Witch One Dunnit? (Rachael Penzra mystery) (24 page)

       So much for the image of an average little old lady.  However, I agreed to go along with her wishes.  It wasn’t really a complete surprise to realize she apparently intended to read my future.  For some reason she felt no one else should know about it.  I shifted uncomfortably.  Fortune tellers spook me.  If they’re good, they tend to be so casual about it.  “Oh, by the way, my dear, the stars say you shouldn’t travel today, so maybe you’d better call in sick for work.”  Or, “Do watch out for strangers in the next few days.  One of them might want to harm you.”  I am always extremely cautious on those days, yet I never read my horoscope in the newspapers.  The future, fortunately, is highly volatile.  It’s not locked into a set pattern.  It’s kind of like the old arguments about free will and predestination.  If God already knows what you’re going to do, then you’re predestined, aren’t you?  Yet you supposedly have all those choices in life ... Or consider the Universe, unending ...

       The age-old conundrums are too confusing, so I did what I usually do and stopped thinking about them.  I’d drink my tea, have my fortune read, and go on my merry little way.  I’d listen to what I was told, but I wouldn’t let it rule my behavior.  I’d use my rational common sense to guide me through my life and ... Yah, right.  Sounded good, but even
I
knew better to believe my own fairy tale.

       “Here we are.” My hostess reappeared with two cups.  “Messy tea leaves and all.  I used to wonder about any stray leaves that might get swallowed and therefore never read.  My Granny would warn me not to worry about such little things.  She said if I continued to worry every little thing to death, I’d drive everyone crazy and there’d be nobody left to have their futures read.”

       “She sounds like a wonderful woman,” I told her.  However, she’d managed to put a new worry into my mind, and now I was secretly fretting about any speck of my future I might be swallowing.  Would it make much difference in the reading?

       “She
was
wonderful.  And funny,” Elena quietly agreed.  “Grandparents meant something back in those days.  They either lived with you or close by.  They were built-in baby sitters and teachers.  Granny and Grandpa never married.  That’s hard to believe, isn’t it?  We like to think that sort of behavior belongs to modern times.  Luckily, the family was never ostracized because of it.  Of course,” She peeked up from her tea and grinned at me.  “It didn’t hurt that Granny was the town witch and nobody was in a big hurry to offend her.  I think they were afraid she’d turn them into goats.”

       I had to chuckle.  Mysterious Elena had a sense of humor.  At least I hoped it was humor.

       “Of course, what they didn’t realize at first was she never harmed anyone, and never would have.  She was a very gentle woman, and became quite well-loved.  The Gift passed by my mother and ended up with me.  Mother was just as happy.  I remember her as being a very prosaic woman, really much happier feeding her family or trying out a new recipe than she would have been trying to solve other people’s problems.”

       I thought about it.  “I think I’m more like your mother than your grandmother.  I’m not too thrilled with this idea of me solving Lucinda’s problems.”

       “No.” She laughed out loud.  “You tell yourself that because you’ve spent your lifetime trying to hide your powers, and not call attention to them.  Now the real you is emerging.  I think you’ll find you’re very curious, and curious about more than what fortune signs you might have swallowed with your tea.”

       I had to laugh with her.  That’s the problem with mind-readers.  You can’t hide even the silliest thoughts from them, and I told her so.

       “I don’t have to be a mind-reader to recognize the thoughts going through your head.  You tend to be much too open sometimes.  A charming trait, but sometimes a dangerous one.  You don’t always remember to keep your face as a mirror rather than a window.”

       I’d thought I was getting better at developing the all-important poker-face.  Apparently not.

       “Drink up, now, and we’ll start with your hands,” she told me in oddly business-like manner.

       I gave her my hand, palm upwards, but she gently turned it over and studied the back of it.  I’m not familiar with palmistry, but I couldn’t imagine what she was seeing on the back of my hand other than a lot of wrinkles, several minor scars from a lifetime of wear and tear, and embarrassingly dirty fingernails.  “What can you see from looking at the
back
of my hand?” I asked.

       She kept her head lowered, still studying.  “I’m getting a general personality reading.  It’s easier to see the basic shape of the hand without being distracted by the actual reading.  You have an interesting shape to yours, neither fish nor fowl.  I’m always interested in conflicting personality traits.  We all have them to some extent, but occasionally someone like you comes along where the differences and the balances are unusually equal.  It’s a good hand, though,” she patted it and turned it over.

       A good hand?  What constitutes a good hand to a palm reader?  I wasn’t sure it was a compliment, but I decided to take it as one.  I tried to guess what else she was seeing.  To my untutored eyes my hand was a mass of tiny, fine lines.  When had that happened?  I didn’t remember having so many lines, and the major lines had cracks and fainter lines crossing them.  Was that good or bad?  And why was she feeling the pads below my fingers and the thick area by my thumb?  Didn’t a palmist just look at the lines and then know everything there was to know?

       She set my right hand down and picked up my left hand.  This time she didn’t bother with the back of my hand.  Again her hands stroked and kneaded various areas.  Her intent study was making me nervous.  I’d never been one to put much faith in physical studies, although I knew some problems became obvious to the right observer before any other symptoms showed.  That was reaction to something definite, though, something where anyone with the proper training could identify the problem.  I guess what I really don’t believe in is the shape of the head, or ears, or eyes defining the soul within.

       And what was that old wives tale about the size of a man’s feet?  Walter had really big feet, but he hadn’t had a very big ... I gave my head a light shake.  I simply
had
to get better at controlling my thoughts.

       “What do you see?” I finally blurted.  I didn’t like her concentrated interest.  What I mainly wanted to hear was something absolutely mediocre. And if the reading was going to show something awful, then a good-old fashioned lie would suffice.  In fact, I’d settle for the tale wherein I would meet a mysterious stranger and take a long ocean voyage.  Or maybe win the lottery.

       “For one thing, a double lifeline.”  She pressed my hands together gently, then turned them up to point out my life line and its weak, secondary companion line.  The second one didn’t look too impressive to me.  I was more interested in the lines
crossing
my lifeline.  It seemed to me that they were more important.  Were they omens?  Bad ones?  Wouldn’t something
crossing
your lifeline be bad news?

       “Is that good or bad?” I asked.  “And what about all those lines coming off it?  Are those illnesses or something?”

       “You have a strong lifeline.”  Her tone made it clear she’d tell me what she chose and no more than that.  “It has some unusual ... not breaks, exactly, but signs.  You’ll have times when you’ll need to be extremely careful, when outside forces are concentrated on you with enmity.  The double line is good, usually denoting lots of energy.”

       “Not me, then,” I told her.  “You must have the wrong person. Lately, I have all the energy of a dying fruit fly.”

       She looked up at me and shook her head in wonder.  “The double line isn’t just for
physical
energy.  This time it means you’ll always be running in high gear with your imagination.  The trouble is learning to control yourself and put your artistic talents to work.”

       “I haven’t got any artistic talents to speak of,” I complained.  Yet wasn’t this what I’d been longing to hear just a few minutes earlier?  Something soothing and mundane?  Why was I practically
begging
for bad news?

       “This would include your psychic talents,” she informed me dryly.

       That shut me up.  I knew I was behaving irrationally, and nothing she could say was going to make me happy, but I had sensed something, a brief glimpse into her mind.  She’d been worried about something she’d seen.  I wanted to know what it was, but then again I didn’t.  I believe in free will.  I
know
so-called destinies can be changed. 

    At least I like to
think
I know.

       She pointed out some details in my hand, comparing one hand to the other.  “Here, in the left palm, you can see that you were meant to have great psychic powers.  Fortunately they are balanced in the line of
Head
.  See how strong that is?  Unusual combinations, lots of astral power, but well-grounded.  You’ve a very healthy, interesting balance of nature, almost primitive.  Now look here, in the right hand.  See how your powers, that started out so strongly, have become somewhat faded and choppy?  This is your worldly life, what actually happens, as opposed to your spiritual life, the one where your nature would have led you had it been uninterrupted by outside influences.  We all have outside influences, more or less.  They’ve certainly played havoc with you, haven’t they?  It makes you understand why some religious sects are so dedicated to removal of self from the daily world, doesn’t it?  The Eastern religions understand this so much better than we do.

       “Here you change again.”  She showed me where the markings became deeper and steadier.  I tried to follow what she was saying.  When she pointed things out to me, I could see how they followed a set course, or were interrupted.  It was unbelievably complicated.  It certainly took a real expert to decipher all the signs and countersigns.  “This is the point of life you’re in now, your second lifetime, so to speak.  Not many people undergo such an extreme change later in life.  By that time we’ve lost the innocence and faith we had as children.  Unfortunately, we replace them with cynicism and doubts.”

       “Okay,
this
I can understand.  I really have become a different person than I was for so many years.  Only what about those other things you were talking about?  The, uh, dangerous-sounding parts where other people might harm me?  Is that emotional or physical?”

       “The nitty-gritty?” she returned my hands to me, sat back in her chair, and smiled.  “I would say it
is
physical, and yes, there’s definite danger to you.  What should I tell you?  Over and over many signs are counter-balanced by others.  You have marvelous lines.  You have potentially dangerous ones.  I would suggest, to put it bluntly, that you watch your back."

      
Oh great! 
I thought.  All the good sounding stuff is negated by those three words. 
Watch your back
.  Not exactly Shakespearean in eloquence, but every bit as pungent as some of his more pithy sayings.  I didn’t know whether to be grateful for the warning or distraught.  I’ve always been a proponent of the school of thought professing ignorance to be bliss.  Oh, sure, sometimes it’s better to know things.  Forewarned is forearmed and all that, but we can get by quite nicely without knowing about
every
potential danger.  My mind seemed suddenly overwhelmingly filled with clichés, most of them contradictory, and none of them the least bit comforting.

       Elena finished the session by reading my messy, soggy tea leaves.  Even
she
didn’t seem to take this particular reading seriously.  “Tea leaf readings are surprisingly accurate when they’re done correctly,” she told me.  “I, however, don’t consider myself an expert.  I use them occasionally when I’m unhappy about the clarity of my other readings.  Ah, see, here is your handsome stranger,” she pointed to a blob of wet leaf.  “And here the journey.  See the boat?”

       All I saw was a blob of wet leaves.  “If there’s a handsome stranger in my future, you can bet the key is the ‘strange’ part of ‘stranger’.  I’ll take the boat, thank you very much,” I said decisively.  

       “All in the eye of the beholder,” she agreed laughingly.  “But then, isn’t everything?  Come, David’s waiting to take you home.  I’m sure you’re tired after a long day.  I had wanted to read the Tarot for you, but I think we can wait.  You seem to be a little unsettled.  If you want my advice, let me know.  Now, don’t be overly worried.  Everything seems to be protected in one way or another, but still ...”