Chapter ONE - Weebly

had stolen from a peddler. “It’s not much,” she said
after a long time, sounding annoyed that he was making
her tell. “Might not be anythin’ at all.”
“Let me be the judge of that.”
“It’s been a while now. This was back in the fall.”
“On Pope’s Day?” Ethan asked.
“Before then,” she said, clearly irritated by the
interruption. “It was th’ day those two people got
themselves hanged.”
“The Richardsons?”
“Yeah, that’s them. The ones who didn’ take care
o’ their little ones.”
For close to a year, since their hanging in October,
Ethan hadn’t given a thought to Ann and John
Richardson. Now they had come up in conversation
twice in two days. Odd. And perhaps important.
Janna pointed toward the southern end of the Fat
Spider. “Their hangin’ was right over there,” she went
on. “Right by th’ town gate. Big crowd came t’ watch.
An’ that day, right in th’ middle o’ the hangin’ I felt a
spell. A strong one,” she said, her brow wrinkling.
“Stronger even than I can do. I’d bet everything I got