabeth

Amelia was ordered to stop the party and break the news.

Sarah came as requested hours later in a black frock that was too small, clutching her doll, Emily.

Miss Minchin coldly explained she would stay in the school and work, but that all her belongings would be stripped from her to pay for the expenses she owed.

When she went to her room to grieve, Miss Amelia emerged, locking the door and telling Sarah that her place would now be with Becky in the attic.

And that is where we pick up tonight.

So just lie back and relax as I turn to the next pages of A Little Princess.

Chapter 8 In the Attic The first night she spent in her attic was a thing Sarah never forgot.

During its passing, she lived through a wild, unchildlike woe of which she never spoke to anyone about her.

there was no one who would have understood.

It was indeed well for her that as she lay awake in the darkness, her mind was forcibly distracted now and then by the strangeness of her surroundings.

It was perhaps well for her that she was reminded by her small body of material things

If this had not been so, the anguish of her young mind might have been too great for a child to bear.

But really, while the night was passing, she scarcely knew that she had a body at all, or remembered any other thing than one.

she kept whispering to herself.

It was not until long afterward that she realized that her bed had been so hard that she turned over and over in it to find a place to rest.

that the darkness seemed more intense than any she had ever known, and that the wind howled over the roof among the chimneys like something which wailed aloud.

And then there was something worse.

This was certain scufflings and scratchings and squeakings in the walls and behind the skirting boards.

She knew what they meant because Becky had described them.

They meant rats and mice who were either fighting with each other or playing together.