Urban Legend

When you live in the New England countryside it's nearly a law that you adore Halloween. It was certainly that way in 1963 when Pamela was 15. Young people in the 60's had a double dose of bloodrush going on. 15 at the threshold of being a full blown teenager and this life event taking place as the infamous 1960's were just picking up steam. A heady combination. So much so, even teens living off the beaten track were not immune. They gave their parents instructions to bring them things from the city when returning from work or the supermarket. The latest Bob Dylan record or a magazine with a multi-page spread on the British Invasion. Turn tables rotated constantly and phone lines buzzed.

It has always been recognized that country kids matured early. After being cooped up at home on a back country road with just your immediate family, by 12 or 13 you were pretty well itching to broaden your horizons. So you found a group to join in at the new Regional Highschool which included some members old enough to drive. In order to do this Pam cultivated a mature look and reputation early on. Fall of school year '63 found Pam settled in to the tenth grade. If you were at all pretty, which Pam was, you already had a boyfriend. This didn't mean an awful lot yet, other than you were cool enough to get a boyfriend or vice versa for the boys.

Pam was on the cheer squad and her boyfriend Rob was on all the ball teams. Poster children for their type. There was another type that during this historical period enjoyed an unusual popularity. The Bohemian who would morph into the Hippie. There is always an "artistic" faction among teenagers. They dress in black and mope while being painters, writers or musicians. They contemplate death and worry their parents, who try to decide if they are playacting or truly suicidal.

At the highschool this year, the beat group is almost edging out the jocks. The times they are a-changing! A strange un-voiced competition for popularity ran an undercurrent through school activities.

Claire was on the other team from Pam, even though they had been country neighbors; living a half mile apart; since they were little. It's interesting to witness the unspoken way things like clique politics work themselves out between teenagers. While Pam and Claire remained friends in the neighborhood, at school they each drifted off into their own peer groups. Claire was in all the art classes she could fit into her schedule. She wanted to be a painter. She didn't think she was very good, but she kept at it. As Pam was pretty, Claire was plain. A little chubby. Her baby fat never left as people kept promising her it would.

The beats had a tendency to conduct their social life in groups rather than couples. Even so after a while they would pair off because they wanted to explore their sexuality and we weren't quite into the whole free love thing just yet. Claire found her counterpart in the art room. Thomas was a good painter. He was from a farming family and the real ideal of who would evolve into a Hippie. They made a good pair, not ultra popular by jock standards; but well liked and included.

The school year was well underway. Students and teachers settled in. Days were growing shorter and colder. By mid-October houses up and down the country roads were sprouting Halloween decorations. Pumpkins and hay bales and mums. Paper cut outs in windows and Indian Corn tied to doors and lamp posts. Every year stories would circulate about scary events that had taken place in the rural surroundings.

"There is a rock on our farm that has a Witch's footprint in it" Thomas was telling a group in the art room. " Four generations ago my family bought the farm from the Haskell family who had owned it since colonial times. The Haskells proudly told the new owners of the rock they had purchased and it's attending legend."

"It seems one Mercy Brewer had been run out of Boston colony because she was suspected of being a Witch. Her transgression was stealing a baby for what was thought to be a ritual sacrifice. Truth of it was she did indeed steal a baby from it's cradle, in a neighboring town, in the dark of night. Her intent was not to harm the child, but to return to Boston claiming that the babe was hers and the product of an affair with a well respected magistrate, who had a wife already. She had hoped that the ensuing scandal would dissolve his marriage and she could have him and the babe for her own. What she didn't count on was the wife's refusal to give up her husband and more so, her life style. Nor the denial of the Magistrate as to the affair with her. Instead he used his influence to have her banished from Boston by trumping up the " baby sacrifice " tale.

Cast out, she took the babe and fled south to Middleborough. There she was taken in by the original owners of the farm as a farm hand."

Now of course you would have to be more than a bit unstable to trump up such a plan to begin with and her ensuing plight made her seethe with rage every time she thought about it. Her anger clouded her thinking further and she began to think perhaps the powers of darkness could help her exact revenge on the magistrate. She would wonder the woods behind the cow pen and sit on a table rock and ponder a plan.

"There must be something to this witch stuff or there wouldn't be such an uproar over it. Perhaps the Devil would help me." The more time went by the more obsessed she became with revenge. The last night of October she again took the sleeping babe from it's cradle and carried it to the rock in the woods. She laid it on the table rock and began to walk circles around it muttering curses she had invented in her head.

"Take this babe I beg of you and in exchange for this life strike down the Magistrate who betrayed me!" She kept repeating this plea and walking faster and faster around the rock. The child just lay there not even crying- just watching her.

As her ranting reached a crescendo, she grabbed a rock from the ground, jumped upon the table rock and held it above the baby's head. Just as she was about to fulfill the curse a mighty lightening bolt smote her down into a vapor.

The next morning the farmer and his wife went searching for the missing girl and her baby. The wife had become very attached to the baby and had prayed for some way to have it be her own. Finally they came to the table rock and saw a bundle there. Running to it, fearing the worst, they saw the baby was alive and sleeping. Just beside it was a pile of blackened ash burnt blacker than coal. The farmers wife lifted the child tenderly in her arms. The farmer, curious, brushed at the ash on the rock. He felt of it and bent to smell it. It smelled so acrid he reacted by sweeping it to the ground. Beneath the ash, burnt into the rock was a clear footprint. Small and in the shape of a woman's boot sole.

It was so burnt into the rock face it has lasted all these years and every Halloween it turns black black again. There is a legend that says if a pregnant girl steps upon the print she will not be able to remove her foot until the adulterer is punished."

"That's just a story!!!" the listeners said.
"Well you can think that if you want or better yet come see it for yourselves !" said Thomas, thinking it would be a good hoot for Halloween.

And so a Halloween field trip was planned. The story spread like wildfire through the school. Before long kids from all the different social sets were making plans to converge on the woods of Thomas' farm.

Pam had just confided to Claire that she was pregnant. No one else knew yet. Not Rob and certainly not her parents.
"This can't be happening to me!" "I can't have a baby--what about college?"
"Well if you really don't want it, you'll have to have your parents send you away to get rid of it." 'They'd probably rather do that than have everyone know you got pregnant."
"You're probably right there knowing them." "Swear you won't tell a soul."
"Of course-- I would never--you know I love you like a sister." "What are you going to do about the Witch Rock Halloween party?"
"Why?"

"Well you know the legend says...."
"Claire don't be ridiculous!" "That's just a Halloween story and an excuse for a party."

The week before Halloween the excitement grew. There was to be a bon fire in the field and food and drink was being trucked in for the party. It really seemed group politics had been put aside for this uniting event.

Halloween night was perfect, not too cold. At dusk everyone started pulling their cars and trucks onto the hayfield. Hamburgers sizzled- music blared- lots of Rolling Stones. The beer keg was tapped and plenty of doobies made the rounds. Around nine o'clock the bonfire was lit. People started telling Ghost stories to get people in the mood for the hike.

Claire and Thomas had been busy keeping things at a manageable level of revelry. At eleven o'clock Thomas jumped up on the back of his pickup truck.
"O.K. Everyone.... we're heading out. It's about a mile so stay on the trail. Don't wonder off ...there are wild dogs back there...." He knew he was wasting his effort but had to at least try. "Use flashlights!!!...no fires!!

And so the procession began. Much laughter and drunken stumbling. At various spots along the trail spooks jumped out to wild shreeks.

Finally at the rock, Thomas lit the TIKI Torches he had placed in a circle around it. The rock was about six feet by four feet. and sure enough, there towards the back side was the footprint plain as day, or should we say night. The girls touched it in awe. The boys scraped at it to see if it were freshly painted. Little stone steps had been placed beside it and the procession across the rock began. All the girls walked across- some holding their breath- and placed their foot on the print. When they didn't stick they jumped off the back side and their boyfriends gave cheers and pats on the back.

Pam hopped up on the rock, turning to give Claire a sly smile. At the stroke of midnight she gave one long hop and her right foot came down on the print. A loud rumble crossed the sky and when she would have naturally completed the motion of landing on her left foot she crumpled to the stone. Her right foot would not budge. Lightening pierced the sky with another loud crack, leaving the smell of sulpher in the air. Pam was out cold with fright. Girls screamed for real this time. The boys tried to pry her foot loose. After the midnight hour passed the foot released and a badly shaken group of young people straggled back to their vehicles.

"WOW That was awesome!!!" was the word around the halls before first class the next morning. The light of day made the whole thing not so scary. No one saw Pam or Rob.

The students for first period civics class opened the classroom door and stopped in their tracks. The smoldering remains of Mr Jenkins was strewn across his desk.

Happy Halloween Everyone!!!

Use It All

Ermine lived in the little hut behind the corn field. It was very small but it was enough for her now. At middle age she found herself alone except for her cats and other small creatures that came out of the field for little treats she left for them.

Her life had not gone as she had hoped. She couldn't say planned because that was the problem. She hadn't made a plan. She had just drifted along, year to year, dealing with whatever came along. Life was so different now than when she was young. In these modern times. So fast and so expensive. It made her life feel so tenuous. Used to be you had your job for most of your life. Now you were lucky if you had the same job for five years. Technology made it possible to have all the world's problems delivered to you every day- all day.

Some people liked it, the new caffeine driven existence. Some people couldn't take it. Ermine couldn't take it. So she dropped out. Pulled the plug. Carted her T.V. set to the curb and moved a few times. Each time was to a place a little more removed. Now here she was.
The little hut was twenty feet square. Just one room, open space. It had a wood stove which was what Ermine loved best. It was work but she didn't mind. The hut was built for workers to live in while they worked the cranberry bogs. She made a deal with the owner to live there in exchange for work around the place. His wife was ill and needed help. So Ermine settled into a routine of work and her off time ,which she used to write her stories. She didn't see many people but that was o.k. She had had enough of people and enough of the world.

Part of her work included taking some of the care of the animals around the place. She liked that too. So there were her indoor cats, the farm animals and the wild critters. She made a study of them all. How they differed in their varying states of wildness. How they related to her and to each other. Their family ways. They were much more sensible than people.

Ermine didn't have much money. She made a little from her stories and that had to cover her food and her bare needs. She became very proficient at making do and using up everything. Nothing went to waste.

Ermine learned about death. Everything is born and everything dies. It is just how it is. She became fascinated with the breath. She assisted at births and witnessed life enter the body with the first breath. She was present sometimes when beings died. She would cradle them in her arms the same way, if they let her, and watch the last breath leave taking the spirit with it. Then she would just be holding the empty body. It felt like someone had just left a room or a house leaving it empty. Ermine could never understand people's attachment to the corpse. All you had to do was look at it to see the being was long gone.

So after a respectful period , the body was used up as well. If it was something that could be used for food you dressed it out before the blood cooled. Over the course of years Ermine learned more and more. She learned how to be able to make use of the skins or feathers, the horns and nails and teeth. Everything was used.

In Ermine's house, things she had brought with her began to be replaced with things she made from things that once lived or grew. She learned to carve, to replace cups or plates. She sewed articles of clothing. What she required from the outside world became less and less.

Eventually the farmers wife died. Ermine held her as that last breath passed out of her. The farmer was there but could not give her the same comfort. The two of them dug the grave out in the woods behind the bog. In a little while the farmer wanted Ermine to move into the house with him but she didn't want to. She was passed all that. She continued looking after him though, and the animals.

Sometimes Ermine thought about what would happen if she were forced to go back to the world. She didn't think she could do it. Once in a while some horror story would find it's way back to her about what was going on out there. She knew she would never make it.

One night the farmer didn't come in for supper. Ermine ate her meal and cleaned up. She put his plate in the fridge finally and went to her hut. At nine o'clock she checked the animals. No sign of him. Not much she could do in the dark.

Next morning brought no word. So now Ermine took the dog and started walking the land. She wasn't at it very long before the dog started barking. They found him in the corn field. His body was slumped on the ground. Altho he had hit his head on a rock when he fell, she didn't think that is what killed him. Looked like a heart attack. At any rate he was dead now.

If he was dead and people knew, she would have to leave. She would have to go back. Ermine went into the shed and got the butcher tools. Nothing went to waste.

Child Vanishes From School Trip

Little Billy didn't want to go to school on Friday. "I hate school trips Mom. They're boring!"
Truth be told Billy was scared. He was an over-sensitive child- afraid of everything. His Mom was well aware of his fears in life and worried a lot about the best way to deal with it. She did her best not to show him her concern and encourage him to be more at ease in his world.
"But Billy you like history class and you like boats. The Whaling Museum will be fun. They have that whale skeleton and the big boat you can go aboard. Here's your hat - give me a kiss."

"O.K. Mom I'll try" said Billy as he tugged his ball cap on his head and pecked his Mom on the cheek.
Little did Mom know Billy's fears would be well founded.

Everyone at the Museum liked Ibraham. No one could remember a time he wasn't there. Small of stature, he was all sinewy muscle. He still whipped around the big building keeping everything spotless and ship shape. No one knew his age, he'd never say. His hair was white now, close cropped tight curls. His copper skin had few lines and his dark eyes flashed when he smiled. If you looked at him real close you could just see the faintest blue tracings of tattoo on his cheeks. You almost thought you imagined it.

Ibraham liked to stay around after work and tell stories of the great whaling days to the children who would come on field trips. Was it his Grandfather's stories he told of going after the great beasts in little matchbox longboats? Or how they had been plucked from their native islands while drunk to build these vast fortunes? Everyone was enthralled by Ibraham's stories, no matter how often they had heard them.

Ibraham's favorite room was the one who's walls were covered with old sailcloth painted with scenes of native South Sea villages. In glass cases were relics brought back as curios. Even little heads stared out to scare you. In here Ibraham told his family stories to groups of wide eyed children.

Billy was feeling proud of himself for doing O.K. on this trip. He even allowed himself to enjoy climbing all over the boat and hearing how the marine science people had reconstructed the whale bones high over head. At the end of the day Billy walked off to go to the bathroom. He didn't think to tell anyone. Dawdling as children do, when he came back to the foyer it was empty. The bus was gone from outside. Only Ibraham was there mopping the floor.

The next morning the police were combing the building before opening time. Billy's Mother was in the lobby hysterical. The teacher was seeing herself fired because she hadn't done a proper head count and realized Billy wasn't on the bus.

Ibraham watched out the corner of his eye as he mopped the hallway.
"Is this your son's ball cap Mame?" "We found it by the big black pot in there."

Biting the Hand That Feeds You

For such a high tone New England town Bentley had a few problems. The town Fathers turned a blind eye to up the hill away from the waterfront where all the money was. This was the part of town where the mills had been. After shipping money dwindled, the mills came with their sizable immigrant populations to work in them. First it might be French, then Irish or Polish, then the Portuguese. It was the same all over New England. Each group came to work in the mills churning out cloth or rubber shoes or metal parts of things. Each wave left it's imprint on the town. Then manufacturing moved South and left the empty mills behind.

There was a long span of emptiness before the condo craze came along. The glass windows got broken, pipes froze, doors got pushed in. But Bentley was too busy turning the waterfront upscale to be worried about the old mills. Tourists and condo dwellers never went east of Woodlawn St.

One cluster of buildings had fallen particularly far into disrepair and because of it's easy accessibility it was no longer vacant. Homeless people had discovered it and moved in. Not enough of a population to even be noticeable. There were no houses right nearby. Nobody wanted to live near the mills. Besides once they got in they could go way back away from the street side, through the maze of rooms to the very back. There weren't as many broken windows there and it was warmer. Plus people didn't see the barrel fires so they could fix something to eat and then roll up in their blankets and sleep. Pretty good.

Those hiding out there didn't know that they were not alone.

There was another problem that Bentley tended to ignore. It's ever growing number of feral cats. Not the polite kind of pampered house pet, but in many cases their off spring. Summer people and kids from the college had a habit of getting a cat and then leaving it behind after the season or after graduation. With no one to care for them, they reverted to their feral nature and learned to take care of themselves. Not being "fixed" they multiplied greatly and Bentley had numerous colonies all throughout town. The colonies ranged anywhere from 5 or 6 members to 20 or 30. It's a hard life and the average age span was around five years. Those in the neighborhood of the abandoned mills moved inside after the local teenagers broke out the windows with their baseball bats. Life was a little easier then.

At least they had shelter from the elements and a nice old lady who lived down the road religiously came morning and night with tin pie plates of food for them. They started living longer. Their numbers grew. Pretty good.

When the homeless people came they hid. And watched. After the people fell asleep the cats would creep out of their hiding places and eat whatever scraps of food were left. Little by little they grew bolder and once in a while they would show themselves. Being basically soft hearted, the homeless people took to sharing their food with them. This went on through the fall. Once in a while someone would even wake in the night to find a cat or two curled up next to them sleeping. Some of their kittens became quite tame and were good company. Everyone was reasonably fat and happy.

Then winter set in. It was a bad one. The temperature dropped low early in the season and stayed there. Most of the homeless people stopped riding the bus out from the city and stayed the winter in the city shelters. They didn't have as much freedom but it was warmer. Only a couple of the old die hards vowed to hold out up in the mill over winter. They trucked in extra blankets and food and a little something to keep the chill off. But by mid January rations were growing slim. The cats weren't getting enough to eat. They reverted to hiding in the shadows watching.

A couple of Northeasters dumped foot after foot of snow around the mill. Inside supplies had run out except for some mad dog 20-20.

With the Spring came more condo people. The town Fathers decided it was time to expand up the hill- running out of room on the waterfront.

"I think we should get rid of those old mills on Fulton St. and build. More tax money coming in."

A team went up the hill to check out the situation. The town planner and his favorite construction guys. They pulled open a metal door. "GEEZE What a smell!" "What died in here?"
Their question was soon answered. They found the body of an old woman picked clean. Her bony hand was extended nearly touching a rusted metal pie plate.
furthur to the back they found more bones also clean and shiny.

In the shadows some big Toms sat grooming themselves.
"Hmmmmm foods here."

The Ebony Brothers had been very well received by the Bomb's patrons and they were booked to play every other Saturday night. Two weeks seemed like an eternity. One Wednesday afternoon over the books, Mozel said to Rhonda, "You'll never guess who stopped in here the other day."
"Who?"
"That Lemar from the Ebony Brothers. He wanted to know about you and Henry"
"What did you tell him?"
"The truth."
"NO"
"Yes I did. Why not? He is head over heels about you. Why shouldn't you have some love in your sorry life?"
"Why! because Henry would kill us both- that's why. You know that."
"Well you're full grown now. You could get a divorce. It's the sixties for crying out loud!"
Rhonda didn't answer but she sure got to thinking.
"Well here." Mozel said as she slid a note across the bar to Rhonda.

Rhonda boldly took the note. No trembling hand here. She had become amazingly self assured given her young life's circumstance. Two things were responsible for this; her own strong spirit and the nuturance of her community of Mothers. Rhonda had made up her mind that she would one day have a love and a home and a family. She just had to figure out how.

Mozel watched Rhonda's face expectantly.
"Meet me Wednesday afternoon at the lunch counter at Woolworths around three. Lemar"

Although they both had big smiles, Rhonda and Mozel both knew this was fire they were playing with.
"Girl you better be sure you want to do this." Rhonda had never been more sure of anything.

Wednesday at 2:45 Lemar took a seat at the far end of the lunch counter, away from the street side's big picture window. At 2:55 Rhonda approached from the rear of the store. She had come in the front door and circumnavigated the entire store giving herself a chance to gather herself. At 3 o'clock the lunch counter was busy with the after school crowd having cokes and fries. Rhonda slid into the seat side of Lemar.

"I didn't know if you'd come." Lemar said. "But I'm glad you did."
His smile was warm.
"I had some errands to run uptown." Rhonda said. But then her reserve broke when she looked him full in the eyes.
"I don't know what we're doing."

It wasn't like they were strangers. It was like they had known each other always. Every opportunity to found them together. A lot of that time was spent at the Bomb. Lemar moved nearby so it wasn't surprising he spent time at the club. Rhonda had her job as a reason to be there. Richard gave Lemar a few shifts bartending. As they always had, the community surrounded them and protected them. It wasn't that they usually supported infidelity, but they did oppose what Lewis and Henry had done. They felt no remorse for either of them. Quite the contrary.

1971 found a matured relationship between Lemar and Rhonda. It was hard to imagine Henry didn't know about them, but his health was failing. Not that he was that old, not at all. But he seemed to be fading. Henry went to his Doctor with complaints of lack of energy and vitality. He seemed to be losing his substance. The doctor ran some tests and gave him a multi-vitamin. A week later he went back for results, expecting to hear something bad like cancer. No, the doctor found nothing out of the way. His red blood count was a little low- keep taking his vitamins. He waas getting older after all. "Maybe it's trying to keep up with that young wife of yours," he joked. Yes indeed.

Rhonda and Lemar were just the opposite of Henry. Rhonda was at her height. Like a rose in full bloom. Even Henry wondered how she could be so happy. In his heart of hearts he knew what he had done and how he had treated her were not right. It began to eat at him. Then the fact he was even having these guilty thoughts began to trouble him because he had never been big on conscience. More often than not lately, when he tried to have sex he found he wasn't able. Needless to say this made Rhonda very happy.

Besides the day to day work and community life of the neighborhood, other things went on with the women. They were, after all, descended from people who were tribal; whose ideas on the workings of life went way back. Way back. Potions and charms spells and sacrifices were all part of the old way of looking after yourself and those you loved.

And so Henry continued to diminish. No bloody murder that would sacrifice someone else's life to jail. That wouldn't help anything. Just slowly remove him.

By the Spring of 73 Rhonda and Lemar were married. It was a hell of a wedding; the reception, of course, was held at the Bomb Shelter. The music business was serving the Ebony Brothers well, but Lemar had quit the group. He didn't want to travel away from Rhonda. So he got a degree and taught music in the school system. As the years went on they bought a house and had children. Community life continued to center around the church and the Bomb. Rhonda and Lemar never traveled far from their little community because they did have one other person to look after, an old old man.
The End

At about nine o'clock they left for the Bomb. Half way down the stairs a cloud of cigarette smoke was sucked up at them by the cold air from the opened door. Fall was getting underway early this year. Henry escorted Rhonda to a little table and went to the bar for drinks. Lemar had been keeping half an eye on the stairs wondering if Rhonda came in on Saturday nights. The stage had a clear view of the stairs and the first thing you saw was peoples feet and legs coming down. Lemar perked up when he saw a shapely pair of fine legs in high heeled shoes descending. Sure enough it was Rhonda.

Then he spotted Henry behind her and didn't know what to make of it. Was she with her Father? Then he watched as Henry put his hand at her elbow and escorted her to a table. Lemar missed a couple of beats staring and his band mates were staring at him staring at them. He re-grouped and returned his attention to his sax, crestfallen.

As the evening wore on people drank and smoked and talked loud and danced. Henry could be counted on to dance with Rhonda two or three times over the evening. The third dance about eleven o'clock they were up front near the band riser. Lemar thought they looked stiff and not at all like the other couples who by this time were dancing with heat. When this number was done the band took a break. Lemar went to the bar for a drink, but even more to ask Mozel what the heck the story was.
"That's her husband," Mozel said. But she said it with a sorry look on her face. " It's a long story."

"Hi" Lemar turned to his right and it was Rhonda at his elbow.
"The band sounds real good tonight." It took a few seconds for Lemar to gather himself.
"Good evening Rhonda. You look very pretty tonight."
Mozel watched the exchange from the other side of the bar. Rhonda told Mozel and therefore also Lemar, that Henry was in the back playing cards. The last couple of hours of the night found Rhonda at the bar keeping Mozel company and watching Lemar.
"Ain't he pretty."
"He sure is."

And he was. He had an understated elegance. He was very lightskinned. Even lighter than Rhonda. His eyes were not blue but grey. His hair was shorn close to his head but still waved. Over six feet tall and slender, he walked with an easy stride. Yet his demeanor was relaxed and open, as though it didn't occur to him how nice looking he was.

At one thirty a.m. everyone tumbled out into the street, drunk, happy, amorous. Saturday night was over for another week. Lemar went home thinking of Rhonda; wanting to know more about her situation. Rhonda went home with Henry but thinking about Lemar. She was very happy Henry had had too much to drink to want sex. He was asleep by the time he hit the bed. Rhonda lay awake wondering what it would be like to share a bed with someone you actually loved.

Rhonda was a pretty thing. Light skinned and her hair was fine and didn't need much processing to look good. She was brought here from her island at thirteen in 1959 by an uncle. Her parents back home thought she would have a good American life so they tearfully let her go. What they didn't know was her uncle Lewis had made a deal with another man to sell Rhonda to him for a wife. By 1961, at fifteen, Rhonda was married to a man named Henry who was 45 years old. Needless to say there was no love between the two. Rhonda's purpose was to keep Henry's house and receive his sex whenever he wanted which was often and brutish. The women of the neighborhood were irate at the whole situation. Lewis was ostrasized from community doings but he didn't care. He got good money for Rhonda and threatened her that if she tried to run off her family would be disgraced. Never being allowed to go to school Rhonda was easily manipulated.

So all the neighborhood woman could do was to try to look after Rhonda as best they could. They taught her the skills to keep a good house so at least Henry wouldn't beat her for being slovenly. And they gave her their remedies so she would not become pregnant too young. Henry didn't even think to question her not getting pregnant because he wasn't interested in having any children. He just wanted sex. The women taught Rhonda what reading and writing and figuring they collectively knew. She actually was very bright, especially with numbers. All this kept her content enough to not be totally crushed in spirit by her situation. By 1966 when Rhonda turned twenty Henry was easy enough in mind to think Rhonda had no desire anymore to leave him. So he let her take a little job up the street at the Bomb Shelter doing the books.

By 1968 the world was an exciting place. Women's rolls were changing and free love was in the air. As Rhonda was blooming Henry was well on the decline.

Rhonda would go to the club every other afternoon to do the books for the previous couple of days. On the weekends Henry would take her there for the sociability of other couples and puff himself up over having a pretty young wife. The club had started having a group come in to play the new music on the weekends. Something different from the old folkloric stuff. Times were changing.

One Saturday afternoon Rhonda went by the Bomb to return some bookwork. Henry was at a neighbors playing cards, so she felt she had a little free time. Walking down the stairs she heard music playing. A new group, The Ebony Brothers, was rehersing for the Saturday night gig. Rhonda took a stool at the bar and swung around to face them. That's when she first saw Lemar. He was tall and thin and light skinned like herself. He was beautiful. He was playing the sax and Rhonda fell in love right there on that stool, for the first time in her life. She could not take her eyes off him. When Mozel looked at Lemar she saw he was returning the gaze to Rhonda. "Oh no" Mozel muttered to no one.

At the break Mozel had no choice but to introduce Rhonda to everyone. The band was from a nearby city, just coming up in the world. Playing local clubs for exposure.

That night Rhonda dressed and did her hair with extra care. Henry didn't notice.