THE WITCH AND THE TEA PARTY (A Rachael Penzra Mystery) (11 page)

“You don’t think I’d tell someone like that, do you?” There was a pause, probably because that’s exactly what Moondance did mean. “I can’t have the sheriff tromping all over my house. Besides, it might have been one of the neighbor children. They’re nasty little brats. They hold it against me that their cat was picked up by the animal control. They should have kept it home if they loved it that much.”

“Were… were you responsible?”

“That doesn’t matter. They weren’t keeping the damn thing out of my yard. Besides, they can’t prove anything.”

“Then why do you want me to ask
these
people about it?”

“Because that wasn’t the end of it.
There have been two so-called accidents since then. I’m a lucky person. That’s all that’s kept me alive.” She paused for Moondance’s gasp before continuing. “All you have to do is talk about there being something dark in their reading, something they’re hiding from the light of day—something like that. I don’t expect them to fall down on their knees and beg for forgiveness. I want you to watch each one carefully. If you think they’re nervous, push a bit. Can you do that?”

“Yes,” Moondance said, rather hesitantly. “Only I don’t know what I’d actually say.”

There was a snort which I assumed came from Mrs. B-H. “It won’t be that difficult. Surely you can think of something. Anyway, I want a full report when you’re done.”

“I never share information about my readings,” Moondance finally took a stance.

“I’m not asking you to talk about any of your usual nonsense. I just want a report on the questions about me. Use your head. If you’re talking about me to them, even if you aren’t using my name, I automatically have the right to know what the conversation was. Otherwise it’s slander.”

Poor Moondance. She was in over her head. She didn’t
seem to question any of the rather confusing remarks. I suppose they made some sort of sense in her mind, convoluted as they were. She must have nodded her head, because Mrs. B-H continued.

“Quite possibly you’ll be saving my life,” she cajoled. “And if we can nip this plot in the bud, you’ll be preventing someone from going to jail.
Now, I’ll go out and mix. You keep your eyes and ears open and probe for some answers.”

Moondance mumbled something. There was the sound of a chair sliding back.

The next one in was the husband. Nicholas, as he introduced himself. He was all charm, probably a good thing as it seemed as if our poor seer was having a hard time talking.

“Frances seems to think you’re one of the best,” he told her. We heard the chair being pulled into position. “She puts a lot of credence into this sort of thing
. One of her latest interests. Now, do you want to read my palm, or what?”

“Oh no, no,” Moondance stammered. “I usually study images in my crystal ball. Or I might read the Tarot for you. I think… I think we should start with the ball.”

“That’s fine,” he said agreeably. “What do I do? Do I try to think hard or something?”

“No, you just sit there,” she told him. There was a little pause. “
Er.. hmm.. I see something unusual here. I see other women, beautiful women. I see you and other women. Are you, by any chance, having an… a… an affair?”

He roared with laughter. “My dear Moondance!
What an idea. By the way, that’s a lovely name, you know. I’m lucky to have a clever, charming wife whom I love very much. Affairs are for the discontented. I’m a very contented man.”

“Oh.
But there’s something I’m seeing. It could be that someone is using you…”

“If you’re seeing something concerning
beautiful women, I can only imagine that you’re somehow seeing the young ladies who have been cavorting around my wife, trying to get her interest in backing them. Our company is helping to finance a local beauty contest and some of the interviews have taken place in the store. They’re certainly cute little girls, but ‘little girls’ is the first thing someone my age thinks about. Some seem sweet and some quite precocious. I am surprised, though, that you’d see them somehow in my mind. To be honest, I prefer more mature women.”

“Oh, of course,” Moondance simpered. I never knew you could hear a simper through a microphone so clearly. “Sometimes it’s difficult to tell what is the correct interpretation of what I’m seeing really is. I didn’t mean to accuse you of anything.”

“Well, having gotten the females in my life out of the way, what else do you see about my future?”

She went on to tell him that she saw tumultuous seas ahead, but that she thought the final outcome would be favorable. She predicted wealth and good health. All in all she did a pretty good tale. I wondered if she ever actually saw anything in the ball.

Next came Stella Lang, one of the sisters. She scraped the chair rather aggressively. “I suppose you’re going to tell me that I’ll meet a dark, handsome stranger, or maybe that I’ll take a long trip somewhere.”

“Only if that appears in the ball,” Moondance said, having apparently heard that kind of attack numerous times. “It would be nice if we all had such pleasant readings, but alas, it isn’t always that way. You, I see, have deep, sometimes conflicting, family ties. I can tell you that in your case the good far outweighs any negativity.” There was an intake of breath. Ignoring it, Moondance continued. “You probably
don’t
want to take any long trips in the near future—say the next few months—but if you do, watch out for too easily obtained friendships.”

“I don’t plan any,” Stella interrupted. “But what exactly did you mean about family conflicts? What do you see?”

Oh, oh. From what the terrible trio had talked about various times around my kitchen table, saying that was the sort of question to be avoided. Their theory was to keep things general.

“I don’t see anything definite,” Moondance seemed quite confident. “There is an aura of unusual upset. I think that’s what I’m seeing, as though there’s been an argument with someone close that’s gone beyond the typical clash.
I think you both need to take a step back and reassess your primary values. Anger and frustration, and that’s what I see, can muddy things.”

“She can be so stubborn!” Stella pretty well gave the game away. It didn’t take much to guess that it was her sister she was talking about. It could be a mother, or even daughter, but a good fortune teller had to play the odds sometimes.

“Is there someone else you wish ill feelings toward?” Moondance asked. I was beginning to think she was smarter than I’d given her credit for being. That was a neat way of bringing in Mrs. B-H’s request.

“There are a lot of people who irritate me,” Stella sounded as though that was normal in everybody’s life. And maybe it is. “I’ve got a few in mind that I wouldn’t mind seein
g take a little fall, bring them down to earth a bit.”

Not being a psychologist, I didn’t immediately hear the word “fall” and connect it with the string across the top of the stairs. It was rather odd wording, though. I jumped up and dug in my purse for my trusty notebook and pen. I scribbled, “Stella used word ‘fall’ about getting even with somebody”. I hoped I could make sense of my notes later. Still, we’d have the tape to rely on if we needed to go back and check anything.

A little “bing” sound ended the session, indicating that the time limit was up. I noticed that it hadn’t been set for the Brown-Hendricks couple. Power does have its privileges.

“What did she tell you?
” Martha Stone, Stella’s sister, demanded, after she’d changed places with her sibling.

“What I hear
is as private as if I were a priest,” Moondance intoned. “As to what I’ve said to her, the same is true. You can speak to her later and she’ll share what she chooses from the session.”

“Oh, okay,” Martha seemed a little uncertain how to pursue her curiosity. “Well, what do you want to ask me?”

“I’m not a therapist,” Moondance reminded her. It sounded as though Martha had visited more than one in her lifetime. “I tell you what I see. It’s up to you to decide how to interpret what I tell you. I can guess only so much, and interpretations can be quite tricky. You have to decide how accurate I am. I’ll only provide what I can see.”

“What do you see?” Patience, I could have told her, wasn’t something I’d see, crystal ball or not.

“Waves of powerful energy. Not all of it is good. I see a tumultuous swirling of darkness in the midst of your aura. It needs to be cleared or you’ll find yourself becoming ill. Anger and fear destroy our balance. You need to regain that in yourself. I also see, in the midst of the swirls, some sort of angry movement, perhaps representing something you’ve done recently, something vengeful.”

“That’s just stupid!” The chair made a scraping noise as she stood up. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not going to listen to any more.” We could actually hear her stomp out and her voice outside, quite loudly announcing that the whole thing was a joke.

I quickly wrote down that she must have done something underhanded, or at the very least planned something in the near future.

Helen
Mandrell was next in line. She sounded a little nervous, no doubt wondering what was in store for her after Martha’s impetuous exit. “I… I really don’t believe in this sort of thing, not really.”

“That’s as may be,”
Moondance sounded like a teacher who wasn’t buying a student’s excuse for not handing in homework. “Not everybody is sensitive to outside forces.”

“Oh, I’m terribly sensitive,” the client quickly corrected. “Everybody tells me that. I can’t stand to see suffering. I have a very gentle nature, and I always respond to other people.”

Well, I couldn’t blame her for insisting on her right to be thought of as other than insensitive.

“Perhaps that’s why you don’t believe,” Moondance replied. “You might be more open to the other side than you want to recognize. Sensitive people often are, and many of them shy away from too much empathy.”

“Yes, that does rather sound like me,” Helen agreed. “Can you really tell me what’s going to happen in the future? Would it tell you if there’s danger of my husband somehow losing his job? Could you see if there’s any… trouble ahead for him?”

I noticed that her whole concern seemed to be centered on him rather than on herself. That was odd. She didn’t strike me as the type of woman who often thought of others ahead of herself, no matter what she said about her sensitivity. It
hit me suddenly that what I was basing that on was a flash of my wayward psychic powers. Something was very wrong in their household and the image in my mind was of a dollar bill. Was she one of those women who couldn’t control her spending? Maybe she could no longer shuffle the debt she’d run up so he wouldn’t notice it.

“What I see is someone, I’m not clear if it’s you or someone near to you, shoving someone. That’s often symbolic in my readings with an act of aggression. Are you feeling terribly angry with someone right now?”

“Of course not. I’m not that sort of person. I told you that.”

Moondance wisely changed the subject and promised a wonderful vacation that lay ahead, sometime in the following year. That seemed to satisfy Helen and she left quite cheerily when the little bell announced the session was over. It certainly hadn’t been difficult to divert her attention toward a happy ending.

Her husband, Brandon, wasn’t such a happy camper. “What’s this crap about a ‘long vacation’ supposed to mean?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “What were you referring to?”

“I simply noticed that she was due for a long vacation,” Moondance stammered. “It doesn’t mean you’ve already planned it.”

That seemed to infuriate him. He was almost panting. I was again thankful that they’d fixed the room so that it was virtually sound-proof against normal voice levels. However, I was sure anybody close by outside could hear his shouts through the heavy double-layer velvet that covered the doorway. “Well, I’m not planning on any ‘vacation’ so get that out of your head.”

Moondance protested. “I wasn’t doing your reading,” she reminded him. “And as I explained to your wife, interpretations can be wrong, just as your own behavior can change what the future points to right at this moment.”

“Don’t give me any mumbo-jumbo crap!” he grumbled, but we could hear the chair moving as he apparently sat down. “Okay, let’s get this over with. The boss says ‘isn’t this a fun idea?’ and we’re supposed to smile and clap our hands.” I noticed that he’d lowered his voice quite a bit before he said any of that. “What’s your crystal ball have to say?”

“It’s rather fuzzy in your case,” Moondance retorted, either because she was getting a weak reading or because she was extracting a little revenge. I was still having a hard time believing that she was so good at it. “I’m still seeing the vacation, but it seems to be over-ridden by a mist. I’m not sure what that means. Perhaps it’s simply your antagonism that’s clouding the issue. I do see something troubling. Are you feeling particularly angry with someone at the moment?”

“Yes, you,” he snarled. “I’ll bet you have one story for the rich and another for people like me. Right?”

“I have nothing to do with what comes up, and I rarely know the financial position of my clients.”

“Oh come off it. The rich stink of money. It’s in their clothes and polish. That’s pretty much what your job is, isn’t it? Spot the rich and stupid and soak them?”