Blue Willow by Deborah Smith Read Free Book Online Page B

because he was a Colebrook.”
    “Hold your horses, that wasn’t till lots later. Anyhow, everything was fine until the next spring, when Old Halfman came through.”
    Lily huddled closer to Artemas but looked up at him slyly. “I know what he looks like.” Artemas put an arm around her. Her sly expression dissolved into red-faced delight.
    Mama drew herself up and waved her kindling like a wand. “He was half-Cherokee Indian and half-colored, and everybody was scared of him, not only because of him being different, but because he was a preacher, and a peddler, and a soothsayer.”
    Lily dragged her attention back to her mother. “What’s a soot sayer?”
    “A sort of witch. Halfman would look at people’s spit and blood, and tell their futures.”
    “Their spit and blood ? Ugh!”
    “Halfman was sickly, and Elspeth let him stay in her barn. She fed him and took care of him. And when he got ready to leave, Elspeth called on him to tell her future. She drew a sharp knife across her forefinger.” Mama pretended to slash her finger with the stick of kindling. “ Drip, drip, drip . Her red blood fell into Halfman’s palm. Then she spit on top of it.”
    “Into his hand? Ugh!”
    “But that’s the way it had to be done. Halfman, he looked at his palm, and he shook his head. Then he reached into his big ol’ peddler’s bag and pulled out a pair of little-bitty willow saplings, all wrapped in dirt and paper. And their leaves were blue , not like any other willows in the whole world. He smeared Elspeth’s spit and blood on them. ‘You’re the blue willow,’ he said, looking straight at Elspeth. And she stared back in horror—because she knew he meant she was going to die.”
    “How did she know? How?”
    “Because willows are women. That’s what the ancients said. And blue women are sad women. And the only thing that would make Elspeth sad would be to leave her land and her sons—and Artemas, her new husband.”
    “Wow!”
    “Then Halfman said, These here are magic trees, not like any others. For love of you they and all that grow from their seed will keep your loved ones safe, them and theirs and all that cometh from their blood.’ ”
    “Neat!”
    “So she planted those little saplings down by the creek, right out there”—Mama pointed to a window, making Lily crane her head in fascination, as if the original trees were right outside—“and they grew tall and beautiful.”
    Lily hugged her knees. “And Elspeth went to heaven?”
    “Yes, she went to heaven having Old Artemas’s baby, and the baby went with her.”
    Lily looked at Artemas ruefully. “I guess God put you here to make up for that. You’re supposed to do what I tell you to do.”
    “Hmmm.” He hooked his arm around her neck and jostled her as if she were a small wrestler. “I think I was put here to catch you. You don’t bounce very well.”
    Her face broke into a puckish grin. Turning back to her mother, she waited for more with wide eyes. Mama was watching the two of them with a soft little smile. “Anyway, when Elspeth was being buried, Halfman showed up. No one knew how he’d heard she’d died. He just came, like some kind of all-seeing mountain spirit, to pay his respectsto Elspeth and her blue willows. People said he was never seen again, after that day.”
    “But he still lives in the mountains?”
    “Could be.”
    “And what happened to Old Artemas?”
    “Oh, it was terrible. Elspeth’s sons turned away from him. They said he’d killed their mother. Old Artemas had to leave their farm and live in the back of his potter’s shop.”
    “Under the lake!”
    She nodded patiently. “Under the lake now. And he grieved and grieved. He wanted to tell the whole world about his Elspeth, his blue willow. He thought about an old, old Chinese china pattern called Blue Willow, and he decided he’d make his own pattern from it, in dark blue cobalt from the iron mines over in Birmingham. And he did. And his work was so