Falling In by Frances O'Roark Dowell Read Free Book Online Page B

from her apron. “Took many a life, and for naught, I’d say. Kings’ wars fought by villagers’ sons. Folly, all of it.”
    The woman lifted her apron and with one motion tore a strip from near the hem, and then another. “That should do for a binding, for now at least,” she said. “My house isn’t but a quarter of a league from here, but you shouldn’t cover any ground until that ankle is wrapped tight.”
    It felt natural to Isabelle to lean against the old woman’s shoulder. She hopped awkwardly along on her good foot but didn’t feel awkward at all. Why was that? And why did these woods seem so familiar? Why, when they got closer to the woman’s house—she pointed to the smoke curling out of the chimney—did Isabelle feel like she was going someplace she’d been before?
    Oh, she was pretty sure she knew why.
    Well, almost sure.
    Anyway, she was sure enough to start giggling like crazy, and after a minute Hen joined in, and even the old woman cracked a smile.
    “Why are we laughing, miss?” Hen asked after another minute.
    Isabelle shook her head. “Just happy, I guess,” she said, and then it was Hen’s turn to shake her head.
    “Just happy,” Hen repeated. “Who ever heard of such a thing?”
    And then the two girls laughed some more.



15
    Grete’s cottage was small, and it was made to seem smaller still by a cacophony of—well, the only word that Isabelle could think of was
stuff.
There was furniture, of course, but not a lot of it, a round kitchen table with two chairs next to the stove, three rocking chairs in front of the fireplace. In the small bedroom off the kitchen, there was a narrow bed and a blue washbasin on a wooden stand.
    What filled the rooms of Grete’s cottage so decidedly were woven baskets and wooden boxes and clay pots glazed in red and blue, each with its own mishmash of this and that. Roots and leaves still redolent of dirt. Balls of scratchy wool in variegated strands—purple twining into pink easing intoperiwinkle fading into gray. At least three boxes held squares and strips of fabrics, all colors, and eight pots overflowed with apples.
    The walls were lined with shelves, the shelves were lined with books. Wordless spines peered out. As soon as Isabelle saw them, she itched to open one up and read it from cover to cover.
    “You girls sit, and I’ll bring you something to drink before I set to work on that ankle,” Grete instructed as she opened the stove door and livened up the fire with a few pokes of a stick.
    “Tea?” Hen asked hopefully, taking a seat at the round table.
    “Of a sort,” Grete replied. “And some bread, if you’re hungry. I made salt bread this morning.”
    Isabelle thought of the salt and flour clay she’d made when she was little, the way it tasted like the ocean when she’d put a pinch of it in her mouth. But Grete’s bread had sweet notes beneath the salty ones, as though the ocean had chewed on sugar cubes for breakfast. The tea, however, was bitter, and Isabelle and Hen had to stir spoonfuls of honeyinto their cups before they could take a single sip.
    “It will make you sleepy,” Grete said, pulling a rocking chair to the table and lifting Isabelle’s ankle onto her lap. “You look like a girl who needs a rest. You as well, Hen.”
    Already Isabelle felt drowsy, but she still couldn’t help wondering, had Hen told Grete her name? They hadn’t introduced themselves as they’d walked through the woods to the cottage, no
How do you do’s
or a single
Pleased to meet you, my name’s ———
. But when they’d arrived at the doorstep, a package wrapped in rough brown paper and tied with twine was waiting,
Grete of the Woods
scrawled on it in ink so wet that it had branched out from every letter like veins. The address looked like something a spider might have written.
    “That’s me,” Grete had said, picking up the package. “Though any more than one name is too many. The more names upon your head, the more they think