“Every storm has a story to tell, if you listen to it.” Rosemary Moody grimaced at the dark clouds looming over the ridge as her late father’s voice whispered in her thoughts. She settled into the soft leather chair at her desk but kept a wary eye out the second-story window. Slender yellow leaves from black walnut trees swirled past her view in the late-September wind. Those trees always gave up on summer first and the ones bordering the back of her property looked bare already. In contrast, the tall oak standing in the backyard’s center still clung proudly to full branches of green foliage. Below the brooding shades of indigo and gray steadily consuming the sky, the hills bore only a smattering of autumn color.
She sighed heavily. As a child, she never liked storms. Back then, she cringed at every thunderclap and screwed her eyes shut when lightning flashed at night. Her father would perch on her bed and say the words echoing in her mind before prodding her to meet his gaze. His gentle smile and raised eyebrows silently asked for a character that needed help. Sometimes she said a princess was locked in a tower. Other times a woodland creature was lost and searching for home. As the wind whipped rain against her bedroom window, her father wove his magic, adding characters and twists to match the fervor of the tempest beyond the glass. His sly distraction never failed. She became engrossed in his story every time, the thunder losing its menace and becoming nothing but a soundtrack to her father’s tale. To this day, Rosemary associated the easing of storms with happily ever afters.
Unlike the irrational fears in her youth, her dread of storms today was rooted in experience. When she and her husband bought an old estate to make it their growing family’s home, her father’s romantic strategy provided little comfort during bad weather. The roof leaked. The basement flooded. The expansive grounds became a treacherous swamp. As she watched the clouds creep closer, Rosemary couldn’t shake the anxiety that rose with memories of those early years.
The Moodys slowly learned to tackle one problem at a time with an eye towards lasting solutions. It had been a good lesson to instill in their boys, now grown men with homes of their own. The restoration ultimately transformed the house and grounds into Rosemary and Ed’s pride and joy. Once their sons moved out, turning the historic dwelling into an inn was the perfect next step for the empty nesters. Now Moody’s Bed & Breakfast, they shared their home’s warmth with anyone who found Casten’s Horn and needed shelter.
Wind slammed against the window as the gust front delivered the first drops of rain. The glass doors rattled at the cold fireplace in the corner and a downdraft moaned in the chimney. Rosemary steeled her nerves and tore her eyes from the sky. She’d returned to her office after dinner to review Charlotte Burke’s draft of the town’s October newsletter. Its stories would help her ride out the storm this time.
She rolled her chair forward to read the articles on her laptop. Deep satisfaction filled her as the spirit of Casten’s Horn leapt from every page. Though only her third newsletter, Charlotte had already set up recurring columns that fostered the sense of community Rosemary championed to become mayor last year. The articles gave equal coverage to tradition and progress, the two themes Rosemary highlighted in her Walpurgis Night speech. She had to admit her newest employee was clever.
Thunder pealed and then faded into a hollow grumble as she focused on the first recurring column. Charlotte had used Sarah Tenneson’s love of history to convince the librarian to write a story each month. In the September newsletter, Sarah had reminded folks of the museum room she curated, promising future columns would delve into hidden tales behind key individuals they might not know. To Rosemary’s surprise, her October column didn’t start with the town’s founder, Wilhelm Casten. Instead, Sarah chose to tour the graveyard behind the church on the hill, using its unique monuments and memorials to bring old ghosts to life in a perfect article for Halloween month.
Charlotte herself wrote another regular feature to promote the town’s commerce. After visiting shopkeepers during her first month in her new public relations role, she’d confessed to Rosemary that a few bristled at her outreach tactics. Rosemary had gently advised that some folks in small towns took a while to accept newcomers. Charlotte had taken her counsel to heart and softened her approach. She created an informal group for sharing new ideas and offered attendees home-baked treats alongside her marketing expertise to encourage participation. Her latest column described the new group’s first collective endeavor, football-themed offers supporting the Lumberjacks season at the school.
A sharp tap sounded against the window, and then another. Rosemary looked up to find pea-sized hail falling against the panes. Rolling thunder echoed in the valley and lightning flashed beyond the ridge as if a heavenly child were playing with a light switch. She forced her gaze to her laptop. She’d made no changes to Charlotte’s file but reflexively clicked the save icon before opening a browser to check the radar. An angry line of red approached the town. Rosemary reminded herself she had endured countless Wisconsin thunderstorms. This one would also pass.
The center spread of the newsletter showcased the new Anna Casten Foundation that had been formalized over the summer. Edith Spencer wasn’t mentioned as the charity’s founder but the whole town would know. She lived near Madison now and made it very clear the foundation was Charlotte’s to run. As the new caretaker of Casten House, Charlotte chaired the foundation and led a committee that included the mayor and three residents they’d chosen together in August. The article explained how the group would solicit, evaluate and fund projects to benefit Casten’s Horn.
Finally, Rosemary reviewed the calendar of upcoming events on the last page. She confirmed the city council and committee meeting dates and times were correct before shifting her attention to October’s entertainment offerings. She’d been invited to tap the first keg at Boards and Brews to kick off their one-year anniversary celebrations on the first of the month. The remaining games in the Casten’s Horn Lumberjacks regular season would draw big crowds on Friday nights. The annual Trunk-or-Treat party at the community center was scheduled for the Saturday before Halloween. Trick-or-treating hours were noted on October 31st.
The calendar also included a special event on the first Saturday in November. Placing lanterns in the church graveyard on All Saints’ Day was a Swedish tradition that Mildred Olsson, the vivacious first caretaker at Casten House, had brought with her when she arrived in 1948. Mildred never did anything in half-measures and invited the whole town to join her in remembering those departed. The church eventually took over the event, adding a fundraiser to supply lanterns and a reflecting pool to honor those not laid to rest in Casten’s Horn. Rosemary opened her personal calendar to mark the day before reviewing the information Pastor Sandgren had provided for the newsletter. Everything looked in order.
She saved Charlotte’s file again and sent a quick email approving the newsletter. Charlotte would post it on the town’s new website. The newsletter would also be delivered to every mailbox in Casten’s Horn and to a growing subscriber list reaching into nearby Percy and beyond.
Just as Rosemary closed her browser, her desk lamp flickered and dimmed before extinguishing entirely. As she rose, a deafening snap sounded with a blinding flash. She flinched and sent her chair toppling backwards as a thundering crash outside overpowered her senses. She froze and held her breath. Her heart kept time with the torrent pelting the window.
After a slow, unsteady exhale, she whispered, “Every storm has a story to tell, if you listen to it.” She stepped timidly around her desk in the darkened room, drawn to an eerie glow coming from the yard.
A long, fiery wound marred the standing trunk of the massive oak tree in the center of the lawn. Shorn in half, the toppled remains had narrowly missed the detached garage and lay smoldering in the grass despite the falling rain. A sense of loss washed over Rosemary, no different than if someone close to her had died. That tree had been tall and proud the day she and Ed moved in. It had stood like a guardian over the house and was probably a century old. Given the woods surrounding Casten’s Horn, it seemed impossibly unlucky for lightning to strike it down.
The orange glow on the fractured trunk faded to skeletal red lines that reached for the ground. Rosemary wrung her hands, finding they’d gone cold. She returned to her desk, picked up her laptop and turned the screen to light her way. Ed would know if they needed to do anything right away or if they could deal with the fallen tree in the morning.