Page 36 of A Lullaby for Witches

Claudia was a dream to interview. She mostly talked about her childhood in Tynemouth, and she was a natural storyteller, peppering her anecdotes with vivid details. “I know I’m going to sound like an old lady, but everything really was cheaper back in the day. I could get fried clams at Tony’s for fifty cents and see a movie with the change.”

Augusta dutifully took notes, asking the occasional question to guide her along.

“How long has your family been in the area?”

Pursing her lips, Claudia appeared to do some mental calculation. “Oh, a long time. My mother’s family was always here as far as I know, and my father’s family emigrated from Trinidad in the 1950s.”

“Do you have any stories passed down from your relatives about Tynemouth? Like, really old ones?” Maybe if she was lucky, Claudia would be able to corroborate some of the other stories in the oral history book, like the one about Margaret Harlowe’s ghost.

“How much time do you have?” Claudia laughed. “If I’d known you were interested in old stuff, I would have pulled out some of my family keepsakes. Let me see what I can put my hands on.” She got up and started rummaging around in a desk in the corner. When she returned, she handed Augusta a faded shoebox held closed with a rubber band.

“Those are family mementos from over the years. Stuff I don’t really know what to do with, but is too important to throw out.”

Augusta opened the box. Just like her father’s, it was filled with snapshots and old papers, little mementos. Carefully rummaging through everything, her hand found a palm-sized wooden object the shape of an arrow. It was impossibly smooth and beautiful. “What’s this?”

Claudia leaned over to look. “I think it’s called a shuttle. It would have been used for mending fishing nets back in the day. Kind of like a big sewing needle.”

“Was someone in your family a fisherman?”

“Oh, probably. But this didn’t belong to any of them. This belonged to a great-aunt in the 1800s. According to my grandmother, she had a little business mending nets for the fishermen.”

Augusta ran her fingers over the satin-smooth grain of the wood. “That’s amazing. I never thought about women being in the fishing industry back then, but of course they must have been.”

Claudia nodded. “From what I remember my grandmother telling me, this auntie was a real character.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know if it was because there weren’t many other Black folks around or what, but she had a reputation for being a bit of an outsider, maybe even a witch.”

Augusta looked up at this. “Really?”

“Mmm-hmm. I heard all kinds of stories, but you have to take them with a grain of salt because they’ve been passed down over generations and probably embellished a bit over the years. Apparently, sea captains would pay her to calm the seas for them before they set sail, and they said that she could weave spells into the nets to double or even triple their catch.”

“Okay, that’s awesome,” Augusta said as she continued turning the shuttle over in her hands. “Do you know anything else about her? I’d love to include her in our exhibit.”

Claudia tapped her finger against her chin in thought. “There was some kind of drama around her and how she left Tynemouth. I remember my grandmother making a big deal of it, saying that Phebe got mixed up with a rich white girl who got her into trouble. My grandmother was pretty angry on her behalf. If there was ever a woman to hold a grudge, it was Grandma Lou, so I tend to believe that she knew what she was talking about. Anyway, she said this girl got mixed up in some sort of occult business, and Phebe ended up taking the fall for her. Forced Aunt Phebe right out of town.”

The hairs on Augusta’s neck stood up. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she was certain that Claudia was talking about Margaret. She hadn’t even been thinking about Margaret, but there she was all the same, a shadowy figure living on through the story of this woman. Flicking her tongue over her suddenly dry lips, she asked, “Do you know what the girl’s name was?”

Claudia shrugged. “I have no idea. Whatever happened, no one thought it was important enough to write it down. Phebe ended up moving out of the area, and my grandmother mentioned her being buried somewhere in Boston.”

Claudia had moved on and was telling her a story about a beached whale back in the ’90s, but Augusta couldn’t seem to focus. All she could think about was Margaret and what had transpired between her and Phebe. She could practically envision the dark-haired Margaret, beautiful and tempestuous. How many other people had fallen under her spell, had found themselves in trouble when her passion had turned stormy? For the first time since starting her hunt for Margaret, she began to wonder if her beautiful muse from the painting had had a darker side, as well.

19

Margaret

I lean’d my back against some young oak

Thinking it a sturdy tree

But first it bent and then it broke

So did my love prove false to me.

—“The Water is Wide,” Traditional Folk Song

Why was I so nervous? I had always known what I wanted, and I cared little for the opinions of others. Yet as I left Phebe’s cottage with Shadow at my heels, my palms were damp, my breath short and fast. Perhaps some part of me knew what was to come.

---