One Year in Coal Harbor

by Polly Horvath

  I decided to try another tack. “Have you noticed that Dan Sneild is always eating at The Girl on the Red Swing?”

  “People have to eat somewhere. I imagine he gets tired of the haute cuisine up at Miss Clarice’s.”

  “She likes him.”

  “Miss Clarice?”

  “NO, MISS BOWZER!”

  “So I hear.”

  “They knew each other in high school.”

  “I knew a lot of people in high school, Primrose, what’s your point?”

  “Yes, but this is romantic.”

  “Is it romantic, or are you?”

  “Well, somebody better be,” I said meaningly. “Did you know tonight was pierogi night? Miss Bowzer never had pierogi night before.”

  “So?” said Uncle Jack, tapping on timbers and writing on his clipboard. It was getting on my nerves.

  “Dan Sneild is UKRAINIAN.”

  “It’s a free country,” said Uncle Jack, laughing.

  “You’ll be laughing out of the other side of your mouth when Miss Bowzer starts dressing in dirndls and making great vats of sauerkraut.”

  “I think you’re confusing the Ukraine with Bavaria,” said Uncle Jack, still scribbling away.

  “Miss Bowzer thinks Dan Sneild might be here to buy the B and B. When they were younger it was their dream to own it.”

  Now he stopped writing.

  “Miss Clarice’s B and B?”

  “Well, of course it wasn’t Miss Clarice’s then. Miss Bowzer has always wanted it. It’s her dream.”

  “I thought The Girl on the Red Swing was Miss Bowzer’s dream. She certainly gets prickly if she thinks it’s been insulted.”

  “She’s proud of The Girl on the Red Swing, she created The Girl on the Red Swing, but her heart’s desire is the B and B! All her life she has wanted to live there. She spends all her free time decorating it in her head.”

  Uncle Jack put down his clipboard and looked at me straight on for the first time since I’d come in. “Well, well. Now, this does make things interesting. I’ve always thought a B and B was a two-person business.” He looked thoughtful for a minute. I was hoping he would say something heroic like, Then there’s no other choice—I will have to run Dan Sneild through with my saber, but when he finally spoke it was crushingly disappointing. “Let’s hope she gets it, then. Everyone should have their heart’s desire. You, me, even Miss Bowzer.”

  “EVEN?” I protested.

  “Now,” he said, shuttling me toward the door, “as much as I love these little tête-à-têtes, let’s shoot you back outside while you still have a tête.” As if to illustrate, a plank fell from the ceiling, and Uncle Jack bellowed, “WATCH IT UP THERE!”

  Then he clapped me on the shoulder and pushed me gently through the door, saying, “Thanks for looking out for me, Primrose, but let’s just say I’m not worried about that particular problem.”

  He had disappeared back inside before I could reply, but I was sorely tempted to say, Well, if you’re going to get worried I’d advise doing so before the first of their twelve children is born.

  Tater Tot Casserole

  Brown a pound of hamburger with a chopped onion or two in an ovenproof skillet. You can add some chopped green pepper or red pepper or corn or other things if you like but my advice is not to make it too terribly vegetably or it loses its je ne sais quoi. Drain the excess fat off unless you like excess fat. Spread the hamburger mixture evenly over the bottom of the pan. Put half of a pound bag of Tater Tots on top. Thin a can of cream of mushroom soup with half a cup of milk and pour that on top. Then put one and a half cups of grated Cheddar cheese over all and bake the whole thing in a 350-degree oven for forty-five minutes. On a cold rainy night when people are not participating in the better plan you have for them, this can be a comfort.

  What Happened at the Meeting

  WHEN WE ENTERED THE town hall, I was still sulking. It is very annoying to be putting everyone’s life to rights without any help from them or those around them.

  There were long backless benches set out, which could get very uncomfortable if the meeting dragged on too long. My dad said once that he suspected that was why they were used. My mom and dad and Evie and Bert were down at one end of a bench with Ked and me at the other. Miss Connon was sitting in the row in front of me and waved to me cheerily as I came in. Miss Bowzer didn’t come at all, which was surprising. She usually closed the restaurant early if there was a town meeting. But maybe she had to keep it open all the time because, as she had said, it wasn’t doing so well. Or maybe she was embarrassed to come to a meeting where so many people had signed a petition she refused to. You could count on most everyone showing up for these things. Aside from the movie theater, which only changed its movie every six weeks, it was, entertainmentwise, the only game in town. There was a loud buzz of excited conversation as people came in and greeted, like long-lost relatives, acquaintances they’d seen not two hours before. There was a kind of festivity to these gatherings that really called for cake. I looked around hopefully but apparently this was to be a pastryless event.

  Dan Sneild was across the way, sitting with Miss Clarice.

  “What’s he doing here?” I whispered to Ked, who just shrugged.

  Uncle Jack came in at the last second and squeezed in next to me.

  “I thought you weren’t coming,” I whispered to him.

  “I had to. I got a letter asking me to do something. It’s not going to make your mom happy.”

  And then the mayor tapped the table with his gavel and we had to be quiet. At first it was very boring, with requests for dull things like stop signs and the removal of stop signs. It seemed to be a big concern where drivers should and should not stop. There was a contingent who wanted a series of stop signs put on the road that runs parallel to the beach because a lot of children and dogs like to run in that area and people use it as a speed course.

  “Someday some child is going to get hit,” said a woman indignantly.

  “Or even worse, a dog!” said another woman passionately.

  This occasioned a moment’s silence while people tried to figure out if they’d heard right.

  Then there was the usual uprising from the cat people, who didn’t think cat safety got enough consideration, and there was even a budgie lover who spoke up, but nobody took her seriously. Finally, things appeared to be back on track. I always found these discussions like new fires. They fizz up and look really scary, like they might flame right out of control, but eventually they settle down to a quiet crackling hiss and then burn themselves down to embers.

  This fire had appeared to die down and we were listening to the mayor raise the issue of parking meters when someone stood up and yelled, “ANIMAL HATERS!” and the mayor, who is a nice man, broke into a visible sweat.

  It was for just such moments that we all came to the meetings. The topics under discussion often seemed largely beside the point. The point was to have an opinion and make sure everyone heard it. It seemed to me particularly necessary for people who lived alone and didn’t have the benefit of someone always available on whom to force their views. They were always the most vocal. I pointed this out to Ked and he thought a minute and said, “Do they need to shout most because they have no one at home to shout at or do they have no one at home because they like to shout so much?”

  I would like to point out that this was a fine point Eleanor would never have come up with and it required some thinking through. By the time I had finished, the mayor had moved things from parking and pets to the “Honeycut Project,” as he called it.

  “It’s been suggested to me that instead of overwhelming Miss Honeycut with a raft of letters, we unite to write her with one plan for the use of the money. That way the project will be chosen not so much by her but by a majority of us. Does that make sense?” asked the mayor.

  There was a quiet buzz that seemed mostly favorable to this idea. It made sense to me. Who knows what strange notion Miss Honeycut would support if
left to her own devices? She might choose the budgie lady’s idea of starting a budgie sanctuary. We didn’t want her blowing half a million pounds on birds.

  The mayor got out a sheet of paper and began to read all the various ideas people had had since Miss Honeycut’s letter had been published in the newspaper. Then people stood up to plead their cases. My mother made a stirring speech about Fishermen’s Aid. A less stirring speech was made by the Hacky Sack kids.

  Eleanor’s mom stood up and said, “What do you people think you’re doing, coming into town with your Rastafarian hair and wanting the money for some big global project that has nothing to do with Coal Harbor and just stirs up trouble?”

  “Now, I don’t want you folks to stand up and start arguing and, uh, shouting and such,” said the mayor, wiping his forehead again when the usual twittering on the old-lady bench and a restless stirring in general had begun. “We have plenty of time to choose a cause, as this selection process has just begun.”

  That’s when Uncle Jack stood up.

  “Well, I’m afraid I have news that is going to eliminate the need for such a process, Eric.” (That’s the mayor’s name.) “I’m sorry I didn’t have time to get this on the agenda but I only got the letter today. As some of you know, Miss Honeycut and I were friends.”

  There was some sniggering in the audience. A lot of people were aware that Miss Honeycut had set her cap at Uncle Jack in a kind of sad and desperate way. He ignored the sniggering, although he turned slightly redder, but it was hard to detect unless you knew him well because Uncle Jack was always pretty red. He was so full of life that he glowed from within.

  “Anyhow, I guess that’s why she appointed this task to me. She has made me her agent over here. And it seems”—he cleared his throat—“that’s she’s already decided on a project.”

  “Well, THAT didn’t take long!” my mother cried. “She couldn’t have even gotten my second letter yet.”

  “We want a boardwalk!” screamed the little old ladies, banging their canes until someone in front of them said, “SHHH!”

  “Don’t you shush me, Young Man Having a Very Bad Hair Day!” cried one of the old ladies, hitting the shusher’s chair with her cane.

  The Hacky Sacks looked on in amazement. I don’t think they were used to old ladies outshouting them.

  Miss Connon stood up and whispered, “That’s so mean, making fun of someone’s hair,” and walked out. I saw her face and I could swear she was starting to cry again. Lately she seemed to cry at the drop of a hat.

  One of the Hacky Sacks, who was sitting right in front of me, turned to a boardwalk granny and said, “I know you don’t like my hair but I think your hair is very nice.”

  “I do it myself,” the granny whispered to him.

  “Really? I’d never guess. I was a hairdresser. I got fired a few months ago. I was giving a woman a perm and I sort of forgot about the time and her hair fell out.”

  “Oh my,” said the granny, looking concerned. “That would be worrying. But we all make mistakes, don’t we?”

  “That’s not what the owner said.”

  “Now, don’t fret, dear,” said the granny. “You’ll find work again.”

  “Oh, I know,” he whispered back. “I’m not doing this just because I couldn’t find a job, you know. I really believe in saving the rain forest.”

  “Of course you do!” she said, patting him on the knee. There was a pause. “I could hire you to do my hair.”

  “I wouldn’t if I were you. I think you’re doing a lovely job yourself. And to be honest, I’m kind of scared I’m going to burn off someone’s hair again.”

  “We’ll buy you an egg timer!”

  “It’s okay, really,” he said, turning red.

  They continued to whisper but I couldn’t hear the rest of their conversation because the level of noise and chaos was escalating.

  “Listen, folks!” shouted Uncle Jack over the roar, trying to get matters back on track. “It doesn’t make any difference what you all want because Miss Honeycut has chosen a project that is dear to her heart.”

  At this there was an outbreak of groans.

  “This money to allocate is Miss Honeycut’s,” Uncle Jack reminded everyone. “And it seems that what she’s decided to do with it is build a park and erect a statue of her father in it.”

  At this there was dead silence.

  It was broken by one of the fishermen shouting, “We don’t want no stinking park with some statue of some guy we never even met.”

  “Yah!” piped up someone else. “What does her father have to do with Coal Harbor?”

  “BOARDWALK! BOARDWALK!” yelled a particularly sprightly old lady in a lime-green pantsuit, trying to rally the troops, but they all looked exhausted. One of them looked like she was working on a stroke.

  “It’s true her father had nothing to do with Coal Harbor. Except leave us this money—which it would behoove us to use as Miss Honeycut sees fit. We’ll still get a park. And a, uh, statue. We can, of course, refuse the money.” Uncle Jack paused meaningly.

  The room went quiet again.

  “But I’m afraid it will do no good to try to persuade her otherwise. I took the liberty of phoning her as soon as I got the letter, explaining that feelings might be not completely unanimously in her corner on this one. But she made it quite plain that this is her intention and she won’t be dissuaded.”

  “Half a million dollars for a park and a statue?” someone cried. “That’s crazy! We don’t have a piece of land worth that much!”

  The room erupted into a blend of disappointed voices, bemoaning Miss Honeycut’s lack of sense. Just like the rich, came up again and again. Just like her, came up even more often. I felt bad for my mom. She had come to the meeting, certain that she’d convince everyone of the need to give the money to Fishermen’s Aid.

  In the midst of this Dan Sneild stood up. “Excuse me. Excuse me, please, folks.” He had to say it quite a few times before the room quieted down and he got everyone’s attention.

  “I know a lot of you planned to stop the clear-cut and create some kind of international appeal with Miss Honeycut’s money but I have to tell you, it would do no good. We’ve got no plans to do some big wholesale clear-cut. We don’t do that any longer. You folks are behind the times. We do a small area. In this case one small mountain, which we will replant afterward because our goal is always sustainable forestry. Now, you all need to help us find a balance between jobs for loggers and the needs of the community. This province was built on logging just the same as fishing. How’d you feel if some environmentalists came into town and closed down the fishing business? I suggest you all bow to the inevitable and remember those loggers are supporting families same as you folks are.”

  Well, I think he was doing okay until he told us to bow to the inevitable. About half the room erupted in angry cries and the other half, myself included, were stunned silent to find out that Dan Sneild worked for the logging company. A lot of us hadn’t thought he was in town for any reason other than to win Miss Bowzer and talk Miss Clarice into selling the B and B. Now I understood why Miss Bowzer wasn’t at the meeting. She could hardly protest the clear-cut being arranged by her fiancé-to-be.

  “Oh, this is terrible,” I said to Ked. But he didn’t understand what I was talking about.

  “No, it’s demolition derby!” he said, his eyes sparkling as he looked from one hysterical contingent to the next. I could see his point. One dread-head had just beaned Eleanor’s mom with his Hacky Sack. It had made a little dent in her tightly curled perm but otherwise didn’t seem to have injured her. I thought he had crossed a line and felt bad for her until she got up and poured some cold tea on him. “Are these meetings always like this?”

  “Well, people in Coal Harbor have strong feelings,” I said proudly. “But I thought you didn’t like altercations.”

  “I don’t mind them as long as they’re not about me. This is weirdly balletic, like a good hockey game,” said
Ked.

  It was kind of lovely in its anarchy. It was a kind of ballet of desires. People wanted different things and there was something nice about wanting them and the noise and movement all swirling around those things.

  “Miss Bowzer knows what Dan Sneild does for a living,” I said to Uncle Jack. “She must! That’s why she won’t sign the petition.”

  “She’ll sign,” he said, and his eyes twinkled as he sat there implacably, as unruffled and unrufflable as always. He even looked passively on as Dan Sneild made a long speech about how the company was ecosensitive, using a lot of technical terms that I could tell no one understood. I figured that was probably Dan Sneild’s intention. What he was probably saying in technospeak was, And then we plan to uproot and get rid of every last living thing on planet Earth.

  Now would be a fine time for Uncle Jack to get up and punch Dan Sneild right in the nose. He could do it under the pretense of being ecosensitive himself. Everyone would approve. If Eleanor’s mother could go around throwing tea on people, I’m sure no one would fault Uncle Jack for a jealous punch or two. But no, he just sat there calmly as Dan Sneild went on to say that even Miss Clarice, whose property faced the mountain, wasn’t going to protest it. “But perhaps it would have more weight coming from her,” he said. Then Miss Clarice stood up and talked about how she had such faith that Blondet and Blondet was going to replant and make a new forest and log sensitively and responsibly, at which point one of the grannies dropped her knitting, stood up and shouted, “THIS IS CRAP!”

  Mrs. Henderson, whom I knew to be quiet and well-mannered, started repeating “crap” like a chant. She was either finding a new freedom of speech in her old age or she had developed Tourette’s.

  Eleanor’s mom put her hands over Eleanor’s ears, which must have been very embarrassing for Eleanor and also useless, as the damage was done.

  “Why didn’t you tell the mayor first thing about Miss Honeycut’s letter?” I asked Uncle Jack.