Apalachee

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

chapter thirty-one Kneeling before the fireplace, Lucia opened the little cloth bundle and looked for a moment at the four herbal medicines that were inside it, then blew her breath on them and dropped them into the kettle of simmering water. ‘‘Why did you do that?’’ asked Grace Hawkins. The girl stood beside Lucia, watching, asking the questions of an eight-year-old. ‘‘To bring the medicine into the water,’’ said Lucia. ‘‘So Abe can drink it.’’ ‘‘No, why did you blow on it?’’ Lucia turned and looked at her. The girl had her mother’s light brown hair, though not her fine features; her face was round, her lips full like Henry’s. ‘‘To tell you that, I would have to tell you so much more. You would have to fast for four days before I could even start.’’ ‘‘Not eat for four whole days?’’ Lucia nodded. ‘‘I don’t want to do that.’’ ‘‘I thought not,’’ said Lucia and she turned back to the kettle, stirring it with a wooden spoon. ‘‘I know why you did it,’’ said Grace. ‘‘Why?’’ said Lucia, hardly paying attention. ‘‘It’s what witches do, that’s why.’’ Lucia looked at her again. ‘‘Do you think I am a witch?’’ Grace nodded soberly. ‘‘Then why do you stand here? Aren’t you afraid?’’ ‘‘No.’’ Lucia lifted the simmering pot from the fire. ‘‘If I am a witch, you should be afraid.’’ ‘‘Sheba says she’s not afraid.’’ ‘‘So it’s Sheba who tells you these things.’’ ‘‘And Tickey.’’ Lucia shook her head. Her accusers were the nurse and the houseboy, neither hardly more than a child. ‘‘Ask Cajoe what he thinks about it,’’ said Lucia. ‘‘He’s old enough to know a few things.’’ ‘‘I did ask him. He says you are a doctor, not a witch.’’ ‘‘Don’t you believe him?’’ Grace shrugged. ‘‘I do a little bit.’’ ‘‘What about the next time you get sick? Will you want me to take care of you like I always have before?’’ Grace nodded. ‘‘I don’t think you’re a bad witch, Lucia.’’ ‘‘It lifts my heart to hear it,’’ Lucia said flatly. She dipped a silver cup into the medicine and then dried the outside of the cup with her apron. ‘‘You don’t mind, then, if I give some medicine to your little brother?’’ She got up and walked over to the bed where Abraham, just two years old, sat playing with a small block of wood, moving it so it rocked along like a horse over the crumpled sheets. ‘‘Here, Abe,’’ she said, sitting down on the bed beside him. She put her finger into the reddish liquid to make sure it was not too hot for him and then held it while he drank, making him keep on when he tried to turn his head away. ‘‘There,’’ she said when he had finished. She set the empty cup on a table by his bed and put her hand against his forehead. ‘‘How is he?’’ asked Grace. ‘‘Better,’’ said Lucia. ‘‘Not much fever today.’’ Grace got onto the bed. ‘‘You’re better, Abe.’’ She picked up his horse and galloped it over his legs. He laughed and reached for it. ‘‘Give me,’’ he said. ‘‘My horse, Gracie.’’ She held it away from him and then galloped it over his head so that he fell back on the bed laughing. Lucia got up and took the cup back to the mantle. Sheba came into the room followed by Robin, the middle Hawkins child, who ran to join his brother and sister on the bed. Robin was the heir, the oldest son. ‘‘Miss Charity want you,’’ said Sheba in her rough English. She was young, scarcely past her first menses, raised in the quarters and only recently brought to the house as a nurse. ‘‘Try to make Abe take a rest,’’ said Lucia. ‘‘His fever is down today. Tomorrow he’ll be out of bed, I think.’’ ‘‘But if he don’t want no rest?’’ asked Sheba. ‘‘I can’t make that boy be still.’’ ‘‘Try telling him some of your witch stories,’’ Lucia said cooly. Sheba looked quickly at her and then away. Lucia picked up the pot of medicine and left the room, crossing the hallway past the head of the stairs and going into the other upstairs chamber. Charity was sitting in a chair by the window, her feet resting on a cushioned stool. She was thinner and...