Tales From The Loon Town Cafe

by Dennis Frahmann

  “Maybe I’ll see you there,” I gave in. Actually it might be good to be more involved with the community. Like Henry Van Elkind said once, I should be in touch with the pulse of the town. I could help guide the way it thought. Instead of this pompous pot-bellied man.

  “Do come,” he said sternly. “Perhaps my final words for the Gundersons will help you take the path to salvation for your own soul.”

  Thelma nudged me and said again, “What a windbag.” I returned to the moment.

  “I’m not paying attention,” I whispered back. I continued to survey the church. Of course, my cafe trio was there: Bromley, Claire and Mr. Packer. Mr. and Mrs. Trueheart were sitting near the front. Amanda Manny who still ran the decorating shop was midway back, and probably wishing it were her Drano-drinking husband who was occupying one of the coffins. Rueben Cord, the butcher at Red’s Piggly Wiggly. Several school teachers. Officer Campbell. Some high school students. I didn’t see any of the summer folk, like the Van Elkinds. But then why would I? They had all left for the season. Even if they had been in town, none of the local people mattered to them. The locals were just the people who mowed their lawns, repaired their plumbing and guided them to the best fishing holes.

  Nor were Chip Frozen Bear and his sister Jacqueline in the church. I was starting to like Chip as much as Cynthia was beginning to adore him. I still didn’t understand what he hoped to accomplish by being part of the American Seasons deal. I wondered if he even knew about Henry’s strategy to scare townspeople into selling their land cheap.

  The pews were filled with people who were likely targets of Van Elkind and his crowd. Most of them just scraped by, living from season to season on what they might eke out of the summer crowd. Some had been born here and never left. Others fled to the area because they couldn’t deal with pressures of metropolitan life. And then there was me. I had escaped and then I came back when I needed a new escape.

  I was becoming uncomfortable with this funeral. The last funeral I had attended had been in Brooklyn, and I didn’t like being there either.

  Pastor Paul Mall kept glancing over the congregation. At first, I thought my fidgeting was capturing his attention. Then I realized he was looking at the Gunderson boy, Josh, with clear signs of displeasure. At one point, I thought he would stop the sermon and direct some chastisement directly to the boy. God only knew what Josh could be doing to get the pastor so upset. Probably chewing gum.

  I continued my survey of the congregation and reached the back row on the opposite side. There was Pete Sullivan, our very own Reverend Willy. What was he doing here? I guess he really did try to attend every church service in town—including the funerals.

  Another poke in the ribs from Thelma just as the organist began a mighty dirge. “Stand up,” she whispered. “We’re walking across the street to the cemetery.”

  A light sprinkling of sleet was falling as we departed the church. A thin layer of ice formed on the flight of exterior steps that led down to the street. The procession of two coffins, each supported by six men in black, was descending the steps. One man slipped on the ice, momentarily losing his footing and causing his end of the coffin to bob, setting in motion a curious undulation of coffins as each of the pall bearers strained to see what had happened while striving to hold up their lot.

  The sky was completely dark with storm clouds. The little pellets of ice stung as they fell, flung against our faces by a wind just strong enough to make its point. The empty branches of the maples were swaying. The evergreens at the edge of the cemetery were already dusted with light ice. As the sleet hit the recently mounded dirt, freshly spaded from the earth, it melted into tiny puddles of water beside the two graves.

  Pastor Mall stood between the two graves with a coffin on either side of him. The crowd was divided as well, with only young Josh Gunderson standing at the foot of both graves, looking solemnly at the two gaping holes.

  The women pulled out their scarves and wrapped them around their hair. Out of coat pockets, men pulled stocking caps and put them on. The temperature was dropping even as Pastor Paul Mall began his final words. “From ashes to ashes,” he began. He looked up, seeming to notice for the first time how evenly the crowd was divided between the two graves. On the right hand and the left. There was nothing to distinguish on which side each congregation member had gone. Somehow, Thelma and I had ended up on different sides. Only Josh, stood alone, by himself.

  Indecision flitted across Mall’s face. He looked at Josh, who looked directly back at him, Josh’s head held high and bare in the sleet, his clothes better suited to a trendy street during a Los Angeles rainy season than to a Wisconsin November. He smiled.

  The young man’s smile seemed warm, friendly, but totally wrong. He looked far too healthy, too pleased for a man whose parents had died so tragically. I looked at him closer and I saw the artifice. He was wearing makeup. The mascara around his eyes was beginning to run in the sleet, creating black icy tears that conflicted with his smiling lips. Shiny, silvery glitter reflected from his eyelids.

  The pastor looked as though he had downed a dozen lemons. He stared again at the division of people on his left and his right. I could tell he was thinking of Revelations and the Final Judgment, and desperately seeking in his mind some way to discuss that in a manner that only damned Josh. But he couldn’t solve the puzzle. So he looked back at his prayer book and continued the service.

  Pastor Mall’s indecision had taken only a moment, and most of the attendees had not noticed anything. They had kept their heads and eyes lowered, not only out of respect, but also out of a desire to avoid the elements. Josh continued to look forward and I followed the line of his gaze and saw that he wasn’t looking at the pastor, but at one of the pallbearers. It was focused on Tony Masters, a young man was married to the town’s nurse, whose beauty caused many a young lad’s heart to flutter when they had to visit the town clinic for their annual high school basketball physical. Masters was staring back at Josh, not with belligerence, but maybe with a kind of hunger.

  I looked down embarrassed. I wanted the ceremony over. I was freezing. I was uncomfortable. And I didn’t even know these people.

  I looked back up. Josh and Masters were continuing to look into one another’s eyes across the emptiness of the graves. Pastor Paul Mall was finishing up a prayer. Everyone else was looking down at their feet with proper reverence. Except one person. Danny Lahti was also watching. Watching Josh. Watching Josh watch Masters. Watching me watch Josh watch Masters. He saw me watch him. He didn’t blush or look away as he normally might. He seemed to sigh and let his eyes drift down to the funeral program in his hands.

  Earlier in the day, during my exchange with Pastor Mall, Mr. Packer had been sitting quietly at the counter drinking his coffee. He harrumphed at its end. There was no other word to describe the sound he made. It was clearly a tone dismissing worthless chatter. Pastor Paul Mall looked over in Mr. Packer’s direction. “Is there something on your mind?” he asked even as his tone implied that nothing important could flow from a man of Mr. Packer’s unkempt demeanor.

  “I was listening to your ruminations on the private lives of everyone you encounter, thinking to myself what an intelligent man you must be to be able to know exactly what each of us should or should not be doing.”

  “It does not take great intelligence when you follow the words of the Lord.”

  “If you say so,” Mr. Packer smiled.

  Pastor Paul Mall stopped, a scowl forming on his face. He sensed that he had stepped into a trap. But he couldn’t quite figure out what the trap might be. “You should take a bath old man,” he went on the offensive, “instead of trying to debate theology.”

  “You know, Wally,” Mr. Packer said to me, deliberately ignoring the fuming pastor, “I’m reminded of another fellow from Alabama who used to come through Thread each summer. We called him Petey the Peach Boy.

  “Petey was a good-natured boy, kind of dim-witted, but his heart was always in the righ
t place. In those days, you could keep a calendar by when Petey would show up in the Town Square driving his dilapidated 1939 Ford flatbed truck. The back of it would be piled high with bushels of peaches, all freshly picked from orchards down south. He’d set up shop for a day or two, sell the best peaches you ever tasted from the back of that truck, and then he would be on to the next town, just traveling down the road till the last peach was sold.

  “And there was no one who loved a peach as much as Petey. He was one of those lucky people who loved his work. You asked him how the peaches were, and he would just reach into one of those bushel baskets and take out a peach without even looking at it. He’d bring it up to this mouth, and sink his teeth through that fuzzy yellow red skin, letting his mouth close around the soft luscious flesh, and the peach would be so ripe that its golden juices would just flow around his lips and over his chin and drip to the ground.

  “There would be this smile that would animate Petey’s face, just took over every inch of his cheeks and his eyes, until that entire face was animated like an angel’s. ‘That’s a peach!’ he’d say, and then he would keep on eating that peach, slurping at it. There was such pleasure in his simple face that you would have paid a fortune to get a hold of some of those peaches.

  “But you didn't need to pay a fortune. A couple of dollars and the bushel was yours. And when all the housewives had paid their visit to Petey the Peach Boy, he would take down his sign and his little canopy strung to the wooden rails on the flat bed and he would be on his way to Timberton, and then to Ashland, and wherever else his trails took him. But we were left with the treasures of the best peaches there ever were, and we knew how to enjoy them.” Mr. Packer had a wistful look as he reached for his coffee cup.

  “A very nice story, but I really must be going,” Pastor Paul Mall gave me a look that suggested he thought Mr. Packer was as dim as Petey the Peach Boy.

  “Hold on just a second there, Mr. Mall. I’m not finished with my story.” Mr. Packer took another sip of coffee. He looked out toward the empty town square underneath now graying skies, then continued. “We must have seen Petey every summer for ten, fifteen years. Then he stopped coming. We had to rely on getting our peaches at the Piggly Wiggly. I heard tell some minister down there in Alabama got Petey religion, convinced him to give up on all his passions, including his passion for peaches.

  “I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I miss Petey. It’s been over twenty-five years since he showed up with that truck, and I still miss seeing him eat a peach. I never saw a man happier than Petey was when he had a peach in his mouth. I hope he’s as happy with his religion. I hope so, but I wouldn’t bet on it.” Mr. Packer put a dollar on the counter and gave me a half-hearted salute. “It’s time for this old man to wander on. Don’t want to overstay my welcome.

  “And Mr. Mall,” he said as he walked out the door, “for God’s sake, let people eat their peaches.” He was out the door.

  Pastor Mall finished his prayer, the coffins were lowered into the grave and then he sprinkled a handful of ice-covered dirt across each grave. Josh did the same, but the pastor ignored him.

  “Ooh boy, it’s cold. Let’s get out of here,” Thelma was pulling me along as she moved back toward the church. She had on a heavy ski parka and thick woolen mittens. If anyone was warm, it should have been her.

  “Back to the restaurant?” I asked.

  “Don’t be silly,” she replied. “The Ladies’ Aid is having a potluck supper. Anyone who doesn’t want to cook tonight in this town is already here. We might as well keep the cafe closed and enjoy the food here. What do you say?”

  Who could say no? We descended into the basement of the Old World Lutheran Church, where several of the older members of the Ladies’ Aid were busily setting out the town’s specialties.

  “Now this is what I call real eating,” said Thelma.

  “Thanks a lot,” I replied. There wasn’t one menu item along the entire length of two long tables that I would even consider serving in my restaurant. But I was hungry, so I grabbed a plate and began working my way through the offerings.

  First, there was the boring stuff. Sandwiches made with sharp cheddar cheese on rye bread with butter, or with Wonder bread and a ground bologna combination that included sweet green pickles and lots of Miracle Whip. Miracle Whip seemed to be an essential ingredient to many of the items here.

  Canned soup was almost as important as Miracle Whip. As incredible a baker as Thelma was, she had an unusually strong loyalty to Campbell’s. She believed that virtually anything could be improved by the use of a can of condensed soup. Spread before me was a range of evidence from some of the best kitchens in Thread. Here was that old standby—the ground beef hot dish. A casserole made with a pound of hamburger browned with onion and mixed with sliced carrots and sliced potatoes and, of course, a can of cream of tomato soup. After an hour in the oven at 400 degrees, you had a tasty hot dish suitable for any funeral.

  The many hot dishes at the funeral supper attested to the popularity of the Gundersons. There was the green beans and onion ring casserole made with cream of mushroom soup. Next to it was scalloped potatoes and ham bound by cream of potato soup. And here was another cream soup concoction, this time tomato pulling together curly macaroni and browned ground beef. And what was the secret ingredient in the tuna hot dish? Could it be cream of celery soup?

  In truth I loved all these dishes, but I wasn’t about to let Thelma know that. Nor could I eat too much, because there were still the salads and the desserts to be sampled. A big bowl of fruit ambrosia beckoned me. A simple thing to make, really. Empty a can or two of fruit cocktail, thicken the juice with cornstarch, and then mix it with a container of frozen whipped topping. Why bother with whipping cream just because you’re in the dairy state? Here was another funeral fancy: a fruit salad made with unadulterated cherry pie filling used to bind together canned syrupy cling peaches, canned pears, and a jar of maraschino cherries.

  Those were the salads, of course. Time to move on to the desserts. Apple pie, cherry pie, black bottom pie, maraschino cherry cake, lemon cake with poppy seed pudding icing. I half expected to see the Gundersons walk through the door, because if they were on their way to heaven, then this surely had to be a stopping point for their journey.

  “Disgusting spectacle,” moaned Pastor Paul Mall as he stopped by our table unwanted “The boy’s a Sodomite. If his parents were alive, they would disown him. To have to look at his mascara eyes as I gave my sermon. I’m a Christian man with feelings for sorrow, or I would just have thrown him from my church. It’s an affront to God to behave that way. And at one’s parents’ funeral!”

  “I think the boy’s kind of cute,” said Thelma.

  “We’ll see what the Lord says on Judgment Day,” huffed the pastor and he went to the next table. Josh didn’t seem concerned about upsetting the spiritual leader of his dead parents. In fact, he was holding a small court of his own in the far corner of the church basement. I noticed that both Masters and Danny were among the circle of people who were listening to a very animated Josh. Peals of laughter floated out. Then there was quiet as everyone at the table leaned in closer as Josh began another story.

  “He probably has a colorful life back there in California,” I mused.

  “Probably,” Thelma agreed. “Are you done pigging out? Ready to head back to the restaurant? See who shows up?”

  “I thought you said no one would come in tonight, and that there was no sense in opening the place,” I pointed out.

  “Well, I do recall that Gilbert mentioned he might be driving through Thread tonight, and if he did he was going to stop in. It’s a nasty night out there. Don’t want to make the poor man get out in the cold for nothing.” Thelma stood as though there could be no argument about returning.

  “Fine,” I said. “Might as well see if we can make a few more bucks.”

  “Great to see you here, Wally,” I heard Red’s voice boom out as I felt a heavy hand slap
me on the back. Red leaned in close to whisper. “It’s a damn shame about the Gundersons. But they say every cloud has its silver lining. Bernard and Anna own two hundred acres of swampland right in the middle of parcel we need to put together. Should be able to get it for a song from that one. Fucking city boy.” He tilted his head dismissively toward Josh.

  I returned a half-hearted smile and looked over toward Thelma, who returned a dismissive look. “We should be going,” she said.

  “Don’t let me stop you,” said Red. He was on to the next table, shaking hands and smiling.

  Another loud peal of laughter rushed from Josh’s corner. I looked over and Danny who was giggling and rocking in his chair. His entire face was animated.

  “It’s nice to see the boy happy, isn’t it?” said Thelma.

  “Yes,” I agreed.

  “It would be nice to see you that happy once in a while,” she added.

  “What do you mean by that?” I asked.

  She just smiled and waved me to follow her. I looked back at the corner with Josh and his admirers. The circle of followers had grown. They were having entirely too much fun for a funeral. Pastor Mall was standing with several of the leaders of the Ladies Aid near the doorway. They too were looking in Josh’s direction. “I always liked the boy,” said one of the ladies. Pastor Mall turned on her rapidly and began a new sermon.

  “Let’s get out of here,” said Thelma. We stepped into the cold evening. The sleet had turned into full snow, but the steps up from the basement were still dangerously icy. Once up on the street, we could see a landscape transformed by the ice and snow into a wintry wonderland. The lone streetlamp flooded light through the nearest ice-covered branches in a shimmering glow. Beyond that, the icy white glimmered in the shadows.

  “Stop,” I said. Was that a bear at the edge of the cemetery? It should be hibernating. Then I saw the movement again and I resumed breathing.

  “It’s Toivo Lahti,” said Thelma. “He must have waited until the funeral was over before he visited his wife’s grave.”