Somebody Tell Aunt Tillie She's Dead (Toad Witch Series, Book One) (22 page)

After I picked up a couple gallons of cream-colored latex paint and supplies, I headed over to the Trading Post, to see if they had anything I might need. J.J. was working the counter. Since I was the only one in the store, he followed me around, helping me out.

“So, how you liking that witch house?”

I hesitated. “It’s… gorgeous.”

“But haunted, right? Was I right? I was right, wasn’t I?”

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, you were right.”

“I knew it!” He pumped a victory fist into the air, pleased to get confirmation of his family legend. “See? I told you. Didn’t I tell you?” He leaned forward to whisper to me. “There was even a book written about that house, like a ton of years ago. My ma told me about it when I was a kid. Not many houses are so creepy, people wanna pay to read about them.”

“Really? There’s a book about my cottage? That’s so cool. Is it still in print?”

“Hell if I know. Did you see the J-tree?”

“Seen him, watered him. He seems pretty happy. For a tree.” I picked up a bottle of citronella and dumped it into the basket.

 ”I heard about that cottage my whole life. I always wanted to go check it out.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“No way. I didn’t want to be turned into no tree, taking root right next to my kin. I expect you’ll be moseying on then.”

“Oh, hell no. That cottage is mine. Any and all ghosts will have to take a back seat.” I wasn’t sure where this streak of bravada had come from, but I was feeling distinctly like Ripley in Alien. Or Sarah Connor in Terminator. I am woman, hear me roar.

“Ain’t you ever seen any horror flicks?” J.J. asked. “People say crap like that, right before they get chopped up in little pieces.”

I laughed. “Don’t worry, J.J. No one’s going to mulch me.” At least, I hoped not.

Female roaring aside, I was starving. I’d been so busy dealing with the cottage, I hadn’t stopped to eat. So I grabbed some beef jerky and pretzels to snack on in the car and a large chocolate milk. I was trying to stay away from high fructose corn syrup and trans fats, but they were ubiquitous. Even the milk had high fructose corn syrup. Oh, well. One bottle wasn’t going to kill me.

I took my basket back from J.J. and handed him one of the big, black, cooking cauldrons, just in case I needed to put together something with more spellcrafting oomph. All I had brought with me from Los Angeles was my mom’s small one. J.J. groaned under the weight as he put the cauldron on the counter.

“What kills snakes?” I asked, setting my basket on the counter next to it. Just in case my dream was actually a portent of things to come, I wanted to be prepared.

“Ferrets. They’re nasty little things though. Mean tempered.”

Couldn’t be any worse than a room full of snakes. Snakes creeped me out almost as much as spiders. “Know where I can get one?”

“Pet shop.”

“They’re legal to keep as pets? They’re not legal in California.”

“Well that’s just weird.” He gave me a look, as if all Californians were mental.

“Don’t give me that look. I don’t know why they’re not legal. I’m not responsible for California’s weird pet laws.”

“Maybe it’s a smell thing. They can be kinda stinky.”

I laughed. “Somehow, I don’t think B.O. is illegal in California. If it was, a whole lotta people would be in trouble.” Like half of the pagan community. I’m all for back to nature, as long as it includes soap and deodorant. And clipping toenails. And regular visits to a dentist.

“In Hollyweird? I thought y’all were supposed to smell like money and gold.” He took the items out of the basket and started ringing me up.

I snorted. “Maybe in Beverly Hills.”

Just then, a cute thirty-something guy walked in. Not my usual type — short hair, respectable looking, wire-rim glasses. Normally (according to Gus, at least), the guys I go for look like drug dealers and thugs. But there was something about this guy. The thickness of his neck. The way his sweater caressed the muscles in his chest. The fit of his jeans.

My breath caught in my throat and my heart beat so loud it drowned out the sound of J.J.’s voice. I caught myself staring at the stranger, my mouth hanging open.

As he turned toward me, I quickly looked away. But as soon as he was out of earshot, I grabbed J.J.’s arm. “Who was that?”

“Who?”

“The guy who just walked in. Cripes, J.J., it’s not like this store is full of people.”

“Dudette! Like, I don’t check out guys. I don’t swing that way if you know what I’m sayin’. If you’re looking for a date, the J-ster is at your service. Where would you like to go?”

“Sorry, I don’t date smokers.”

“Well that’s not fair. I thought you California types were big on non-discrimination. It’s that weird smell thing you people have, isn’t it? Admit it. Y’all are smell snobs.”

“J.J., focus!” I felt like shaking him. “Do you want me to keep watering Ol’ Jack? Because he’s looking like he could make a nice piece of furniture.”

That got to him. He sighed. “Paul Raines. He’s the new teacher over at the high school. Humanities or something.”

“Really? So he just moved here too?”

“Oh, yeah. About three years ago.”

“I thought you said he was the new teacher.”

“He is. He’s only been here three years. Have you seen how ancient the other teachers are? They’ve been here like, forever. Hatched out of eggs when dinosaurs roamed the earth.”

“Somehow, I doubt that.” I paid for my stuff. “Why do you think he moved here? It’s not like this place is such a big tourist attraction.”

“Hey, we’re not that backwater.”

I shot J.J. a look and he sighed. “Okay, yeah, you have a point. His family’s from here. Guess he got lonely in the big city.”

“Which city? Chicago? New York?”

J.J. looked at me like I had grown a third head. “No, dude. Trinity Harbor.”

“Of course.” I should have realized the term ‘big city’ was dependent on perspective. I snuck a look down an aisle and just glimpsed his tush as he turned the corner. I thought about hanging around until he cashed out, but that was just too high school for words. A place this small — I was pretty sure I’d run into him again. Besides, thanks to J.J., I knew where he worked. And I still had another stop I needed to make, one that might help me deal with my cottage’s little eccentricities.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The librarian, Mrs. Anderson, was a sturdy, older woman with a kind face and sensible shoes. I explained to her that I had just moved into my Aunt Tillie’s cottage, and I’d heard it had been featured in a book on the area.

“We did have a lovely little book about the old houses in town. It was written by one of the locals. Daniel Roake. He was the librarian here when I was a girl.” She flipped through the card catalog — an honest-to-goodness, index-card system, not a computerized one. “Here it is. Historic Cottages of Bayfield County: Myths, Legends and Facts.”

She wrote down the Dewey Decimal number on a post-it and handed it to me.

I searched the shelf but couldn’t find it. So I searched every shelf in the area, in case it was misfiled. Nada.

I returned back to the librarian, empty-handed. She searched the return cart, the back room, and the shelf of books that needed to be repaired, but couldn’t find it either.

She finally gave up. “We must not have replaced it after the fire. What a shame.”

“Fire?” I looked around. I couldn’t see any sign of water damage.

“Round about fifty years ago. A group of kids were smoking by the feed store, and one of the hay bales caught fire. The feed store, library, newspaper office and school all burnt down before it was brought under control. Tragic.”

“Oh.” I paused. “That seems like an awful lot of damage from a single hay bale.”

“Oh, dear.” She chuckled. “You are a city girl, aren’t you?”

What did that have to do with anything? “I guess so,” I said, blowing out a sigh of frustration.

She took pity on me and explained. “That one hay bale ignited the hundred and fifty bales next to it, and the wooden shed, and the wooden store, and it just kept spreading.”

“Oh, my gosh.” I said, taken aback. I could see the fire in my imagination, way too clearly. “That’s horrible.”

“Yes, it was, dear.”

“Wow. Well, okay. Maybe I can get a copy on Amazon.”

She laughed. “I seriously doubt it. The book was never widely published. Daniel — Mr. Roake — just made a handful of copies. It was a passion project for him, I’m afraid. He bound each copy by hand, with goatskin leather, and included a hand-painted frontispiece. They were truly a work of art. Back before computers were ever conceived of.”

I slouched down over the counter, head in my hands.

“You could try talking to Daniel,” she said, as she started checking returned books back in. “But there’s no guarantee he’s going to be lucid.”

I perked up. “He’s still alive?”

“Just turned one hundred and twelve last Saturday. Oldest man in America.”

Holy crap. “I can’t imagine living that long.” Would it be a blessing or a curse? At that age, do you wake up every morning, looking forward to another day? Or upset that you have another day to fill?

She laughed at a memory. “Daniel certainly is a firecracker.
Good Morning, America
came out for his birthday party last month. They called him a super-centenarian. He thought they were commies and ran them off with his cane.”

“He sounds like a handful.” But I had to smile at the image of a camera crew running from an irascible old man. “What about newspaper articles? If the cottage was that famous, maybe the local paper would have something on it?”

“You can check the microfiche records at the paper, for the newer archives, but the older archive fell victim to the fire.”

I sighed. “Well, Mr. Roake it is. Where can I find him?”

“Shady Valley Nursing Home. It’s down the street from the high school.” She paused in her work. “If he’s lucid, see if he’s got a copy he’d be willing to donate to us. A book like that should be kept safe for future generations.”

I refrained from mentioning how much they had already sucked at keeping it safe. The library, and most of the town, was still made of wood and stone. But for all I knew, maybe they’d since doused everything in massive quantities of fire retardant.

Daniel Roake turned out to be a grizzled old man with a lascivious sense of humor and an obsession with getting around. He had a cane, a walker and a wheelchair in his room, along with Betty Page pin-ups on his walls.

When I told him I had moved into the witch house, he chortled so much, I thought I was going to have to call 9-1-1, just in case he choked on his tongue or something.

But when he heard I was interested in his book, he perked right up. He opened his bedside table and reverently pulled out a small, leather-bound book.

“So, you have Lady Lisette’s cottage. My, she turned this place upside down in her day. My granddaddy showed me a sketch of her once. She was quite a looker, she was.” He eyeballed me up and down, and nodded approvingly. “Looked a lot like you.”

A nurse came in to give him a bath, and despite Mr. Roake’s invitation to stay, I thought it would be easier on my psyche if I didn’t. I had heard stories about what happens to men as they age and I really did not want to risk seeing if they were accurate.

As she started arranging the bathing supplies, I picked up my purse and cleared my throat, to remind her I was still there.

“You can wait in the common room.” The nurse nodded at me. “We’ll be done soon.”

Daniel handed me the book. “Go ahead, take a look. I’m right proud of it, I am. Did all the artwork myself. But don’t you break the spine or crease the pages, missy, or you and I are going to have words.”

I closed the door, so they’d have privacy and went out to the common room.

A few oldsters were roaming around, watching TV, or playing cards or checkers. While some of them sent me curious glances, for the most part, I was ignored. Which was fine with me.

I settled down on a chair and gently opened the book. The leather on the cover was soft and luxurious. And the frontispiece was a beautiful painting of Devils Point, the way it must have been, back when it was a settlement.

I slowly turned to the section on my cottage. There was a sketch of what it must have looked like when Mr. Roake was a small boy. A lot smaller than it was now, and closer in shape to the cottage I had dreamt about in Los Angeles. I eagerly started reading.

The Myth:
The cottage was nestled in a small clearing, deep in the Great North Woods. It was a witch’s cottage, the whispers went, built by the Devil, enchanted and protected by the blackest arts. And day after day, it quivered in anticipation, waiting for the unspeakable something — or someone — to enter its realm.

Despite what should have been the ravages of neglect, time and harsh weather, the cottage thrived, a living being made of wood and stone and clay. And every so often, one of the more foolhardy villagers would screw on their courage with a jug of moonshine and move into the old place, claiming squatter’s rights.