The Winter Sisters

by Tim Westover

  “I assure you, I won’t dig a new Tallulah Gorge with my footsteps.”

  “Well, sure, sure.” Renwick’s friendly expression did not change, but he stepped closer. “But in the second place, Doctor, I don’t want a teetotaler pacing back and forth in front of my store. Makes my folks nervous. Sometimes, Boatwright will stop in, raving about the costs of sin, or Mrs. Maltbie will make a fuss about her drunkard of a husband and how we’re all leading him to perdition. But I’ve got every right to keep my store, and my folks got every right to drink there, if they like.”

  “Given that they drink in moderation,” I protested.

  “Or not in moderation,” said Renwick. “A man can get liquored up if he’s got the money to pay for it. It’s a free country, isn’t it?”

  I wondered that a man of Renwick’s race would call this country free. Nine-tenths of his fellow Negroes in Georgia were slaves.

  “Just sayin’… be a lot more healthful if you were out in the forest, Doctor.”

  I started—the word “forest” was more menacing in Lawrenceville, for all its wild unknowns.

  Renwick read the emotion on my face. “Oh hell, Doctor, I didn’t mean it like that. I was only thinking that there’s not so many of these hogs or tanning vats or cooking fires. The forest is healthful when there’s not a monster in it.”

  “I don’t credit those rumors, Mr. Renwick. Do you believe there is really a giant panther stalking the woods around us?”

  “I ain’t seen it, and I ain’t talked to anyone that’s seen it. But all of them at the Flowing Bowl have. Everyone’s got a cousin, a friend, a farmhand who’s got a glimpse of it. No paw prints. No fur. No teeth marks. There’s been a couple mad dogs, but that’s not the same as a panther, is it? Raccoons can be rabid, and no one’s going to hide under his pillow because a raccoon might be after him.”

  I did not think myself a cowardly man. A person cannot be prisoner of a rumor. I would not be afraid of this panther until I’d seen it with my own eyes.

  “And so what part of the forest should I go to, Mr. Renwick? There’s forest all around.”

  “If you follow this road,” he said, indicating a footpath that extended past Honest Alley, heading east, “it’s nice and flat—shady, too. That’d make a nice walk.”

  I looked at the path out of town that headed east. “And there aren’t any Indian war parties that take this same constitutional? Any bandits or robbers?”

  “No, all the Cherokee are north of here. And the robbers—I keep them liquored up at the Flowing Bowl.” Renwick stepped away and put his hand on the door to Parr’s Confectionary. “I’ll tell Ouida Bell you said hi.”

  I did not want to seem suspicious, and I especially did not want to seem lecherous toward this Ouida Bell. True, she was comely, and she was surely the object of every young fellow’s desire here in town, but I had never been one to seek out companionship, marked as I had been by sadness. No one was as kind as Eva or as noble or as tragic, and while I was engaged in my studies, I needed the solitude to master my discipline. A sip of ether came to my aid whenever a pang of loneliness distracted me, ether being far quicker than courtship. I had no wish for a dalliance in Lawrenceville—to love and leave is worse than not to have loved at all.

  So I decided not to perambulate the town square anymore lest others think I had intentions other than the improvement of constitution. I passed Honest Alley on my right and followed the path Renwick had shown me.

  Lawrenceville’s civilizing influence ended half a mile from the town square. Fields and pastures surrendered to aboriginal forest. Ash and elm and chestnut knitted into a verdant canopy. Low pines and rhododendrons and scattered spiny bracken lay on the forest floor, unkempt and untamed. With more industry and ingenuity, the people of Lawrenceville could transform these woods into useful land: fields, pastures, cabins, and orchards. The little rivulets could be dammed to drive a small wheel, enough to mill corn or turn a lathe. Lawrenceville need not be such a monotonous smear of nature. I kept a sharp eye on the underbrush and an ear tuned to the sounds of the forest, but they found only the regular features of the wild. Nothing, nothing to fear.

  I met a turnip wagon headed toward town. I stopped to salute the driver, and the mule yawned broadly in my face, its breath smelling of turnips.

  “Where’re you headed for?” asked the driver, who’d given his name as Pa Everett.

  “Just a little farther up the road, and then I’ll turn back,” I said jauntily.

  “Just a little farther up the road, you’ll hear a sound like an organ playing.”

  “What’s that? A nest of bees?”

  “Bees? Nope. Pigeons. Sight to see.”

  “I have seen a pigeon before.”

  “A pigeon, huh? Well, maybe you go a little farther up the road. Sight to see.”

  Pa Everett slapped the reins, and the turnip-breathed mule lurched into motion. As it moved its hind legs, it expelled a flatus that reeked even more strongly.

  I watched the wagon disappear slowly back down the road I’d traveled. I didn’t have any interest in a pigeon that sounded like an organ playing, but nor did I want to turn around just yet and follow behind that mule. I thought it best to see what this pigeon was all about. That would allow time for the air to clear, and I’d see what passed for genuine spectacle in the countryside.

  A quarter mile farther, I started to hear the organ sound. It grew louder as I continued, but the pitch remained constant. A single pigeon couldn’t keep up a song like that. Was it a geological feature, water echoing through a rock? The canopy cleared above me, and I emerged into a glade. The sound was all around me now. What could it be? Then, looking upward, I realized that, roosting on every protrusion from the gray trees, were pigeons, thousands upon thousands. What I’d thought at first glance were leaves and branches were wings and beaks. Pigeons stood on top of other pigeons. Pigeons collided in the air with other pigeons. Pigeons roiled and mated and snapped and scratched. The ground was snow-white with their droppings, and the ammonia made my eyes water. Their calls blended into one continuous hum. It was indeed a sight to see but unnerving in its immensity.

  A single pigeon poses no danger, but a thousand little beaks? They could tear me into bite-sized morsels. I willed my breathing to slow down, moved my right foot back an inch, and repeated the motion with my left. I eased backward, never blinking, mesmerized by the millions of black eyes.

  Then, musket fire crashed through the glade, and dozens of birds fell from their places. Bodies raised puffs of desiccated excrement where they fell to the forest floor. The bullet sent the assembled millions into chaos. Beating wings raised a gale of droppings and feathers. The whole sky was squalling. I dropped to my haunches and covered my head as birds flew past my ears.

  “Whoo-whee!” shouted a voice above the din. “Hodgson, I got twenty in one shot!”

  “What’s that, Pearson?”

  “Twenty, I said!”

  Pearson’s footfalls were coming nearer. The wings thrashing above my head did not permit me to make any response.

  “Eighteen, nineteen, twenty! Wait, twenty-one! Whoo-whee, one better!”

  The ground rumbled with the nearness of his bounding leaps.

  “Aw, shit,” he said, and all the bounding ceased. “That ain’t a pigeon.”

  “It’s the damn doctor. You shot the damn doctor, Hodgson.”

  “I didn’t shoot him. That was you! You shot your twenty pigeons—”

  “Twenty-one,” said Pearson.

  “Twenty-one pigeons and one doctor. That’s some kind of record, but some kind of felony, too.”

  The sound of the pigeons faded, and my heartbeat quieted. I took my arms off my head.

  “Wait, he ain’t dead,” said Pearson.

  “You ain’t gonna hang after all,” said Hodgson.

  The pair was standing right over me, blocking out the sun. Both men were tall and wiry, their legs like cornstalks. Pearson’s head was covered in dirty blond
curls. Hodgson’s complexion was much darker. He had a waxed black mustache. Pigeon blood and streaks of fresh droppings spattered their clothes. Feathers were tangled in their hair.

  I struggled to my feet. Neither Pearson nor Hodgson offered to help me up, but they stepped back to give me room.

  “Doctor, I didn’t mean to shoot you,” said Pearson. His hat was against his chest. “I was aiming for them birds.”

  I took off my jacket so that I could beat the pigeon shit out of it, and with each whack, I remonstrated with the duo. “It’s irresponsible, sirs. This is a traveled road. What if a pigeon carcass had hit me on the head? What if I’d had a heart palpitation and dropped dead right here?”

  “We weren’t thinking,” said Hodgson. His eyes were downcast, and he scrawled in the white dust with the narrow toe of his boot.

  “Well, see that it doesn’t happen again.” I slipped my jacket back on and tugged at the hems so that it snapped against my shoulders. “Wait—what the devil is that?”

  A black shape moved behind Pearson and Hodgson. They turned to follow my gaze.

  “Pearson, Pearson, it’s that panther!” said Hodgson. His voice was a whisper, but it filled the glade. The noises of the pigeons had vanished.

  In an instant, the rumor turned to sinewy muscle and knotted flesh. It was no mountain lion. It was far too large. For a moment, I could not believe the evidence of my own eyes, but if a man of science cannot believe his own eyes, his own senses, what can he believe? I had thought this panther an impossible tale, a ghost story grown large on the credulity of simple folk, but I should have heeded them. Now the panther was there, and my life was the price I’d pay for my arrogance.

  Its jaws hung open, and great strands of white foam trailed from between its fangs. Its eyes bulged from their places, dark swellings half clouded with its disease. I am a doctor of only a single animal, the human animal, but I could see in that creature the same affliction I’d seen on Eva. Maniacal thirst. A quivering violence, coiled and ready. Poison, infection, affliction. The panther snuffled along the ground, approaching some of Pearson’s slain pigeons. Hodgson sighted down his musket barrel. The creature was ten yards away, an easy shot. He pulled the trigger, and half a dozen birds dropped from the trees.

  “Damn it, Hodgson! You missed him.” Pearson threw his hat to the ground.

  “Got six birds, though!” Hodgson bumped his fist against his companion’s shoulder. “Wasn’t even trying.”

  “You ain’t gonna get to eat them, idiot. That panther is gonna get them.”

  “Damned if I’m gonna let it make off with my kills!”

  Pearson fumbled at his belt and pulled out a knife. He rushed at the creature, which turned its head toward us. The creature hadn’t been startled by the gunshots. Its hunger or malice made it deaf to danger.

  Pearson, slashing the air, stumbled. The creature lunged and missed. The two opponents moved past each other. Hodgson had reloaded his musket. He fired again, missing both beast and birds. That time, though, the creature had enough. Its natural instinct overpowered its inner rage. With still enough sense left, it turned toward the woods and fled, its pawfalls kicking up clouds of pigeon guano so that the beast left behind a trail of what seemed like white smoke.

  “You better run, you damn meat sack!” Pearson shook his knife at his fleeing enemy, but the gesture of defiance made him wince. He pressed his free hand against his arm then pulled his arms toward his chest, doubling over.

  “Did he bite you, Pearson?” asked Hodgson.

  “No, not a bite. Clawed me.”

  Hodgson peered at the arm Pearson was holding up. “Aw, quit your moaning. That’s a scratch.”

  I was still rooted to my spot. The sanguine rush filling my head put a pounding pressure on my temples. “That was a panther. A rabid panther. Not a mountain lion or a wild dog.”

  “Yeah, doc, it sure was,” said Pearson.

  “But there is no panther. And yet it bit you. Maybe infected you.”

  “Not bit. Clawed. I’ve been clawed and bit enough to know the difference, and this is a clawing. Hurts like the devil.”

  I had to put the upheaval in my mind aside, because poor Pearson needed my attentions. The panther—the impossible panther—had fled, and the danger was past, and a man needed my help. I willed my bowels to obey me.

  “Let me see,” I said.

  “Doc, it’s only a scratch,” said Hodgson, dismissing his partner’s wound. “I’ve had worse from a tomcat.”

  “Only a scratch?” said Pearson through gritted teeth. “Why don’t you get scratched like this? Then you can tell me it ain’t nothing.”

  I put weight on Pearson’s shoulders, guiding him to a sitting position, and knelt down beside him. The claw marks were there, and they’d broken the skin, but claws can’t pass rabies. That’s not where the infection lives. It lives in the mouth, in the bite. Mad dogs had mauled people, but unless the people were bitten, they hadn’t been infected. If only that dockside cur had scratched Eva instead of putting its poisoned teeth into her leg…

  That is what my doctor’s training told me, but it also told me there should be no such thing as a panther in the Georgia mountains. I could take no chances.

  “I need to bleed you,” I said. My hand went for my jacket pocket, where I kept a small traveling kit: a lancet and a few essential chemicals. My fumbling fingers, still perturbed by the recent traumatic events, untied the bundle with difficulty.

  “Naw, Doctor.” Pearson’s eyes grew wide. “No bleeding. I’ve got an ointment.”

  I thought I’d misheard. “Ointment?”

  “Yeah. Stinky, oily stuff. Last month, I put a nail through my foot. Went up to Hope Hollow for it, before all this panther stuff started up, when folks weren’t afeard to make the trip. Rebecca Winter mixed it up. I’ve got some left. Much better than a bleeding.”

  “You can’t put a balm on this, man! This is an actual flesh wound. It needs debridement. Stitches. Laudable pus—”

  “Ointment worked on my foot just fine,” said Pearson, curiously defiant for a man who’d just been attacked by a rabid panther. “You’re not going to bleed me.”

  “Maybe I can talk it out, Pearson,” said Hodgson. “Read it Ezekiel.”

  “Dummy! No, you can’t.” Pearson lifted himself up. “A doctor’s got to do that. Doctor, do you have a Bible? Know Ezekiel?”

  I did not carry a Bible in my traveling kit. A fine Southern Protestant would never ask for last rites. “Why a Bible?”

  “Ezekiel will stop the blood faster than stitches,” said Hodgson. “I’ve seen it, Doctor. Sarah Winter did it for my momma. You know Ezekiel?”

  I swallowed my reaction. My feelings on religion were best not to air. “I think, sirs, that we should save prayer for more dire circumstances.”

  “Then maybe we do nothing,” said Pearson, as if it were an equal option among a menu of treatments.

  “Yeah, we do nothing,” said Hodgson, nodding. He sat down beside us with a whump, sending up a cloud of white pigeon dust.

  “Nothing’s the worst you can do, Pearson! Don’t give up hope, man. I’ll bleed it to get the poisons out. I’ll blister your feet to get the sanguine humor flowing away from your arm. Sulfurous phosphate to cauterize the incisions. That will bring up a laudable pus, which we’ll keep flowing so that the humors—”

  Pearson shook his head. “None of that, Doctor. Next, you’ll be amputating.”

  “I refuse to permit it.” I folded my arms, and as soon as I did, I regretted it, for the gesture made me look like a petulant child.

  It wasn’t their fault. They hadn’t half a cup of sense between them. The blame rested on the Winter sisters. I pleaded, I lectured, and I scoffed, but in the end, I was made helpless by their ignorance. Pearson leaned on Hodgson as we hobbled back to Lawrenceville, and the only role left for me was carrying the slaughtered pigeons. I spent the entire walk stoking the fires of my anger. Since the panther was real and the rabies wa
s real, that made the threat of the Winter sisters a reality too. I could not ignore their superstitions, knowing what I knew now. I would confront these sisters and make them answer for their lies.

  3

  HOPE HOLLOW

  “Effie shouldn’t be out there all by her lonesome,” said Sarah.

  “She’s not a child,” said Rebecca, blowing out the last candle and leaving the room in full darkness. “She’s old enough to know what she should and shouldn’t do.”

  Sarah huffed and pulled the covers off Rebecca. “You get up and help me look for her.”

  Rebecca grabbed the quilt and tucked herself back in. Sarah clenched her fists.

  “Get out of the damn bed, Rebecca. Get your boots on.”

  Rebecca sat up. Sarah could barely see the outline of her face in the meager moonlight that came into the cabin.

  “I wouldn’t be any help,” said Rebecca. “Listen, if you don’t find her in an hour, come back and get me.”

  “I’m taking the gun,” said Sarah.

  “You’re afraid? Of what?”

  “Just… not anything.”

  Sarah left the cabin door open behind her. If Rebecca wanted to keep the mosquitoes out, she’d have to get up.

  The woods were still. Sarah liked the sounds of animals, the sounds of life, when she could understand the woods and what was moving in them. But, when the wind stayed silent, and the pigeons and the owls and the cicadas kept to themselves, and the deer and the foxes hid in their homes—those were menacing woods. Silence was mystery.

  Sarah held up a hand around her mouth to amplify her voice. “Heya, Effie! Get your bony little behind to bed!” Nothing moved, though: not an owl and not Effie.

  She checked the clearing by the scrying bowl. She checked the cornfield and the lemon-tree grove. She scouted around the shed where their nameless mule slept. No sign of her. Effie had wandered out late several times since they’d fled Lawrenceville, but Sarah had always found her close to the cabin. She’d been counting the fireflies among the sweet-potato vines or threading her way through a labyrinth of tousled rocks over the ridge, but not tonight.