Next time, try thinking with your brain, I thought but did not say. We stood for a moment, staring at the open trunk.
That’s when I felt it. Something emanating from beneath the stack of linens.
Vibrations. Strong vibrations.
I have a special affinity for clothing. For textiles of all kinds, actually. It’s hard to explain why or how—I’m not sensitive to what most psychics are, such as metal and stone, though maybe that’s because I’m not a psychic. I’m a witch. A powerful witch, too, though I’m not always on top of my magical abilities—I never finished my formal training in the craft, so I’m learning as I go along. I can brew with the best of them, but divination and most psychometrics escape me.
But clothes? Clothes, I can read. They absorb the vibrations of the people who have worn them and emit a wisp of that human energy. Before moving to San Francisco and finding a community of friends, I had lived a lonely and isolated life. The sensations I picked up from cast-off clothing had offered solace and connection to others, and old clothes had become not just a passion but a profession.
Even given my particular sensitivities, though, I wasn’t normally able to hear a piece calling to me.
Sebastian slammed the lid shut, muttering under his breath. “Worthless piece of—”
“Wait.”
His eyes flew to mine.
“Mind if I take another look?” I asked.
“Why, surely. You take all the time you need.” A calculating gleam entered Sebastian’s watery blue eyes as he lifted the trunk lid with a flourish. “Don’t see specimens like this every day, am I right? Work a bit of the ol’ magic on them, they’ll be good as new.”
I gave a start of surprise, which I turned into a shrug when I realized the “magic” he was referring to was just a turn of phrase. And frankly, I could have brewed for a week nonstop and still not have reconstituted those decaying threads. Even my strongest magic didn’t work that way.
But when Sebastian opened the trunk, I heard it again. Something was in the trunk, calling to me. I heard it, felt it, deep in my gut . . . and in a tingling in my fingertips.
“May I?” I asked.
“Just don’t hurt anything or you bought it. Like the sign says.” He jabbed a finger in the direction of a large sign, grimy with age, hanging above the register: YOU BREAK IT, YOU BOUGHT IT.
It wouldn’t take much more than a gust of wind to damage these pieces, I thought. Gingerly, I lifted the top garments from the trunk and set them aside: men’s clothes in one pile, women’s in another. My practiced eye recognized that the yellowing white cotton shirts, petticoats, and bloomers had once been fine-quality garments, but now were all falling apart. The linens beneath them were in somewhat better condition, but still too far gone to sell. Taking care to disturb the clothes as little as possible, I dug a little deeper.
My fingers touched something soft and fine, like the coat of a baby bunny. I peeked in: Velvet.
“What’s this? Do you know?” I asked.
Sebastian shrugged. “I didn’t look through it, tell you the truth. The girl who brought it in said her uncle was desperate for cash, and the whole trunk came across from Boston back in the day, with the pioneers. Probably some cockamamie story. Tell you what: I have too big a heart—that’s my problem. She sold me a few decorative items that might be worth something, so I just took this as part of the deal.”
“Would you mind if I examined this velvet piece?”
Sebastian rubbed his hands together. “How ’bout you buy the lot, and it’s yours. Think about it—this trunk came from Boston with the pioneers! Just imagine the history, the stories it could tell. There’s bound to be something really great in there.”
“I thought you said that was a cockamamie story the seller made up.”
“Doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
I shook my head. “So if the trunk came across the prairies all the way from Boston, how come it’s still packed? Why wasn’t it opened, and the clothes worn?”
“The owners died en route.”
I glanced up at him, surprised.
“Leastways, that’s what the gal said.” Sebastian stuck out his receding chin. “She said the way she heard the story, her relatives were in a party of wagon trains coming overland, and this trunk and a few other items belonged to a family who died before they got here. Buried somewhere along the way. I guess their stuff was picked up and carried the rest of the trip by other relatives and eventually ended up here in San Francisco. Listen, I tell you what I’m gonna do: seventy-five bucks and the trunk’s yours, contents included. You can’t beat that.”