Jilo (Witching Savannah #4)(71)

“May I help you?” Jilo asked, adding as an afterthought, “Ma’am?”

“I need to speak to the old Negress,” she said, yanking on the screeching screen door with such vehemence, Jilo feared this cry might be its last. “Oh, do let me pass,” she said, pushing past Jilo, her tone impatient and irritated.

Jilo faced the intruder, amazed to see this buckra woman standing there before her, steam starting to rise up from her damp garments.

“Well, where is she? The woman”—she seemed to be searching her memory—“May. Yes, Mother May. She helped me before. Years ago now. I need her help again. I went to the cemetery three days in a row now, and she hasn’t shown up like usual. I know this is where she lives.”

“She did live here, ma’am . . .”

“Did?” the woman interrupted her.

“Yes, my grandmother passed some months back.”

The visitor’s face hardened. “This is very inconvenient. I am in great need of her services.”

Jilo had to swallow back a laugh. “I apologize for the inconvenience my grandmother’s death has caused you,” she said, a good dose of sarcasm creeping into her words, though she had done her best to modulate her tone.

The woman didn’t seem to notice. Instead, her gaze narrowed on Jilo. “Wait, you say she was your grandmother?”

Jilo nodded. “Yes, ma’am, she was indeed.”

“Then you can help me, can’t you?” The woman grasped Jilo’s forearms in her small, pale hands, made to look even paler by the scarlet nail polish she wore. “That’s how it works with your kind and this Negro magic isn’t it? It gets passed on through the blood. Right?” The woman shook Jilo’s arms, tugging hard enough to make Jilo take a step closer. “You can help me.” The words sounded more like a statement of fact than a question.

Jilo smiled and began shaking her head. “No, ma’am, I can’t . . .”

“I’ll pay you.” To Jilo’s surprise, the woman fell to her knees sobbing, pressing Jilo’s hand to her tearstained cheek before pulling back to kiss it.

Jilo jerked her hand free. “I don’t know,” she said, the wheels in her mind spinning fast. “The work is dangerous. And I’m not as practiced at it as my grandmother was.”

“I will pay you well.”

Jilo took a couple of steps back and placed her hands on her hips, giving the fine lady the very same stink eye she’d given Binah only minutes before. “You tell me what Nana—I mean, Mother May—did for you, and I’ll see if I can help. No promises, though. And it’s cash up front.”

The woman’s hand flew up to her breast and she froze in place, suddenly, it seemed, cognizant of her humble position. “There’s a woman. An ungodly and lascivious woman. A rival for my husband’s affections.” She rose, turning her back to Jilo, undid a button on her suit, and tugged a stash of bills from her brassiere. “Again. Last time, she tried to turn my husband’s affections from me. This time, she’s determined to take my life so that she can have him. She’s put a fix on me.” She carefully peeled off two five-dollar bills, which she held out to Jilo. “I need you to remove it.” Jilo stepped forward, amazed at her own temerity, and took the rest of the bills from the woman’s other hand, leaving the woman clutching the two fives.

“But that’s so much more than your grandmother would have ever charged,” the woman protested.

Jilo tilted her head and rested her left hand on her hip. “My grandmother’s just a bit up the road at Laurel Grove. You think you can get a better deal from her, you’re more than welcome to try.” She wanted to sound confident, and to her own ears she did, but she held that wad of cash in a death grip.

The woman relented, lowering her head. “All right. But this had better work.”

Jilo stuffed the bills into her own bra. “Like I told you, there are no guarantees. Don’t try my patience. The spirits,” she said, stretching the word out, giving it a sense of fearsomeness, “are taxing enough.” She secured another button on her dress, just to help make the money harder for the woman to retrieve. Jilo would never have treated a buckra woman with such audacity outside her home, but this woman seemed torn between her belief in her own superiority and her fear of Jilo’s mysterious Negro powers. It was as clear as water that the story of what happened here tonight would never be shared with a single soul. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to threaten the buckra with unpleasant repercussions if she were to speak of the secrets she saw here.

“Come through to the kitchen. We can talk better in there.”

She rapped on Binah’s door as she passed by. “Get on out here,” she commanded. “We’re calling on the spirits.” Binah opened the door a crack, her eyes wide and brows arched in a mixture of worry and confusion. Jilo gave her a wink. “The missus here has paid us to approach the spirits on her behalf.”

Binah’s face froze in disbelief, but she quickly recovered. She opened the door fully. “Then I should bring the baby, too. His innocence will protect us from any unclean ones.”

Jilo smiled and nodded. “You are a wise child.”

After leading the way to the kitchen, Jilo pulled a chair—one that faced away from the pantry—back from the table. “Sit here,” she said. The woman stepped into the kitchen, looking around it with wide eyes, filled with a mixture of expectation and fear, as if she might bolt at any moment. Jilo stepped back, giving the woman a clear and unhindered path to the seat. There was a moment’s hesitation, but the woman made the decision to do as she was told. She slid the seat an inch or so farther back from where Jilo had left it, then sat down, tugging on the hem of her skirt as she did.