Page 3 of Carnal Magic
2
Still reeling from the news that I was now a millionaire, I gripped the wheel tightly as I bounced over the rutted gravel road. When Great Grandma Martha’s house finally came into view, I had to laugh and shake my head.
Her cabin was little more than a shack at the end of an overgrown wagon-trail path. My first uncharitable thought was“What a dump.”
The exterior was a weathered stormy gray. Some of the boards looked a bit warped, but I didn’t see any rot, and the metal roof was intact. The front porch railings were giant, rough pillars that looked like weathered, stripped tree trunks with lots of bumps and spikes. None of the railings were straight, but the slightly curved pieces of wood carried a natural elegance. Almost like gentle waves.
In the front yard, a tall gum tree provided shade for the porch, and while the spiky balls could be annoying the fall, they also were supposed to provide protection. Bushy plants sprawled across the front of the house, some trailing up over the railings like roses, though they didn’t have any flowers. I parked my Mustang beneath the tree and climbed out, looking out over rolling hills carpeted with trees. Most were pine, but orange and yellow leaves spotted throughout the forest told me at least some of the trees were oak or other varieties.
As I neared the porch, I got a closer look at some of the other plantings in front of the cabin and recognized rosemary, basil and dill, all overgrown and gone to seed. The sage plant in the back corner of the herb garden looked sparse and straggly, nearly suffocated out by the huge rosemary bush.
Nice confirmation that Great Grandma Martha had been a witch too.
Something creaked, drawing my attention to an older man sitting in a rocking chair. I drew up short with surprise. I hadn’t expected anyone to be here.
“G’afternoon.” The man looked to be about sixty years old, wearing worn overalls with one strap hanging loose. He gave me a suspicious look, taking in my flowing black skirt, frilly white top, and strappy sandals. “You a Redwine?”
“Yes, sir.” I kept my tone polite, though I gave him an equally suspicious look. “Who the hell are you, and what are you doing on my property?”
He snorted, nodded his head, and slapped one hand on his thigh. “Yep, sure ‘nough, Redwine through and through. I’m Sam Woodward.”
Wait a minute. Hadn’t Mr. Woodward said his grandfather had been Miss Martha’s attorney back in the day? “The baseball player?”
He grinned and mimed a batter hitting a ball, shading his eyes like he’d hit a homer into the next county. “I ‘bout fell outta my chair when Drew said a Redwine was coming home. I had to see you for myself.”
“Did you know my great grandmother well?”
His eyes went distant and misty. “Sure did. I used to do odd jobs for her now and then. At least ‘fore I married. Miss Martha didn’t care none for married men.”
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. Why would she care if her handyman was married?
“Now don’t you go gettin’ any ideas on my grandson, miss.” Sam gave me a narrowed look, though he cackled at the same time. “He’s very happily married. He and Amy were sweethearts in grade school.”
This was getting weirder by the moment. Weird enough that I wasn’t offended that he thought I’d run around with a married man. “I have no interest in dating anyone at this time, certainly no one who’s married,” I said carefully, trying not to insult him. I wasn’t going to stay here. Goodness, no. I surely didn’t want to date or marry one of these country folk. Let alone the married attorney who managed the estate.
Myestate. The three million dollars. Plus five-hundred acres of land. My mind lurched and spun again with disbelief.
“Miss Martha always said the exact same thing.” Sam cackled again as he pushed up out of the chair. The hesitant way he came down the porch stairs, gripping the railing, made me reassess his age to at least eighty. “We live down the road a couple of miles. Give us a call if you need anything.”
Surely he wasn’t going to walk all the way home, if he lived that far away? But he started ambling down the dusty road back the way I’d come in. I hadn’t seen any other vehicles. Maybe he could cut across a field or through the forest rather than take the road.
Shrugging, I turned back to my grandmother’s house. The screen door squealed as I opened it, but the inside door handle turned easily. Not locked, just as Mr. Woodward had said.
The inside of the house was simple and minimalist, with a few well-loved items like show pieces rather than furniture. A rustic table with benches and chairs around it, none of which matched. The tabletop had rough bark edges and gorgeous wood patterns, made from a giant tree split down the middle. Similar raw-edged shelves stored simple dishes and cups on either side of a large window over a ceramic farm sink.
On the opposite wall, two winged-back chairs faced each other in front of a deep stone fireplace, well-used for decades by the smoky smudges, though the hearth was clean. One of the chairs looked more worn than the other. A side table held a stack of books and a pair of thick glasses. A cozy-looking Granny Square afghan draped over one arm. Evidently, this had been my grandmother’s favorite place to sit and read a book.
Despite the worn exterior, everything inside was clean and appeared to be in excellent shape. On a whim, I opened the refrigerator—I wouldn’t have been surprised to find out it was from the fifties—and found fresh groceries. A couple of glass bottles of milk, a dozen brown and blue chicken eggs, a carton of apples, and a basket of miscellaneous vegetables including carrots and radishes. A couple of packets wrapped in white paper might be fresh meat.
It was almost like I’d time traveled back to a decade where the milkman brought fresh bottles to your step every day and the butcher hand cut your steaks.
A freshly made cobbler sat on the gas stove, covered in a hand-stitched flour sack dish towel. Because of course someone would have brought dessert.
Awed and amazed at the care someone had gone to make me feel at home, I decided to go up the steep stairs before investigating the rear of the house. Under the sloping eaves, there were two smaller guest rooms and an older but still functional bathroom. Both rooms had twin beds covered with handmade quilts. No dust, no rot, no spiderwebs. Amazing. The cleaners had done a first-rate job.
Back downstairs, I pushed open a door and found a short hallway ending in another door to the back yard. On either side of the hallway, there was a door. The one on the right appeared to be a craft room. Lots of windows allowed light to spill into the room, lined with shelves and tables and stacks of drawers. Where the front of the house had minimal clutter, here nearly every square inch of the walls had been used for shelving or work areas. Evidently Grandma Martha had tons of interests, from watercolors to quilting and everything in between. One whole wall was lined with books. I took a quick glance and recognized many that had been in Mama’s collection too. Wooden racks and small glass bottles hinted at foraging in the woods for herbs and roots.
“This is a witch cottage in the woods,” I said aloud, each word soft with wonder. Not the flash and glitz of our trendy witchy shop, but someone who’d lived close to the land and embraced her spiritual side.
