Lavender-Green Magic Read Free Page B

raised. But she stopped short as Crock caught her wrist in a grip so tight it hurt.
    He was looking straight at her and his eyes were fierce. “Holly Wade, you leave Mom alone. Don’t you dare go whining at her now—you hear me!”
    All the troubles which had ridden her for so long, ever since that hateful telegram had come, boiled up in Holly. She exerted all her strength and jerked free from his hold.
    â€œYou can’t tell me what to do, Crockett Wade!”
    â€œI can sure try if you make any trouble for Mom. She’s had enough. You think you’re so smart ’cause you get good grades in school an’ are a year older than Judy ’n me. But you’re dumb, Holly Wade, you’re good and dumb when it comes to being helpful to Mom. You’ve done nothing but go around saying mean things and acting even meaner! Dad would be ’shamed of you, he sure would!”
    Holly wanted to scream, to reach out and slap Crockett right across his big mouth. But that was being a baby—like being sick on the bus. She wouldn’t let him know how bad he made her feel. She’d never let him know that. Deep inside she also knew that Mom would not take them away, no matter how hard she might beg. No, she would have to be a new Holly Wade, one who lived in a junkyard, rode around in an old truck with a piece of dirty old canvas to keep off the rain, stayed in a place where a witch was supposed to have cursed a family—
    Cursed a family—how would it feel to be a witch and, as in the old fairy tales, have wishes which would come true? Holly knew exactly what her first one would be: that the telegram had never come, that they were back in Boston with life going on exactly as it always had. If she were a witch, that’s what she would do with her magic.
    She continued to add to that dream as the truck turned off the highway into a side lane and trees and brush began to wall them in, adding to the darkness and gloom of the day.

2
Treasure Trove
    There
was
a house at Dimsdale, but such a queer one. The Wades did not get much chance to see the outside of it because they were hurried from the truck right in through a side door. But once inside, Holly pushed off her rain bonnet, which had hitched forward over her face like a mask with red flowers printed all over it, to see better.
    There was one big room, darkish in the corners, for all the light came from a lamp set on a table. To one side an open stair went up steeply, but the room was divided in places by partitions which rose only to Holly’s chin, if she tilted her head a little. These ran along one wall like a lot of wide cupboards without doors. They were full of things, as if someone had shoved furniture and boxes in as tight-packed as they would go. Two of them had shelves around the walls, and on those were what looked like piles of dishes, even a row of electric toasters set side by side. In some ways thatvery cluttered section of the room resembled Mrs. Pigot’s store, except there was even less space to move between all the things which had been jammed in together.
    At the side of the lamp table was a big fireplace, the largest Holly had ever seen in her life. So huge was its cavern that there were even seats in the side walls, as if people could creep in there and warm their toes and hands at a fire kept burning in its center.
    Smells—such strange smells—some spicy, some like cake baking, others Holly had no name for. But good smells, she decided, against her own desire to find every fault with the house in the junkyard. There was no one to greet them. Grandpa had taken the truck on to wherever his garage might be—but where was Grandma?
    On the table beside the lamp, newspapers had been spread out to protect a red-and-white-checked tablecloth. On these were some broken dishes: cups without handles, plates cracked across.
    Were Grandpa and Grandma so—so poor that these were the only sort of dishes