Witch Water Read Online Free PDF

first thing he saw next was a
display in a curiosity shop window: a mounted skeleton whose
yellow-boned hand held—of all things—a pair of binoculars to its
face. Fanshawe frowned. He hoped the grotesque thing was artificial
but had the edgy notion that it wasn’t. Who the HELL is going to
buy that? Next was the Starbucks— Some things never
change, he thought—and, next, an information kiosk tended by a
spry, elderly woman with a crown of frost-white hair. “Just out for
a gallivant, sir?” she piped up in surprising British accent.
“Yes,” he said, still distracted, “I just arrived. Not really sure
what to do.” “Well, sir, if you’re of the type to fancy such
things”—she pointed across the street—“you might have a look in the
waxworks, but if you’re easily dispirited, be forewarned to steer
clear of the back hall,” yet she pronounced “hall” as ’all. Fanshawe followed her finger to glimpse a pair of Revolutionary War
soldiers “guarding” the wax museum’s entrance. At first he thought
the pair were living actors in costumes but in a few moments their
perfect stillness betrayed them as mannequins, lifelike to an
unnerving degree. That’s pretty good work, he realized,
though he’d never been particularly impressed by waxworks. He was
amused, though, by the elder woman’s reverse psychology. She’s
daring me to go in. “I don’t know if I’m easily dispirited,” he
said, “but I guess there’s a torture chamber and the whole
witchcraft theme.” “That there is, sir,” she replied. “It’ll give
you a case of the creepers, it will.”
    Fanshawe smiled. “And, of course, a lifelike
mannequin of Jacob Wraxall, hmm?”
    “’Tis nothing more than the truth, ole limb
of the Devil that he was, and that wretched daughter of his. Oh,
the carryin’ on they got up to? Heavens!”
    But Fanshawe had had enough of Jacob Wraxall
for one day. “Thanks for the information,” he said, glancing at the
town map. On the index, he spotted the words: FORTUNE TELLER, and
its numbered code indicated it to be close to the waxworks. He
looked back across the street and saw it. LETITIA RHODES - PSYCHIC,
announced the small window sign in gaudy neon. PALMISTRY, CHARTS,
TAROT. It occurred to Fanshawe that he’d never had his palm
read.
    “I see you’re eyein’ the palmist’s ,
sir. Well, I can only speak like what my heart tells me and say
you’re a-better off passin’ that one up.”
    “Oh? Why’s that, ma’am?”
    “An odd card that Letitia Rhodes is, sir,
yes, sir, not that I’m speakin’ ill, mind you, not one word of it.
But one day I was just havin’ me my stroll to the tea shop, and I
passed her, I did, and she look me right in the eye and say, ‘I’m
sorry for your loss, Mrs. Anstruther”—that bein’ my name,
o’course—Anstruther, Delores, Anstruther, sir. So I say
back, ‘What loss might you be referring to, Ms. Rhodes?’ and then
she go all white in the face and eyes big ‘round as saucers, and
she rush off, apologizin’ under her breath. I just took her to be
daft, I did, but then when the daily post come I get a letter from
Merseyside sayin’ me brother died a week before. A massive stroke it was he ’ad, on his way to the train.”
    “I’m sorry to hear that,” Fanshawe said for
lack of anything else, but now he saw that she was merely using her
previous trick, daring him to test the palm-reader’s authenticity.
“But I don’t think having my fortune told is on my to-do list
today, Mrs. Anstruther.” Nevertheless, he enjoyed the old woman’s
lively candor; and the accent was a hoot. “What do you recommend, ma’am?”
    “Well, sir, if’n you’re in want of some
exercise, you can always rent a bystickle down at Mr. Worby’s shop,
and if that ain’t to your likin’, sir, you might find it pleasin’
to ’ave an amble ‘bout the scenic walkaways.”
    The idea immediately appealed to him. A
good long walk might get rid of this lousy mood.