Moonheart Read Free

might expect to find in an Indian's medicine bag. Except Indians didn't use Celtic ribbonwork, nor did they have gold rings. At least not in those days.
    This time she stopped and wondered why she assumed it was so old. There was really no way that she could put a date to either the painting or the pouch... but she knew they were old. She just did. The intensity of that knowing gave her a queer feeling. She glanced at the painting again. A shaman and a Celtic bard, she thought.
    Looking away, she blinked rapidly a few times and took a deep breath. Okay, it was old. Time to move on to more practical things. Whatever else the pouch had offered, there hadn't been a clue to the identity of the artist. She looked at the side of the box to see if Jamie had bothered to note where they'd gotten the box. Printed in his neat handwriting, with a magic marker, was:
    From the Estate of
    Dr. Aled Evans
    Aled Evans. A Welshman, if the name was anything to go by. Sara tried to picture what he'd looked like. Sort of Albert Schweitzerish? She shrugged and studied the painting again, bending so close that her nose was just a few inches away from it.
    For a moment everything wavered around her. She had the decidedly weird sensation that the store had vanished, to be replaced by the forest in the painting. The feeling came over her with a razor-sharp acuteness— so suddenly that it took her breath away. She could sense the gnarled cedar thickets and the thick grass of the glade, the tall pines sweeping skyward on every side of her, their dark green points stabbing the clouds. The rich pungent odor of dark loam filled her nostrils.
    Startled, she looked up, half expecting the image to remain and the store to be gone. But the shop was still there, as cluttered as ever. Outside, the afternoon drizzle continued to mist down, slicking the streets and spraying the windows with a million tiny droplets. Silly Wizard were just finishing off a selection of jaunty reels. Nothing had changed. Except maybe in her, for to her eyes the store seemed vague, lacking the clear definition of the forest she'd just seen, felt, smelled...
    Her pulse beat a quick tattoo. She glanced at the painting again, expecting the sensation to return, but the painting remained what it was— an image of ink lines and watercolor in a wooden frame. Strange. She pushed the pouch's contents around with a finger and shook her head. Just for a moment there, it'd seemed that she'd really been someplace else. Maybe she was coming down with the flu.
    At that moment the tiny bell above the front door jingled and the real world intruded on her speculations in the unmistakable shape of Geraldine Hathaway. She stood in the doorway with her back to Sara, shaking out her umbrella, then closing it up with a snap. Sara stifled a groan.
    "Well, Ms. Kendell," Miss Hathaway said. Her glasses clouded up with condensation and she took them off, rummaged in her purse for a handkerchief, and wiped them before continuing. "How is business today?"
    "Quiet," Sara said. Or at least it had been.
    "Ah, well. The weather, you know." The glasses returned to her nose and the handkerchief to its purse. "I see," she added, studying the litter on the countertop, "that you have some new stock. Anything that might be of interest to me?"
    "Hard to say," Sara replied. "It's mostly junk."
    "Well, you know what they say. What's junk to some..." Her voice trailed off as she neared the counter.
    Sara stifled another groan. She'd yet to figure out what made Geraldine Hathaway tick. The only time she ever seemed to want to purchase something was when it was being held for someone else. Then she'd wave her checkbook about and argue until Sara felt like wringing her neck.
    "Oh, I say. What's this?" Miss Hathaway picked up the gold ring that had come from the medicine bag. "How much is this?"
    "Its not for sale," Sara said and braced herself for the worst.
    "Nonsense. Everything is for sale in an establishment such as this.