Cultural Background Storyteller's Cabin			-2- Hours later, Tommy Joe finally came stumbling out of the woods. Barbara Ann came rushing out of the cabin, then froze in her tracks. She took one look at him and knew immediately that her worst fears had been realized - Tommy Joe had seen the Ewah. Tommy Joe's eyes were wild, and they flitted from one side to the other, back and forth. His hair stood on end in all directions, his clothes were torn and ragged, and there were cuts and scrapes all over his body. It took her a long time to get him into the cabin and settle him down enough to lie quietly in his bed. By that time, all the folks around had heard about Tommy Joe and had raced up to the house with food and offers to help, like they always did. Mountain folk would always come to help their neighbors when there was a death or tragedy of some kind. And this was a death if there ever was one because, from that day forward, the Tommy Joe they knew would never be the same. The Ewah had frightened him to the point of near madness, and he would never again be the strong hunter that promised to take care of Barbara Ann forever. Barbara Ann wept for days, and somewhere in the middle of all that grieving, she figured out that somebody had to stop that Ewah before he did this to anybody else. But for the life of her, she couldn't figure out who else could possibly do it but her. She had nothing left to live for, other than to seek vengeance on this creature that had taken her husband away from her. In fact, she was so caught up in her anger that she found herself walking down the road toward town before she even knew what she was doing. She was on her way to see the Old Woman who lived in the crumbing old house down by the river. Everybody in town said that the Old Woman was mad. She had what they called "the sight," and nobody, including Barbara Ann, wanted to have anything to do with her. But Barbara Ann marched on, her anger pushing her forward. Before she knew it, Barbara Ann found herself on the rickety old porch of the Old Woman's home. The door creaked open before she could knock, and the Old Woman peered out from the darkness of her home, dressed head to toe in a tattered black dress. She was as ugly and scary as the townspeople had said, with scaly skin, long and stringy white hair, and dark, menacing eyes. "Come in, young one," the Old Woman cryptically whispered to Barbara Ann. "I've been waiting on you."
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