by Curtis Hox
Let it happen, let it happen, let it happen.
“I’ll help you make Husband Rehab work. I’ll be an employee, an intern, an experiment. Whatever you want. Your gardener. Just hire me. It’ll be legitimate.” She hears desperation in his voice and finds herself cupping his elbows. He continues. “She’ll try to destroy me. She … she hates warlocks.”
“Okay, whatever you need—”
She finds herself hugging him. The desire to comb fingers through her hair forces her to bite her bottom lip hard enough to sting.
He pulls away. “Thank you.”
The moment lingers. Josie could swear on her life he wants her as bad as she wants him. She can’t tell if it’s honor that keeps him from kissing her, or something else, something more kinetic. Once we come together, she thinks, nothing can pull us apart. We need to come together …
“I should go,” he says and backs toward her door. “I owe you.”
He hurries away as quickly as he came.
Josie feels her heart beating in her chest like a living thing desperate for attention. She feels the sweat on her forehead and the back of her neck dampen her skin.
He came to my room and hugged me. We are so hooking up at some point.
All the troubles of the world vanish. All the fear that she is stepping headlong into trouble with the coven vanish. The thought she might renovate Birchall and snag Lennox galvanizes her. Josie Bran is ready to challenge the world, if need be.
Josie grabs a bath robe and heads for the grand stair. She sneaks down, listening for voices. She hears faint talking in the drawing room. Christine and …
She enters the vestibule, which always remains lit through the night. The soft light from the drawing room reveals Christine in a full-length nightgown, whispering to the newcomer. The driver stands at attention. All three turn as Josie enters.
“Hey,” Josie says. “I thought I heard something.” She pretends to rub sleep out of her eyes. She gives the driver a once over, as if he’s the reason for the disturbance. “New member in need of help?”
Grand Dame, and High Priestess, Lady Eleanor Dooley pulls at the bottom her coat. Each button is in the shape of an oak in full bloom. The woman’s age is impossible to tell. Only the subtlest hint of crow’s feet at her eyes or wrinkles in the neck suggest she’s past her prime. Something elegant and seductive in the way she holds her head, almost at an angle, with her chin out, means she’s probably used to getting what she wants. Josie senses that everything about her is of the finest quality, down to the protective enamel covering her blood-red nails. She’s much as Josie remembers her, only older, and scarier.
The woman smiles as she notes the hem of Josie’s night gown, which she’s wrapped up with a bath robe. “Your grandmother gave that to you, didn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“Do you remember me?”
“You visited my grandmother once. I was there, working on the garden.”
“Yes you were. She kept you to herself, didn’t she? Teaching you how to brew …”
Christine repositions herself, as if to shift attention away from Josie. “The high priestess is interested in our new venture.”
“Oh, I am,” Lady Dooley says and looks around with trepidation as if the ceiling come crashing down on their heads. “I’ve heard interesting things.” She edges closer to Josie, defying Christine. “So, secretive Lady Treadwell’s granddaughter is responsible. Not much to you, by the look of you.” Josie steps back, thinking the high priestess might flick her ear or maybe twist her nose. Lady Dooley continues. “I’m here at the request of my goddaughter, Stella Spivey. She says you’re using magic to create better husbands. Is that true?”
“It is,” Josie says.
“Well, then,” Lady Dooley says, “what can you do about a man who sits on his front porch all day yelling at anyone who passes?”
Christine’s eyes widen, the hint of a hopeful smile crossing her face.
“Excuse me?” Josie asks.
Lady Dooley lets her steely mask fall. “My husband is the most cantankerous old codger for miles around. Just this morning, he met the mail man at the curb to explain why the US Postal Service is doomed. As if it were the man’s fault. He’s an embarrassment.”
“I can think of some things.”
“Can you? You’re a dear. Don’t tell Stella just yet, though. She thinks you’re doing this to steal her husband away from her.”
“Me?”
Christine moves in. “Can I show you to your room?”
“Thank you. My husband will be here tomorrow. Then we can figure this out. Maybe we’ll trick him into staying. I’m sure there’s a way to make everyone happy, once I see how it works.”
Christine winks as she escorts the high priestess away.
Josie waits until they’re gone before raising both hands in the air and dancing a few steps of joy.
* * *
Josie carries a pewter candle holder with a foot-long taper made from actual sheep fat. She found them in a larder, having helped put them there one summer. The flame is long and flickering, sending up a wispy trail of heat.
No chance of sleeping, not now, she thinks as she creeps down a side passage, not after the most powerful witch for miles just walked into Birchall. Have I really changed the order of things, like she said? So much history echoes through their tradition that Josie wonders if fate is moving her into a position of influence. Her grandmother always said she will be a powerful witch one day and that people will come from far and wide to see her.
Josie glances over her shoulder to check that no one follows. She enters the library. It’s in near darkness, except for the pocket of light shining from her candle. Shadows flicker on the tall ceiling, creating life-like runners through the rib vaulting. The wall is comprised of compact bookshelves holding more volumes than she can count. This section, though, is dedicated to the craft. Here, she can find what she’s looking for.
She scans the titles until she sees the old book her grandmother used to read to her: The Greater and Minor Witches of the Southeast.
Josie pulls the large, bound manuscript. It is illuminated with colorful, hand-painted images depicting a woman standing in a glen. She runs her fingers over the rough exterior, like the skin of a thing that once lived in a desert. The manuscript was constructed here at Birchall when they had their own scriptorium dedicated to the documentation of the craft. That venture was already gone by the time Josie first started coming around, but her grandmother always mentioned it as a wonderful place to visit. The last time Josie checked, the scriptorium was a print shop out back that’s probably now nothing more than a storage space.
She carries the book to a table, sets it down, and begins to thumb through it. She finds a section dedicated to the ambitious, young Eleanor Dooley, one of the key figures in the final eradication of male witches. Josie reads about what happened decades ago, when powerful male witches were put down in the last battles of the final war.
Apparently, if you talk to anyone in the know, they’ll tell you how dangerous men are, when left to themselves. They misuse the craft, sometimes like children, sometimes like criminals. Josie has always thought such incriminations are exaggerated. Not all men are dangerous, just some. The manuscript tells how Eleanor Dooley led a campaign in the south to round up a few outlaw warlocks and imprison them, even killing one. Her methods were used around the country, issuing in a new golden age wherein harmless female witches were able to integrate into modern society.
Josie flips the page and sees a photograph of Lady Dooley walking behind a man in handcuffs. Lord Birchall. No way. I can’t believe that’s him, she thinks. She reads how he was captured and imprisoned. Josie was always told he just disappeared. She only knew him vaguely. Her grandmother talked about him as a funny, odd man who could sing any song he ever heard. He was an entertainer ... and a witch, who was condemned because he was a man.
She reads and learns how Lord Birchall challenged Lady Dooley over
her fervor in hunting warlocks. Lady Birchall was just a priestess at that time and had little power. She couldn’t protect her husband.
Lady Dooley’s at fault for everything, Josie thinks. She has to be.
She shuts the book, as if she might unlearn what she just read. She replaces it, but lingers by the bookshelves, wondering what other mysteries from the past stand on these shelves.
“Doing some light reading?”
Lennox stands at the edge of her light. “Not really.”
He steps forward. “Find her in that book of yours?”
“The grand dame, herself.”
“Be careful. She’s a crafty one.”
“I know. I was reading about her.”
“She in many of those books?”
“At least one.” Josie returns to the table, hoping he might sit for a minute instead of making some announcement, then running off again. “You know about the history of the craft?”
“Are you kidding?” He edges closer. “Not much. All I was ever taught was that male witches are dangerous, that I wasn’t supposed to practice and that I was the problem. Case closed. Everything else was kept from me.”
“Yeah, well, what you can do … isn’t a problem to me. It’s wrong you haven’t been allowed to flourish.”
“Glad to hear it.”
He takes a deep breath, the kind that means he has something on his chest and is about to unburden himself.
“What is it?” she asks.
“I was wondering if you … might help me with something.”
“Right now?”
“After midnight and before five am. Best time.” He grins as if they might do something naughty, like raid the refrigerator for some ice cream.
“After midnight …?”
“Come on. I’ll show you.”
He leads her into the winter garden. At this hour she can see moonlight through the glass ceiling panes. Each one breaks up quicksilver light to cast a two-tone, gray-and-black pattern over everything. The few plants and the empty fountain suggest they have stepped into another place, maybe somewhere forgotten and enchanted, where no one will disturb them.
Lennox checks on his flower, which is doing fine where he left it.
“The high priestess is going to say I’m the problem,” he says. “I’ve heard it more than once from her, even though she knows how my wife uses me.”
“You’re not the problem—”
“Thanks, but I have to prepare myself … for the worst. I want you to help me with something.”
“How?”
He hands her a camcorder, one of those fancy small kinds no bigger than your palm. “Don’t worry. It’s got low-light filtering. It’ll shoot me just fine.”
She looks into the view finder to see him standing as if made for the device. He reaches behind a rough, stone bench and retrieves a small bird. It looks like a young pigeon, one wing standing out at an odd angle.
“Broken?” she asks.
“I saw it out my window. I asked the grounds keeper to retrieve it for me. I told him … I wanted to make it better.”
Josie considers the awesome truth behind the simple claim. She knows he can heal. But to see it in action stimulates a dormant reverence. No glib remarks now. Not in the face of what she is about to see.
“Okay,” she says and taps the red record icon. “Okay.”
As she watches him work his fingers over the damaged wing, the little bird head bobbing up and down, left and right, she witnesses the undeniable truth: A male healer is practicing in front of her. Everyone knows that women, as rare as they are, tend to be healers. She doesn’t follow the old religion, but it’s one of the pillars behind the craft that the female spirit is the nurturing impulse given from the Great Goddess, Gaia to some, the Earth to all. Women give birth, women feed young at their breasts, women bleed for life. Ask any witch, and she’ll tell you that in most cases, a woman will have a healing touch before a man. It’s only because of the West’s infatuation with the Judeo-Christian tradition that men are believed to be the ones who can heal the sick, or raise the dead. The ancient fear by female witches that men are primarily rational animals with rational magic doing rational things is bogus. They can be healers, just like women. Josie knows better, has proof of it right here.
Lennox Cruz is performing the most sacred of acts.
When the bird’s wing rights itself and it launches into the air, Josie can’t stop a cry of delight. Her chest swells, as an indescribable emotion surges through her. A distant part of her brain, imbued with something that reaches back to humanity’s primordial past, envelops her. She succumbs to the euphoria like a supplicant before the Earth Mother herself. She rushes into Lennox’s arms. He embraces her, his own body trembling.
“I need to sit,” he says.
Josie clicks off the camera and helps him to a bench.
“I’ll be out of it tomorrow,” he says. “There’s always a price.” He pauses as if a wave of sickness rushes through him. “Tell everyone I ate something bad. Okay?”
She nods, letting him close his eyes.
She can’t help herself and places a gentle kiss on his cheek.
“Keep the footage,” he says. “If they try to put me down, please show them what I can do. Only Stella really knows what I’m capable of ... and my mom ... and the people I’ve healed.”
“I will.”
“You’re the best, Josie Bran.”
His eyes glow in the moonlight. “I’m alright.”
She helps him to his feet, and the two of them leave the winter garden like an old couple who’s visited many times before.
* * *
The next morning Josie piddles around in her room, waiting for the arrival of the high priestess’s husband, Mr. Oswald Dooley. She peeks downstairs several times, thinking he may have arrived without making any noise. By lunch, all the men prepare to leave Birchall but Lennox. Christine stands at the front door, holding it open, as each one hurries down the grand staircase and out of the house.
Josie watches them go from her window. None of them wave goodbye, maybe because they guess they’ll be returning at some point.
From the landing, she hears Lady Dooley asking about Lennox. Josie has already explained to Christine that he won’t be coming down because he is ‘sick.’ Just as she turns to explain that Lennox will probably be in bed all day, Mr. Oswald Dooley drives up the gravel road in a massive Lincoln Continental that the elderly always seem to drive.
He exits his vehicle two feet at a time like a spry man of younger years. He’s dressed in his Sunday best: gingham-patterned sapphire-colored blazer with matching pleated trousers, a bowler hat, even a slim tie the color of jade. He looks like he might be on his way to the Kentucky Derby.
That’s the cranky, old man, she wonders?
Instead of walking up the steps to the front entrance, Mr. Dooley pivots like a setter spotting a bird, pauses as if frozen, then heads for the front lawn. He walks under Josie’s window as he edges along the house. She imagines he’s seen something by the horse barn. Or maybe he knows about the outbuildings that once kept Birchall running smoothly.
She hurries downstairs to find Christine and Lady Dooley standing in the vestibule, both baffled, both chattering about where he could be going.
Lady Birchall snores in her chair in the drawing room.
“I lost him,” Josie says, “after he passed under my window.”
“That man …” Lady Dooley says.
“Should we follow him?” Christine asks.
“I’ll bet the farm he’s going to check on whether the house is secure or not. He thinks fire hazards exist in a field of snow.” Lady Dooley eyes Josie as if seeing her for the first time. “Have you cooked up something special for him?”
“Well …” Josie says, looking for a good lie. “I need to meet the man first. “
“No, you don’t,” Lady Dooley says. “He’s a mean old devil. You’ll see. Make him nicer. That’s what you do here,
correct?”
Josie wonders why such a powerful witch needs help. She also wonders how Mr. Dooley has escaped her clutches for so long. The grand dame standing before her must have a wide array of earth and sky magic at her disposal. To be a grand dame is to be more than a religious leader, like a high priestess; it’s someone who gives guidance to many covens, or to anyone who comes asking, and someone who’s made a difference in the secular world. It’s assumed she’s in touch with the most difficult of magics. But she can’t manage her own husband? That just doesn’t sound right.
“Where’s that young, handsome actor of Stella’s?” she asks. “He’s the only one not cured, I hear.”
“Stomach ache,” Josie blurts. “He must have eaten something bad yesterday.”
A twinkle in the woman’s eye means she doesn’t believe one word. “I imagine so.”
“We might as well go find our new guest,” Christine says.
Josie trails along as the two older women move onto the front porch. The morning is still cool, although summer heat will come on fast. Josie has chosen shorts and a light cotton tee. Her flip flops mean her ankles will be getting wet, which is fine with her. Christine glances about happily, as if taking a walk around the mansion is a perfect idea. Lady Dooley looks miserable in her trim, ankle-length dress and long-sleeved shirt buttoned up to her chin. That’s her own fault for coming to Birchall without the sense there might be some out-door activity.
They spend the next thirty minutes skirting the southern portion of the mansion, taking a few side trips to visit the decrepit horse barn, the busted corral, the empty chicken coops, the dried-up vineyard, and even a vegetable garden the grounds keeper still manages to cultivate. Josie hangs back while the two witches talk shop. Husband problems aside, it’s no secret that Lady Dooley is a powerful seer and that she uses this skill to her advantage. Josie has never thought divination should be so praised. It’s not as reliable as her brewing. You can’t just look into the clouds, or a crystal ball, or a pile of beans, and know the future or the past. It’s always cryptic. Spells and potions, though, work ... mostly.
“There he is,” Lady Dooley says.
