by Jan Karon
“Kavanagh, remember one of the calendar pictures we talked about—Violet chasing the guineas?”
“I’m planning that for the September page.”
The caravan raced down the hill at break-neck speed and disappeared around the barn.
“You may need to revise it slightly.”
Even with the attentions of the Mitford Hospital staff, Uncle Billy Watson wasn’t improving. Now stuck with cooking for Miss Rose and checking on her three times daily, Betty Craig was desperate; and no, there was no opening at Hope House until . . . “well, you know,” said the director of admissions.
Though he hadn’t the faintest idea what to do, he felt he must do something.
“Lloyd,” he said, shaking the rough, ham-sized hand of the low-bidding mason. “Welcome to Meadowgate.”
“I’ll take care of some prep work today, an’ startin’ tomorrow I’ll have a helper. We’ll do you a good job,” said Lloyd.
Unlike some poor saps who were promised such a thing by a contractor, the vicar was relieved to know he could take Lloyd’s promise as the gospel truth.
“Let’s play a game,” he said to his wife.
“I love games!”
“What don’t you love, Kavanagh?”
“Jeans without Lycra, lug soles on barn shoes, age spots . . .”
“Ditto.”
“And,” she continued, “any sitcom more recent than M★A★S★H.”
“So. Let’s say someone was working with you in the house two days a week. Now that you have the calendar to contend with, would that bother you?”
“Not if they did their work and let me do mine. Why?”
“End of game,” he said.
“Who won?”
“We both won,” he said. “Trust me.”
“Lily?” he whispered into the phone.
“Who is this?”
“It’s Father Tim,” he said, still whispering.
“Why are you whisperin’?”
“I don’t want my wife to hear.”
“Why, shame on you! I’ve heard of preachers like you!”
“Wait, no! It’s nothing like that. I’m trying to hire you to help Mrs. Kavanagh. It’s sort of a surprise.”
Skeptical silence.
“Two days a week,” he said.
“Doin’ what?”
“Cooking and cleaning.”
“For how many?”
“Three. This summer, there’ll be four.”
“I cain’t take any Saturday work; that’s when I do parties.”
“Of course.”
“An’ no Friday work, that’s when I get ready t’ do a party.”
“Fine. Fine.”
“An’ no Monday work, that’s when I get over doin’ a party.”
“Ah.” He sat down.
“Sometimes I’d have to send Del or even Vi‘let in m’ place.”
“I thought Violet was married to somebody in a brick house and . . .”
“That’s Arbutus.”
“Of course.”
“Del can’t cook t’ save ’er life, but mama says she cleans like a Turk.”
“Like a Turk . . . what does that mean, exactly?”
“Upends y’r chairs on y’r table; pulls th’ furniture out from th’ walls; beats y’r rugs with a paddle. Don’t miss a trick.”
He was having a sinking spell. “Can you come?”
“I guess I ought t’ tell you Vi’let sings as she works. I hope you don’t mind singin’. She’s very popular with ever’body.”
“I’m sure!”
“Lite Country, she calls it.”
“Can you do it?”
“When would I start?”
“Immediately. Right away. Tomorrow.”
“How long would this job last?”
“’Til sometime in January, when the owners of Meadowgate return.”
“I have reg’lars, y’ know. I’d have t’ make other arrangements, which can be a heap of trouble.”
“I understand,” he said. “And by the way, Mrs. Kavanagh . . .”
“She tol’ me to call ’er Cynthia.”
“Cynthia ... needs a lot of concentration to do her work. She can’t be disturbed.”
Long pause. Background music from a radio . . .
“I jis’ prayed about it,” said Lily, “but I didn’t get a answer. Zip. Zero.”
“How long do you think it might take ... to get an answer?”
“You oughta know better’n me, you’re th’ preacher.”
He sighed; Puny Bradshaw Guthrie had spoiled him for all others. “Why don’t we just . . . talk later?” A brilliant idea.
“Wait a minute, wait a minute, I think I’m gettin’ a answer. Hold on.”
Longer pause. The deejay was singing along.
“I can do it!” she whooped. “Ever’ Wednesday an’ Thursday!”
“Wonderful! Terrific!”
“I’ll be there Wednesday mornin’ at eight o’clock. I bring m’ own cleanin’ rags an’ sweet tea, an’ I have a allergy to cats so I’ll be wearin’ a mask.”
“A mask. Right. Anything else?”
“I sign out at three o’clock, sharp.”
“Perfect.”
She giggled. “You can stop whisperin’ now.”
“It’s all yours,” he told Sammy.
He stood inside the rusted gate with Sammy and surveyed the sun-bathed vegetable garden. Marge once said this patch of ground had been continuously worked for more than a century, with cow, sheep, and chicken manure, at least during their tenure, being the principal fertilizers.
“That g-green stuff’s asparagus.”
Sammy lowered the bill on his ball cap, as his eyes roved the ruin of winter. He picked up a faded seed packet. “Beets was here. Maybe c-c-carrots an’ onions over there.”
“Pole beans grew on that trellis,” said Father Tim. “I picked a hatful two years ago.”
“Prob’ly t-taters here.” Sammy kicked at the mounded earth. “An’ t’maters over yonder.”
“Think we’ll have any room for squash?”
“What kind?” asked Sammy.
“Yellow.”
“Yep. How ’bout watermelons?”
“I don’t know. Can you grow watermelons in the mountains? I believe they need sandy soil.”
“You c’n g-git sand at a nurs’ry.”
“That’s the spirit! As ye sow, so shall ye reap!”
“I’d put c-corn in here, ‘bout f-four or five rows. And put y’r okra in next to th’ c-corn.”
“How do you know all this?”
“I learned it offa Lon; he g-grows ever‘thing he eats. If we’re goin’ t’ git seeds an’ plants an’ all, we need t’ b-bust ass.”
“We’ll make a run to Wesley tomorrow.” Sammy’s arms were definitely longer than the sleeves in Dooley’s sweat shirt. They’d hit the department store while they were at it, and a haircut wouldn’t hurt matters, either.
“About the fertilizer. Mrs. Owen says they use sheep, cow, and chicken manure.”
“That’ll work.”
“The problem is—you have to collect it.”
“You mean—git it out of th’ f-field?”
“Right.”
“Is it rotted?”
“I don’t know. You’ll need to work with Willie on that. A good wheelbarrow, a pitchfork, a shovel, and you’re in business.”
Sammy adjusted his ball cap.
“Can you use a tiller?”
“I don’ know; I ain’t never used one.”
He clapped Sammy on the back. “I’ll show you.”
Two robins swooped across the garden. The emerging leaves of a fence-climbing trumpet vine trembled in the morning breeze.
Though Sammy seldom allowed his face to register his feelings, his eyes weren’t under such strict command. Father Tim saw that this garden would be more than food for their table; it would be food for Sammy Barlowe’s soul.
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“Willie, how’s it going?”
Willie held out two egg cartons. “Fourteen. This here carton’s five short.”
“Just fourteen?” He’d promised a dozen to Emma, a dozen to Percy, a dozen to Esther . . .
“The hens must be on strike.”
“Looks like.”
“They’re on their laying mash?”
“Same as ever.”
“Snakes?”
“Too early.”
“Right. Well! I’m town folk, you know. Thank you, Willie. Anything new at the barn?”
“Two singles.”
“Almost done, then.”
“Yessir. An’ thank y’r missus f’r th’ pie. I et it at one settin’.”
“Good! My wife will love hearing that!”
He hated to give away less than a full carton. Percy would have to wait.
With Andrew’s cordial permission, he and Sammy dug through the Plymouth looking for, as he told Sammy, a manila envelope. At scarcely more than four feet tall, and weighing less than ninety pounds, Miss Sadie wouldn’t have had the strength to pull the lower seat out and stash something behind it, but they pulled it out anyway.
They felt around behind the dashboard; they looked in the glove compartment; they examined the roof liner as best as they could without removing it. They opened the trunk and rifled through a rusted green toolbox, they looked under the floor mats, and even inspected the ashtrays.
“You c-couldn’t git a big envelope in them little bitty ashtrays,” said Sammy.
“True!” he agreed.
Their labors, he knew, were rudimentary. All the places they looked would have been the places Miss Sadie could easily access, but Miss Sadie was no dummy. She wouldn’t have hidden nine thousand dollars where any Tom, Dick, or Harry could stumble across it.
He remembered George Gaynor talking about the jewels hidden in the oil pan of a Packard, but Miss Sadie, for all her savvy, was not the oil pan type.
“Nothing,” he said to Andrew, who was looking his usual trim and urbane self, while lamenting the downward spiral of the dollar and the upward spiral of the pound.
“We probably shouldn’t mention this to anyone,” he suggested to Andrew.
“I agree completely.”
“Tony said you may be having it restored?”
“I looked into it a few months ago. Something nostalgic for the Independence Day parades! However, at several thousand dollars to bring it into mint condition, and the economy in its present state . . .”
“Indeed. How’s business at the Oxford?”
“Slow.The good stuff is harder and harder to find. How’s life in the country?”
“Slow,” he said, chuckling.
“Law, lookit how you’ve growed!”
“J. C. Hogan, Percy Mosely, Mule Skinner, Lew Boyd—meet Sammy Barlowe, Dooley’s brother.”
“No way!” said Percy. “I took ’im for Dooley.”
“Set down, set down,” said Lew, clapping Sammy on the back. “Let me treat you to a Coke an’ a pack of Nabs.”
“I’ll kick in a bag of chips,” said Mule. “You want sour cream or barbecue?”
“B-barbecue,” said Sammy.
“I thought we’d have lunch in Wesley,” said Father Tim.
“Don’t go over there an’ fling your money around.” Percy dropped a half dollar in the slot of the vending machine. “Keep y’r b’iness at home is what I always told my customers.”
A Moon Pie thunked into view; Percy handed it off to Sammy. “On me!”
Father Tim eyed the Moon Pie with some disdain. “We were going to the all-you-can-eat salad bar in Wesley.”
Percy rolled his eyes. “This boy don’t need a salad bar, he needs somethin’ to put meat on ’is bones! Ain’t that right, Sammy?”
“They got another word out of Edith Mallory.” Conversation froze; J. C. looked around at the assembly, relishing his moment.
“Spit it out, buddyroe.”
“Said she rolled into ’er breakfast room th’ other mornin’, looked her people dead in th’ eye, an’ said . . .” J. C. leaned back in his plastic chair and milked the pause.
“He’s doin’ it again,” said Mule. “Come on, dadgummit.”
“An’ said . . . ‘God is. ’”
“God is what?” asked Percy.
J.C. shrugged. “That was it. All she wrote.”
“Could have been a complete sentence,” said Father Tim. For Edith Mallory, those two words alone would be an astonishing affirmation.
“Prob’ly tryin’ to say God is one mean soan’-so for droppin’ a ceilin’ on ’er head. Who knows? Who cares?” Percy’s estimation of his former landlady was decidedly on the low side. “How’s that little church comin’ along?”
“Growing! Attendance is up one hundred percent.”
“No way,” said Mule.
“I’ll be dogged,” said Percy.
“They ain’t got a t-toilet,” said Sammy. “Have t’ use th’ b-bushes.”
Hee haws, thigh slapping, general hilarity.
Lew Boyd stepped in from the grease pit.
“That’s what I like to see at Lew Boyd’s Exxon,” he said. “People enjoyin’ theirselves.”
They schlepped the whole caboodle into the kitchen until it could be sorted through tomorrow morning: seeds, seedlings, seed pots, planting mix, an English garden spade, a set of tiller tines, fifty pounds of organic fertilizer, four sport shirts, four T-shirts, a sweatshirt with a hood, two pairs of khaki pants, two pairs of jeans, a dozen pairs of socks, tennis shoes, a V-neck sweater, a windbreaker, two packages of underwear, a case of Cheerwine, and, in readiness for Lily’s visit tomorrow, four sacks of groceries.
He’d dropped Emma’s eggs at Lew’s; left a dozen in Esther’s screen door with a note; gone by to see Uncle Billy, who was sleeping; and stopped on the highway for a sack of burger combos, which they devoured to the last fry before leaving the town limits. As for Sammy’s haircut, no cigar.
He was killed, and so was Sammy. At eight o’clock, they dragged up the stairs to bed, maxed to the gills.
“Lily?” he said, opening the back door.
“No, sir, it’s Delphinium, you c’n call me Del. Glad to meet you.” The tall, well-built woman gripped his hand in an iron clasp—was that one of his knuckles breaking?—and swept by him with a bucketful of cleaning rags.
Del who pulls furniture out from walls! Who upends chairs on tables! Who beats rugs . . . “But I thought Lily . . .”
“Lily�
�s sick as a dog. Puking!” said Del. “Want t’ show me what you’uns need done?”
He didn’t know how Del would go down with his wife; Cynthia may not like the furniture pulled out and the rugs beaten.
“I’ve got a surprise,” he told Cynthia as she came along the hall to the kitchen.
“You’re white as a sheet.”
“You may not like it.”
“Of course I’ll like it; I love surprises.”
“It was supposed to be Lily,” he whispered.
“Supposed to be Lily?”
“But it’s Del.”
“Del?”
“She pulls furniture out from the walls and can’t cook to save her life.”
“Timothy, why are you whispering? And what are you talking about?”
He threw up his hands, stricken. “I hired Lily to help you, but she’s puking and sent Del.”
“One of the Flower Girls! Is she in the kitchen?”
“She’s very tall,” he said.
He came out the backdoor at a trot, and not a minute too soon. Del had just whipped on a head rag and was ready to roll.
“Lloyd, how long do you think you’ll be with us?”
“You know we’ve got t’ tear th’ rest of y’r chimney down t’ where it goes t’ two-brick wide. We’ll be layin’ two-brick wide all th’ way to th’ top this time.”
“Right.”
“Then you’ll have t’ get y’r flue put in.” Lloyd gazed at the sky. “If th’ weather holds like this, which it won’t, prob’ly take about six weeks.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask—can all your work be done from the outside? I’m sure my wife is hoping as much.”
“‘Fraid not. Once we get goin’, there’ll be a good bit of in an’ out.”
He positively roared out of the driveway and onto the state road.