Baby gone down the river: fantasy

Baby gone down the river, was all she said when they asked her. They scoured the dams and such along the river for days, but they found no body. She just sad sad in her house, rocking back and forth, weeping for the loss of her child. There was no sympathy for her at first, but then she said that the baby had jumped out of her arms and leapt into the water and swam away. Some talk was started about a witch or maybe a witchy baby, but most of the folks began to believe that she'd accidentally dropped her baby and that the sorrow of it had broken her heart, and maybe her mind. She'd never been particularly strong-minded to begin with, just an amiable girl who was maybe a bit too friendly to the traveling peddlers and other drifters that would come through town and stay maybe just a little bit longer--

Inspiration: "Goin' Down South" by R.L. Burnside
Story Potential: Low.
Notes: Not much potential in and of itself, but kinda fits in with some of the rural magic realism sort of stories that I've had a few ideas for.