Echo Mountain - Lauren Wolk Page 0,59

as I could. And then again, “Mother!” more loudly still.

Maisie appeared at the door of the woodshed, growling.

Samuel came out into the yard.

He took one look at the woman and seemed to be split, as I had, between wanting to stay and wanting to go.

I loved him more than ever when he scampered to my side and took hold of my hand.

“Who’s that?” Samuel said.

“That’s Larkin’s mother.”

He peered at her. “I don’t like Larkin’s mother.”

“Where’s your own mother at?” she said.

“Mother!” I called again, more loudly.

And she came through the cabin door all at once.

Esther, who followed behind her, took one look at the situation and stopped short, wavering in place, like a dress pinned to a line.

My mother didn’t slow for one moment.

“And what’s this about?” she said firmly, taking her place at my side.

But just then Larkin came down the path, too, yelling, “Mother! Mother, wait!”

We all stayed in place, like game pieces on a board.

Larkin slowed as he came into the yard.

I tried to see him through my mother’s eyes, this lean boy with his dark, dark hair and his worn-out clothes, and his half-this-half-that face. From one side: just a boy. From the other: a boy hurt.

But we were looking at him straight on, and he was both of those things and more besides. “I’m sorry if she scared you,” he said. “Mother, what are you doing?”

“Who’s that boy?” Samuel said.

“That’s Larkin,” I said.

“I didn’t scare them,” his mother said, though she had.

But, up close, I could see that this was no centipede.

Looking at Larkin’s mother was like looking at a broken bowl. Jagged. A woman in pieces.

And I didn’t see how she could ever be whole again.

Or hold anything properly ever again.

Not with that look on her face.

As on the mountaintop, I could feel the mad-sorrow coming off her like a stink.

“I don’t know you,” my mother said. “I’m Evelyn.”

“You don’t need to know me. Or my boy either.”

My mother looked at Larkin’s battered face. “Did you do that to him?”

“Of course not. He did that himself, paying no attention to what he was doing. But she’s the one who cut him.”

My mother turned to me.

“I only let off the blood so he could see better!”

“That blood,” my mother said. “On your jacket.” She put her hand on her forehead. “Esther, take Samuel into the cabin.” To me, she said. “Is that something else the hag taught you?”

“No,” I said carefully. “Miss Cate taught me to do that. And how to fill a wound with honey. And how to use maggots to eat away dead flesh. And how to make a potato poultice. And—”

“What’s a poultice?” Samuel said over his shoulder as Esther dragged him toward the cabin.

“All right,” my mother said, holding up her hand. “That’s more than enough.” She turned to Larkin’s mother. “What is it you want?”

“I want your girl to stay away from my son. She has no business telling him to wash an old woman’s underthings.”

Which might have sounded comical if someone else had said it. But there was nothing funny about Larkin’s mother.

“They needed washing,” I said.

She nodded. “Then you’re the girl to do it.”

My mother held up both hands now. “You came all the way down here because your son had to do the wash?”

“I came down here to tell you that Larkin already knows his business,” she said, looking not at my mother but at me. “Without you telling it to him. You and his grandmother. Teaching him things that won’t do anyone a bit of good. Telling him to scrub her sour bedsheets when there’s work to be done at home.” She leaned closer. “I’ll thank you for seeing to your own business and letting us see to ours.”

Larkin shook his head. “I’m sorry,” he said again.

“No need to apologize,” my mother said mildly. “You haven’t done anything wrong.”

“You don’t know a thing about it,” his mother said. “Or about your own girl. Out in the night alone, roaming around in trousers, telling Larkin what to do. When she’s the one who needs a strong hand but no man at home to give it.”

My mother stared. “Whatever gave you the idea that there was no man here?”

“You mean that little boy?”

My mother snorted like a spring horse. “I mean my husband, who built this cabin and made these clothes we’re wearing and cut a notch in this mountain for our garden there and a great deal more. None of which is any of your affair. So,