Free The Cure for Death by Lightning by Gail Anderson-Dargatz Page B

Mr. and Mrs. Blundell and was fraught with stories of ghosts and the like. This one I know is true: the spring the grizzly attacked our camp and my father sold the sheep, Ginger Rogers and an unnamed male companion drove into town while on holiday and stayed the night at the Blundells’ haunted motel because there was no place else to stay. Hanging on the wall of the room in which Ginger Rogers stayed was a photograph of Mr. and Mrs. Blundell standing on either side of the elegant and smiling movie star. The motel building was nothing but a frame of poles on which cedar shakes had been nailed. The floor and bunks were made of split cedar logs, the beds were straw mattresses. The only other furnishings were an airtight heater, a bucket of water, and an enamel washbasin that could be seen through the two little crossed windows in each unit. There were three units to the motel, all attached to one another and to the house in which the Blundells lived.
    The doctor’s house and office was on one side of the motel, and the blacksmith’s shop was on the other. Beside the blacksmith’s shop was the garage and gas station, the notary public, and the United Church. Opposite this, to the right of Bouchard and Belcham’s, was G. Locke Drugs and the butcher shop. To the left was W. Clark Jewelers and a vacant lot. The little police office was down by the train station. Other than a few houses, that was all there was to the town of Promise.
    The dirt road that was the main street was rutted and dusty, and when a horse and buggy went by the dust didn’t dissipate but hovered, so the air was never free of it. Cars and trucks had seen their glory days briefly in the space where the Depression declined and the war and its gas rationing began. There were cars in Promise — the doctor had one, the one police constable had another — but many people went back to horse and buggy for the duration of the war.
    As I was sitting on the steps in front of the store, a crow with odd coloring hopped across the street with a chunk of bread in its mouth. The crow was mostly white with black streaks running through its feathers. It stopped in the center of the street and busied itself prying the soft meat of the bread from the crust until a couple of black crows swooped down and went after the albino as if it weren’t oneof their own. The white crow fought them for a time and then gave up; it took off and landed on the church roof. I shooed off the black crows and picked up a feather the white crow had lost in the tussle; it was a beautiful thing, white with streaks and specks of blue-black.
    Then Goat was there, right behind me. “Hello,” he said.
    Goat was the son of Dr. and Mrs. Poulin. His real name was Arthur. My brother said Arthur Poulin had the body of a man and the mind of a stupid dog. My father, surprisingly, was kinder. He said Arthur Poulin could play the piano and could be taught other things, if someone took the time with him. Half of Goat’s face was that of a shy young man; the other was a cross-eyed child. His ears were small and square, his nose was flat and broad, his tongue hung out, his eyes were puffy-looking and slanted up. He was very short and his shoulders were hunched and he flopped around as if he had no muscle or joints. He had short stubby little hands that flew all over his body, all the time, scratching, pulling, picking. His constant nervous movements frightened me.
    “Hello,” he said again.
    I looked at the faces of the town buildings and at the albino crow on the church roof and pretended Goat wasn’t there. Goat stamped a circle in the dust. I flicked an ant off my skirt.
    “I’m like everybody else,” Goat said. “My dad said I’m like everybody else.”
    I looked up at him. Goat held one arm out and took a step towards me. I stood and ran, and after a moment Goat ran after me.
    “I’m like everybody else!” he cried out.
    Dan left the blacksmith’s shop as I ran by. “Give her a kiss!” my