Read Online Moon Over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool - Free Book Online Page B

green fishing lure in the Lucky Bill cigar box. She knew the mementos Ihad and she’d zeroed in on the fishing lure mentioned in the letter to conjure her story. Anybody could do that.
    I looked at Miss Sadie sitting there, her leg propped up. She was a pathetic sight. What kind of purveyor of the future could only tell stories from the past?
    “Go home,” she said. “Communing with the spirits is a privilege. I have ointment on the top shelf, just behind the baking soda, above the icebox. But I will get it myself.”
    She sure gave good directions if she was planning on getting it herself.
    “I’ll get it,” I said with no small amount of reluctance. “Long as you don’t charge me another dime for the
privilege.
”
    I maneuvered my way through the maze of velvet and fringe into her pantry and retrieved the nearly empty jar of salve. I gave it a whiff and nearly singed my nostrils.
    “What is this stuff?”
    “Hawthorn root,” she said, scooping out the remainder and rubbing it onto her leg. “It helps to increase circulation.” She moaned a little, massaging her swollen leg. It was then that I could see the wound that was causing her so much distress.
    “What happened to your leg?” I asked with a grimace.
    “I catch it on barbed wire. It is slow to heal.”
    That was putting it mildly. That sore, with its scabbing and yellow pus, looked to have gone from bad to worse and about another mile past that.
    “If you tell me where another jar is, I’ll fetch that for you and then I’ll be on my way.”
    “There is no more. I gather the last of the hawthorn rootnear the cemetery last night. But I am sure there is more to be found elsewhere.”
    I looked outside at the scorching sun. “Maybe you haven’t been outside lately, but there’s not much growing around here. There’s not enough water to fill a thimble.”
    “There is water. It remains deep and hidden, but there is always water.”
    “How do you know?”
    “Because I know what my father knew. And his father before him. It is what diviners know.”
    “Your people are all fortune-tellers?” I hoped they were better at it than she was but I didn’t say so.
    “No. We are a family of diviners. We see and understand things most people overlook. We read the signs of the land.”
    “You mean like those hill people who walk around with a jiggly stick, thinking they can find underground wells?”
    She made a guttural, scoffing sound. “Pah, what does one need with a stick? All one needs is eyes and ears. The earth speaks loud enough when it wants to be heard.”
    I was beginning to have no doubt that she heard things. The woman wasn’t right in the head.
    “All right, then. You have a nice day,” I said, backing toward the door.
    “I believe there is still a matter to be settled about my broken pot. It survives a boat ride all the way from Hungary and now it is in pieces.” Hungary. That explained the accent.
    I stood my ground. “Well, it wouldn’t be broken if you hadn’t taken my compass.”
    “Take your compass? I am out to gather hawthorn rootand find something on my property. How am I to know it is yours?”
    She had a point, I thought as she winced, rubbing her leg. I was surprised she could make it to the cemetery and back, but figured that was why her leg had swelled up so bad today.
    “I’d offer to pay for the pot but I don’t have that kind of money.”
    “Yes, it is worth much more than the coin you have remaining in your pocket.”
    The hair on the back of my neck prickled. I didn’t believe in fortune-tellers, but how had she pulled that one off?
    “So,” Miss Sadie said, knitting her fingers together, “it appears you have something I want and I have something you want.” She said her
w
’s like
v
’s
. You have something I vant and I have something you vant
.
    “You have my compass. But what could I have that you vant … I mean, want?”
    “Two. Good. Legs,” she said, punctuating each word.
    I wasn’t sure