Some Dark Holler (The Redemption of Ephraim Cutler Book 1)

by Luke Bauserman

  The ax she gave to Ephraim. “Ye can chop us some wood for the fire. And once you’ve finished, go inside and get a few apples out of the basket in there for Earl.” She shook out the shirt. “Me ’n’ pappy got to talk.”

  Despite receiving their orders, no one moved. They stayed to watch the granny woman. She walked to her clothesline, draped the shirt over it, then knelt down in front of it and started speaking in a low tone. Before long the garment was waving in answer, sleeves fluttering wildly in the barest hint of a breeze.

  “Isn’t it somethin’?” Ephraim said, looking at Reuben’s and Isabel’s slack-jawed expressions.

  Earl moseyed over and began sniffing the hem of Isabel’s dress.

  “It reminds me of the paper,” Reuben said. He drew it out of his coat and tossed it into the air. It spun and darted in the direction of Sixmile Creek before floating to the ground.

  “Mr. Reuben, the crick awaits ye!” Nancy called from the clothesline. “Pappy says he can smell ye from here!” She pointed at Earl. “Careful, Isabel, that goat’ll eat anythin’!”

  By midmorning, Ephraim had split a sizable stack of wood and had gotten a fire started in the stove. Isabel had cooked a round of cornbread and had a pot of beans boiling.

  Nancy joined them in the Laura and said she had a long story to tell, but she wouldn’t speak a word of it until Reuben returned. Fortunately it wasn’t long before Reuben came back, Earl in tow. His scent had improved immensely, and he was clean-shaven, cheeks still red from the chilly creek water. His only complaint was that he’d lost his hat at the creek. Upon hearing this, Nancy shot Earl a withering glance. He stared back at her unabashed, jaw working suspiciously.

  Isabel served the cornbread and beans, and they ate. Reuben and Ephraim sat at the table, while the women sat on Nancy’s bed. When the last bite of beans had been cleaned from the pot, Nancy stood.

  “I have a tale to tell ye. It begins with my pappy. His name was Abel Eckerlin, and he died afore I was borned. He was Dutch, and when he first came over from the Old Country, he lived in a place called Ephrata, up in Pennsylvany. He was one of them Dunker Brethren, but he took off into the wilderness to live by hisself. He lasted a few years as a hermit, then got friendly with a group of Cherokee that didn’t live too far from him, and that’s where he met my mammy.”

  Nancy stopped and held up a finger. “But the most important thing ye should know ’bout Pappy is that he had the gift of the cunning-folk. I got it from him. “

  “What’re cunning-folk?” Isabel asked.

  Nancy smiled at Ephraim, then gave Isabel the same explanation she’d given him.

  “Oh,” Isabel said. “So what you’re saying is, there’s people born with magic gifts, and the ones who use it for good are like you—healing folks and protecting them. But those that use their magic for evil turn into witches.”

  Nancy nodded. “That’s right, and ye know ’em by their evil eye.” She cleared her throat. “Anyways, the reason my pappy left the church at Ephrata was, he’d made up his mind to study all of creation. He aimed to learn the power and purpose behind every time, season, plant, and critter. He wanted to write it all down in one book, like all the old almanacks rolled together. Accordin’ to Mammy, he done it too, and then some.” She looked over at Ephraim. “If there’s a book out there that’d tell ye how to cure a hellhound bite, it’d be Pappy’s.”

  Isabel grabbed Ephraim’s hand and squeezed it. A flutter of hope stirred deep inside him.

  Nancy looked at Reuben. “Can I see that paper of your’n?”

  Reuben handed it to the granny woman.

  Nancy held the paper up. “Near as I can reckon, this is a page out of my pappy’s almanack.”

  “So where’s the rest of it?” Ephraim asked.

  “That’s what I was talkin’ to Pappy’s shirt about. I asked it ’bout the way this piece of paper behaves. The shirt said, in not so many words, that it’s charmed to find the book it belongs to.”

  Isabel’s eyes grew wide, and she looked at Reuben. “You said that paper keeps trying to go to the church, didn’t you?”

  Reuben nodded.

  “So Boggs has your pappy’s almanack?” Isabel said to Nancy.

  “I reckon that’s right. But I can’t figure how he come by it. That book has been lost for over a hundred years. Nary a soul’s seen it since Pappy was killed.”

  Ephraim stiffened. The book with golden stars and a moon on its cover. That had to be it. “I’ve seen it!” he said.

  “Ye have?”

  “Yes! Boggs keeps it on his desk. The first page in it is torn!” Ephraim closed his eyes, trying to summon the image of the page. What had it said? The year, 1757, and somethin’ ’bout a calendar and seasons.

  Reuben took the page back from Nancy and turned it over in his hands. “You say your pa was killed,” he said. “Who done it?”

  Nancy shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve asked the shirt to tell me many a time. It always says that the story of that day is too sad to bear tellin’. It says it can still feel the places where my pappy’s blood stained it.”

  “Nancy,” Isabel said, “if that shirt was your pappy’s, is it his spirit you’re talking to when you talk to it?”

  Nancy pursed her lips. “Mmm, I don’t reckon so. See, I’ve heard tell that the blood of the strongest cunning-folk is a powerful thing.” She unfolded the shirt and placed it on the table. “Look here,” she said, pointing to a hole in the shirtfront. “I reckon my pappy was wearin’ this shirt the day he was cut down. Now this thing has been washed many a time since that day, so ye cain’t see no bloodstains on it, but I reckon that when Pappy’s blood soaked into the shirt, it passed some of his power into it.”

  The vision of Silas’s blood soaking through his shirtfront flashed through Ephraim’s mind. Guilt swelled inside him, and his wounded arm began to throb. He massaged it under the table. “So you think this almanack will tell me how to cure this bite?”

  Nancy started to nod, then stopped. “Well, when I asked the shirt it said, ‘To free the soul and claim the prize, evil must taint familiar eyes.’” She shook her head and folded the shirt back into a bundle. “I never was much good at understandin’ this fool thing, but it sounds to me like Boggs has the prize that’ll free your soul, Ephraim. If that ain’t the almanack, then I don’t know what it’d be. And if we’re goin’ after it, I think we best wait until Sunday and take it while he’s preachin’.”

  Winter took hold of the mountains over the next few days. From the warmth of the Laura, Ephraim watched as snow covered the ground. The woods were silent beneath the thick white blanket, but his arm kept him from enjoying the peace. The venom was spreading; fingers of blackened flesh soon laced over his shoulder and onto his neck. Sideways glances from Isabel, Nancy, and even Reuben made him keenly aware that his condition was now visible above his collar. The coldness inside him was sharper than the winter nights.

  They left the Laura at dawn on Sunday. It was snowing again. They waited in the woods on the far side of the church graveyard, watching the townsfolk enter the church. When the doors to the church were shut and the faint strains of singing reached their hiding place, Ephraim spoke.

  “All right, let’s go.”

  They stayed low, zigzagging from grave to grave, and made their way to Reverend Boggs’s home. Ephraim darted up the stairs and tried the door. “It’s locked.”

  “Move out of the way,” Reuben said. He walked forward, wiped sweat from his face with a sleeve, and gave the door a powerful kick. The door swung open with the sound of splintering wood. “Go on,” Reuben said. “You know where that book is. I’ll keep watch.”

  Ephraim and Isabel stepped inside.

  Ephraim made straight for the shelf that held the reverend’s books. He scanned the titles. The Higher Christian Life, Pilgrim’s Progress, The Alhambra…

  The almanack wasn’t there.

  “I don’t see it,” Ephraim whispered. “Wait, it was on the desk when
I saw it last.” He threw himself at the reverend’s desk, sliding aside papers and inkwells. He picked up an open tome, only to find that it was the Bible. “It’s gone.”

  It has to be here somewhere.

  He ran to the reverend’s bed, looked under it, then stood and ripped off the blankets and shook them. “I can’t find it,” he said to Isabel, panic rising in his throat.

  Then he remembered the cellar. He lifted the trap door and looked inside. The cellar was bare, just as it had been when he’d slept there.

  He turned to Isabel, lifted his hands, and let them fall. “I don’t know of anywhere else he could have hidden it. The almanack isn’t here.”

  They walked outside. Reuben took one look at Ephraim’s empty hands and said, “He must have it with him.” He threw the scrap of paper in the air, and they all watched as it drifted a few feet toward the church.

  Ephraim took his head in his hands. His only hope for a cure was slipping away. “There’s no way we can get it away from him with the whole congregation in there,” he said.

  They stood in silence.

  Nancy shut her eyes and took a deep breath. She opened them and gazed at the sky. “To free the soul and claim the prize, evil must taint familiar eyes,” she whispered. Then she shook herself and looked at Ephraim, her face grim. “There’s yet a way. I need ye to fetch some things for me.” She looked at Isabel and Reuben. “All of ye.”

  “What? How?” Ephraim asked. “What are you goin’ to do?”

  “Don’t worry ’bout the mules, just load the wagon,” Nancy said briskly. “Isabel, I’ll need ye to build me a good fire and get a pot of water a-boilin’. Ephraim and Reuben, go find me some hackberry leaves. I know the wind’s blowed most of the leaves off the trees this time of year, but try to be quick about it.” She scanned the reverend’s home. “And I need to find a fire poker.”

  By the time Ephraim and Reuben made it back to the house with the hackberry leaves, the water in the pot was boiling, and Nancy had the tip of a poker shoved into the coals at the bottom of the hearth. She took it out and spat on the tip. The saliva bubbled and hissed.

  She nodded in approval. “Go ahead and put them leaves in the water.”

  Ephraim obeyed, and they stood around the hearth watching the dry leaves ride the roiling water. After a moment, Nancy pulled a knife from her skirts and drew the blade across her palm in one swift motion. Isabel gasped, but Nancy shot her a sharp look as she held her curled fist over the pot and let a few drops of blood drip in.

  “As soon as I say so, one of ye grab that pot and follow me.”

  “Wait a minute,” Reuben said. “I think we all need to know what’s goin’ on here.”

  Nancy bent over the pot and studied the concoction boiling inside. “Witchery, that’s what’s goin’ on here. I’m goin’ to curse the preacher man, and the whole congregation. I’ll hold this here poker, and when I give the signal, one of ye need to dump the potion over the hot end of it. It’ll confuse ’em—addle their brains long enough for somebody to sneak in there and grab the almanack.”

  “I’ll do it,” Ephraim said.

  “I reckon Reuben better do it,” Nancy said to him. “That way ye can go after the almanack since you’ve seen it afore. Now, as soon as I’m done castin’ this curse, y’all need to let me clear out. Don’t none of ye follow me or go anywhere near the Laura till dawn tomorrow, ye hear?”

  Ephraim and Isabel looked at each other, perplexed.

  “Where should we go once we’ve got the almanack, then?” Ephraim asked.

  Nancy looked up from the pot, and Ephraim was surprised to see tears in her eyes. “I don’t know,” she said, dabbing her eyes with her skirt.

  Isabel rushed to Nancy’s side. “What’s wrong?” she asked, drawing the granny woman into a hug.

  “The Black Madness,” Nancy said. She pushed Isabel away and tried to compose herself.

  “The what?”

  “It’s what happens when a person becomes a witch.” Nancy wiped her eyes again. “All my life I’ve been a granny woman. My mammy raised me well—I ain’t never used my power to hurt no one. I cure folks and undo the work of witches. If I use my gift to cast a curse, the Black Madness will come over me, and when it leaves I’ll have the evil eye. I’ll be a witch. My gift will turn sour, and it’ll only be good for hexin’—I won’t be able to heal and help folks no more. It was me the shirt was talkin’ ’bout, ‘evil must taint familiar eyes.’”

  Ephraim stepped forward. “Nancy, I can’t have you give up your gift on my account. I’ve ruined enough lives lately. I can’t add yours to the list.”

  Nancy took a deep breath and drew herself up to her full height. “Ephraim Cutler, I’m an old woman and I can choose for myself. I’ve lived a long life, and I know what it takes. Ye done me a good turn that day when ye gave me half of your corn, and I’m a-goin’ to do this thing for ye, and for everyone else that no-good preacher man has harmed.”

  She turned back to the fire and inspected the point of the poker, which was glowing a dull red. “We’re ready. Everybody stay behind me, and don’t be a-follerin’ me once I’ve done this. I don’t care if it starts snowin’ oats and rainin’ tomcats, you leave me alone! There ain’t no tellin’ what a witch’ll do when the Black Madness is upon her. I won’t be holdin’ the reins on my actions till the sun comes up tomorrow mornin’. So stay clear!”

  She held up the glowing fire poker, face hardening, and nodded to Reuben, who grabbed a rag and lifted the pot from its hook over the fire.

  “Come on,” Nancy said. She strode toward the door, her baffled entourage in tow.

  They rounded the side of the church and walked up to the double doors that led inside.

  “Wait,” Ephraim said. He turned to Isabel. “You shouldn’t come in here with us. All of Sixmile Creek’s in there.”

  Isabel folded her arms. “Ephraim, don’t tell me—”

  “He’s right,” Nancy cut in. “Ephraim, Reuben, ’n’ me, this town don’t think too highly of us. But you, Miss Isabel, you’re different. You got a good family. Folks think the best of ye. If ye walk through these doors with us, it ain’t gonna be that way no more.”

  Isabel looked from Nancy to Ephraim. “You think I haven’t thought about this? I know what helping Ephraim is doing to my reputation. But you know what matters more than what this town thinks of me? What I think of me. I’ve come this far with you, and I’m not turning back.”

  “All right then,” Nancy said. “The girl’s made her choice.”

  Ephraim wanted to protest further, but the granny woman had already reached for the church door and yanked it open.

  Boggs’s sermon was in full swing. The reverend stood at the pulpit, Bible in one hand, the other punctuating his words.

  “You and I, all of us,” he said, sweeping an accusatory finger at the crowd. “We are able to hide so much. As a matter of fact, most of what is important to us, we’re able to hide. But the Lord sees all. There’s no escaping that all-seeing eye.”

  Nancy held the red-hot poker out in front of her like some hellish, sword-wielding general about to lead a charge. She stepped forward. Reuben stayed close behind her, ignoring the turning heads of the congregation. He locked eyes with Boggs.

  The reverend trailed off as he saw the group entering at the rear of the church.

  Ephraim’s heart knocked against his ribs. All those eyes, eyes of folks ready to hang him. He swallowed hard and stepped up next to Reuben. Murmurs rippled through the congregation.

  “Well, well,” the reverend said. “A witch, a vagabond, and a murderer. And you, Miss Coleman?”

  Nancy raised the fire poker and jabbed it toward the pulpit. “The day ye ran me out of this church, I told everyone the whirlwind was a-comin’. Well, now it’s here! Your undoin’ is at hand, preacher man!”

  Ernest Williams and several other men got to their feet and started toward the granny woman, pulling pistols out of their belts.

  Nanc
y closed her eyes and waved the poker. A fierce gust of wind whooshed into the church, rattling the open doors. “Ye wrongdoers, I conjure ye!” she said, her voice filling the chapel. “I seek refuge beneath the tree that bears twelvefold fruit, and conjure ye with the curse of the trotter head!”

  Isabel looked at Ephraim, eyes wide.

  “I bind your eyes that ye may hear, but not see! I bind your ears that ye may see, but not hear!” The wind blasted again, turning the pages of Boggs’s Bible on the pulpit.

  A shudder rocked the congregation. The standing men swayed as if caught in an earthquake. Ernest Williams convulsed, and a dazed look entered his eyes.

  Reverend Boggs staggered, clutching the sides of the pulpit. His nostrils flared, and he bared his teeth.

  “I cast your minds into darkness,” Nancy finished quietly, lowering the poker. She nodded to Reuben.

  He upended the contents of the pot on the poker’s glowing tip, filling the air with a hiss.

  Nancy groaned and doubled over. The poker dropped from her hand and hit the floorboards with a clang.

  The standing men, including Boggs, collapsed to the floor. The others slumped forward and backward in the pews, eyes wild, mouths agape. But no one made a sound. The church was filled with an awful silence.

  Ephraim felt weak in the knees. “I thought you said the curse would just confuse ’em.”

  “I did,” Nancy said, still bent over, breathing deeply. She took her head in both hands.

  “But they look like they’re dead!” Ephraim said.

  “What?” Nancy looked up at the still congregation and took a step backward. “Must’ve boiled them hackberry leaves a mite too long,” she said, then gave a dreadful moan. “I got to clear out now. Remember, leave me be till sunrise!”

  She stumbled out the door and disappeared.

  “Get the book and let’s go,” Reuben said. “There’s no tellin’ how long this curse will hold.”

  Ephraim walked up the aisle to the pulpit. Reverend Boggs lay facedown on the floor behind it, arms reaching over his head. The muscles in Ephraim’s stomach tightened; he imagined the man’s head jerking up from the floor, his hand closing around Ephraim’s leg. He shook his head to clear the image. The almanack, he thought. I’ve got to get the almanack.