LOVE POTION
ALONE THEY LIVED in their house, the two old sisters, as quiet as spiders, as large as sofas, both of them, stuffed with time and dust and snow. Walking by their house at night you saw their faces, like porcelain plates in the unlit windows, or you saw their hands put up to draw the green shade. And you heard no noise inside, save the dry crackling of newspapers. Miss Nancy Jillet and her sister Julia took their air at four in the morning when the town was undercover, and the only one who ever saw them was the policeman walking by swinging his nightstick threateningly at his shadow which ran away ahead of him down the lanterned street as he marched away from the raw lonely light.
So it was not impossible, then, that on an evening in summer, unable to sleep, with lin
es in her forehead and perspiration in a dew upon her upper lip, Alice Ferguson, out for a walk around the block, and not afraid for the moon was out and the town serene and beautiful, and she was aged eighteen and nothing could happen to her, happened upon the Jillets, the two old ladies, sitting in the milky dark of 2 a.m., with needley, silver stars for eyes and fat porcelain hands across their pincushion breasts rocking slowly in their asthmatic rocking chairs, alone, alone.
At first, Alice Ferguson was quite startled, and then, remembering the tales of their solitary confinement within life, lifted her hand and called, “Good evening,” across the lawn to the silvered porch.
After a time, one of the chairs stopped rocking and one of the sisters said, “Good morning.”
Alice Ferguson laughed. “Of course, it is morning. Good morning, then.”
The sisters nodded silently.
“It’s a lovely night,” said Alice Ferguson.
“You’re Alice Ferguson,” said one of the old women.
“Yes, how did you know?”
“And you’re 18 years old.”
“Yes,” she replied, uncertainly.
“Come here, child,” said Nancy Jillet, the oldest and fattest of the two, in shadow.
She crossed the soft moon lawn to the edge of the railinged porch and peered in at the two half-seen faces.
“And you’re in love,” said Nancy Jillet, in an awful whisper.
“How did you know?”
The sisters rocked and looked at each other wisely.
“How did you know?” demanded Alice Ferguson.
“And he doesn’t love you,” said Nancy Jillet.
“Oh,” said Alice.
“And you’re unhappy and out walking late tonight,” said the other sister in an old voice.
Alice stood before them, her head sinking, her eyelids flickering.
“Never you mind, child, never you mind,” whispered Nancy Jillet, uncrossing her arms from her amazing breast. “You came to the right place.”
“I didn’t come...”
“Sh, we’ll help you.”
Alice found herself whispering, also, they were a trio of black velvet and white ermine conspirators, half moon, half shadow, there at the center of the night.
“How?” she whispered.
“We’ll give you a love potion.”
“Oh, but...”