The Witching Hour

  Sophie couldn’t sleep.

A brilliant moonbeam was slanting through a gap in the curtains.  It was shining right on to her pillow. The other children in the dormitory had been asleep for hours.   Sophie closed her eyes and lay quite still.  She tried very hard to doze off.  It was no good.  The moonbeam was like a silver blade slicing through the room on to her face. The house was absolutely silent.  No voices came up from downstairs.  There were no footsteps on the floor above either. The window behind the curtain was wide open, but nobody was walking on the pavement outside.  No cars went by on the street.  Not the tiniest sound could be heard anywhere.  Sophie had never known such a silence.