The Witches of Snyder Farms (The Wicked Garden Series)

by Henson, Lenora

  “That didn’t mean he was ready to give up—at least not as long as he could still talk. What he said then tore me to the soul, but his words just made Mama madder.

  “She stepped toward him and pressed the barrel of that gun right against his head. She said—and I’m quotin’ her here, because I’ll never forget what she said—‘I let you beat me all you wanted, boy, because I deserved it for being stupid enough to follow your lyin’ ass ‘cross the country, but my baby girl ain’t never done nothin’ wrong, and you ain’t never gonna touch her again.’

  “Then she shot that son of a bitch—clap!—right between the eyes.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Irvine, 2010s

  The sound Miss Poni made when she clapped her hands reverberated around the room like a gunshot. Just as she’d intended.

  “Well, Daddy’d dug his own grave. He’d never told anyone in St. Louis where he was running off to. He didn’t stop in downtown Irvine for anything, and he sure didn’t talk to anyone working at Snyder Farm, so he knew nobody here and nobody knew him. If anybody ever went looking for Daddy—and I suppose they did—they had no idea where to find him. Mama and Mr. Snyder buried his body in the remains of the poppy garden, and they dumped his 1926 Cadillac in the lake. And that was that.”

  Ame’s eyes were wide. Gretchel felt like she’d just had the wind punched out of her. They shared a look. Both were remembering the ghouls the Woman in Wool had raised from the Wicked Garden, and both were pretty sure that one of them must have been Colin Ferguson.

  “Now Mama, she never did get over it. She felt guilty about killing him, but I think she felt guilty for falling for him in the first place. The voice got real bad, too. Mama never told me what it said, but it wasn’t anything good, and there were times when it seemed like the voice was in control, not her. She took to the bottle pretty hard after that. She said the booze was the only thing that made the voice go away—just like Bridget had said before her. That old bottle of Scotch on the mantle at the cottage has her kiss of death on the rim. It was the last bottle she drank out of, and I have to admit I’ve had a swig of it myself... but just once. It did make the burning in my belly go away for a time—or maybe it makes more sense to say that it replaced it with a different kind of burn—but I knew that wasn’t the way. I knew that burning wasn’t just pain. It was power. I’ve spent a long, long time trying to understand how to use that power.”

  Miss Poni shook her head to bring herself back to her story. “Anyway, me and Mr. Snyder tried to help Mama. He and a few of his men built her the beautiful little sanctuary on the island in the lake. They fenced it in and laid the pentagram themselves. We tried to convince her to do her rituals, ‘cause she could do them in the open now, but she was already too far gone. She’d just sit out there on that island and watch the ripples in the water. Either that, or she would sit and weep in what was left of the poppy field. This went on for seven years. Then she drowned herself.”

  No one in the room was surprised to hear this. They sat in silence for a few moments, out of respect for Carlin, and out of respect for Miss Poni.

  “I was twenty-years-old when she killed herself. There was no one to miss her but Mr. Snyder and me, so I didn’t bother with a death certificate—which is why you didn’t find one.”

  Miss Poni was speaking to Diana, who tried hard not to look vexed. She had wasted so much time looking for a document that didn’t even exist!

  “We never recovered Mama’s body, but I’d seen her die in my mind. I knew the moment it happened, just as I knew that I had no time to save her.

  “I told Mr. Snyder what happened, and he agreed that there was no need to involve the authorities in Mama’s death. ‘Let her rest in peace,’ he said.

  “Well, I let him think that she could rest in peace, but I knew better. Some folks say the lake is haunted…”

  Eli shuddered as he remembered the skeletal hands reaching for him from just beneath the water’s surface.

  “And that may be true, but I don’t think that Mama is haunting anyone. In fact, I think she’s come to our aid at least once.”

  Ame’s eyes were wide. “When the lake rose… that was my great-great grandmother Carlin?”

  Miss Poni nodded her head in agreement. Besides Miss Poni, only Ella and Gretchel understood what Ame was talking about. Diana could barely contain all the questions she wanted to ask.

  “I think they’re all trying to help us, all those women driven to take their own lives by a spiteful ghost. They may be dead, but they’ll never be free until the curse is broken. Those women—Carlin, Bridget, all our female ancestors for hundreds of years back—want to help us because they need for us to help them.

  Diana couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She was so close to understanding everything, if only this woman would tell her all of what they knew!

  “The trouble is, I suspect they can’t help us much. They weren’t powerful enough to fight the curse in life, and being dead hasn’t exactly made them stronger or smarter. Well, maybe that’s not quite the way to put it. The power Mama displayed when she made the water rise up out of the lake was far beyond any magic she could work when she was alive. But when she speaks to me—and she has, many a time, in dreams—her words are so garbled that I can’t begin to make sense of them.”

  A chill crept up Gretchel’s spine. “And the voices in my head….”

  “Yes, Baby Girl,” Miss Poni said gently. “Like I said earlier, we thought we were doing the right thing when we let you think you were crazy. Of course, after the accident—” She stopped herself. That was nothing Diana Stewart needed to know about.

  “We thought maybe we could save you from yourself—and from our family’s fate—if we put you away for a spell. Your mama and me… we felt like we needed to find out more! We didn’t think we knew enough to save you! But now I understand that you were the only one who could tell us what we need to know. We should have had this talk a long, long time ago, and I’m sorry.”

  Gretchel’s face flushed with anger. Everyone who knew her—that is, everyone except Diana—waited for her outburst. But it didn’t come. She looked at her grand mama’s sad eyes and her mother’s bent head. She looked at Ame and remembered all the ways in which she had failed her own children. And then her rage was gone.

  “So, those foul-mouthed biddies with thick Scottish accents are my ancestors?”

  Miss Poni’s laugh was a dry bark. “I believe so, Gretchel.”

  “They’re trying to help me? You should hear the trash they talk!” Gretchel laughed, too.

  “Are you sure that’s all, Baby Girl?”

  Gretchel thought for a moment. “No, that’s not all. Sometimes they give me warnings. And sometimes they try to help me stay strong. But most of the time, it’s like a never-ending hen party in my head.”

  Diana was listening intently. They were all listening intently.

  “Like I said, they’re wounded things, Baby Girl—tormented all their lives and dead by their own hands. If Bridget and my Mama are typical, they were at least a little crazy before they died and being stuck between this world and the next surely hasn’t made them any more sane.

  “But I believe that with this new knowledge, we can help them. And, if we’re able to let them know that we’re working to break the curse, they’ll be able to settle down and work with us, instead of running in fear from the spirit that drove them to suicide.”

  Diana couldn’t stay silent any longer. “Who is this spirit? Does she have a name?”

  “The Woman in Wool,” Gretchel whispered.

  “Describe her,” Diana commanded.

  Gretchel’s face turned stony.

  Oh, Mother. Eli thought. It’s never a good idea to boss Gretchel around.

  Ame spoke up. “She’s beautiful—or she would be if she wasn’t pure evil. She wears a dress that’s been out-of-style for a few hundred years and it’s beat to hell. And she’s wet—really, really wet.”

  “Oh
, God.” Eli’s voice was hoarse with shock. “I’ve seen her.”

  Diana bristled. She had always known that her son was implicated in the prophecy, but this was too much! “I’m not at all sure that drug-induced hallucinations are relevant here, Elliot.”

  “You’re one to talk, Mother,” Eli retorted, then continued with his revelation, “I was a boy. She was standing on the dock, but I was the only one who could see her. It was a warm day, perfect for sailing. She was wearing a heavy wool dress, and it was dripping. The water puddled around her feet.”

  “You have seen her.” Gretchel’s face was ashen.

  “Fine,” Diana snapped, “Apparently everyone but me has had a lovely visit with this…”

  Miss Poni thumped her cane. “Careful Ms. Stewart. Be careful of your words. To name a spirit is to call it, and you don’t want this one to come looking for you. Trust me on that one.”

  Diana was chastened, barely. “But who is she?”

  Miss Poni’s face was incredulous. “Surely, you’ve figured that out for yourself by now.”

  Diana looked baffled for a moment, but it was just a moment. “The Solstice Twin who drowned.”

  Miss Poni smiled. “I was starting to think that a college education wasn’t everything I’ve been led to believe.”

  Eli was enjoying his mother’s mild mortification when Holly let out a low groan.

  She clutched at her belly and whispered, “Whit’s fur ye’ll no go by ye.”

  “What was that?” Diana asked, knowing full well what the girl had said.

  “Nothing,” Holly mumbled.

  Diana narrowed her eyes and looked at the girl curiously. She decided to leave her alone—for now—grateful that Holly had drawn everyone’s attention away Miss Poni’s comment about her education.

  “Pardon me, Epona, but may I go back for a moment?”

  “I prefer to go forward.”

  Diana was persistent. “It’s just that you never told us what your father said right before he was killed.”

  Eli wished, with every fiber of his being, that he had never inflicted his mother upon Gretchel’s family as he watched Miss Poni sag into her rocking chair and stare out the window.

  After a few moments, Miss Poni fixed Diana with the full force of her gaze. “I never loved my father, and I always knew that he hated me. I wouldn’t have thought that there was anything that he could say to me that would hurt. But the words he said, right before Mama shot him… well, I had heard those words—or versions of those words—so many times in dreams and visions…. Then, I knew that a human sacrifice was about to take place. Now, I know that the Woman in Wool gains strength over us all every time that happens.”

  Diana, for once, was cowed.

  “What did he say?” Ame’s voice was small. She already knew the answer, but she was afraid to hear it.

  Miss Poni looked to her great-granddaughter sadly. “He said I was a no-good witch like my mama and that I didn’t deserve any better.”

  Ame’s voice was numb. “That was the last thing my dad said to me after he beat the shit out of me for the last time. Just before he tried to rape me.”

  Everyone in the room gasped. Eli held her close, cursing Troy for the millionth time.

  Once she started talking, Ame couldn’t stop. “Mom had hidden the shotgun in my room. She knew! I don’t know how she knew, but she knew! She threatened to kill him, but she didn’t—not with the shotgun, anyway.”

  “That’s progress,” Miss Poni whispered.

  “He fell out of the tree the next morning,” Ame finished.

  “And thank the Goddess,” Miss Poni replied.

  Marcus—who had been silent throughout this long, strange afternoon—had had enough. “That motherfucker!” he shouted, slapping his ball cap against the back of the sofa. His greatest wish, at that moment, was that Troy could come back to life so that he could kill the asshole all over again.

  Eli was just as outraged as Marcus, but he felt that he had less license to show it. Marcus was Gretchel’s brother. Eli was merely the boyfriend she’d thrown over.

  “So, my father….” Ame’s voice was shaky. “Was really no different from the men who came before him.”

  “Enough!”

  Miss Poni thumped the floor with her cane three times.

  The room fell silent and all eyes turned to her.

  Marcus saw the tall, straight-backed young woman who had run a 2000-acre farm through flood and drought.

  Holly saw maiden, mother, and crone together in one form.

  Diana saw… the shriveled old woman who surely held the knowledge she had been looking for her whole life.

  Epona turned the full force of her gaze on her granddaughter, and Gretchel shrank against Teddy, shaking her head and whispering, “No. Please don’t.”

  “It’s time, Baby Girl. It’s past time. You say the words, or I will say them for you.”

  Gretchel was silent, quivering with fear.

  Miss Poni turned her attention to her great-granddaughter. Ame met her stare without flinching.

  “Your mama broke the cycle, Ame. She created a child out of pure love.”

  Miss Poni let her words sink into the silence.

  “What does she mean, Mama?” Ame’s voice quavered.

  Gretchel said nothing, her face still buried in Teddy’s chest.

  Ame turned away from her mother and looked at Eli. Their eyes met, and they understood.

  With a single strangled cry, Ame ran out of the house.

  Eli followed right behind her.

  Part Three

  Oregon, 1970s

  Charles Stewart had a paradoxical look on his face—both intensely focused and totally distracted—as he paced a well-worn path along the maternity wing of a private hospital in Oregon. It was the wee hours of the morning. His daughter, Diana, had been in labor since late afternoon.

  “The boy should have been born back home,” he muttered. Charles had been talking to himself, but his son-in-law, sprawled across a plastic seat screwed into the floor, looked up and grinned.

  “So you think it’s a boy, too?”

  Peter’s eternally cheerful voice grated, but Charles had resigned himself to having an American in the family. “Aye. No doubt in mah mind.” His exhaustion showed in his voice. He was usually more careful about his elocution.

  Charles dropped into the hard chair next to Peter. He patted the young man’s knee and looked him square in the eye. “This child will change things. You’ve got to start keepin’ yer nose clean. You know how important being a father is, don’t you, son?”

  Peter’s eyes lit up. “I was born to be this child’s father.”

  Charles was relieved to find that he believed the young man. “My daughter, lad…” Charles searched for the perfect word. “She’s driven. You know this, of course, and she might surprise us all, but she’s not…. Well, she’s not what I would consider maternal—and I say this as a man who married a career woman.

  “This child, this baby boy…. He’s going to need a kind of love that maybe Diana can’t provide. I trust that you’re capable of giving him that, but I just want to know that you understand. And I want you to know that we can help, Diana’s mother and I.”

  Peter smiled. “My mother intends to be a big part of the boy’s life, too. He’s coming into the world surrounded by people who love him, people who are ready to care for him. But I appreciate your trust in me, Charles.”

  Peter’s father-in-law decided to let the informality go.

  Charles started to speak, and then he stopped. For a transpersonal psychologist, Charles was peculiarly attached to phenomena that he could record, measure, and analyze. Or maybe it was because he was a transpersonal psychologist that he was so committed to scientific rigor. He felt the need to prove that the field to which he had devoted his professional life was valid. His wife was the dreamer in the family. Diana seemed to have inherited traits from both of them. Her intensity, however, was entirely her ow
n.

  Charles knew that his daughter had embarked on a new research project. He also knew that the frenzy with which she was attacking her subject was remarkable, even for her. And he knew, finally, that she didn’t want to discuss it with him—possibly because her research was connected to a small amount of LSD that Charles was certain she had purloined from his lab. But he had an inkling that Diana’s work was connected to something he had been working on himself—nothing professional, more like family history. He wanted very much to ask Peter a few questions while they were alone, but he had little faith in intuition, and he hated to intrude.

  “My son will be the messenger,” Peter said softly.

  Charles dropped his head and started to weep. He had no idea why.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Irvine, 2010s

  Ame had wanted this. She had prayed for it, wished upon a star for it, dropped a penny in the lake for it. Now that she had it, she couldn’t figure out why she was so conflicted about it.

  When Eli had first arrived in Irvine, she had thought—for a moment—that maybe he really was her real father. She felt such a strong connection from the first time she met him in that hotel elevator in Champaign. But why wouldn’t her mother have told her? Troy was dead. What did Gretchel have to lose?

  Ame thought about a phrase that popped up in every Graham Duncan novel, Chew on that for a while. So she kept thinking, trying to get to the source of whatever it is that was ruining what should have been one of the happiest moments of her life.

  What she found was grief—and rage. Eli should have been the one to raise her, not Troy. Ame’s mother had destroyed Ame’s childhood by letting her think that Troy, a man who clearly detested her, was her father. Ame tried to believe that her mother had a good reason, but she couldn’t even begin to imagine what that reason might be.

  Ame’s first impulse, when she stormed out the farmhouse, was to get away from there as fast as she could. She almost smiled at the happy coincidence that her father—who didn’t even know that he was her father—had just given her the perfect escape vehicle. Now she pushed her new car faster than she had ever driven it before. Hot tears flowed down her face, and that just made her angrier. She hated to cry. She drove faster.