Coppers Rest would band together and dig Daddy free before the year's first snowfall. Standing with one foot still in the mine, Daddy would squint at the sun and smile. A breeze would ruffle the wispy, auburn beard which would've grown down to his chest, while a broad-winged hawk kited overhead, its body a russet blaze against the limitless blue. Sprays of violet asters would line the path down to camp. The mine would reward Daddy for his suffering, his endurance, his example. Wearing a formal top hat, the mayor would shake Daddy's hand. They'd hold the pose and wait for the reporters' sulfur bulbs to flash. The story would chitter out across the transcontinental wire.
But there was no use pretending.
As I lay in bed reading the last book Daddy had bought me, the world was the wind howling down from the pass, colder each day. It was the walls of the shack creaking. It was the squeal and crumble of mine carts unloading and making up for lost time. A lantern flame and too little oil.
It was, and couldn't un-be.
Madame Blye agreed. While she rarely made house calls, she said she had made an exception for me. She ran a house for working girls, but she hadn't come on business, rather something more important. School teacher Strobel told her I hadn't returned to class since the cave-in. His best girl, thirteen years old, I should've been someone to look up to. Where was I instead, burying my head in a book? Yes, I had a right to my sorrow, but it wasn't sustaining. I should've faced facts sooner. The exploratory tunnel was closed. Daddy was gone.
She wasn't telling me because she was heartless. She wanted to take me in until I left for my Aunt Claire's back East in the Spring. It would take at least a season to grieve.
It was, truly, a pity.
From the way she said it, I knew her compliments to Daddy about my grace, about my tender eyes, about my silken black hair, so much like her own, had been strokes of a blade on a whetstone.
quote:I thought, wow, he’s powerful but he doesn’t understand that he’s wielding power. He doesn’t remember. He’s like a little wizard who forgot his magic. While growing up, he could turn out any number of ways, and his parents were working to ensure that he’d turn out good, that he’d nurture things rather than destroy them just to see how they could be destroyed.
The first draft of “Memory of Magic” was titled “Little Wizards.”
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