y on again--to break the witch of old Pol
Gentry's black cat. But never were the two, Pol and the cat, seen
together.

Truth to tell there were some among the old folks on Rocky Fork who long
had vowed that Pol and the cat were one and the same. They declared Pol
was a witch in league with the Devil and that she could change herself
from woman to cat when the spell was strong enough within her, when the
evil spirits took a good strong hold upon her. Moreover, Pol Gentry had
but one tooth. One sharp fang in the very front of her upper jaw. "A
woman is bound to be a witch if she has just one tooth," folks said and
believed.

Pol Gentry was a frightful creature to look upon. She had a heavy growth
of hair, coal black hair all around her mouth and particularly upon her
upper lip. Her beard was plain to be seen even when she turned in at a
neighbor's lane, long before she reached the door. Little children at
first sight of her ran screaming to hide their faces in their mother's
skirts.

There wasn't a child old enough to give ear to a tale who hadn't heard
of Pol Gentry's powers. How she had bewitched Dan Eskew's little girl
Flossie. It wouldn't have happened, some said, if Flossie had spit in
her bonnet when the black cat crossed her path as she trooped through
the woods one day gathering wild flowers. That very evening when she got
back home Flossie sank on the doorstep, the bonnet filled with wild
flowers dropped from her arm. She moaned pitifully, holding her head
between her hands and swaying to and fro. Right away her head began to
swell and by the time they got word to Seth Eeling, the wizard doctor
who lived in Mossy Bottom, Flossie's head was twice its size. Indeed,
Flossie Eskew's head was as big as a full-grown pumpkin. The minute the
wizard clapped eyes on the child he spoke out.

"Beat up eggshells as fine as you can and give them to this child in a
cup of water. If she is bewitched this mixture will pass through her
clear."

Orders were promptly obeyed. Flossie drained the cup but no sooner had
Flossie passed the powdered egg shells than the witch left her. Her head
went back to its natural size. Nevertheless Flossie Eskew died that
night.

"Didn't send for the wizard soon enough," Seth Eeling said.

Some believed in the powers of both, though neither witch nor wizard
would give the other a friendly look, much less a word.

Pol Gentry was never downright friendly with any, though she would hoe
for a