Silent Superstitions by Catherine Marshall

Author:Catherine Marshall
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gilead Publishing
Published: 2018-11-06T16:00:00+00:00

“That lightning was a sign, I’m a-tellin’ you, Swannie,” Granny said Friday morning as she settled into her rocking chair on the O’Teales’ front porch. “It’s a good thing we ain’t lettin’ the young’uns near that city gal.” She reached out her hand and pulled Mountie into her lap, rocking quietly as she stroked the girl’s hair.

Mary stood in the yard, listening to her great-grandmother talk. She tossed corn kernels to the chickens, who strutted about the yard as if they owned it. Ever since Granny had heard about the lightning strike at the mission school on Monday, she hadn’t stopped talking about it.

It hadn’t taken her long to hear, either. News had a way of traveling fast in Cutter Gap. Of course, by now almost everybody had heard about the raven’s visit to the mission school at the end of last week. They’d also heard about Granny’s carefully prepared mixture of herbs and roots. “Smells plumb fearsome,” Creed Allen had whispered to Mary when his mother had stopped by the O’Teale cabin to get some of Granny’s “curse chaser,” as Granny called it. She placed a spoonful of the smelly mixture on a little piece of rag, then tied it up with a string. It was to be worn around the neck under the clothes—at all times, if it could be tolerated.

Mary thought Creed was right—the mixture did smell horrible—but Granny knew her potions well. And for whatever reason, nobody who’d been around Miz Christy had been hurt yet. Fact was the tree hit by lightning hadn’t done much damage other than scaring some of the children. That very afternoon the preacher had boarded up the broken window.

Mary tossed the last of the corn to Lucybelle, her favorite chicken. She gazed toward the path that led to the school and let out a long sigh.

“Look at that face,” Granny chided. “You look like you lost your last friend.”

“Granny,” Mary asked slowly, choosing her words with care, “if’n the raven and the lightning were signs that Miz Christy’s cursed, how’s come none of us were hurt at church last Sunday or the Sunday afore that? She was right there in a pew a-sittin’.”

“It’s the Lord’s house on Sunday, child.”

“But the children who keep a-goin’ to school, they’re still all right. Creed said so on Wednesday.”

Granny considered. “Well, most all of ’em is wearin’ your granny’s secret curse chaser, for one thing. And for another, that don’t mean bad things can’t still happen. Those parents is takin’ an awful risk, if’n you ask me.”

“Creed said his mama figures he’ll be safe if’n he wears your recipe. She wants real bad for him to learn Latin, ’cause that’s a proper education. So she’s lettin’ him and the other children keep a-goin’ to school.”

Granny held out her hand. Mary squeezed it gently.

“You don’t need no schoolin’ anyway, Mary,” Granny said. “You’re already smart as a whip.”

Mary thought of Teacher’s magic blue eyes as she’d read them the Twentieth Psalm the first day of school.

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