Hangman's Root by Susan Wittig Albert Read Free Book Online

that regress the listener through seventeen past lives without being arrested by Bubba Harris, Pecan Springs's chief of philistines.
    There was a tape in the player under the counter. I turned it on and the silence was broken by the eerie sounds of whales caroling to one another through unfathomable depths. I had just turned to go back to Thyme and Seasons when the front door opened. A young woman stood, diffident and irresolute, in the doorway. Her triangular face was familiar but I couldn't place it.
    "Are you open?" she asked.
    "Just," I said, turning down the volume on the whales. I added, encouragingly, "Make yourself at home. If you have any questions, I'll be next door." In the herb shop, many people are

    browsers, not buyers, at least the first time they come in. Making a sale usually comes second to educating them about herbs. It's the same in Ruby's business, although if this customer wanted to know about pyramid power or the difference between one tarot deck and another, she'd have to wait until Ruby got back.
    But the young woman—early twenties, tall, with freckles and red hair cut short on the sides, with a little tail in back—was neither a browser nor a shopper. She walked hesitantly to the counter and stood there, a wary look in her hazel eyes and a mix of apprehension and determination in her expression, as if she were torn between standing her ground and getting the hell out of there.
    An odd one, I thought. She held one hand awkwardly behind her, and alarm bells jangled in my head. Ruby's shop was broken into once, but neither she nor I have ever been held up. There's a first time for everything, though. Then I saw the PETA button on the young woman's striped blouse, and I remembered.
    "Weren't you handing out leaflets at the rattlesnake sacking championship this weekend.^" My question held relief, mixed with guilt for being unreasonably suspicious of her. Somebody who stuck up for rattlesnakes seemed unlikely to stick up the Crystal Cave.
    She bit her lip. "Yes," she said. Her freckles were like flecks of copper paint against her pale cheeks, and there was a faint tic at the comer of her eye. Whatever her errand, it was definitely making her edgy. Her glance slid off to one side, then down. Then, as if the act took all her courage, she looked straight at me, meeting my questioning glance.
    "My name is Amy . . . Roth," she said, concentrating on my face. The corners of her mouth quivered. "And you are ..." She swallowed hard, twice.
    She was wanting me to introduce myself, I thought. She was probably proselytizing for PETA, and nervous about making

    cold calls. Well, it wouldn't hurt me to make a donation. After what rd seen on Sunday, I could certainly find a few bucks to save the snakes. I extended my hand to put her at her ease. 1 m—
    She ignored my hand. "I know who you are." Her voice was thick and she swallowed again. Suddenly, surprisingly, her eyes filled with tears. "YouVe my mother"
    i

    I stared at the girl. Her mother} The notion was so absurd that I had to suppress the urge to giggle. But that would have been unforgivable. Amy Roth was dead serious.
    "I'm sorry," I said. I dropped my hand. "There's been a mistake."
    "Yes." She blinked the tears away fast, pretending they weren't there. Her voice held a childhood's worth of bitterness. ''Your mistake. Twenty-five years ago last month."
    I shook my head. "People get confused about paternity all the time. Amy, but maternity is a different matter If I had been your mother, I couldn't forget that I—"
    "Please," she said wearily. "I didn't come to listen to your excuses. I have a perfectly decent adoptive mother and father who worked hard to give me a good start in life, after you walked out on me. All I want from you is a simple acknowledgment that I exist and—"
    The back door banged opened. The woman who sailed in was remarkable in ankle-length black skirt, loose green tee that said "My Other Body's in the Shop," and black flats that kept