by Harper Lin
As Becky strained her eyes, she finally saw the jugs and jars around the still. There were also the creepy statues and plaques and carvings strewn all around like miniature guards and lookouts.
From far behind, two more men emerged from the woods. One man was wearing tattered pants and boots with holes in the bottoms. The other man was familiar. Just then fear seized Becky’s heart.
It was the man from the Crazy Calico, the one she had danced with. He turned in their direction just as Becky pulled her head down out of view.
“If you’re threatening me, Mr. Gavin, then I’m going to leave you here to talk to these fellows. And then I’ll send Leelee down. If you’ll excuse me,” Mr. Tobin hissed.
“No. Wait! Tobin. You’ve got it all wrong! I’m not threatening anyone! Tobin! Fellas! You don’t need to get Leelee. Trust me. I’ll just wait. I’ll go about my business, and you tell Mrs. Tobin to come by my store and…”
“We don’t deliver messages,” the man Becky had danced with hissed.
“But this is a mistake. I don’t need to see Leelee. I don’t. Please. Fellas, look. Let me go. I won’t say anything to anyone. You have my word as a gentleman,” Gavin blubbered.
“You see any gentlemen around these parts, Edward?” the man in the torn trousers and holey boots asked.
“Not a one, Zeke,” replied the man Becky had danced with. It was no wonder he had gotten sore when Becky had mentioned the Ruthmeyer fire. If Zeke was muscle for Mr. Tobin, he wouldn’t tolerate anyone flapping their gums about his bread and butter.
“Becky. Becky, we need to get out of here. I don’t want to be a witness to no murder. I’ve seen enough. So Tobin has a moonshine still back here. Ain’t no different from what I said before. And I’ll bet under one of those jugs is a stash of nudie pictures. Now let’s call it a day,” Martha hissed.
“We can’t leave. They’ll see us for sure. Close your eyes and don’t move until I tell you,” Becky whispered back and turned back to the scene unfolding.
Before Martha could protest, everything in the forest went quiet. Becky felt her heart starting to race and pound like cymbals in her ears. She put her index finger slowly to her lips, to which Martha nodded. Just then, the woman with the scarf on her head appeared.
“Leelee, I didn’t mean anything,” Mr. Gavin blubbered. “I’d never turn you in. You know that. I just lost my head. I’ve been a faithful customer for years. You can always trust me.”
“Shh, Mr. Gavin. It’s too late for talk.” Leelee’s voice clutched Becky’s heart like a vise. It was the voice she had heard from the window. That hadn’t been Mrs. Tobin being bossy at all. It was this waif-like maid they called Leelee.
“No. Leelee. Whatever you’re thinking of doing, don’t do it. I have a family. I have a store to run,” Gavin stammered.
“You’ll be able to run your business. But not much else.”
Becky lifted her head and squinted through the leaves. She saw Leelee pick up one of the little jars that had been placed around the still. It was filled with dirt and something else Becky didn’t dare guess at. But it wasn’t seeing that jar that broke her heart. There was something else.
“Mr. Wilcox?” Becky gasped.
Standing off to the side, unseen by anyone else, was the spirit of her favorite friend from the Old Brick Cemetery. His face looked worn, and his eyes darted around as if he had no idea where he was. And they were filled with tears. The dirt Leelee was using for her spell or magic or whatever it was must be from Mr. Wilcox’s grave.
Becky watched helplessly as he silently cried out in frustration and what Becky could only guess was anger. He had lived the life of a hardworking man, not unlike Becky’s own father. He was supposed to be waiting peacefully to be escorted by St. Michael and the Lord’s army of angels into paradise. Instead, he was being dragged unwillingly to this den so Leelee could use his burial ground for her own twisted purposes.
This wasn’t just bootlegging. This was something much darker.
Chapter Fourteen
“Becky?” Martha whispered.
Becky heard but didn’t look at her friend.
Leelee took that jar of sacred dirt and other things and began to wave it around Gavin. He clenched his teeth and jerked like he was going to try and run away. But the two men, Zeke and Edward, took hold of his arms and held him fast. He begged Leelee not to put a curse on him. He promised her everything he had if she’d show mercy.
When Becky looked at the woman with the scarf wrapped so tightly around her head, she didn’t see that same waif she had seen the day of the fire. That woman had looked like she might be helpful, like she might offer a firm but kind word of comfort to the distraught Mrs. Tobin. But this woman looked like a cat enjoying the slow death it was inflicting on a mouse.
“Don’t cry, Mr. Gavin. You’ll be all right.” She smiled a wide, crooked grin as she shook the jar and stuck her fingers deep into the grit then smeared it on Gavin’s shirt. He writhed and tried to pull away, but it was no use. “You go on home to your wife, and you go to work tomorrow. You’ll see. You’ll be fine…until you are not.”
Zeke and Edward turned him loose only to laugh as Gavin tore himself away and began to stumble and blubber his way out of the woods and in the direction of the house.
“Becky?”
“Martha, we’re in deep. I don’t even know what I just saw, but I know we’re in big trouble,” Becky whispered while keeping her eyes on the group.
“Becky?”
Finally, Becky turned to Martha and saw that her friend’s rosy complexion had turned white. She followed her gaze behind them to see two other men standing in the shadows of the trees, almost completely camouflaged. Their mouths were sewn shut. Their skin, once smooth and dark with life, was now ashy, with dirt and grime clinging to it. Their shoulders slumped with the weight of a version of life that shouldn’t have been there. They were alive, but they weren’t living things. They moved, but they saw nothing with their eyes, which looked like those of a boiled trout.
“Don’t move.” Becky’s lips barely moved.
She and Martha were directly in the middle between the poor creatures dragged up from the graves in the shed and the hillbillies from the Crazy Calico. And it couldn’t be overlooked that Leelee was still standing there, surveying the land.
Becky looked around the ground, moving just her eyes to see if there was anything they could use as weapons. The pickings were slim.
“Miss Leelee, what you call them here for?” Edward asked, pointing to the two things that were just a few yards from Becky and Martha. “You know I don’t like them.”
Leelee started to laugh out loud. She shook her head before setting down the jar of dirt that she’d smeared on Gavin. She picked up two mason jars of clear liquid and handed one to Edward and the other to Zeke. Both men were quick to take a sip.
“You don’t like my pets. Better than bloodhounds, they are,” Leelee cackled.
Becky and Martha looked at each other.
At that very second, Leelee stopped laughing and looked in their direction. She sneered, clapped her hands, and said something that Becky thought might have been French, but she couldn’t be sure. Where was Fanny when she needed her?
With jerky, lumbering movements, the poor souls turned in Becky and Martha’s direction and advanced. Without thinking, Becky grabbed Martha’s hand. They jumped up and began to run.
“Get them! Don’t let those boys escape!” Edward yelled.
But it wasn’t from Edward that the poor souls took their direction. It was from the shriveled woman with the scarf around her head. Leelee was their master.
Becky didn’t dare turn around to see what was happening behind her. Instead, she held Martha’s hand tightly and felt as if she was doing nothing more than pulling a kite behind her.
Martha was quick on her feet until…
“Oooph!” Martha’s hand tore from Becky’s.
When Becky turned around, she saw her friend ly
ing on the ground, stunned. The culprit that had tripped her up was an exposed tree root.
“Are you all right?” Becky asked.
“Yes. What were those things? What did we just see?” Martha panted.
“I don’t know. But we need to…”
Just then, one of the poor souls burst through the brush and grabbed hold of Martha’s leg. She screamed as Becky took hold of her arms and tugged. Martha kicked and squirmed and finally remembered the cleats on the bottoms of her shoes. Without a second’s hesitation, she thrust her heel into the creature’s blind eyes. It bellowed and let go of her.
“Come on!”
Becky hoisted her to her feet, and they continued running. The other poor soul was quickly approaching but stumbled over his partner, who had fallen to the ground, still holding his face.
The women made it to Martha’s car, where Becky dove into the driver’s seat as Martha jumped into the back seat and ducked. Within seconds, the engine roared, and they were on the dirt road.
“Where are you going? Your house is that way.” Martha pointed behind them.
“Quick. We need to change back into our dresses,” Becky said as she pulled off her cap and tore the shirt off her back.
“Oh, if your cousin Fanny saw what we were doing.” Martha chuckled nervously. “I do believe Miss Kitty would have you sent away to a convent.”
The car swerved all over the road as Becky undressed down to her intimates before slipping her dress over her head, her foot on the gas the entire time. There were gasps and grunts and a couple of screams as she nearly drove them into the ditch, into an oncoming truck loaded with hay, and over a raccoon lazily crossing the road. Finally, they looked as respectable as two women who had just run through the woods could and pulled the car up in front of a small farm stand and general store.
“I didn’t know this little place was here,” Martha said.
“Me either. But I could use a cold drink,” Becky said as she patted her hair into place and adjusted her garter belts before getting out of the car.
“Becky, if my father knew you had been driving my car, he would have himself one grand tantrum,” Martha chuckled. “Everyone for eight counties knows all about why you don’t have a car. It’s common knowledge, and I think that whole incident has gone down as a feat that cannot be duplicated. Sort of like a circus act that…”
“I don’t think this is the time or place to discuss my driving record,” Becky snapped as she got out of the car and slammed the door. “And if you’ll take a look…not a scratch on her.”
“That’s a miracle.” Martha climbed out of the back seat, adjusting her bra strap and smoothing out her dress. No one inside the store or milling around outside paid too much attention to the new customers.
“I think we made a clean break,” Becky said quietly.
“Becky, what was all that? I’ve seen moonshiners before. There’s an old man with a wagon that goes door to door at my Uncle Samburg’s shanty in Kentucky. He’s as pleasant as punch. A real good egg. Not like that. Not like we saw. Becky, what were all those statues and carvings and things? No. Wait. Don’t tell me. I know what they are.”
“You do?”
“That’s hoodoo. I know it. And if we get found out, Becky, we’re not going to be able to stop it. We’ll be baked in,” Martha stuttered, her eyes wide.
“Let’s not talk about this here. I know a place where we can go that’s safer. But I’ve got to get something to drink. You holding any cabbage? I’ve got fifteen cents.” Becky frowned.
“I think I can match that.” Martha managed a smile.
They each bought a bottle of Coca-Cola and split a moon pie, leaving them enough for a couple of real drinks later. But after they ate and Martha drove a few miles toward downtown Savannah, she had to pull the car over. Becky threw up. She didn’t want to tell Martha how scared she was and how sorry for dragging her into this mess.
“I should have listened to that man at the Crazy Calico and left well enough alone,” Becky said before spitting on the ground.
“And I shouldn’t have dyed my hair blonde for New Year’s Eve last year.” Martha patted Becky’s arm. “We can’t go around regretting every bad decision we ever made. Besides, some of those bad decisions were the best times we ever had together.”
Becky grinned. “I’m sorry, Martha. I should have gone alone.”
“What? So you could have all the great stories and adventures? Look, if you know a safe place to talk, let’s get there. But don’t think for one second that I’m sorry I came with you. If I didn’t want to go, do you think I would have?”
“Yes, because I can be very pushy.” Becky grinned again.
“That’s true.” Martha revved the engine and drove into downtown Savannah and the one-half address on Bryn Mawr Street.
Chapter Fifteen
It was as if Becky and Martha had come inside Madame Cecelia’s store covered in cobwebs. Ophelia dashed over to them. Swatting a kerchief all over their bodies, she muttered something in a language that definitely was not French and then glared at Becky.
“What have you been up to?”
“Us?” Becky batted her eyelashes. “Nothing much.”
“You are covered in it. Get upstairs before more follows you in,” Ophelia ordered and pushed both of them toward the stairs.
Becky took Martha’s hand and led her to the back of the store and upstairs. There was only one man in the whole place. He looked up casually to check out their gams as they went up the stairs and then went back to his own business.
“What is this place?” Martha asked.
“You’ll be pleasantly surprised as soon as we get upstairs. But watch out for Mimi. She’s trouble.” Becky smirked, feeling better the second she stepped across the threshold to Madame Cecelia’s store.
Cecelia opened the door before Becky could knock and yanked both women inside. “Oh, you’ve really put us behind the eight ball on this one.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know where else to go,” Becky pleaded before looking at Martha. “You remember Madame Cecelia from your party?”
“I…do. Madame Cecelia, it’s nice to see you again.”
“You, too, Martha. I do hope that nice boy who was stabbed in your home hasn’t decided to linger,” Cecelia said as if she were inquiring about a pie plate she had left behind.
“Not that I’m aware of,” Martha replied meekly.
“Good. I can only deal with one crisis at a time. Now, the two of you need to have the sprinklers turned on you like a bulldog that found a mud puddle,” Cecelia said. “Strip.”
“What?” Martha gasped, crossing her arms across her breasts.
“Just do as she says, Martha,” Becky urged. “It’ll be for the best.”
“I’m sorry, but one episode of indecent exposure per day is enough for me.” She looked at Cecelia. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I had to change in the back seat of my car as Becky drove. Have you ever been in a car when Becky is driving? Most people haven’t because of an incident…”
“Would you quit flapping your gums and do as the lady tells you? Sheesh,” Becky interrupted while she pulled her dress over her head and stood in the middle of Cecelia’s apartment in her slip and stockings.
“I mean everything,” Cecelia ordered as she stomped across the room and opened a small closet. She pulled out two silk robes. One was red with bright-green palm leaves all over it. The other was blue with white cranes. “Put these on.”
Becky hurried behind a screen in the furthest corner of the living room and tossed her remaining clothes out before emerging in the blue robe. She stared at Martha, jerked her head toward the screen, and pointed with her thumb. Her friend huffed before stomping across the room to do the same.
“Mother, you’ll take care of these?” Cecelia asked.
Ophelia had appeared in the doorway without anyone noticing. Martha jumped and let out a squeal at the woman’s sudden appearance.
�
�They should be burned,” Ophelia said before spitting on the clothes.
“Oh no you don’t. That is one of my favorite dresses. I danced with Nicholas Hendricks in that dress. One of the best nights of my life,” Martha gushed. “He said he never met anyone who could dance the way I did.”
“That was because that dress snaps in the front, and you hadn’t noticed it had come undone,” Becky replied.
“It was love at first sight,” Martha cooed to her new audience.
“At least lust,” Becky teased.
“That was the last time I ever saw him.” Dramatically, Martha put her hand to her cheek and stared into space.
“He’s not dead. He joined the Navy,” Becky interrupted. “He’s stationed in San Diego, California. Probably has a girl in every port along the way.”
“You two need to shut up!” Ophelia ordered. “You bring in this filth and then blah-blah-blah, you give me headache, too.”
Before Becky or Martha could reply, Ophelia slipped out the door with every stitch of clothing they’d had on.
“Now we have to clean up the rest of you,” Cecelia said.
Within minutes, Becky and Martha had each been nearly drowned in the kitchen sink as one at a time Cecelia washed their hair with special herbs and oil. Then she made them scrub their skin with a rough pumice stone, not letting them finish until their skin was red.
After a thorough inspection, she sat back in her chair by the window, shuffled her tarot cards, and told them to take a seat.
“Do you want to tell me how you got covered with all that?” Cecelia asked.
“Covered with what? I didn’t see anything. Do I need to check my pockets to make sure my money hasn’t been stolen?” Martha squawked.
“Of course not,” Becky said and began to tell Cecelia about what she had seen and heard at the Tobin house that first night she went alone. “Mr. Tobin went stomping off into the woods. I wanted to see what he was hiding back there. Turns out he’s brewing moonshine.”
“But there was something odd about the still,” Martha added as she tugged at the hem of her robe. “There were all kinds of strange statues and jars of stuff all over the place. That was surely hoodoo if I had to guess. I’d hate to hear a fellow who was drinking that shine got mixed up and took a swig from one of those mason jars. Lord knows what would end up in his gullet.”
