by Jan Karon
When Fernbank was sold, all that would be left of the old Mitford was three original storefronts on Main Street, Lord’s Chapel and the church office, the town library, and the Porter mansion-cum-town museum where Uncle Billy and Miss Rose lived in the little apartment.
Blast! he exhorted himself. Stop being a hick and move on. This is today, this is now!
He glanced at Emma, who was staring at her computer screen. What did people find to stare at on computer screens, anyway? Nothing moved on the screen, yet she was transfixed, as if hearing voices from a heavenly realm.
“I’ll be darned,” she muttered, clicking her mouse.
He sighed.
“Look here,” she said, not taking her eyes off the screen.
He got up and went to her desk and looked.
“What? It looks like a list.”
“It is a list. It’s a list of everybody in the whole United States, and their addresses. Our computer man sent it to us. See there?”
She moved her pointer to a name. “Albert Wilcox!” he exclaimed. “Good heavens, do you suppose . . .”
“We’ve been lookin’ for Albert Wilcox for how long?”
“Ten years, anyway! Do you think it’s our Albert Wilcox?”
“We heard he’d moved to Seattle,” she said, “and we tried to find him in the phone book, but we never did. This town is somewhere close to Seattle, it’s called Oak Harbor.”
“Well done! Let’s write this Albert Wilcox and see if he’s the one whose grandmother’s hand-illuminated prayer book turned up in the parish hall storage closet.”
“A miracle!” she said. “I remember the day we found it—right behind the plastic poinsettias that had been there a hundred years. How in th’ dickens it ended up there . . .”
“That book could be worth a fortune. Every page is done in calligraphy and watercolor illustrations—by his own grandfather. When it disappeared out of the exhibition we did for a Bane and Blessing, it broke Albert’s heart.”
“It was only Rite One, remember, not th’ whole thing!”
“Nonetheless . . .”
“And don’t forget he was goin’ to sue the church ’til Miss Sadie talked him out of it.”
Well, that, too.
Ingrid Swenson was fashionably thin, deeply tanned, and expensively dressed.
“Arresting!” she said, as they drove along Fernbank’s proud but neglected driveway.
Tendrils of grapevine leapt across the drive and entwined among a row of hemlocks on the other side. To their right, a gigantic mock orange faded from bloom in a tangled thicket of wisteria, star magnolia, and rhododendron.
The house didn’t reveal its dilapidation at once, and for that he was relieved. In fact, it stood more grandly than he remembered from his caretaker’s visit in March.
He was touched to recall that exactly two years ago there had been the finest of fetes at this house.
On the lawn, young people in tuxedos had served champagne and cups of punch on silver trays, as lively strains of Mozart poured through the tall windows. Inside, the ballroom had been filled with heartfelt joy for Olivia and Hoppy Harper, the glamorous bride and groom, and with awe for the hand-painted ceiling above their heads, which was newly restored to its former glory.
Roberto had flown from Italy to surprise Miss Sadie, and Esther Bolick’s orange marmalade cake had stood three tiers high, each tier supported by Corinthian columns of marzipan bedecked with imported calla lilies. It had been, without doubt, the swellest affair since President Woodrow Wilson had attended a ball at Fernbank and given little Sadie Baxter a hard candy wrapped in silver paper.
The man who came with Ingrid Swenson seemed interested only in biting his nails, speaking in monosyllables, and exploring Fernbank quite on his own. The rector saw him peering into the washhouse and wandering into the orchards, taking notes.
“A little over twelve acres,” said Ron Malcolm, a longtime member of Lord’s Chapel who kept his broker’s license current.
“Excellent,” said Ingrid, who took no notes at all. “Twelve acres translates to twenty-four cottages. Town water, I presume?”
“On a well.”
“Town sewer, of course . . . .”
“Afraid not,” said Ron. “And I must tell you in all fairness that the cost to connect this property to town services will run well above a hundred thousand. The connection is a half mile down the hill and the right-of-ways pose some real problems.”
Ingrid looked at him archly. “It could behoove you to make that investment and offer your buyer an upgraded property.”
“It behooves us even more,” said Ron, “to avoid putting a burden of debt on the parish.”
She smiled vaguely. “That is, in any case, a trifle, Mr. Malcolm. But let’s consider an issue which is the polar opposite of a trifle, and that’s the number of jobs such a facility would bring to your village. An upscale property of twenty-one rooms and twenty-four cottages, including a state-of-the-art health center, would employ well over a hundred people, many of them coming from Europe and the British Isles and requiring satisfactory housing. This, gentlemen, could create a small boom.” She paused for effect. “A small boom for a small town!” she said, laughing.
“Yes ma’am,” said Ron Malcolm.
“But we’ll get to all that later. Now I’d like to start in the attic and work down to the basement.”
“Consider it done,” said the rector, wanting the whole thing behind them.
She would talk it over with her associates, Ingrid told them in the church office. They wouldn’t buy an option—they’d take a risk on the property still being available when they returned with an offer in thirty to sixty days.
“Risk,” she said, toying with the paperweight on his desk, “has a certain adrenaline, after all.”
Their lawyer would begin the title search immediately, and a full topo would be done by a surveyor from Holding. No, they didn’t want the window treatments or furnishings, with the possible exception of Miss Sadie’s bed, which Ingrid concluded was French, a loveseat and secretary that were almost certainly George II, and a china cabinet that appeared to be made by a native craftsman.
Her people wanted to talk with the town engineer again, and expressed regret that the heating system appeared defunct and the plumbing would have to be completely modernized.
Before leaving, she mentioned the seriousness of the water damage due to years of leakage through a patched roof, and frowned when the subject of the well and sewer emerged again.
He tried to be elated, but was merely thankful that the first phase was over and done with. He made a note to get up to Fernbank with Cynthia and go through the attic, pronto.
Pauline Barlowe had the job and was to report to work on Monday morning at six-thirty.
He called Scott Murphy at once.
“Thank you!” he said. “I can’t thank you enough.”
“What for, sir?”
“Why, for . . . saying anything that might have helped Pauline Barlowe get the job in your dining room.”
“I didn’t say a word.”
“You didn’t?”
“Not a peep out of me. That was our personnel director’s idea. She said she knew she might be taking a chance, but she wanted to do it and came to talk to me about it. Lida Willis is tough, she’ll watch Mrs. Barlowe like a hawk, but Lida has a soft center; she wants this to work.”
“We’re thrilled around our place. This means a lot to Dooley as well as his mother. When will you come for dinner? We’ve got a regular corn shucking going at the rectory; it’s just the thing to liven up a bachelor.”
“Name the time!” said the chaplain.
“I’ll call you,” said the rector.
“We’re giving a party,” announced his wife, flushed with excitement.
“We are?”
“Friday night. In the basement, a housewarming! I’m baking cookies and making a pudding cake for Harley, and Lace is doing the lemonade. I’ve invited Olivi
a, Hoppy has a meeting, and oh, I’ve asked Dooley, but he’s not keen on the idea. Who else?”
“Ummm. Scott Murphy!” he wondered
“Perfect. Who else?”
“Tommy. But wait, I think Dooley mentioned that Tommy has a family thing on Friday, and Dooley’s going over there later to watch a video.”
“OK, that’s seven. Terrific! They finished painting today, the place looks wonderful, and it’s all aired out and Harley is excited as anything. He raked tons of leaves from under the back hedge, and in the next couple of days he’s replacing my alternator.”
“Wonderful!” he said
“Harley’s so happy, he can’t stop grinning, and Lace—she doesn’t say so, but she’s thrilled by all this.”
“It was her idea, and she was bold enough to step forward and ask for it.”
“Let us come boldly to the throne of grace . . .” said his wife, quoting one of their favorite verses from Hebrews.
“ . . . that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need!” he replied.
“Amen!” they cried in unison, laughing.
He frankly relished it when they burst into a chorus of Scripture together. As a boy in his mother’s Baptist church, he’d been thumpingly drilled to memorize Scripture verses, which sprang more quickly to memory than something he’d studied yesterday.
“One of the finest exhortations ever delivered, in my opinion,” he said. “Well, now, what may I do to help out with the party?”
“Help me move that old sofa from the garage to Harley’s parlor, I don’t think he’s strong enough, then we’ll shift that maple wardrobe from the furnace room to his bedroom.”
Was there no balm in Gilead?
“Oh, and another thing,” she said, smiling innocently. “We need to haul that huge box of books from his parlor to the furnace room.”
For his wife’s birthday in July, she was getting a back brace whether she wanted it or not. In fact, he’d get one for himself while he was at it.
On his way to Hope House, he stopped at the Sweet Stuff Bakery to buy a treat for Louella.
Winnie Ivey looked at him and burst into tears.
“Winnie! What is it?”
“I heard you’re leaving,” she said, wiping her eyes with her apron.
“Yes, but not for a year and a half.”
“We’ll miss you somethin’ awful.”
“But you’ll probably be gone before I will.”
“Oh,” she said. “I keep forgetting I’m going.”
“Besides, we’ll still be living in Mitford, in the house next door to the rectory.”
“Good!” she said, sniffing. “That’s better. Here, have a napoleon, I know you’re not supposed to, but . . .”
What the heck, he thought, taking it. At least one person was sorry to hear he was retiring . . . .
When he left the bakery, he looked up the street and saw Uncle Billy sitting in a dinette chair on the grounds of the town museum, watching traffic flow around the monument.
He walked up and joined him. “Uncle Billy! I’m half starved for a joke.”
“I cain’t git a new joke t’ save m’ life,” said the old man, looking forlorn.
“If you can’t get a joke, nobody can.”
“My jokes ain’t workin’ too good. I cain’t git Rose t’ laugh f’r nothin’.”
“Aha.”
“See, I test m’ jokes on Rose, that’s how I know what t’ tell an’ what t’ leave off.”
“Try one on me and see what happens.”
“Well, sir, two ladies was talkin’ about what they’d wear to th’ Legion Hall dance, don’t you know, an’ one said, ‘We’re supposed t’ wear somethin’ t’ match our husband’s hair, so I’ll wear black, what’ll you wear?’ an’ th’ other one sorta turned pale, don’t you know, an’ said, ‘I don’t reckon I’ll go.’ ”
“Aha,” said Father Tim.
“See, th’ feller married t’ that woman that won’t goin’ was bald, don’t you know.”
The rector grinned.
“It don’t work too good, does it?” said Uncle Billy. “How about this ’un? Little Sonny’s mama hollered at ’im, said, ‘Sonny, did you fall down with y’r new pants on?’ An’ Sonny said, ‘Yes ’um, they won’t time t’ take ’em off.’ ”
The rector laughed heartily. “Not bad. Not half bad!”
“See, if I can hear a laugh or two, it gits me goin’.”
“About like preaching, if you ask me.”
“Speakin’ of preachin’, me ’n Rose ain’t a bit glad about th’ news on Sunday. We come home feelin’ s’ low, we could’ve crawled under a snake’s belly with a hat on. It don’t seem right f’r you t’ go off like that.”
“I’ll be living right down the street, same as always. We’ll be settling in the yellow house next door to the rectory.”
“Me ’n Rose’ll try t’ git over it, but . . .” Uncle Billy sighed.
Father Tim couldn’t remember seeing Bill Watson without a big smile on his face and his gold tooth gleaming.
“See, what Rose ’n me don’t like is, when you leave they’ll send us somebody we don’t know.”
“That’s the way it usually works.”
“I figure by th’ time we git t’ know th’ new man, we’ll be dead as doornails, so it ain’t no use to take th’ trouble, we’ll just go back to th’ Presbyterians.”
“Now, Uncle Billy . . .”
“I hate t’ say it, Preacher, but me ’n Rose think you could’ve waited on this.”
The rector made his way down Main Street, staring at the sidewalk. It was the only time in his life he hadn’t come away from Bill Watson feeling better than when he went.
At the corner of Main and Wisteria, he saw Gene Bolick coming toward him, and threw up his hand in greeting. It appeared that Gene saw him, but looked away and jaywalked to the other side.
June.
Something about June . . .
What else was happening this month? His birthday!
Dadgum it, he’d just had one.
In fact, the memory of his last birthday rushed back to him with dark force. His wife had brought him coffee in bed and wished him happy birthday, then the phone had rung and he’d raced to the hospital and discovered that a woman who would be irrevocably fixed in his life had been horribly burned by a madman.
He sat back in his swivel chair and closed his eyes. Wrenching, that whole saga of pain and desperation. And days afterward, only doors down the hall from Pauline, Miss Sadie had died.
No wonder he’d come close to forgetting his birthday. When was it, anyway? He looked at the calendar. Blast. Straight ahead.
How old would he be this year? He could never remember.
He called Cynthia at home. “How old will I be this year?”
“Let’s see. You’re six years older than I am, and I’m fifty-seven. No, fifty-six. So you’re sixty-two.”
“I can’t be sixty-two. I’ve already been sixty-two, I remember it distinctly.”
“Darn!” she said. “Then you’re sixty-three?”
“Well, surely I’m not sixty-five, because I’m retiring at sixty-five.”
“So you must be sixty-three. Which makes me fifty-seven. Rats.”
He realized as he hung up that they could have used their birth years to calculate the answer. What a pair they made! He hoped nobody had tapped his phone line and overheard such nonsense.
“I’ve been thinking,” said Emma.
Please, no.
“I might as well retire when you retire.”
“Well!” He was relieved. “Sounds good!”
She looked at him over her half-glasses. “But I wasn’t expecting you to give up so soon.”
“Give up?”
“I guess you can’t take it anymore, the pressure and all—two services every Sunday, the sick and dying . . .”
“It has nothing to do with pressure, and certainly not with the sick and dying. As you know, I�
��ve committed to supply pulpits from here to the Azores.”
“Yes, well, that’s vacation stuff, anybody can go supply somewhere and not get involved.”
He felt suddenly furious. Thank God he couldn’t speak; he couldn’t open his mouth. His face burning, he got up from his desk and left the office, closing the door behind him with some force.
There! he thought. Right there is reason enough to retire.
He deserved a medal for putting up with Emma Newland all these years—which, he realized only this morning, would be a full sixteen in September.
Sixteen years in an office the size of a cigar box, with a woman who made Attila the Hun look sensitive and nurturing?
“A medal!” he exclaimed aloud, going at full trot past the Irish Shop.
“There he goes again, talking to himself,” said Hessie Mayhew, who had dropped in to share a bag of caramels with Minnie Lomax.
“What do you think it is?” asked Minnie, who hoped the caramels wouldn’t stick to her upper plate.
“Age. Diabetes. And guilt,” she announced darkly.
“Guilt?”
“Yes, for leaving those poor people in the lurch who’ve looked after him all these years.”
“My goodness,” said Minnie, “we don’t look after our preacher at all. He looks after himself.”
“Yes, but you’ve got a Baptist preacher. They’ve been raised to look after themselves.”
“I declare,” said Minnie, who had never considered this possibility.
At The Local, he saw Sophia Burton, who wasn’t even a member of Lord’s Chapel, and was flabbergasted when she burst into tears by the butcher case.
“I’m sorry,” she told him.
“Don’t be sorry!” he implored, not knowing what else to say.
“It’s just that . . . it’s just that you’ve been so good to us, and . . . and we’re used to you!”
Didn’t he despise change? Didn’t he hate it? And here he was, inflicting it on everyone else. If his wife wasn’t so excited about the whole adventure of being free, he’d call Stuart up, and . . . no, he wouldn’t do any such thing. Actually, he was excited, himself.