Eat, Drink and Be Wary

by Tamar Myers

  I had just waved to the Stutzmans when I noticed the lone figure of a woman walking toward me from town. This naturally came as somewhat of a surprise, since not many women are as confident about walking alone as I am. I was even more surprised when I discovered that the lone figure was none other than Gladys Dolby.

  I paced myself so that we met where the trees overhung the highway. Gladys must have been deep in thought, because she seemed surprised to see me.

  “Ah! Miss Yoder.”

  “Fancy meeting you here,” I said pleasantly.

  Gladys shook her head. Frankly, her bob did nothing to enhance her looks, although I must say it did fall neatly back to place.

  “When I got done being grilled by that awful man, I needed to clear my head.”

  “I know exactly what you mean, although with me it’s my stomach.”

  “He’s even worse than Daddy,” she mumbled.

  “What?”

  “He didn’t take me seriously at all. He barely asked me any questions.”

  “Count your blessings, dear. The man is a certified twit, and I mean that charitably. You could be on your way to Sing Sing as we speak.”

  “Stereotypes. I hate it when people stereotype me.” She mumbled something unintelligible. “Do I look like a killer to you?”

  “Yes.”

  “I do? You really think so?”

  “Well, not you specifically, of course. But everyone looks like a killer to me. You wouldn’t believe the unassuming types who—”

  “So that’s how I come across—unassuming?”

  It would have been unkind to tell her the unadulterated truth. “You look innocent, dear. There’s no crime in that.”

  I, on the other hand, have a face the Good Lord must have copied from the wanted pamphlets at the post office. Aaron called it a face that would make the devil drop his drawers—and that was when we were courting. No telling what this face is capable of doing now.

  Gladys took a step back and stared up at my face. “I’m full of surprises, you know.”

  “I wouldn’t doubt it, dear.”

  “You’re just saying that to be nice.”

  “Random words of kindness are not my forte, dear. The truth is, nothing on God’s green earth would surprise me anymore—not after what my pseudo-ex-husband sprung on me. Go ahead, tell me that Arnold Schwarzenegger and Michael Jackson are one and the same person, or that Bill and Hillary were both virgins when they married. See, I didn’t even blink.”

  “You’re patronizing me, aren’t you, Miss Yoder? I can’t stand it when people patronize me.”

  “Honestly, I’m not—”

  I had spoken too soon. I was genuinely astonished when Gladys Dolby threw back her head and burst into song.

  “Gladys Dolby took an ax and gave her daddy forty whacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave him fifty just for fun.”

  I closed my mouth before my tongue had a chance to freeze. “That’s all but been disproved, dear. Lizzie Borden was probably as innocent as—well, as me.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. I told that police chief I thought Mr. Mitchell was revolting. He pinched my bottom once. Can you believe that?”

  “Melvin Stoltzfus?” Just wait until Susannah heard about this.

  “No, Mr. Mitchell pinched me! I was going up that—uh—impossibly steep stairs of yours—and he was right behind. Suddenly I feel this sharp pain, and when I looked around back at him, he winked! Isn’t that disgusting?”

  “That’s hardly grounds for murder, dear.”

  Her face fell. “You can’t prove that there weren’t other times when he harassed me.”

  Gladys was not a woman I needed to talk to, she was a woman who needed to talk to me. Since I have never been one to sacrifice in silence, I’ll tell you now that I did the Christian thing and invited her on my walk. Perhaps that will help make up for the fish I mailed to Aaron by parcel post on the hottest day of the year. By the time I scooped it out of the pond, it had no doubt been dead for several days.

  I’ll say this for Gladys, she was every bit as nimble as a mountain goat. Despite the fact that she was wearing a tweed skirt suit, topped with a heavy knee-length jacket, she scrambled to the top of the highest rock in a matter of seconds.

  “Are you sure you’re not part bighorn?” I puffed when I joined her some minutes later.

  “I’m nothing like my daddy. He climbed Everest, you know.”

  That did not impress me. Why anyone would want to risk their life climbing to the roof of the world is beyond me. Most folks can’t breathe up there without oxygen tanks, and I hear it’s colder even than Hernia. Why not wait until you die, and get the very same view on your way up to heaven?

  “I have no doubt, dear, that you could climb Everest if you wanted.”

  “I’d like to. Without oxygen. Daddy climbed with.” We settled ourselves on the crest of a boulder I call Baldy. The others are covered with lichens and moss, but Baldy occupies a position in the sun and its surface is smooth, gray granite. I would guess it to be about fifteen feet high.

  “Now, dear, tell me more about your father. He sounds like such a fascinating man.”

  “Oh, he’s that all right. You name it, Daddy’s done it.”

  “Served as president of the United States,” I said.

  She rolled her eyes. “Served the president. Daddy is a four-star general.”

  “Get out of town!”

  “I made him swear he wouldn’t tell anyone. I didn’t want special treatment, and I certainly didn’t want him getting special treatment.”

  “Land o’ Goshen!”

  “Do you know what his middle name is?”

  “I haven’t a clue, dear.”

  “Good, because I also made him swear not to put it down when he registered at the inn.”

  I gave her a moment. “Well?”

  She looked away. “It’s Oliver.”

  "Oh.”

  “That’s right. Daddy’s initials spell G.O.D. That’s one thing he never lets you forget. Once, when I was about eight years old, I left my bike out in the rain. It was a brand-new bike, and I didn’t want it to get all rusty, but I was afraid to go out and get it because there was a lot of lightning. Well, Daddy went out and got it for me, but when he got back he made me say, ‘Thank you, God.’ ”

  “One should always remember to thank God,” I said, not understanding her point.

  “The real God yes, but Daddy was talking about himself.”

  “That’s blasphemy!”

  “That’s Daddy for you. He thinks he’s invincible. But you know what?”

  “What, dear?”

  “He’s afraid of spiders!”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “No, I’m not. Even those little tiny brown house spiders make him crazy. One crawled onto his sleeve once, and Daddy about had a fit. He jumped around, screaming and hollering, until I brushed it off.”

  “Get out of town, girl!” An eclectic stream of guests has vastly improved my vocabulary.

  She clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle a laugh. Then she shook her head.

  “No, I’ve just got to tell somebody.”

  “I’m all ears.”

  “The thing is, Miss Yoder, I didn’t brush it off right away. I let him dance around for a few minutes before coming to the rescue. I know that sounds awful—but I enjoyed watching G.O.D., the four-star general, be afraid like that.”

  It’s hard to say who laughed the loudest. We both laughed until our throats were raw and our collars soaked with tears. The curator at the Pittsburgh zoo told the Post-Gazette that, for some strange reason, their pair of spotted hyenas started laughing for no apparent reason around noon that same day, and laughed for twenty minutes straight. He thought it might be some kind of world record. Little did he know.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Kimberly McManus Holt’s Boston Baked Beans

  2 cups navy beans

  ½pound bacon

  1 large on
ion, sliced

  ½ cup brown sugar

  3 tablespoons molasses

  1 teaspoon dry mustard

  ¼ teaspoon ground ginger

  2 apples, peeled, cored, sliced

  Soak dried beans in water overnight. Drain. Line bean pot or deep baking dish with bacon strips. Mix brown sugar, molasses, and spices with beans. Spread layer of bean mixture on top of bacon strips. Add a layer of bacon strips and onion slices. Repeat with layer of beans. Spread apple slices evenly across top layer. Cover with water. Bake covered at 300 degrees for five hours. Add water as necessary to keep from drying out.

  Serves 6.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  We got back to the inn just in time for lunch. Theoretically. The table had not been set, and when I entered the kitchen, I found Freni with her arms around Alma.

  “Ach,” I heard her say, “you still have this afternoon.”

  “Ahem,” I said. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t for a second suspect Freni of anything untoward. It’s just that the last time I saw Freni with her arms around a woman was almost ten years ago, and my cousin was trying to drag the poor soul, an Avon dealer, out into a snowdrift. I know, I am not the most nurturing person on the planet, but compared to Freni, I’m a master gardener. I hug Susannah on an annual basis, and once hugged a toddler at church just because she was crying.

  Alma looked slowly up at me. Even through the Coke-bottle lenses I could tell she’d been crying.

  “Somebody swiped my paring knife.”

  “They did?” Years of experience have taught me not to take customer accusations at face value. The English are a confusing lot. Take for example the pair of white women who checked in last year. Halfway through their stay I discovered they had smuggled in a baby. Then at checkout time the one in the surgical mask and high-pitched voice had the audacity to accuse me of stealing her glove. Just one glove, for Pete’s sake!

  A tear squeezed out beneath the rim of one lens. “Yeah. Mrs. Hostetler was real nice. She gave us each a drawer and three cupboard shelves to store our things in.”

  “She did? And I thought I was going to have to call in the National Guard.”

  “Ach, very funny, Magdalena. Now we have an English girl living in the cellar with my pots and pans. Don’t say I didn’t warn you if some of those grow feet.”

  “Legs, dear.” I turned to Alma. “I’ll ask around about your knife. You know, it doesn’t smell half bad in here. Are you ready for the judges?”

  “Oh. Miss Yoder—well, uh—the lamb turned out fine, but—but—” She turned away to blubber privately.

  “She burnt the jam,” Freni whispered in a voice loud enough to wake the dead.

  “You mean chutney, dear. It’s an Indian condiment.” Freni colored.

  “Like a sweet relish,” I explained quickly.

  “It’s Indian from India,” Alma said, “not Native American.”

  “Yah, not one of our recipes,” Freni said, and somehow managed to wrinkle her beak of a nose.

  I glanced around a surprisingly disorderly kitchen. “Speaking of food, how’s lunch coming along?”

  “Ach,” Freni said, “I completely forget.”

  “You forgot?”

  Freni shrugged. “I’m only human, after all.”

  “My kingdom for a tape recorder,” I moaned. “Freni, in case you’ve forgotten it as well, this is an inn that serves food to its guests.”

  “I’ll throw something together in a minute.”

  “Make that a New York minute, dear. Melvin has graciously interrupted the inquisition until after lunch.”

  “Yah, yah, like I said, in a minute.” She turned to Alma. “After lunch, I’ll help you figure out what went wrong. Maybe it was the saucepan. Magdalena is as tight as last year’s dress when it comes to money, so the quality isn’t the best. But”—she glanced at me, and then back at Alma—“we must try not to be too hard on her. She’s an orphan, you know.”

  I stared at my cousin. Same beady eyes, same beaky nose, same monstrous bosom so unfairly straining at the pleated bodice of her dress. It was indeed the outer shell of my kinswoman. What had happened to the Freni inside was anyone’s guess.

  “Freni!” I snapped.

  Freni gently patted Alma’s arm before turning to me. “So what’s more important, Magdalena, English stomachs or this child’s heart?”

  “Well, this child’s heart, of course, but—”

  “I am not a child,” Alma mumbled and ambled from the room.

  At last I could turn my full wrath upon Freni. “Why, Freni Hostetler, you should be ashamed of yourself! You have never been late with a meal since the inn opened—not counting those times you quit.”

  Freni nodded. “Yah, I have always been on time.”

  “So, what do you have to say for yourself now?”

  Freni yawned. “I’m sorry.”

  My mouth opened wide enough to bob for apples, and might have fossilized in that position if Susannah hadn’t floated into the kitchen, trailing yards of tulle.

  “Everyone’s gathered in the den,” she announced. “Even that horrible Ms. Holt. They want to know when lunch is. I told them I’d be happy to drive into Bedford and bring back pizza, or we can call the order in.” She gave me a meaningful look that I ignored.

  I see no sense to pay the extra ten-dollar delivery charge to get stone-cold pizza delivered from Bedford. Someday, if Hernia ever got a pizzeria, then maybe. In the meantime I have a perfectly able cook—well, you know what I mean.

  “Is that Carlie back too?” I asked pleasantly.

  Susannah shuddered. “Ugh, that horrible Ervin Stackrumple brought her back from Hernia. What’s that all about?”

  “Later, dear. In the meantime, tell them lunch will be ready in the shake of a lamb’s—” I remembered Alma’s contest entry and shuddered. “Just tell them to relax and make themselves comfortable. We’ll have it on the table as soon as we can.”

  I did my best to get lunch on the table within the hour, but the once frenzied Freni was now unfazed. She poked along like a turtle in molasses, all the while telling me what she planned to sew or knit for the baby.

  “Maybe I should just quit,” she suggested at one point. “Just think of all the cute little outfits I could make for the sweet little pumpkin.”

  I shuddered. “You’re Amish, dear. Everyone dresses the same. How many identical little outfits does a baby need? Anyway, if you quit now, I’ll tell Barbara all about the contest—how you schemed to get rid of her.”

  “Ach!” Unflappable Freni flapped just that once.

  “On the other hand, if you keep working, you can buy the little darlings their own farms. I’m sure they’d like that much better.”

  “They? Did you say they?”

  My heart pounded. “I said no such thing.”

  “Yes, you did. I just heard you. Is my precious Barbara going to have twins?”

  “Ha! Don’t be ridiculous.”

  Freni flapped again. “Ach, then why did you say ‘they’?”

  “It was just a slip of the tongue, dear.”

  “Slip, shmip! That dear girl is having twins, and you want me to make lunch for the English? I should be home right now—”

  “Barbara’s not having twins,” I screamed, and then before I could say more, I shoved my fist in my mouth.

  Lunch, when we finally got it on the table, was the worst fare the PennDutch has ever served. The chicken was chewy, the dumplings doughy, and the sherbet had to be sucked through a straw. It was definitely not typical Pennsylvania Dutch cooking. I’ve eaten in Presbyterian homes with better food. A bigger woman would have taken down her shingle or, at the very least, openly converted to another denomination.

  Time and tide waits for no man, and many is the time I’ve wished the tide would come inland as far as Hernia and wash Melvin Stoltzfus out to sea. When the phone rang during our delayed lunch, I knew without a doubt it had to be him.

  “Aren’t you going to get t
he phone?” Susannah asked, treating us all to a glimpse of masticated chicken.

  “Susannah, dear,” I said, furrowing my brow in a meaningful way. That’s all I needed to say, but it was two words too much. One would think that after almost a lifetime—she was married less than a year— spent in a Yoder household, she would be wise to the fact that we do not let that plastic box with bells pull our strings. Not during meals.

  The front desk phone rang until the machine picked up, then it immediately rang again.

  “It could be important,” Susannah said, risking my wrath. Either she was expecting a call, or the six pairs of guests fixed on me were making her nervous. Freni, incidentally, does not eat with us, and never answers the phone anyway.

  I would have unplugged the blasted thing, had it rung again, but immediately after the desk machine picked up for the second time, the phone in my bedroom rang. That’s when I sprinted. That is an entirely different matter, mind you. My bedroom number is given out to only a select few. Besides Freni and Susannah, the only folks who have officially been given the number are the creme de la creme of celebrityhood. If it wasn’t Babs this time, I knew it had to be Brad. His recent split was the pits, and although it may be bony, mine is a broad shoulder to cry on.

  “Babs?” I asked breathlessly.

  “Uh”—a phone rang in the background—“hold on a minute please,” a male voice said.

  I foolishly held on.

  “Uh—okay, I’m back. Sorry about that.”

  “Brad?” It didn’t sound like him, but crying will do that to you.

  “Uh—this is Stuart. May I please speak to Magdalena Yoder.”