Once Upon a Falling Star

Book excerpt: The year is 1935. Bettina, just turned six, is spending her summer vacation with Granny and Dada, her grandmother and grandfather, in Kalenda, a small North Texas town. In addition to her grandparents, the household includes Franky, their cook / housekeeper / laundress, whose husband Professor, principal of the K-12 Negro school, drives Franky to work and spends time at the kitchen table with Dada, discussing world events, and Rufus, the gardener / handyman / chauffeur. Frequent visitors are Nanny, Granny's crippled younger sister, and her husband, Harry, who drive into town from their small farm in an old Pierce Arrow which only Nanny can drive and only in second gear, and Uncle, Granny's younger brother, who lives alone near the railroad tracks with his two hunting dogs. Among the colorful townsfolk are Dolly (wife of Jolly), who has no children but has a wondrous doll collection for all the town's children to enjoy; Scrap, the trash man, who drives a mule-drawn cart to pick up castoffs which he turns into treasures; Miss Annie, the widow of a sea captain, who wears trousers, smokes an occasional cigar,and drives a bright yellow roadster; and Woodrow, confused but harmless, who thinks he is the President of the United States. But through all the delights of a carefree, almost magical summer, is woven the shadow of eight-year-old Billy Jack, the mostly unsupervised son of a mother long gone and a father who works in the oil fields. Billy Jack has told Bettina that Mrs. Crone, a strange neighbor who dresses all in black, is a witch. Bettina is afraid of Mrs. Crone, as well as of the frowning life-size angel with its sword unsheathed, which Mrs. Crone erected at the entrance of Townview Cemetery.