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Now
take a sneak peek inside
"The Witch's Garden"
It was during the great pandemic of 1918 that 20
to 40 million people, between the ages of twenty and forty years
old, died of the flu: 675,000 died in America alone. The
majority would die from complications brought on by a severe
form of pneumonia. Those that caught the flu would literally
drown from the bloody foam pouring forth from their mouths and
sinuses. The people living on the Camas Prairie, in Idaho,
shared the flu-borne misery with others around the world. There
were a few people who lived on the prairie, around the towns of Craigmont and Dublin, Idaho, that came down with what the local
doctors thought was a variant of the influenza virus. In these
cases a person would come down with the flu, and then after a
very high fever he or she would slip into a death like coma.
Believing their patients had died, the doctors would consign
them over to the morticians to be buried. The use of
formaldehyde to embalm the dead wasn't in practice at the time,
and there was always the risk of burying a person alive. To
insure against an untimely burial, the mortician would tie a
string around the departed's wrist and run the string through a
hole in the coffin's lid. He would then thread it through a pipe
which would extend three inches above the ground after burial.
The final step would be to attach the string to a small bell,
and, if the person wasn't truly dead, he or she could ring the
bell to be rescued. The grieving relatives would hold gravesite
vigils hoping to hear the bell, but life on the prairie was hard
in those days and not much time could be spared when there was
so much work to do. And, unbeknownst to them, they weren't the
only ones hoping to hear a bell ring.
One old woman named Claw spent all her time at
the Dublin Cemetery. She stood about five foot tall with her
long gray hair tied in a single braid that fell down her back.
It was hard to tell what her age and race was, but with her
black quilted jacket and yellow wrinkled face most people
thought she might be a coolie. Claw had a quick smile and a
singsong voice, which not only put people at ease but also kept
them from seeing her hard beady black eyes. She appeared in town
a year before the flu had raised its first tombstone and had
taken residence in a shack not far from the graveyard. Claw had
blown into town like a tumbleweed and had stuck fast on
headstones of the Dublin Cemetery. When asked about why she
spent so much time there, Claw explained that her husband had
died at sea, and it brought her comfort to spend time in the
cemetery. No one really had any time to take care of the
property, and since she was willing, the Mayor of Dublin hired
her as caretaker. She assured one and all that she would care
for their lost ones as if they were her own, and if a grave bell
should ring she would alert the authorities. Day and night she
could be found there. The townsfolk thought she was a little
odd, but they were soon caught up in their daily work and forgot
all about her. Deep into the night, when all were asleep, she
would sit there like an ancient spider with only the toads to
keep her company. She would sing to them in their own tongue,
and the toads would croak along with her as she patiently waited
for a bell to ring. This was her garden, and beneath the ground
laid the fruits of her labor.
What tales lie between the covers of the
Witch's Garden?
THE WITCH’S GARDEN
THE CHILDREN OF THE WITCH
BY THE LIGHT OF THE SILVERY MOON
THE HOUSE OF BONES
DON’T CAMP WHERE THE GRASS DON’T GROW
THE AMBER TEARS
I ONLY HAVE EYES FOR YOU
ICICLE FLATS
TRANCE PLANT
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