Old Mr. Smith sat heavily on the bench outside the dry goods store. Holding a match between his index and middle finger, he lit it with his thumbnail, then pulled slow puffs through the tobacco packed in his pipe. Satisfied that the pipe would stay lit, he took it from his mouth and looked at Michael.
Michael had just finished cleaning up a piece of broken pottery from the floor of his father’s store. His younger sister had loved the cream pitcher, and had burst into tears when he had knocked it off the shelf. Michael didn’t see why all the fuss – things in the store were broken from time to time. You swept up the mess, and that was the end of it. Michael had scolded his sister for her outburst.
“There’s a story about a woman and pottery – happened not too long ago, and not far from here,” said old Mr. Smith, pulling on his pipe and watching the thunder clouds gather in the late afternoon sky. “Emma Sioux was crazy about pottery, so it was natural she was blown to bits by a potter, considering that’s what shaped her life in every other way.”
Word of Mr. Smith’s appearance in town traveled quickly, and a small crowd gathered on the porch. The old farmer had lived in the area since before the town was built, and knew stories about the land and the locals. Some of the stories were funny – some were frightening.
“Emma arrived in Oregon in 1843, mutely riding in the back of a wagon traveling the Oregon Trail to The Dalles,” said old Mr. Smith. “She’d been found wandering alone, incomprehensible, and almost dead from exposure, clutching an expensive china gravy boat with a blue and white willow pattern. When separated from the piece of fine china, she resorted to frantic animalistic behavior, ignoring the world until she reclaimed the piece.”
Mr. Smith stared at Michael for a long minute, then continued.
“The family that picked up Emma Sioux guessed she had seen her family die trying to cross the Snake River, leaving thirteen-year-old Emma as the sole survivor and the gravy boat her only link to her family. Emma Sioux wouldn’t talk about anything before her rescue on the Oregon Trail, and after a time, nobody felt the need to pry into her past life.”
“She feigned normalcy, and found work in The Dalles at a dry goods store. China was an obsession – children were not allowed to handle the fragile pottery, and if a piece was dropped, it was as if diamonds had scattered across the floor – the world waited until she gathered every piece,” Mr. Smith paused and took a draw from his pipe. “Emma searched for pottery in the neighbor’s trash cans, as well as the town dump, and her small room above the store was filled with repaired plates, cups and vases.”
“Around 1867 a traveling salesman arrived, pitching wares from the newly opened Buena Vista Pottery Factory. It was fine pottery, and was coming from only 150 miles away. Given Emma Sioux’s fascination with pottery, no one was surprised when she left for Buena Vista the next day,” said old Mr. Smith. “It’s unclear how she traveled the 80 miles from The Dalles to Portland, but once there, she must have charmed her way onto a steamboat traveling up the Willamette River, and stepped off into Buena Vista, gravy boat carefully tucked in her traveling bag.”
The sky was taking on a green color, and the air smelled wet, like just before a thunderstorm. Some folks reluctantly left, knowing they would need to tend to open windows and spooked livestock. Those that could, stayed put and listened.
“Older folks who had visited Buena Vista remember how the air carried the smell of pottery. Every shop in town either sold Buena Vista Pottery, or used it to serve food or display wares. For Emma, it was the closest thing to heaven, and in the months that followed, she became more human – even flirtatious. She again found employment in a dry goods store, right near the pottery factory.”
“Emma Sioux was a looker, and it wasn’t long before suitors started showing up at the store. The owner learned to tolerate the frequent visits by the well-dressed young men. Although they used up Emma’s time, they made frequent purchases to justify their visit – and to show off their generosity and wealth,” old Mr. Smith said. He paused for a minute, seeming to remember something wonderful from his past. He drew on his pipe, exchanged his smile for a frown, then continued. “Among these suitors was a pottery worker from the Buena Vista Pottery Factory, a vile man named Samuel Ashcraft.
“Ashcroft had been a Confederate sniper in the Civil War, and found his way to Buena Vista, far from his destroyed family farm south-east of Atlanta, Georgia. Quick to pick a fight, he would have been run out of Buena Vista if he hadn’t been a fearless employee, willingly entering a hot kiln with a suicidal enthusiasm born of his days living in a war zone.”
“Ashcroft wanted Emma Sioux in the worst way, with emphasis on worst. But he didn’t understand courtship. His work at the kiln left him smelling of coal and his face and clothes blackened with soot. Emma Sioux would have nothing to do with him. His failed romancing left him bitter, giving him frequent reason to annoy the regulars at the Main Street Saloon.”
“Gabriel Smith, another employee at the Buena Vista Pottery Factory, had saved his wages and decided it was time to build his own factory. He needed a cheap piece of land near the river, a source of clay, and a place for a steamboat to load up his pottery. Luckiamute Landing, an abandoned lumber yard just upriver from Buena Vista, was about perfect,” old Mr. Smith said, drawing a rough map in the dust on the porch. “Gabriel leased Luckiamute Landing and built a small kiln. Working long hours with two other employees, he managed to manufacture a small amount of fine quality pottery. What’s more, Gabriel had chosen to specialize in elegant dinnerware with blue willow decorations – almost identical to Emma Sioux’s treasured gravy boat.”
“Gabriel was hard worker, and a clever man of science,” said old Mr. Smith. “Other potteries were busy shoveling coal into their kilns. Gabriel rigged up a wood gasifier that turned logging brush into gas. He stored the gas and piped it into the kiln for perfect temperatures.”
“Emma Sioux was crazy, literally, about pottery. Gabriel was crazy, in a manner of speaking, about the manufacture of pottery. As Emma Sioux was drawn to pottery, she was also drawn to Gabriel, and it wasn’t a year before Gabriel and Emma Sioux were married and living in a small residence at Luckiamute Landing. Emma’s obsession with pottery was perfect for a potter’s wife, and her only excesses were when she treated the inevitable fractured cast-offs with as much love as she felt for Gabriel’s baby, growing inside her.”
“Gabriel wanted to please his new bride, and the surest way to do that was fine china. He was inspired to improve his work, and Luckiamute Pottery became known for it’s exquisite designs.”
Old Mr. Smith watched the scattered raindrops splatting in the dusty street. No question about it, there was going to be a thunderstorm before evening. He knocked the burned tobacco out of his pipe, and continued on.
“For every bit that Emma Sioux became happier, Ashcraft became surlier. His personality and hygiene thwarted his other romantic pursuits, and he became more obsessed with Emma Sioux, more hateful of Gabriel. In his festering mind, it became clear that Gabriel and his pottery factory had ruined his opportunity with Emma Sioux. On a crisp October night in 1869, Samuel Ashcraft hiked the rough trail between his room in Buena Vista and Luckiamute Landing, carrying a gallon of kerosene and a handful of matches.”
Old Mr. Smith paused and swallowed, wiping his eyes.
“Now, any fool with a match can set a warehouse on fire. And Ashcraft was surely a fool – he didn’t understand Emma Sioux, and he certainly didn’t understand Gabriel’s kiln. His goal was to just destroy the warehouse, but evil can’t be controlled. Ashcraft set the warehouse on fire, then ran back to the Main Street Saloon in Buena Vista to drink up an alibi.”
“By the time one of the employees sounded the alarm, the warehouse was sending flames fifty feet in the air. Emma Sioux ran out to the conflagration with a crazy mind, watching a fortune in fine china snap and crumble under the withering flames. Gabriel strained to hold her back from the warehouse fire, their clothes smoldering in the heat.”
“The fire cracked the nearby kiln, which sent the inside temperature plunging. Emma Sioux heard the pottery inside the kiln start to shatter – and whatever little sanity she had shattered along with it. She broke free of Gabriel, grabbed a hammer and broke open the kiln door in a frantic attempt to save the already-ruined china.”
“Emma Sioux let in a rush of cool air, and the fragile pottery exploded like cannonballs over Gettysburg. The shards of pottery slicing the burning night probably killed Emma Sioux, or maybe it was the gas stored next to the kiln. There were two explosions that night – and the factory, Gabriel and Emma Sioux were ripped into small pieces and distributed skyward, falling back like a rain from hell. The kiln, warehouse, gas generator, residence, Gabriel and Emma Sioux were gone, leaving behind the stunned employees and the burning buildings.”
The thunderstorm had started to light up the sky, and it was raining in earnest. Old Mr. Smith, Michael, and the few remaining listeners moved inside the store, gathering around the unlit stove. Old Mr. Smith relit his pipe, the embers glowing and lighting his face with a pulsing light. Old Mr. Smith settled back, and resumed his story.
“Common wisdom determined the Luckiamute fire was due to an explosion of the gasification system, although some of the newly unemployed Luckiamute Pottery employees attested it started in the warehouse. There was nobody left that would benefit from further investigation, and it was dropped. Ashcraft, in his twisted way, felt he was the victim of the event, having irretrievably lost the chance to love Emma Sioux. That evening, he repeated his steps to the now former location of the Luckiamute Pottery. Other gawkers had already made the trip, and when he arrived, he found a small collection of scavengers picking through the smoldering buildings. Numbed by a persistent hangover and his loss of Emma Sioux, he stumbled through the destruction. The ground was covered with shards of partly-fired pottery, mixed with small bits of victims. Clothing, flesh and bone had been embedded in pottery shards, and the fire had hardened the macabre mix. Ashcroft pocketed a small piece of a gravy boat with an embedded tooth and returned to his room in Buena Vista, hoping to sleep off his headache and dismay.”
“Around 11pm, the man living in the next room heard him yelling in fear, and saw him throw a piece of pottery out the window. Ashcraft spent the rest of the night pacing his room and talking to himself, leaving everyone to wonder about his sanity. By dawn, he probably fell asleep again, because folks saw him running mid-morning to the pottery, hours late for work.”
“The Foreman met him as he came in the door, preparing to chew him out. Ashcraft looked down and put his hands in his pockets, then looked up with wide eyes. From his pocket he pulled the piece of pottery, exclaiming that he had thrown it away the night before. Ignoring the Foreman’s rebukes, he rushed out to throw the thing in a firepit. Backing away, he returned to the kiln, pushing past the staring employees and resuming the familiar routine of work.”
“That evening again found him at the Main Street Saloon, with a rising passion for drink. After slamming down two shots of the finest whiskey served by the saloon, he pulled out money to pay for the first round.”
“What’s this?” old Mr. Smith affected a gruff voice, acting the part of the bartender, pointing to an imaginary bartop.
“Ashcraft looked where the bartender pointed and saw the broken piece of pottery instead of coins. He frantically pushed it to the floor and crushed it with his heel. After that, he seemed relieved to be able to produce real money from his pockets, and did so repeatedly until the Sheriff dragged him to his room, leaving him to twitch in the grasp of a nightmare.”
“Ashcraft must have experienced the same disturbance that evening, and the next. Between increasingly frequent shots of cheap whiskey, Ashcraft told the bartender about evening visits from Emma Sioux. Under other circumstances, he would have welcomed her attention. However, her being dead considerably dampened his enthusiasm. She would stand in the corner of the room, her beauty shredded by the explosion. All she offered was sadness and accusations that her life had been ripped apart by his actions.”
“The Bartender told folks that Ashcraft performed the same magic trick every night,” old Mr. Smith said. “From his pocket, he would produce a small piece of pottery, unique because of the tooth embedded in the clay. He’d stare at it for a minute, drop it on the floor, then scream and crush it with his heel. Turning to the bar, he’d down a shot of whiskey, reach in his pocket, and produce the piece in it’s macabre, but undamaged condition.”
“Ashcraft began spending more time at Luckiamute Landing than in Buena Vista, till his factory job was eventually given to one of the former employees of the Luckiamute Pottery Factory. Ashcraft never bothered to show up for his final paycheck, and finally stopped showing up anywhere. Not that anyone cared – nobody could prove Ashcraft had set the fire, but the circumstances made his guilt obvious.”
Old Mr. Smith paused, and looked at Michael. His sister was hiding behind his shoulder. Michael was holding his sister’s hand to try to calm her. Or himself. Old Mr. Smith grunted in approval.
“Ashcraft deserved unpleasant visits by Emma Sioux,” said old Mr. Smith. “And other folks that had taken pottery from the destroyed Luckiamute Landing Pottery had similar visits. You’d hear stories about Emma Sioux walking through hallways at night. Gardens would get uprooted. Small fires would start. Pets would go missing.”
“Throwing the Luckiamute souvenir in the trash didn’t seem to satisfy Emma Sioux. Guaranteed you’d have nightly visits from ‘raccoons’ that would strew everything across the yard. Burn it or bury it, and the next morning it would be waiting at the front door. Seems that the only way to stop the visits were to return the pieces to the Luckiamute Pottery site. Go back after a few days, and the piece would be gone.”
Old Mr. Smith paused, took a deep breath and stared out the window.
“OK. Enough of that,” he said. The rain had stopped, and he stood up to head back to his farm. As everyone trickled out of the store, Michael headed to his Dad’s office in the back.
“Dad, did we ever get china from Luckiamute Pottery?” asked Michael.
His Dad looked up from his ledger sheet. “Looks like Mr. Smith’s been telling a story about his brother.”
“His brother?” asked Michael.
“Sure. His brother Gabe. Died in a warehouse explosion. Killed him and his wife. Gabe owned the Luckiamute Pottery Factory. Better china than what came out of Buena Vista, and that’s saying a lot. Some of that china out on the shelf is from Luckiamute. I found it in the basement last week. By the way, did you get that gravy boat cleaned up?”
Michael turned for the door. “I’ll make sure I got all the pieces,” said Michael. He didn’t want to find out how much of Mr. Smith’s story might be true.