Wonderland Creek

by Lynn Austin

  “Hey, Alice. Miss Lillie told me the good news.”

  “The news? What news?” Had she told Ike that Mack was alive?

  “That you’re gonna be staying in Acorn, after all.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “I’ll come by for you at two o’clock on Saturday, then.” I stared at him blankly. He gave me a grin that would make most women swoon. “You said that you’d love to come with me and hear me fiddle on Saturday if only you was staying. Well, now you’re staying.”

  Yes. I had said that. Because I’d thought I was leaving.

  “So put on your prettiest party dress, and I’ll be back for you at two o’clock on Saturday. See you then. Bye, Miss Lillie. And thanks again.” He jogged out of the library like one of Faye’s boys, only Ike was six feet tall.

  “Do you think I should go with him?” I asked Lillie.

  Maybe she would call Ike a snake, like the sheriff, or warn me to be careful like she had with Maggie Coots. Instead, she said, “He’s a nice boy. There’s no harm in going.” Mack had agreed that Ike was a talented fiddle player. He had seemed to like Ike Arnett, and I did, too. He was a little too handsome for his own good, but he was sweet. And romantic. The flowers he had brought me were still flourishing in the Mason jar on my desk. As Lillie had said, I supposed there was no harm in going. I saw her watching me from the kitchen doorway with an amused grin on her face.

  “Why did you let him take Mack’s jacket?” I asked her.

  “Because dead men don’t need hunting jackets.”

  “But Mack isn’t dead.” I wondered if Lillie’s memory was failing or if she was starting to believe her own lies.

  “Honey, you sure enough can’t keep a secret, can you? You whisper that once too many times and you gonna get Mack and us in a heap of trouble.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s been a terrible day.” I sank down in the chair behind the library desk. Work had piled up again and I could barely see Lillie over the stack of books waiting to be carded and shelved. She hobbled forward to stand in front of me.

  “I see you came home in the sheriff’s car. How’d that happen?”

  “I went up to the mine to use the telephone—and to snoop around for Mack—and the sheriff caught me breaking into the office. He didn’t press charges, thankfully, but he drove me to his office so I could use his telephone to call home.”

  “I hope you was careful what you said on that telephone.”

  “I was. I knew he might be listening.”

  “Did you reach your kinfolk?”

  I could only nod. For some reason, the memory of my father’s calm, pastoral voice brought tears to my eyes and a lump to my throat. I hadn’t had time to get homesick until now. Lillie seemed to read my thoughts.

  “What do you miss the most about home?” she asked quietly.

  “A bathtub.” I gave a shaky laugh, trying to make a joke of it. Lillie didn’t laugh.

  “Well, why didn’t you say so? We got a bathtub, honey.”

  “We do?”

  “Follow me and I’ll show you.”

  Lillie led the way upstairs to her bedroom, climbing as slowly as a toddler. I followed, reluctant to get my hopes up since everything else in Acorn was as antiquated as in the pioneer days. She opened the door to her huge closet and sure enough, beneath a rod of clothes was a big copper bathtub, large enough to sit down in. In fact, it was about the same size as our bathtub back home. Lillie would drown in it. But I didn’t see any water faucets.

  “Where does the hot water come from?”

  She bit back a smile. She must have thought I was very ignorant. “You make a fire in the stove, honey,” she said patiently, “and you heat the water as hot as you want. It works best if you bring the tub down to the kitchen and fill it halfway with well water, then add the boiling water until it’s just right.”

  It sounded like a lot of work, but I was desperate for a good long soak in a real tub, especially if I was going out on a date with Ike Arnett. “This will be wonderful,” I said. “I’ll drag the tub downstairs and take my first bath on Friday night.” I couldn’t help smiling as I maneuvered the bulky tub out of the closet, sneezing at the dust cloud I’d raised.

  “You can take a bath whenever you want to,” Lillie said. “I’ll even give you a sachet of lavender to put in the water so you’ll smell even sweeter than you already do.”

  “Thank you, Lillie. That’s very kind of you.” I would have hugged her if she hadn’t been so frail. She reminded me of a dried-up twig that would snap in two and crumble if you touched it. I was surprised to discover that I was growing fond of Lillie in spite of everything she had put me through. I sensed that underneath her conniving, gun-pointing ways, she was a fine person. And though it irked me to admit it, I could see that Mack was a good person, too.

  The next day was Thursday, so I rode my usual route to the Howard farm, the school, and Maggie Coots’s cabin. I could saddle Belle without too much help now, and I was getting used to climbing on and off her back several times a day. Everyone had said I could learn to ride a horse if I put my mind to it, and I guess they were right—unless Belle suddenly decided to quit listening to me, that is. I didn’t kid myself that I had any control over her. She obeyed Miss Lillie’s and Mack’s orders, not mine. I had never known that horses were so smart, even though Freddy and I had read Black Beauty and every other horse story we could get our hands on as girls.

  The day’s ride went smoothly, and I looked forward to seeing Maggie and telling her that I had decided to stay. I knew we could become good friends. As Acorn’s only flatlanders, we had a lot in common. As I neared her house, though, I suddenly heard a crack that sounded like gunfire. Was someone shooting at me the way they had shot at Mack? I nearly tumbled out of the saddle in fear, and the sound must have scared Belle, too, because she picked up her pace, forcing me to hunch over in the saddle and hang on for dear life. She was only trotting, but it seemed like a gallop as we thundered into Maggie’s yard. I sagged in relief when I saw Maggie out by the barn, aiming her rifle at a row of tin cans. She lowered the gun when she saw us and beckoned to me. I dismounted and tied Belle to the hitching post, then sauntered over, still holding my chest to keep my wildly pounding heart inside.

  “Belle and I heard shots and they scared us half to death. I’m glad it was only you. Are you doing some target practice?”

  “There’s a wildcat roaming around here. I saw paw prints on my property. Make sure you keep your chickens locked up, and whatever you do, don’t come up into these woods at night.”

  My heart went from a trot to a gallop again. “Do wildcats ever hunt in the daytime?” If so, my riding days were over. Done. Finished.

  “Usually not. But I’m worried the cat will come after my goats one of these nights. I have two new baby kids.” Maggie reloaded the rifle, took aim, and fired. The bullet hit one of the tin cans with a metallic plink and knocked it over. She took aim at another can. Boom. Plink.

  “Where did you learn to shoot like that?”

  “Hank taught me when we started having all the trouble at the mine. He wanted me to be able to defend myself. He’d be worried about me now because I don’t have a watchdog anymore. That’s probably why the wildcat has been hanging around my place.” She pointed the rifle again. Boom. Plink. “Want to try it?”

  “No, thanks. It would be a waste of ammunition. I’d probably end up shooting myself . . . like Mack did.” I was pleased that I had worked Mack’s “accident” into the conversation. Lillie’s accusation that I couldn’t keep a secret had stung. But as soon as I’d spoken, I felt guilty for telling a fib.

  When Maggie ran out of bullets, she invited me inside. We sat at her table sipping tea and talking about our favorite characters from the books we’d read. We both agreed that Jo in Little Women was at the top of our lists. Spending time with Maggie was like a little taste of home. I hated to leave. “But I’ll be back,” I promised.

  I stopped to see June Ann on my way do
wn the creek, even though it wasn’t my day to visit her. I arrived to chaos. The dog was barking, the baby was crying, and so was June Ann. “Here. Hold Feather for me,” she said as soon as I’d dismounted. She shoved the baby into my arms before I could refuse.

  “What? . . . Why?” I clutched Feather awkwardly, unsure what to do. Her little face was crimson from crying, her tiny arms and legs stiff.

  “I just need a break from her,” June Ann called as she hurried down the porch steps.

  “Wait! I don’t know how to take care of a baby this small.” But June Ann didn’t seem to hear me. She jogged through the gate and up the trail into the woods. Now what?

  I carried the baby inside the dreary cabin and walked the floor with her propped against my shoulder. I hummed every song I could think of to soothe her as I patted her back, but she continued to wail, her mouth uncomfortably close to my ear. Whatever was wrong with Feather, it hadn’t affected her lungs.

  It seemed like a very long time passed before the baby finally ran out of steam. I felt her shudder a few times as her tiny body relaxed against my shoulder and she fell asleep. I waited five more minutes to make sure she stayed asleep, then carefully laid her in the cradle and went looking for June Ann. She was sitting on a rock near the edge of the woods, far enough away, I guessed, so she couldn’t hear Feather’s cries. Tears still rolled down her face, leaving streaks on her dusty cheeks.

  “Are you okay, June Ann?”

  “I don’t know. I guess so. I just had to get away from her for a while. She cries like that every day and she just won’t quit. Nothing helps. She ain’t hungry or wet.” June Ann swiped at the tears that continued to fall.

  “Do you think something’s wrong with her? Is she sick?” I would have suggested a doctor, but I knew better by now.

  “No, she ain’t feverish or nothing. She’s got the colic, I guess. But it gets on my nerves something awful when she cries like that, and then she can tell I’m upset with her and she cries even more. I love her so much, but sometimes . . . sometimes I just need her to be quiet so I can think.”

  “I’m sorry you’re having such a hard time. I wish I knew what to do to help.” I took June Ann’s hand in mine and held it for a moment. She drew a deep breath, as if drawing strength from me, then let it out with a sigh.

  “Thanks, Allie.” She released my hand to climb off the rock, and we began walking slowly back to the cabin. “Miss Ida the midwife came up a few times to check on us. She says Feather is fine and nothing’s wrong with her; she’s just got the colic.”

  “Did Miss Ida say what to do about it?”

  “She said to try rubbing her back, but that don’t help. Ida’s gonna ask Miss Lillie to make a potion for her.”

  “Good. I can bring it with me the next time I come.”

  “Miss Ida thinks I got the baby blues. She says they’ll go away soon.”

  I decided to change the subject and help June Ann get her mind off the baby for a little while. Maybe her tears would stop, too. “How did you like the last book I brought you?”

  “I ain’t finished with it yet, but it’s pretty good so far. I wish I could read when I’m up late at night with Feather, but we ain’t got money for lamp oil.”

  I made a mental note to bring June Ann some lamp oil, too. Heaven knows I wasn’t using any of it to read at night. After hauling firewood, caring for the animals, cooking breakfast and dinner every day, and rinsing out my clothes in the kitchen sink, I didn’t feel like reading at night. I climbed into bed at the end of each day and slept like a dead woman, paying little attention to the bat flying all around my room.

  June Ann and I talked about books for a bit, and I warned her about the wildcat roaming the woods. “Yeah, I smelled it a couple of times, so I been locking all the animals up at night. This dog of mine barks loud enough to wake the dead. He’ll keep a whole clan of cats away.”

  On the way back to the library, I stopped to see Mack. I had to climb off Belle and sit on his porch to wait for him, but he finally crept out of the underbrush like a Cherokee sneaking up on a pioneer. I was still so jittery from the gunshots, and the screaming baby, and news of a wildcat roaming loose, that I jumped a mile when Mack said hello.

  “Oh! Don’t startle me like that!” I snapped.

  “I’m fine. How are you?” he snapped back. He sat beside me on the steps, waiting until we both calmed down.

  “I stopped by to tell you that I went to the mine office yesterday. I had to break a window to get in, and after all that trouble, the telephone was dead.”

  “Did you check the files for me?”

  “The drawer I opened was stuffed full of papers.”

  “Perfect!”

  “What are you planning, Mack?”

  He shook his head, warning me not to ask.

  “Well, while I was in there snooping around for you, the sheriff showed up.”

  Mack didn’t seem surprised. “What did you tell him?”

  “The truth. That I needed to use the telephone. He was kind enough to drive me to his office, but he asked a lot of questions while he had me in his car.”

  “What kind of questions?”

  “Some were about you—how long I had known you, that sort of thing. He also asked about Miss Lillie. I didn’t want to say too much, but I didn’t want to sound like I was hiding anything, either. He drove me into town and let me call home from there.”

  “Hmm. That’s a problem.”

  My temper flared again. “Why is it a problem that I called home? My parents have a right to know that I’m okay, even if I am staying with a bunch of liars and snoops and . . . and . . . who knows what else?”

  He rested his hand on my arm to calm me. “I’m glad you called home, Alice. It isn’t that. But the sheriff must have someone watching the mine if he showed up so quickly. That’s the problem.”

  “You don’t think it was a coincidence? I didn’t see anyone following me along the way.”

  “I don’t believe in coincidences where he’s concerned. If he has spies watching the mine, then it’s going to be a problem for me to get back in there.”

  “I really don’t want to know what you’re planning.” Which was just as well because Mack didn’t seem inclined to tell me. “You should also know that Cora’s brother Clint has been asking me a lot of questions, too—where I’m from, what I’m doing here. When I told him I was from a town near Chicago, he got very suspicious and said that Chicago is where all the gangsters lived.”

  Mack laughed out loud.

  “I’m glad you think it’s funny. Will you be laughing when Clint takes a potshot at me, too?”

  “I’m sorry.” He ran his hand across his face as if to smooth away his smile. “But it’s hilarious that Clint would think you’re a gangster. Look at you! You’re like one of those dainty porcelain dolls from Germany, with your curly blond hair and peachy skin. I don’t know how Clint or the sheriff or anyone else can believe you’re up to no good.”

  Was Mack flirting with me or making fun of me? I couldn’t decide, but it reminded me of another question that I needed to ask. “Listen, tell me what you know about Ike Arnett.”

  “Ike? He’s like a younger brother to me. Why?”

  “Well, your ‘younger brother’ was up in your bedroom when I got home yesterday, digging around for your hunting jacket. It seemed as though he’d been up there for quite a while. He said he wanted something to remember you by. Lillie let him take it.”

  “That was my favorite coat. I guess it serves me right for dying.”

  “He also invited me to go to with him on Saturday to hear him play the fiddle with his band.”

  Mack rose to his feet to stroke Belle’s shoulder and muzzle. I couldn’t see his face when he asked, “So are you going?”

  “If you think it’s all right, yes. You seem to know the character of everybody in Acorn better than I do.”

  “Ike’s fine. He could go a long way with his fiddling if he could catch a break.
I was trying to help him get to Nashville . . . before I died, that is.”

  “Your death has been inconvenient for a lot of people, including me.”

  “Go with him, Alice. You’ll have fun.”

  As soon as I got home, I went searching for Lillie. I wanted to ask her about making the potion for June Ann’s baby. I found her upstairs in bed. She looked so pale and worn-out that it worried me. “Are you okay?”

  “Just weary, honey. How was your day?” I told her about June Ann and baby Feather. “Yes, Ida came by asking about medicine for the colic. If you got time tomorrow, you can help me make some. It ain’t hard, but I don’t think I can do it by myself.”

  “Sure, I’ll be glad to help. I’m worried about June Ann more than the baby. It seems like she cries as much as Feather does.”

  “Sounds like the baby blues. Ida said June Ann might have a case of them.”

  “Is there anything that might help her, too? Besides someone to talk to?”

  “We can fix some tonic that might help her.”

  “Nobody in this stupid town will visit her because of the feud. I don’t suppose you have a remedy for that, do you?”

  “Only Jesus can fix that mess.”

  The next morning, Lillie felt strong enough to get out of bed again. I was relieved. After breakfast she got out her “picking basket,” and I helped her walk outside so she could show me her herb garden. “This is where I grow things to make my medicines.” She pointed to an overgrown patch of sprawling plants, bordered with stones. “I ain’t had the strength to pull all them weeds this spring, but there’s some good plants growing in there. If I tell you what I need, think you can pick them for me?”

  “Sure.” I looked around for snakes first, since I had seen one slithering through the grass near the chicken coop the other day. My hesitation seemed to puzzle Lillie.

  “Why you looking all around like that? Something gonna jump out and bite you?”

  “I saw a snake in the grass over there,” I said, shivering as I pointed.