10.9 The Witchling Shama
“Frank, you’ve distressed me the most. Shama has done nothing to provoke your distrust. She has been endlessly accommodating, loving, and caring. You should receive her as a potential bonus to end your stubborn, bachelor-prone ways. You would, if only you could lay your suspicions aside and SEE her as the person she is.” Willow had leapt from my arms at the introduction of either my yells or the arrival of the two men. She was back to rubbing her head against Mrs. Penn, acting like she was Mrs. Penn’s familiar and not mine. I tried not to let that disturb me. It wasn’t like I didn’t have other matters of concern at the moment. Both boys were softly crying and clinging to me as if their heart had once more been ripped open and shredded in the anger of the moment. I knew that was my fault for being so upset by Mrs. Penn’s offer and by another rejection in trust by Officer Krugel, plus the suspicions of the doctor. I bent over and hugged the boys, doing my best to soothe them while murmuring soft words of love. My caring for them was certainly no lie. If I could take them with me, I definitely would, but they belonged in Tinkle Town, and I sometimes had doubts as to whether I would ever truly belong. My past always seemed to catch up to me. “Not, you, too, Doc. What gives you the right to lecture me about what I wish to do?” Mrs. Penn said fussing angrily at him. Whatever he’d whispered, I hadn’t heard. “You already have a daughter,” he lectured Mrs. Penn. “She’s your rightful heir and shouldn’t be displaced by the first young female who crosses your path and offers kindness while you’re ill. What would your daughter say about this idea?” “Is this the same daughter who hasn’t bothered to come to visit me in three years?” Mrs. Penn asked with an ascorbic tongue. “Besides, I never said I was going to write her and my grandchildren out of my will. I only said that I want to adopt this girl. I went ahead and bought this house from the Council. Shama can inherit it, and my daughter can have the home she grew up in — not that she wants it. “But you’re talking like I’m about to die,” she added. I have no intention of doing so. I just want to enjoy my last years on Earth, and this child is how I figure on doing that, if she’ll let me. Since Frank over there is too stupid and too prejudiced against newcomers to see it any other way, I plan to have myself a family. If the Council would let me, I would love to adopt . . .” She suddenly stopped, slapped her hand over her mouth and said, “That’s enough of that. My mouth is running away with my intentions. Shama hasn’t said yes, and so we have a stalemate.” She scooted up in bed, smoothed down the covers, and said, “Frances, are you ready to read to me now? I think you can see Shama isn’t going anywhere. I’m planning on asking if she’ll let me live here with you permanently, so we can all be a family. Would you like that? Could I be your grandma?” Frances was nodding emphatically. Then, Carlo, glancing first at me, then back at his brother again, followed suit. “Grandma,” he said. I sighed, feeling trapped. Was this a good thing? Wasn’t it what I’d always wanted? Why did I feel chills running up and down my spine?
10.8 The Witchling Shama
“That noise you heard was only Shama’s humble and amazed scream when I told her I planned to adopt her and give her my name,” Mrs. Penn declared, looking proud of herself and laughing at the two men in their struggle to enter the room, since neither of them was willing to back away and let the other go first. “Frank, let the doctor come in and verify my sanity, please. You can follow after.” I stood up, ready to retreat. Unfortunately, although Frank had followed Mrs. Penn’s order and allowed Dr. Stevens to enter the room, he still stood in the doorway, barring my exit. “I am glad you are here,” Mrs. Penn told the doctor. “Now you can both be witnesses. I plan to adopt the child. Will you attest to my wishes?” Dr. Stevens turned his head to regard me. He studied me a moment in silence. “What do you have to say to that?” he asked me. “I . . .I . . . I” A croaking frog would have been more agile of tongue than I with my dumbfounded stutter. “I see,” the doctor said. He swung about to stare at Mrs. Penn again. “What do you know of the girl’s history? She’s a vagrant, an intelligent child, it is true, but without more information about her background, we cannot be sure that she . . .” “Enough,” Mrs. Penn yelled out. “I didn’t ask your opinion. Only your witness to the fact that I have laid down my intentions.” Frank finally strolled into the room. “Did Shama put you up to this?” Was Frank back to his scowling distrust? That angered me. I whirled about. “I didn’t ask for any of this. I simply did a good deed and have paid for it ever since with . . . “You’re going to leave us,” Frances said, suddenly running into the room to thrust himself at my body, an arrow that stung both with its force and through its words. Carlo, right behind him as always, formed a second thrust of animated protest. “No. I didn’t say that. I only meant . . .” I don’t know what I would have said then. My tongue was numb with distress. My heart was an open sore. Hurt was a rumbling volcano of lava that was only one second from rupturing. “Everyone, quiet down. Shama, sit down. Boys, be still. Men, hush.” Mrs. Penn’s voice was not as strong as formerly, but it still had that element of schoolmarm demand. We all obeyed like a group of naughty little children.
10.7 The Witchling Shama
I had just brought Mrs. Penn a cup of tea. She’d returned to her bed, still weak enough to relish an afternoon nap. She motioned to put it on the table, which I did. Then she asked me to sit down so she could discuss a few things with me. Willow looked up and winked. I knew then that something was brewing, something much stronger than the weak tea I’d brought Mrs. Penn. “Willow and I have been chatting,” Mrs. Penn said. Okay, I blinked at that. In fact, my eyes must have widened fatter than the iris of a sunflower. Two possibilities: either Mrs. Penn was hallucinating or . . . A familiar could only speak to a witch. A commoner could never hear them. Was Mrs. Penn getting sick again? Had she had a relapse? “No, I can see that my words have worried you. Willow explained that you are too young to be fully developed, but she says that I, even though I have almost no white witch power, once had that tendency. I could have been a witch, had I known. But that is neither here nor there. I can hear her, Shama, and I know what you are and why you left your former home.” I bolted up, ready to run off, ready to leave Tinker Town and everyone I’d come to love. “Shama, stop,” she said, holding her hand up like I’d seen Frank do when he wanted to halt someone’s retreat. “I will not hurt you with this knowledge. In fact, I will never allow any harm to come to you. We are bonded, we two.” I cautiously resettled myself on the chair, on the edge, it’s true, but at least, I hadn’t scrambled to the door, fleeing into the wilderness of an unknown future. My eyes fastened on Mrs. Penn’s. I was listening, not understanding where this was going, but willing to hear her out. “I would like to adopt you, if you’d let me. Maybe that’s the wrong word. You are twenty, almost fully grown, but I want to give you my last name, at least. Will you let me do that?” I had not expected anything that wonderful. The breath fled my lungs as surely as if I’d fallen off Frey and been purged of air. I gasped but found no relief from the suddenness of my lack. “Willow, go to her,” Mrs. Penn commanded, and just as strangely, the kitten leaped into my arms, purring air back into my lungs. When my breaths were regular, and my huffs and puffs a mere memory, I regarded Mrs. Penn with skepticism. “Have you taken leave of your senses? If you know about me, and I don’t understand how you could know — and Willow wasn’t even with me in the village. She couldn’t see what happened there.” “She knows. Old Mother talks to her, and . . .” “Old Mother is dead.” I shot up, at the end of my tolerance for such a strange conversation. “What’s this yelling about?” Frank and Dr. Stevens cried out, storming into the room in a massive surge of masculinity that meant neither were able to get through the doorway.
10.6 The Witchling Shama
From that day on, Mrs. Penn slowly recovered. Dr. Stevens said it was due to the medicine he’d given her, and I didn’t argue, knowing that his formula for what ailed Mrs. Penn used the very same ingredients I had recommended. But I knew something he didn’t. It was the purr of my familiar that had kept Mrs. Penn from diving down into death’s spiral. Willow had saved her life. The two had bonded during their time together, the kitten spending almost every moment beside her in the bed. The soups I’d been fixing Mrs. Penn were replaced soon by normal meals. Willow, who up to that time had never been willing to eat from anyone’s dish but mine, began accepting pieces of meat or vegetables that Mrs. Penn offered her. Poor Frey was feeling rejected since Willow was spending so little time with him. I promised the stallion extra treats and began grooming him twice a day to help make up for his loneliness. The boys helped, too, although Carlo only liked the feeding carrots part. Grooming, even with a step stool, was not agreeable to him. I think he was afraid of being up high, or having Frey move unexpectantly which he feared might send him tumbling down to the ground. Frances dutifully began reading to Mrs. Penn, and, of course, Carlo, his forever shadow, sat beside him and listened. It was good for all three of them, and Willow purred the whole time, obviously delighted by all the positive vibes flowing about the room. A week later, Dr. Stevens declared Mrs. Penn able to get up for a bit. Then the reading activity moved into the living room. Carlo liked that better because he could sit on the ground playing with his toys while listening to the purring cat, his big brother’s reading, and Mrs. Penn’s light discourse. And me? I was as happy as the rest of them. Maybe even more so. Life was turning sweet as the boy’s favorite banana ice cream. (Not my favorite, but no one else liked vanilla.) Oh, and Frank, who still spent most of his off hours at the house, had completely stopped glaring at me. Old Mother used to warn me that When Nature is plump, the fattened fawn grows lazy. That had made no sense at the time. Nature’s weaning process usually took place during times of scarcity, but Old Mother was the smartest person I’d ever met. She knew things that no one else did. She was right about this, too. I was the fattened fawn.
10.5 The Witchling Shama
After dinner, Frank volunteered to do the dishes. He got the boys to help. (I cringed a little at that, wondering what the kitchen floor would look like when the dishes were done, but I also knew that it was a good thing when boys were taught that kitchen duty was not a woman’s thing. Learning that meal prep required clean-up was also a useful concept.) Dr. Stevens and I entered the room where Mrs. Penn was sleeping. I was carrying a tray of food, and he had his medical bag. Mrs. Penn opened her eyes and ordered me to take the food away, saying that the sight and smell of it made her feel ill. I offered to fix her some soup, but she didn’t act like that would be welcome either. Meanwhile, the doctor and I made sure that our patient drank some water. I had brought some apple juice, as well, but Mrs. Penn wasn’t willing to even take a sip of that. Dr. Stevens did his doctor thing, administered some liquid medications, which he assured Mrs. Penn and me would fix her right up, then departed. The moment he left, Willow came running into the room, jumped up on the bed and walked her way up to Mrs. Penn. I tried to stop the kitten, but she dodged my efforts. Meanwhile, her purr was so loud that Mrs. Penn opened her eyes. “Why, Willow has come to see me,” Mrs. Penn said, sounding so pleased that I stopped trying to stop Willow from rubbing her kitty face against Mrs. Penn. “Should I take her away?” I asked. Mrs. Penn shook her head, smiled at me, and spoke. “Absolutely not. I feel better with Willow here. Will you let her stay with me? Please?” “You remember that she’s only a kitten. Any moment now she’ll decide to jump on a toe she thinks is wiggling, lick your cheek, or attack your hair.” Mrs. Penn actually let out a giggle. A girlishly cute giggle! “Oh, I hope so,” she said. She reached out and petted the kitty, stroking her head, then under her chin. Willow’s purr grew even louder, although I wouldn’t have thought such a thing were possible. I mean, it was already so loud, it sounded like the boys when they crooned along with one of the songs I sang to them at night. “Oh, my,” Mrs. Penn giggled again. “I think I’d love a cup of tea. Would you mind making one for me, Shama?” Of course I agreed. I left Willow as she was, up on the bed, snuggling right on top of Mrs. Penn’s pillow. The purr was still going, Mrs. Penn was chatting to the kitten, and both of them looked as content as a small child with his first ice cream cone. When I returned with the cup of tea, it was to find both kitten and Mrs. Penn fast asleep, both tucked under the blankets. I set the cup of tea by the bedside, in case Mrs. Penn woke up later, but I figured it had been a wasted trip — except, I could hear the exhale of Mrs. Penn’s gentle snores. Her breathing sounded better, no longer as congested. Her chest wasn’t heaving giant whistles and lengthy stressed breaths, either. I left the door open in case Willow needed to leave, but just before I exited the room, I met the half-opened eye of a fuzzy kitten. Thank you, Willow, I thought in witch tongue. The kitten yawned, tucked her head back under the cover, and purred with a renewed and mighty motor.
10.4 The Witchling Shama
That whole day, Mrs. Penn spent in bed. We tiptoed about the house, making sure not to wake her. Frank, although he left to do whatever officers do in the daytime when they’re not irritating the heck out of people like me, popped in for lunch and returned again at dinnertime. I was in the kitchen, putting the last touches on the green beans and mashing the already cooked potatoes when I heard a heavy knock at the door. Dr. Stevens, I thought to myself, recognizing the door basher. Frank called out that he’d let the doctor in. I was glad, because I had a pot roast to get out of the oven, and I still wanted to fix a green salad, although I knew the boys wouldn’t be enthusiastic about it. They weren’t vegetable fans. Frances, in particular, always tried to hide anything green under the unfinished leftovers on his plate. I’d already warned him about stomach aches and that the failure to eat vegetables might stunt his growth. I hoped that wasn’t a lie. I’d have to ask the doctor privately. “But he wants to look like Frank,” Carlo had said when I’d told Frances that needing vegetables to grow tall. Carlo looked worried about that. “Will Frances get muscles if he doesn’t eat vegetables?” Frank snorted, but backed me up. He pretended to like vegetables, but I was pretty sure that he felt more or less the way the boys did. Perhaps it was a male thing, I surmised, reflecting back on some of the fathers back in the village who had also frowned at the pile of greens on their plate. I’d had to start frying bacon and mixing it in the greens to get them interested in vegetables. I wondered if that would improve Frances’ reception to them. I had the full dinner on the table when Dr. Green sat down by the plate I’d laid out for him. Before sitting next to the boys, I asked the doctor if we should assist Mrs. Penn to the table, but he shook his head. “She’s better off resting. After dinner, we can take her something, but I’d rather she kept to her bed.” So, we sat down to partake. I had my usual salad, which the doctor frowned at. “You need meat, young lady,” he said, looking like he was ready to give me a full lecture on nutrition. “She never eats meat,” Frances said. “And she never gets sick. She told us that.” “Yeah, and she rides like she’s part horse,” Carlo said. It was hard not to chuckle over that. It was a strange thing to say, but Carlo’s meaning was clear. I rode well, not that I looked like a horse (I hoped.) Anyway, the doctor got caught up in his eating and forgot his lecture. His preoccupation with his meal meant that I was free to enjoy my salad. (It didn’t have meat, but it did have peas, cheese, and a sprinkling of walnuts, so my protein sources were well supplied.) Willow, who almost always sat on the floor beside me, eyed the doctor with a suspicious eye, but remained in her place, patiently waiting for my leftovers. (Yes, one would assume that a cat would not eat salad, but Willow had odd eating habits. Only rarely did she take a piece of meat from one of the boys, and then only to be friendly, not with great eagerness. I worried that cats were naturally carnivores and needed meat for their sustenance, but cats are cats, which means they can’t be argued with. Obstinacy and self-reliance are in their persona.)
10.3 The Witchling Shama
“Too bad we can’t fetch Bill. He’d love it here,” I said wistfully. “I think people would be kinder to him and old Clarence in Tinkle Town.” “Was Bill your boyfriend? Should I be jealous?” I laughed. “Sure. Bill was my boyfriend. He and his horse Clarence.” “Real competition, I see,” Frank said, kidding me, but looking a touch worried. “Tell me about him. How old is Bill?” “His thirties, I guess. I don’t know why they sometimes called him Old Bill. He should have been Young Bill.” I’d walked over to the faucet and the bar of soap I kept next to it. I began to soap up my hands with a good, solid lather to remove any nastiness from my manure collecting. Frank followed me, his lips twisted into a sour expression that didn’t look like he was enjoying the conversation anymore. “Did Bill ask you out? Were you dating?” I laughed again. “No one dated where I was from. Not ever. When a boy liked a girl he just started showing up for meals in the young woman’s house. Then the two would sit on the porch swing or play a game with the younger kids while her parents kept watch. As for me, I never had anyone take an interest in me. I had no family, no last name. You know that.” “What does having a family or a last name have to do with it?” Frank had grabbed my arm to stop me from walking away. I looked down at his hand and cleared my throat to get him to remove his overly possessive hold. If he understood my throat clearing, he ignored it. “What does not having a family or a last name have to do with not getting yourself a beau? Obviously, you and Old Bill had something going on.” I jerked my arm away. “Bill was not my beau. He was a man with the mental age of a five year old. Probably, Carlos is smarter than he was. But Bill was kind, and he liked me. No one else did for a very long time. “Wow. Explain that one, Shama, although you still haven’t answered my other question. I absolutely do not understand about the things that went on in that village of yours.” “Which is good,” I snapped, hopefully ending the conversation, “because I don’t want to talk about it. That’s my past, and I left it behind. Hopefully, the future will be better.” I mock laughed, trying to show that the subject was thoroughly closed and that we needed to move on. I hoped the officer would finally get the message and stop his constant inquisitions.
10.2 The Witchling Shama
Since the boys were enjoying themselves chasing each other around, I figured it would be a good time to scoop up some manure. Cleaning was an everyday practice with horses. Flies and angry neighbors made it a necessity. I still didn’t have a wheelbarrow, but doing clean-up regularly kept my load from being too great. I was using the shovel I’d found in the shed. I think it was a snow shovel with a flat portion and a long handle. Of course, I’d accidentally dropped plops on my way to the garbage bin. “That’s not practical,” the man said, watching me with an amused look on his very handsome face. “You need some kind of cart, and how are you going to deal with dumping the garbage can when it’s all full?” “That’s a good question,” said. “Don’t you have someone who comes around to pick up the trash?” The officer, Frank, shook his head and tried to take the shovel away from me. I held on, so, of course, more plops hit the dirt. “Let me do it. You don’t have to do everything by yourself.” Another head shake from me, and Frank shrugged his shoulders and gave up. I quickly cleaned the piles that had fallen off the shovel and tossed Frey’s goodies in the trashcan. “Nope,” Frank said. “No garbage collection now. We used to have a guy who did that, but he moved away, retiring to the village where his children live. You know his old house. It’s the one with the corral and the trough you emptied out.” That announcement caused me to dump a whole shovelful. Exasperated by my carelessness, I sighed, then scraped the stinky stuff back into a pile that I could lift and carry again “Bill used to take care of our village trash,” I said, remembering the way he’d smiled at me whenever he saw me. Bill had been a nice man in his thirties, but unfortunately, according to Old Mother, he’d been born wrong and had the brain of a child. Bill liked to talk and talk, even though he really didn’t have much to say. The villagers were rude to him and said he wasted their time. The children made fun of him. I’d liked Bill and used to bring him cookies whenever I made some. Bill loved to pet Frey, although he had his own pal, an ancient nag with bones like a skeleton horse. The gelding’s name was Clarence, and Old Bill said that his “old bag of bones” was his best friend in all the world. How could you not like someone who talked to his horse and shared half of each cookie with his best friend, the carthorse? Once I deposited the last bit of poop into the bin, I turned to face Frank. “So where do we dump the trash, and how is it going to get there?”
10.1 The Witchling Shama
After I finished the dishes, I worked with Frances on his reading and drilled him on his addition facts. He seemed to have a good head for numbers and liked doing word problems. Carlo wrinkled up his nose and said they were tetious, which after a bit of time, I figured out that Carlo had heard Mrs. Penn saying it (frequently) to Frank. The word Carlo meant was tedious. It was a very big word for such a little boy, but he seemed to have grasped the meaning perfectly. But like Frances, I never found mathematics tedious. I thought math was as smooth and fluid as a poem, part magic and part logic. I loved the consistency of it, yet, also admired how it rippled snakelike in contortions that kept one occupied by its adaptability. I mean, take three numbers: 3, 4, 7. The family of them plays with each other: 3 + 4 = 7, and 4+3 = 7, 7 – 3 = 4 and 7- 4 =3. But then in multiplication, and it becomes a brand new family with a 12 involved: 3 x 4 = 12, 4 x 3 = 12 and then there was division with all the fun ways of writing it. Yes, it was like a complete story with all the characters being numerals. I frankly loved manipulating its dance moves. I told Frances my joy with being a juggler of numerals, and once the boys heard what a juggler was, they insisted on going outside to become jugglers. We first filled up a couple of unmatched socks Mrs. Smith had shoved into the basket down in the basement. Stuffed with rags and a bit of sandy dirt from a pile in the corner of the yard, our juggling balls were ready. Of course, they were very inferior for our game, but we didn’t have any others. It seemed better than nothing. We carried the “balls” over to the side where we wouldn’t fall over the picnic table. We started with one, just tossing it up and catching it. (I was thinking that apples might work better, but Frey wouldn’t like us tossing them anywhere other than into his mouth.) Carlo lasted about two minutes. Frances persisted at least twice that long, but, even catching one sock ball seemed to defeat him. When I showed him how a real juggler could work three balls at once, his eyes popped big and he cried out, “You’re wonderful, Shama. I’m going to be just like you when I grow up.” That was a rather laughable sentiment, but I didn’t even crack a smile. I was too busy concentrating on keeping my fake balls in the air. When I finally dropped them, Frey moved in to pick up one with his teeth, then ran off with it. Willow swooped in on a second ball, swatting it about as if I’d made the thing just for her. Meanwhile, the boys bent over in laughter as they watched our juggling balls disappear as play toys for our two resident animals. Once the boys stopped laughing, they shrugged, not caring in the least that their juggling practice was over. They were already bored with the activity and ready to play tag.
9.30 The Witchling Shama
We were sitting at the table talking, or rather Dr. Stevens was. He was telling me about cases and the treatments he’d rendered. He’d already offered to let me go with him on the next call for his services. “She will not be attending patients with you,” Frank said as he entered the room. “She has a job taking care of the boys . . . and now a sick Mrs. Penn.” I looked over at Frank, surprised that he’d said that. What gave him the right to put his foot down about what I could and couldn’t do? Dr. Stevens hoisted himself up. “I guess I’ve overstayed my welcome. It was nice chatting with you, Shama. If the officer ever allows you some freedom and you want to . . .” “Thank you, Doctor, for coming over to check on Mrs. Penn. When should we expect you to return?” Frank had been very rude. I felt like my mouth must be gaping wide with exasperation, even though I knew it was perfectly and politely closed. Yet, my temper was rising, my blood boiling inside me. How dare Frank more or less forbid me to accompany the doctor out on a case! The moment the doctor left, I opened my mouth, ready to lambast Frank’s uppity manner. But Frank was already raising his hand for my attention in the traditional stop that all policemen seemed to master. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that without explaining first. It’s just that Doctor Stevens has a reputation for making advances on ladies. Maybe it’s all hearsay and hot wind. I don’t know, but I do know that if you accompanied him alone, it would scar you with the very worst reputation. The town people would think that you . . .” He stopped, not quite knowing how to proceed. “Oh,” I said. “But I thought Dr. Stevens was sweet on Mrs. Penn. Why would anyone think he’d be interested in me?” Frank laughed, then shoved into the chair beside me. He picked up my hand and kissed it. “You are too modest. You do know that you’re beautiful, right? You’re vivacious, honest, caring, and . . . everything any man would desire in a woman . . . uh, friend.” I withdrew my hand, but not with any jerk of displeasure. It was only that Frank’s words made me feel awkward, and, besides, I had dishes to wash. (And there was that kiss he’d given me before he went out to feed Frey. My cheeks still felt hot from that.) “Did everything go okay with Frey?” I said needing to think about what Frank had said about Dr. Stevens. I certainly didn’t want a repeat of the village mayor’s advances, but it was hard to picture the kindly doctor, who was probably in his seventies, in a role such as that.