You know when you get all fluttery in your stomach because you don’t know if you’re getting Christmas gifts or not, or you find out a secret that’s real juicy and you know you aren’t supposed to know it? That’s how I felt next day going up the road from our house to Andy McCaffree’s on the narrow gravel road that ran up the mountain. Mr. McCaffree was an old friend of my Papaw, and he was always real nice to me, especially since Papaw died. They both were lucky enough to still have jobs when mining got all fancy with technology. But old Andy wheezed something bad now, just like Papaw had before he died. His wife Doris used to take him out to the big roads where they built the hospital to get his heart checked, and get his oxygen refilled. Doris died over the winter though, and Momma and Daddy had us girls check up on Mr. McCaffree from time to time. I’d known it was my turn to go up to his house when I’d asked Kathy Jo to take me to see the Chew Witch. Mr. McCaffree was about as old as these old hills; I just knew that he’d know where to find her.

I crunched up the road, thinking about how best to ask him, swatting at bugs that tried to fly up into my face as I went. The downpour yesterday had left everything damp, even the air. I was sweating buckets by the time I got to the turn off. His road was all dirt, just like ours, but his house was a bit nicer. Probably because he didn’t have a bunch of kids making messes all the time. Mrs. McCaffree had kept the house so nice while she was alive. She even took down the curtains on Fridays, and washed and ironed them. I didn’t think Mr. McCaffree was doing all that, but he did his best. I liked visiting him. He reminded me of Papaw, and he always had a story.

The house was real simple. It only had about four or five rooms, but I’d only ever seen the living room and the tiny eat in kitchen and the bathroom. The bathroom had been an addition to the house back when Momma was a kid. The McCaffree’s didn’t have indoor plumbing until then. There was a big ol’ porch on the front of the house and one just as big on the back where the two ancient, weathered rocking chairs were rocking on their own as I approached. It was probably just the wind whipping through the hills, but I kinda like to think that maybe Mrs. McCaffree was sitting in one right now. I smiled at that as I knocked on the door. “Mr. McCaffree?!” I called. “It’s Peggy June!” I opened the door slowly and poked my head inside.

“Peggy June!” I heard him wheeze. He waved to me from the couch, where he was sitting with his glasses on the very end of his nose, looking like they might slip off at any second. He was doing one of them puzzle books he liked-crosswords or sudoku, that kind of stuff. He coughed, putting down his book and pencil beside him on the blue threadbare couch. He was trying to stand up, because that was good manners, but between the coughing and his bad knees, I could see he was struggling.

“Don’t get up, Mr. McCaffree. I just come to check up on you,” I said.

His coughing fit continued. I reached for the empty glass that was sitting on his end table, and went into the kitchen to the tiny fridge to get him some water. I filled up the glass with the store bought water and took it back to him. Once he finished coughing, he drank just about all of it in no time. I sat down across from him in the big armchair that matched the couch.

He got himself under control. “Thank you,” he said. “You girls are so kind to check up on me.”

He voice sounded measureably weaker than last time I had visited. “You eat yet today, Mr. McCaffree? I can make you something.”

“Oh, I had a bit of oatmeal this morning.,” he said.

It was 4 o’clock in the afternoon. “Let me fix you something,” I said, not waiting for his protests before going off to the kitchen again. Momma always told us that Mr. McCaffree would try to act like he didn’t need anything, so you just had to do it for him. I rummaged around in his fridge for a bit, until I found some bologna and mustard and a few pickles. The bread was sitting on the counter and didn’t look too fresh, but it wasn’t moldy. I made two sandwiches for him. One for now and one for later, in case he was still having trouble getting off the couch later. Plus, I figured he’d skipped lunch and we were half way to supper now, so he’d probably need two sandwiches to fill him up.

I watched him eat the bologna sandwiches meticulously. He didn’t like spills and stains, so he was careful not to let any mustard drip. He had a thicker growth of beard today. I wondered why he’d quit shaving. “You need Momma to get you to the doctor?” I asked.

“Oh,” he said absently, as if he’d forgotten he had an appointment. “Actually, yes. I do need a ride soon. Do you think she’d mind?”

I smiled at him cheerfully. He should know better. “Mr. McCaffree, Momma wouldn’t make me come up and see you if she didn’t have a concern for you. What day do you need to go?”

“Tomorrow,” he said.

Well, she wouldn’t be too happy about the short notice, but it fit into my plans nicely. “Okay, I’ll tell her. What time?”

He pointed to his table, which was stacked with dirty plates and papers and other random bits of life. “My appointment book is on the table. Can you check for me?”

I walked over to the table, searching among the debris. The book was black, and about as big as my school notebook. I flipped to tomorrow’s date. “10:30?” I asked. Does that sound right?”

“Yes. Yes, that’s right,” he said. He had finished one sandwich and was working on the second one. “Tell your mother I said thank you, in advance.”

“I will,” I said. I was thinking through all the logistics of how Kathy Jo and I would get to the Chew Witch while Momma was gone with the car. With Momma gone to town with Mr. McCaffree Daddy would be in charge, but he would want Kathy Jo to run the register like she always did. Daddy didn’t keep tabs on us like Momma did, so it’d be easier to hoodwink him.

“Can I ask you a question?” I said, making my way back over to the arm chair.

Mr. McCaffree put the plate that had held his sandwiches on the end table. “Of course,” he said, patting his lips with the paper napkin I’d included on the plate.

“You know that old lady that everybody calls the Chew Witch?” I asked.

He frowned at me, and I didn’t think it was one of them frowns for when you were simply thinking. “The Chew Witch? Is that what you call Clara Lou Mabry?”

Clara Lou Mabry. I had her name, now I just needed to know where to find her. “Yeah, I think that’s her. Always chewing tobacco. Looks real mean. Drives an old black truck that might fall apart at any second?”

“That’s her alright,” Mr. McCaffree said. “What do you want to know about her?” He had a twinkle in his eye now. Like he knew some secret or something.

“Well, she comes into the grocery, just like everybody. And my cousin told me that she had invited us to come visit her sometime, but we don’t know where she lives.”

“You didn’t ask her?” he said, his smile widening. I was about to say I hadn’t been invited direcly, she’d talked to Kathy Jo, but he interrupted me before I even got started. “Why don’t you just ask next time you see her.”

“Don’t know when that will be,” I said.

“Well,” Mr McCaffree sighed, but that caused him to start coughing again, and I had to wait for him to quit hacking, and guzzle down the rest of the water I’d brought him. “Ah,” he said, after he had composed himself. “If I didn’t know any better, Peggy June, I’d think you were snooping on poor old Mrs. Mabry.”

“No sir, I ain’t snooping on her!” I said. It might have been a little too forceful, but I was getting the feeling he was onto me and I didn’t like it. Not that I thought he’d tell anybody. Only person he was likely to tell was Momma, and by then it’d be too late to stop me.

“Okay,” he said, with a smile, like he knew the lie for what it was. “Okay, Peggy June. I believe you.” He didn’t. I thought I was a pretty good bluffer, but Mr. McCaffree was a tough old mountain man and nothing got past him. “Tell me, though, why do you think she wanted you to come see her?”

“I don’t know. She’s not very nice to me at the store. She’s not very nice to anyone, is she?”

“No, not anymore, she’s not,” he said. “But would you believe that she comes to check on me too?”

I almost yelped in surprise, but managed to keep it to myself. “She does? Then she lives around here?”

“Oh, yes,” Mr. McCaffree said. “In fact, you take the road from here further up into the mountain, and the next house you find is hers.”

Hallelujah! I thought, though I didn’t really use that word too much. I’d just heard it a few times when Momma made us go to church- which we didn’t do but two or three times a year. I figured that’s what the pastor would shout now, having been given such a great gift as this bit of information.

“Oh!” I said sweetly. “Then it won’t be too bad to get to her place,” I said. I might not need Kathy Jo at all. I could fake sick and get out of going to the store to work. I could walk there from our house, surely.

“It’s a little far on foot,” he said. He smiled. “But it’s a nice walk. I think you’d enjoy the hike.”

I took Mr. McCaffree’s plate to the kitchen, and gathered up all the other dishes on the table too. “I’ll have Jenny Kate and Mary Sue come wash these up for you,” I said. I was the oldest, so I could boss them like that, and Momma would back me up, because she’d know that Mr. McCaffree needed the help.

“You’re too kind to me,” he said. He was trying to stand up again, and when I told him he didn’t have to, he said he had to use the toilet. So I helped him off the couch and to the bathroom, and waited to make sure he didn’t fall, and then helped him back to his spot on the couch.

“I’ll make sure Momma comes in the morning,” I said, as I was going out the door, the information he’d given me tucked away like a precious piece of treasure. He waved goodbye to me and I left him there to do his puzzles. I nearly skipped back home, thinking about tomorrow and meeting Clara Lou Mabry face to face.

The next day it rained buckets and we girls were even more bored to tears than usual since we were stuck inside. I swept the canned goods aisle maybe 15 times in 30 mins just to give me something to do. Momma put Mary Sue to work scrubbing the walls of the bathroom. Me and Jenny Kate laughed at that until Momma said she was gonna put us to work on the sink and toilet once Mary Sue was done. She got done faster than lightning too. Or so it seemed. Took me longer to scrub that toilet than it took to walk up the holler to home at the end of the day. Not because it was so dirty, but because I was in no hurry to get it done.

Uncle Alvey came round in the afternoon, when the downpour had fizzled out into a drizzle. “Come on, girls,” he said, hiccoughing before letting out a mighty belch. Mary Sue and I laughed, but Jenny Kate just rolled her eyes. “I got my check from Uncle Sam,” he said. “Let me take you over and buy you an ice cream from Pete.” There was a soft serve machine at the gas station across the street. Uncle Alvey always liked to treat us when his government check came in. I didn’t really understand back then why the government paid him when he worked in our store, but I didn’t ask questions. I knew better.

“Daddy, you spoil them,” Kathy Jo called out from the register, where she was running the belt so she could clean it.

“Spoil you too, if you like, baby,” he said to his daughter.

Kathy Jo shook her head. “I gotta work, Daddy,” she said.

“Oh!” he scoffed at her playfully, as he moved towards the front of the store. “Aunt Mary Anna will watch over the place. We won’t be too long.”

“Plus, nobody is coming shopping in this mess,” Jenny Kate said. “There ain’t been nobody in here all day!”

Kathy Jo turned off the belt with a smile, and we all ran across to the gas station. Pete served us up quick- nobody was in the gas station either, considering the weather. We hung around inside the station eating our ice cream, me and Kathy Jo standing next to one another in comfortable silence at the window, while Uncle Alvey chatted with Pete about some grown up stuff I didn’t understand nor care to. When I was sure my sisters weren’t listening I elbowed Kathy Jo in the side.

“Ow! What’d’ya do that for?” my cousin said, rubbing her ribs with a deepening frown.

The rain was coming down harder now, and I knew that nobody would want to go back across the street until we’d finished our ice cream and the rain let up a little again. I had my cousin trapped right where I wanted her- as long as Mary Sue and Jenny Kate didn’t interfere. “Take me to see the Chew Witch.”

“What?” Kathy Jo hissed at me. I knew she knew how to drive her daddy’s old beat up Ford, even if she wasn’t supposed to. And honestly, nobody would care if she did. It’s not like her daddy ever followed any rules, and her momma was always too busy making jams, jellies, pies and whatever else she could sell to keep the family afloat. If the car was gone, she’d probably just assume that Alvey took it to go drinking with his buddies again.

“You scared?” I asked, my grin growing wider as she furiously shook her head.

“Why would I be scared of an old lady?” Kathy Jo said. But I could see in her eyes, she was scared. Everybody was at least a little scared of the Chew Witch. She reminded me of that woman from that old German story, the one about the two kids getting lost in the woods. Except I couldn’t imagine that the Chew Witch lived in a house of candy that would lure children right into her cauldron. I almost shivered, but kept my stoicism in the presence of my older cousin. She couldn’t see that I had any cracks, or else I just knew she wouldn’t take me.

“Well, if you aren’t scared, then take me to see her. She said I’d never see anything interesting unless I followed her home.”

Kathy Jo was thinking mighty hard about it. She was mostly done with her ice cream cone, and I knew I wouldn’t really have a chance to talk to her about it again once we were back in the grocery. “Why do you want to go?” She finally asked. She crunched into the bottom of the cone, chewing like a horse while she waited for me answer.

“Didn’t she invite me?” I asked. Honestly, that was the best answer I had for Kathy Jo. Why did I want to go see the Chew Witch? It wasn’t because I thought she’d be a good cook. And it wasn’t because I thought she lived in a nice house or would be very nice to me once I was there. Regardless, there was something compelling about her. That’s why I always watched her when she came shopping. It was like she had a secret about life in the mountains, and I had to know what it was.

“I don’t know, Peggy June,” Kathy Jo said. She wiped her hands on her jeans.

“Pleeeeease,” I begged. “Just tell your momma you’re going to see Annie Mae. Annie Mae was a friend of hers that lived a little further out towards the state highway, near the school. Her momma was a teacher.

“Okay, but I don’t know where she lives,” Kathy Jo said as she crossed her arms. She looked like she’d won some sort of argument, even though we hadn’t really be fighting.

“Don’t worry. I know how to find out,” I said.