‘Ladies,’ Elmira said, ‘I sympathize with you. I know what you’ve been through these last ten years. I know why you voted for Mrs Goodwater here. You’ve got boys, girls, and men to feed. You’ve got budgets to follow.
You couldn’t afford to have your milk sour, your bread fall, or your cakes as flat as wheels. You didn’t want mumps, chicken pox, and whooping cough in your house all in three weeks. You didn’t want your husband crashing his car or electrocuting himself on the high-tension wires outside town.
But now all of that’s over. You can come out in the open now. No more heartburns or backaches, because I’ve brought the good word and we’re going to exorcise this witch we’ve got here!’
Everybody looked around but didn’t see any witch.
‘I mean your president!’ cried Elmira.
‘Me!’ Mrs Goodwater waved at everyone.
‘Today,’ breathed Elmira, holding on to the desk for support. ‘I went to the library. I looked up counteractions. How to get rid of people who take advantage of others, how to make witches leave off and go.
And I found a way to fight for all our rights. I can feel the power growing. I got the magic of all kinds of good roots and chemicals in me. I got…’ She paused and swayed. She blinked once. ‘I got cream of tartar and…I got…white hawkweed and milk soured in the light of the moon and…’ She stopped and thought for a moment.
She shut her mouth and a tiny sound came from deep inside her and worked up through to come out the corner of her lips. She closed her eyes for a moment to see where the strength was.
‘Mrs Brown, you feelin’ all right?’ asked Mrs Goodwater.
‘Feelin’ fine!’ said Mrs Brown slowly. ‘I put in some pulverized carrots and parsley root, cut fine; juniper berry…’
Again she paused as if a voice had said STOP to her and she looked out across all those faces.
The room, she noticed, was beginning to turn slowly, first from left to right, then right to left.
‘Rosemary roots and crowfoot flower…’ she said rather dimly. She let go of Tom’s hand. Tom opened one eye and looked at her.
‘Bay leaves, nasturtium petals…’ she said.
‘Maybe you better sit down,’ said Mrs Goodwater.
One lady at the side went and opened a window.
‘Dry betel nuts, lavender and crab-apple seed,’ said Mrs Brown and stopped. ‘Quick now, let’s have the election. Got to have the votes. I’ll tabulate.’
‘No hurry, Elmira,’ said Mrs Goodwater.
‘Yes, there is.’ Elmira took a deep trembling breath. ‘Remember, ladies, no more fear. Do like you always wanted to do. Vote for me, and…’ The room was moving again, up and down. ‘Honesty in government. All those in favor of Mrs Goodwater for president say “Aye.”’
‘Aye,’ said the whole room.
‘All those in favor of Mrs Elmira Brown?’ said Elmira in a faint voice.
She swallowed.
After a moment she spoke, alone.
‘Aye,’ she said.
She stood stunned on the rostrum.
A silence filled the room from wall to wall. In that silence Mrs Elmira Brown made a croaking sound. She put her hand on her throat. She turned and looked dimly at Mrs Goodwater, who now very casually drew forth from her purse a small wax doll in which were a number of rusted thumbtacks.
‘Tom,’ said Elmira, ‘show me the way to the ladies’ room.’
‘Yes’m.’
They began to walk and then hurry and then run. Elmira ran on ahead, through the crowd, down the aisle…She reached the door and started left.
‘No, Elmira, right, right!’ cried Mrs Goodwater.
Elmira turned left and vanished.
There was a noise like coal down a chute.
‘Elmira!’
The ladies ran around like a girls’ basketball team, colliding with each other.
Only Mrs Goodwater made a straight line.
She found Tom looking down the stairwell, his hands clenched to the banister.
‘Forty steps!’ he moaned. ‘Forty steps to the ground!’
Later on and for months and years after it was told how like an inebriate Elmira Brown negotiated those steps touching every one on her long way down. It was claimed that when she began the fall she was sick to unconsciousness and that this made her skeleton rubber, so she kind of rolled rather than ricocheted.
She landed at the bottom, blinking and feeling better, having left whatever it was that had made her uneasy all along the way. True, she was so badly bruised she looked like a tattooed lady.
But, no, not a wrist was sprained or an ankle twisted. She held her head funny for three days, kind of peering out of the sides of her eyeballs instead of turning to look. But the important thing was Mrs Goodwater at the bottom of the steps, pillowing Elmira’s head on her lap and dropping tears on her as the ladies gathered hysterically.
‘Elmira, I promise, Elmira. I swear, if you just live, if you don’t die, you hear me, Elmira, listen! I’ll use my magic for nothing but good from now on. No more black, nothing but white magic. The rest of your life, if I have my way, no more falling over iron dogs, tripping on sills, cutting fingers, or dropping downstairs for you!
Elysium, Elmira, Elysium. I promise! If you just live! Look. I’m pulling the tacks out of the doll! Elmira, speak to me! Speak now and sit up! And come upstairs for another vote. President, I promise, president of the Honeysuckle Ladies Lodge, by acclamation, won’t we, ladies?’
At this all the ladies cried so hard they had to lean on each other.
Tom, upstairs, thought this meant death down there.
He was halfway down when he met the ladies coming back up, looking like they had just wandered out of a dynamite explosion.
‘Get out of the way, boy!’
First came Mrs Goodwater, laughing and crying.
Next came Mrs Elmira Brown, doing the same.
And after the two of them came all the one hundred twenty-three members of the lodge, not knowing if they’d just returned from a funeral or were on their way to a ball.
He watched them pass and shook his head.
‘Don’t need me no more,’ he said. ‘No more at all.’
So he tiptoed down the stairs before they missed him, holding tight to the rail all the way.
The end
