by Bill Crider
However, it has been brought to our attention that there is an actual, practicing witch on the campus of HCC, a witch who, although unrelated to Sarah Good, had until recently a copy of a book about the pagan religion of Wicca on a desk in plain view. This situation begs several questions:
1. Is this the kind of instructor that we want for our college-age youth? A person who dances under the full moon at sabbats to celebrate the changing of the seasons?
2. Could it be that the current bond election has brought some kind of curse on those who are opposed to allowing the college a bigger percentage of our tax dollars?
3. Did Harold Curtin die of natural causes, or was something far more sinister at work?
The good people of our community deserve answers.
16
Sally’s mother had psychic powers. Or so she claimed. She wasn’t psychic in a general sense, which might have had some practical use. For example, Sally wouldn’t have minded getting advance word about which Texas lotto numbers were going to be winners when the jackpot was somewhere up in the millions of dollars, but her mother didn’t claim to be able to predict things like lotto numbers. Instead she claimed that she knew, or at least could sense, when someone in the family was in trouble. There was no use in telling her that such things were impossible. Sally had about as much chance of changing her mother’s mind as she did of running a hundred yards with a refrigerator strapped to her back.
Her mother must have been waiting by the phone. She picked up on the first ring. Even her “hello” had an accusatory tone.
“You haven’t called in a while,” she said.
Sally held the receiver away from her head and took a sip of wine. When she’d swallowed it, she said, “I’ve been busy at the college.”
“There’s more to it than that. There’s some kind of problem. I can sense it.”
Maybe there was something to her mother’s claims of clairvoyance after all. But even if that was true, Sally wasn’t ready to admit it.
“The bond issue isn’t going so well. Dr. Fieldstone has asked me to help out with a few things.”
Sally thought it would be wise not to mention exactly what the “few things” were, and she certainly wasn’t going to mention the e-mail about Sarah Good.
“Dr. Fieldstone is a shrewd man,” her mother said. “You’re by far the most capable person he has working for him.”
Sally’s mother had never met a single member of the HCC faculty, administration, or staff, but she wasn’t the kind of person to let a little thing like that interfere with her right to express an opinion, which to her was not an opinion at all. It was an incontrovertible fact. So Sally didn’t bother to contradict her.
“One of the bond’s major opponents died the other night,” Sally said.
“I had a premonition that something bad had happened. I didn’t read anything about it in the Houston Chronicle, though. Were there suspicious circumstances? There seem to be a lot of those when people die in Hughes since you moved there. Some people have an aura that attracts danger, you know. You could be one of them.”
“There’s nothing suspicious going on,” Sally said, though that wasn’t strictly the truth. “And I don’t attract danger. You don’t have to worry about me.”
“If you had any children, you wouldn’t say that. A mother always worries, no matter how old her children get. It’s just one of those things.”
Sally drank the last of the wine. “Well, in this case, there’s nothing to worry about. My classes are going well, I’m in good health, and Lola is feeling perky.”
Lola had, in fact, returned to the kitchen. She was lying under the table, staring intently at a catnip mouse that she must have brought there earlier in the day. Sally reached down for the mouse’s tail and gave it a tug. Lola lunged at the mouse, missed, and skidded a couple of feet on the kitchen tiles.
“You spoil that cat,” Sally’s mother said, harping on a familiar string.
“I know, but she’s my cat.”
Silence. Sally’s mother was touchy. It was easy to hurt her feelings. The silence might have gone on for a while, but Sally heard the doorbell.
Lola heard it, too. She didn’t like visitors and didn’t welcome the interruption as much as Sally did. Grabbing her mouse in her mouth, she loped away toward the bedroom.
“Someone’s at the front door,” Sally told her mother as Lola disappeared from view.
“That’s a weak excuse to stop talking to me.”
“It’s not an excuse. Listen.”
Sally held up the phone. The doorbell rang again and again.
Sally’s mother must have been able to hear it. She said, “You’re doing that yourself.”
“I wouldn’t know how. I have to go now. I’ll call you later.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
It wasn’t a whine, but there was a minute trace of self-pity.
“I want to,” Sally said. “Good-bye.”
Sally hung up the phone and went to the door. She opened it to find Jack and Vera standing there. Both of them were holding newspapers.
“Have you seen the Journal today?” Jack asked, waving his copy in her face.
Sally shook her head. “I haven’t had time to look at it. I just got home a little while ago.”
“You need to read it,” Vera said, whacking the door frame with her copy.
Sally stepped aside and told them to come on in.
“We can have some wine while I read.”
Jack looked at the empty glass in Sally’s hand.
“Looks as if you have a head start.”
“I needed it.”
“You’re going to need a whole bottle,” Vera said as they followed her to the kitchen.
“Doesn’t anybody know what ‘begging the question’ means any more?” Sally said when she looked up from the editorial.
They were sitting at Sally’s kitchen table, each with a glass of wine and a newspaper.
“I’m glad you can joke about it,” Vera said. “It shows you don’t lose your composure easily.”
“Either that or she’s nuts,” Jack said. “This is awful stuff.”
“I agree,” Sally said. “When an editorial writer doesn’t know how to use the language, we’re headed down the road to hell in a handbasket.”
“Ha. Ha,” Jack said.
“Come on, Jack. Lighten up. You, too, Vera.” Sally tapped the paper with her finger. “This sounds bad, but at least whoever wrote it had the sense not to name any names.”
“It’s just a matter of time before names are mentioned,” Vera said. “Somebody has my book.”
“I was wondering about that. How did anybody manage to get it? And how can anybody be sure it’s yours?”
“It has my name in it.”
“Now you’re the one who’s making jokes.”
“I wish I were. But writing my name in my books is a habit with me, something I’ve done with every book I’ve owned since college. Whenever I get a book, I write my name inside the front cover.
“Well, that answers one of my questions,” Sally said. “What about the other one?”
“You mean how did the newspaper get my book? I can’t answer that. I wish I could.”
“The editorial says it was on your desk.”
“It wasn’t, though. That’s just not true. I would never leave it lying out in plain sight.”
“But it was in her office at the college,” Jack said.
“On the bookshelf,” Vera said. “Not on the desk. This is terrible. Terrible.”
Her voice was shaky. Sally had never heard Vera so unsure of herself.
“Let’s all calm down,” Sally said. “I don’t see anything so terrible about it. Think it over. There’s nothing in the least wrong with a college teacher having any kind of book at all on her shelves. You teach sociology, don’t you, Vera? Why should anyone question the fact that you have a book on Wicca or anything else on your shelves? I’ll bet you have books on Budd
hism, Christianity, Hinduism, and a couple of other religions, too.”
Vera’s look of distress turned slowly to a grin.
“You’re right. I do have a lot of books about religion and religious movements. They’re all part of my library. I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.”
“I do,” Jack said. “You were too worried. And you were right to worry. Let’s face it. People have a tendency to react emotionally when they read an editorial like that. They don’t sit down and think things over. We didn’t even sit down and think it over.”
Vera started to frown again. “So what are we going to do now that we have?”
“We’re going to take the offensive,” Sally said. “First of all, I’ll call Christopher Matthys.”
Vera brightened. “The school’s attorney? Are we going to sue?”
“No, but we’re going to have him call the paper and tell them what I just said about the books. Maybe throw in something about academic freedom.”
“I think that’s a great idea. Why don’t you call the paper yourself?”
“It will sound better coming from a lawyer than from an English teacher. And I think I’ll suggest that he say a few things about that ridiculous e-mail, too. Apparently even the newspaper got a copy. It’s turned out to be a lot more than a joke.”
“It was never a joke,” Jack said. “It was meant to do some damage to your reputation and credibility. Did they find out yet who sent it?”
“I sent it,” Sally said.
Vera and Jack both looked shocked.
“Just another little joke,” Sally said, and then she told them what Frankie had found out.
“I always leave my door wide open, too,” Jack said when she’d finished. “I always have. I never even gave it a second thought.”
“I’m the same way,” Vera said. “I’ve never lost a thing.”
“Except that book,” Sally reminded her. “Somebody took it from your shelves.”
“I can’t believe anyone would do that.”
“Someone did, though,” Jack said. “Things aren’t as safe as they seem. From what Sally’s told us, the computer center guys can even come into our offices, take our computers, and do with them as they will. Or search through them right there in the office if they want to do that.”
“That’s outrageous,” Vera said. “We should take it up with the faculty senate.”
“They aren’t really our computers,” Sally said. “They belong to the college. We’re just using them.”
“That still doesn’t give anybody the right to take them and look at our files.”
“Try telling that to Frankie Gomez or to Fieldstone.”
Vera thought about that. “Maybe they have a point. Even if they don’t, I’m getting us off the subject. We can worry about the computer issue later. When are you going to call Matthys?”
“Right now,” Sally said.
“Calling him sounds like a good idea,” Jack said. “But there’s a problem with it. The Journal is a weekly paper. The next issue won’t hit the driveways until next Tuesday. A lot can happen before then, even if they’re willing to print some kind of retraction.”
Sally knew he was right, but she didn’t see what they could do about the delay, other than hope the editorial didn’t stir up any trouble. She was afraid that was a vain hope.
“I’ll call him anyway,” Sally said. “It can’t hurt, and I can’t think of anything else.”
“Might as well give it a try, then,” Jack said, and Sally made the call.
Matthys, as it turned out, was already on the case.
“Dr. Fieldstone got in touch with me earlier,” he told Sally. “As soon as he saw the editorial, in fact. He was irate. I thought he might have a heart attack while we were talking about it.”
“The article’s not libelous, is it?” Sally asked, hoping that he’d say yes.
“No, but it’s irresponsible. It’s full of innuendo and insinuations. I think we can make the paper’s owner and his editorial writer pretty uncomfortable.”
Sally didn’t think uncomfortable was going far enough. She wanted the people responsible for the editorial to suffer some serious repercussions. She asked Matthys if he could at least get some kind of retraction and apology.
“I’ll do my best. You can be sure of that. And here’s another thing. The paper is in possession of stolen property. We can make an issue of that, too. Granted, it’s not very valuable property, but it was stolen from an office, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. Not from a desk, which is what the editorial said, but from some bookshelves.”
“It doesn’t matter where it came from, as long as it was stolen. Maybe we can scare them a little at the paper with that charge.”
Scaring wasn’t enough, either. Sally said, “Hang ’em high.”
“Isn’t that what they did to witches?”
“I take it back,” Sally said.
“Good, because I don’t think capital punishment will apply. Or even corporal punishment. All we can do is worry them and maybe get them to say they’re sorry. But by the time we do, it might be too late.”
Sally said they’d already thought of that. Then she thanked Matthys for whatever help he could give and hung up the phone. Then she told Jack and Vera what had been said.
“I’m sure people will behave rationally,” she finished.
“Yeah, right,” Jack said. “The way they always do. As for me, I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if the peasants hadn’t already armed themselves with shovels and pitchforks. If you look out your front windows, you might be able to see the torches moving up the street through the twilight.”
Vera laughed and patted Jack’s arm. “You really do have a vivid imagination.”
“I stole it from a movie,” Jack said.
“Frankenstein,” Sally said.
“Young Frankenstein,” Jack said, pronouncing the name Frahnkensteen. “That’s the Mel Brooks version of the story, with Gene Wilder and Marty Feldman. I like Brooks’s ending a lot better than the original.”
“‘Oh sweet mystery of life,’” Vera said.
Though there was no wine left in Sally’s glass, she lifted it as if in a toast and said, “To happy endings.”
“Hear, hear,” Jack said, “and the sooner, the better.”
He and Vera clicked their empty glasses against Sally’s.
“Is making a toast with an empty glass bad luck?” Vera asked.
Sally said she didn’t know, and that was when they heard the chanting from outside.
17
Standing in front of Sally’s house was a group of people carrying signs that identified them as members of Mothers Against Witchcraft. Or, as one of them proclaimed, Mother’s Against Witchcraft.
The use of the apostrophe was a dying art, Sally thought as she looked out over the crowd of eight or ten people, all but one of them women. The Mothers Against Witchcraft didn’t attract a big membership.
The members, however, made up in noise what they lacked in numbers. They brandished homemade signs painted on posterboard and nailed to thin sticks of wood as they chanted, “Witches get out! Witches get out!”
Sally was glad to see that nobody was carrying a pitchfork or a torch.
The leader of the mob, if such a small group could be called a mob, was, of course, Jennifer Jackson. Her sign said, Get the Witches Out of Our School! Another woman carried one that said, Witch’s Don’t Belong at HCC!
Sally sighed. They really could use some help with their sign-making, not that she intended to volunteer.
The only man in the group was Sherm Jackson. He didn’t have a sign, and he stood well behind the others, as if he hoped no one would notice him.
Sally was disappointed in both of them, not that she’d expected anything better. Still, after she’d explained about the e-mail, about her nonexistent relationship with Sarah Good, and about libel and slander, she’d hoped Jennifer would let things drop.
She should have kno
wn better. Jennifer wasn’t going to let the facts interfere with what she believed to be true. Sally was getting more and more students like that in her classes. They were always sure that whatever they believed was the truth, and no amount of proof to the contrary could change their minds. If they believed it, it was true to them, and therefore it should be true for everyone. Ralph Waldo Emerson would have been proud of them. But Sally just found them irritating. Maybe they reminded her of her mother.
Sally waited in her doorway, looking from one woman to the other, the way she looked at chatty students in a classroom, not saying a word herself, just waiting patiently until the noise died away.
It was a technique that had served her well in the past, and it worked just as well there at her house as it did in class. The chanting began to decrease in volume until Jennifer Jackson was the only one whose lips were still moving, and very little sound was coming out of her mouth.
Sally waited until there was no noise at all except for the sound of a car driving down the street a block away. Then she said, “Good evening. I don’t know what you think you’re doing here, but I’d appreciate it if you’d get out of my yard and go back home.”
Jennifer raised and lowered her sign.
“Witches get out!” she said.
Another woman echoed her, but not very enthusiastically, and no one else joined them.
Sally didn’t say anything. She just stood there and looked from one face to the other as if she might be memorizing each one. The women began to give one another uneasy glances. Sally knew they were beginning to have doubts about what they were doing, and she thought they would have left within a few minutes if Vera hadn’t appeared beside her.
“There’s the other one!” Jennifer said. She pumped her sign up and down. “They’re together, having one of their witch meetings! Witches get out! Witches get out!”
Encouraged by her sudden animation, the other women joined her, and the chanting resumed.
Sally could see that a few porch lights were on at houses up and down the street. Her neighbors were standing outside and trying to see what all the commotion was.