by Tamar Myers
She glanced around the dining room, her eyes as big as mousetraps. “You’re joking, right?”
“Alas, I lack a sense of humor. The Good Lord, in His wisdom, bypassed me with the funny gene.”
“You actually coexist with mice?”
“They’re in the cellar,” I reminded her crisply, albeit pleasantly. “It can get to below zero here in January, whereas the cellar is always in the fifties. What would you have me do, turn the poor things out into the cold so they could freeze their tails off? They don’t have fur on them, you know. And, even though you haven’t asked, I sweep up their cute little droppings with some regularity. It’s no different than scooping out a cat box, is it? I just wish Minnie and Mickey weren’t so shy. I miss playing with my pussy, which, by the way, I had to give up on account of my stepdaughter’s allergies. And just so you know, she isn’t allergic to mouse dander; I had her doctor check for that. After dinner, would you like to see the little darlings? Maybe even feed them some cheese? Although they much prefer smoked bacon. The whole cheese thing is a myth.”
Sidney shuddered. “I’ll pass on the mice, thank you. Any other critters allowed inside?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, dear. This is Pennsylvania, not Maryland. I don’t allow dogs, unless they’re safely confined within a bra.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I’m referring to Shnookums, my sister’s miniature something or other. Frankly, he looks more like a rodent than a dog. Folks have actually taken him for a rat. I certainly would not allow him to winter in my basement.”
Sidney’s pen was a blur as it raced across her notebook. I watched, fascinated, as she filled page after page. Finally she paused and looked up.
“Miss Yoder, tell me about your ALPO plan.”
“Ah yes, the one you neglected to sign on for. Well, it’s like this: For an extra fifty dollars a day, guests get the privilege of participating in the chores, much like they would if they lived with an Amish family. They get to muck out the barn, sweep the chicken house, gather eggs, clean toilets, make beds, etcetera. It’s really great fun.”
“I’ll have to take your word for it. Now I’d like to ask you about the bed linens. Why are they so cheap and rough?”
“Cheep is what baby chicks do. My linens may be inexpensive, but they also add to the Amish feel of this place. Besides, tossing about on the hundred-and-sixty-thread-count bottom sheet—and my mattresses encourage tossing—is an excellent way to exfoliate.”
“About the soap—”
“Isn’t that a clever idea? Not everyone would think of taking a bunch of slivers left over from used bars and smooshing them together to form new bars.”
She made a face. “But there are hairs stuck in them.”
“Yes, but the color matches your own. That’s why I had you state your hair color in your reservation. Personalized soap bars; what could be more welcoming than that?”
“It’s disgusting, as is the food.”
“What? Freni is capable of turning an old shoe into a culinary delight. She could call it Amish sole food. Get it?” I laughed pleasantly at my witticism.
“I fail to find that humorous. I took the liberty of speaking to your cook, and you wouldn’t believe what I learned—well, you would, but no one else will.”
“I’ll have you know she cut off the part that the mouse chewed, and scrubbed the rest. But it won’t happen again. Neither of us realized that mice are so fond of—”
“Stop, please! I don’t want to know. What I was about to say is that she cooks with lard.”
“Tut-tut, dear, you make that sound like an accusation.”
“Miss Yoder, these days the only people who cook with lard are—uh, well, they’re ethnic.”
“But she’s ethnic!”
“Which brings me to my next question. Why are you trying to pass yourself off as Amish, when I’ve seen you driving a car?”
I groaned inwardly, which, unfortunately, sometimes expresses itself vocally as well. “The brochure you were given upon check-in clarified that point. Since you either don’t recall what it said or, worse yet, didn’t bother to read it, I am Mennonite, and my cook is Amish. I am permitted to drive cars; she isn’t. I have electricity in my home; she doesn’t. I own a telephone; she doesn’t—although she is allowed to use one. There are many other differences, but what unites us is a common history of religious persecution in Europe, our belief that only consenting adults should be baptized, and our nonviolent approach to life.”
“Which explains the rats in your basement, right?”
“They are tiny little field mice, not rats, and my religion does not prevent me from killing them. It does, however, support the belief that human life is sacred, and that there is no justification for ending it. No death penalty, no assisted suicide, and above all, no war.”
“Isn’t that a little naive? What if there was a terrorist, wrapped in dynamite, about to walk into an Amish church and kill everyone in it, including little babies and sweet, defenseless old grandmothers. Wouldn’t shooting that one man, before he could blow himself up, save many lives?”
“I suppose the fact that most Amish don’t worship in churches, but in private homes, is not germane to the question?”
“Miss Yoder, you’re stalling. Is it right to sacrifice many lives by not taking just one?”
“Only God can take what He gave in the first place,” I said, quoting the official line. The truth is that, more and more, I am starting to see things from the other perspective. The Devil’s perspective, I’m sure. I certainly did not need a guest, an outsider, to add fuel to the fire of my confusion.
“You honestly think God values the life of a hate-filled man—one whose stated purpose is to destroy Christianity—more than He does the life of an innocent child? Maybe twenty innocent children, depending on the size of your church?”
“Get thee behind me, Satan,” I cried, and clapped my hands over both ears.
She jumped to her feet, jarring the table, which was set with gaily colored plastic tumblers I’ve collected from the Dairy Freeze in Bedford over the years. The water lapped dangerously close to the rims, threatening the charming feed-sack tablecloth I made one day last winter in a fever of creative activity. A neutral beige, the covering goes with most of my dinnerware, and the advertisement for Johnson’s Udder Rub, with a high concentration of lanolin, adds a sense of fun to any meal.
“Miss Yoder, did you just call me Satan?”
“Absolutely not, dear. I was merely implying that the Devil was using your lips to lead me from the straight and narrow path.”
“A straitjacket is more like it. I have half a mind to call the men in white coats to come take you away.”
“Half a mind is worse than no mind at all. Believe me; I know of which I speak. Amelia Cornbody—who grew up on this very road, just beyond yonder dip and rise—had only half a mind, which got her elected to the Senate, where she bought into the whole corruption thing, hook, line, and sinker. Now she lives in a multimillion-dollar house, cavorts with sinful playboys, and owns her own yacht. I’ve heard she even flies to Egypt on taxpayers’ money so she can play amateur archeologist. Meanwhile our school is overcrowded, the teachers grossly underpaid, and there are so many potholes in our roads that we’ve long since stopped naming them—except for the monster that opened up following last month’s gully-washer. We named it Amelia Cornbody Canyon in hopes that she’d come back to look at it, so we could pin her down on a few issues. Instead, she sent a brass plaque and asked the town council to erect a monument beside her hole. Anyway, none of this would have happened if she’d been too smart to run for public office.”
“Miss Yoder, are you a bleeding-heart liberal?”
“Moi?” I patted my bonnet-covered bun and tugged at my sturdy Christian bra. “Do I look like a liberal?”
“Well, I’ve heard all I’m going to hear. Miss Yoder, if you’d be so kind as to prepare my bill, I will meet you in the lobby in twenty minute
s.”
“You’re checking out?”
“Just as fast as possible.”
“But you haven’t eaten Freni’s delicious curry!”
“Dump it into Amelia Cornbody’s hole, for all I care.”
Those were the last words that Sidney from Vermont spoke to me. When I checked her room afterward, not only was there no sign of a tip, but one of the cute little burlap hand towels was missing. What’s more, she had even taken her personalized soap.
With no one but Freni and me to eat the curry—Alison, who hates the stuff, had a bowl of cereal in her room—there was oodles left. I packaged it up in an old Tupperware container (curry will stain anything) and delivered it semipersonally. That is to say, I set it on the welcome mat, rang the bell, and fled like a roach when the lights are turned on.
It had been an exceedingly long day, and all I wanted to do was to topple into my own bed and pull my thousand-count sheet and eiderdown comforter over my head. Nighty-night, sleep tight, and don’t let the bed bugs bite.
In fact, it had been such a stressful day that, when I did get home, I didn’t even brush my teeth before crawling into my den. The only other times I’ve neglected my chompers were the night my parents died, and the first night of my honeymoon, following my pseudo-wedding to Aaron Miller. To not brush felt almost like a sin and was every bit as pleasurable as one. To sin with Aaron Miller was…
I thought I’d been asleep about ten minutes when I felt someone poking me. “Not tonight,” I mumbled. “I didn’t brush my teeth.”
“Ya got that right.”
I struggled to retreat back into the world of Aaron Miller, as hurtful as he was, in order to avoid the present world, one that included his biological offspring, Alison. It wasn’t that I was choosing the adulterer over his daughter. I was choosing a simpler time. In that all-too-brief month in which I’d been deluded into experiencing heavy bliss, I’d felt utterly cared for. In today’s world I had a murder to solve, not to mention a broken heart, one that there was no hope of mending. Alas, the present has a way of trumping the past.
“Alison?”
“I ain’t gonna say that ’big as life’ crap, but it is me. How come y’are sleeping in? Ya sick, Mom?”
“No, just tired.”
“That’s cool. But hey, ya need ta give me my lunch money. The bus is almost here.”
“My purse is on the dresser, dear. Help yourself.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really.” I closed my eyes, so as not to wake beyond the point of no returning.
“Ya only got a twenty.”
“Take it.”
“Really?”
“Yes, dear. Now run along and catch that bus. Oh, and have a nice day.”
“Yeah, I’d say the same back at ya, excepting ya ain’t gonna have a very nice one, on account of that cute policeman is downstairs asking for ya. Hey, what’s the deal with him, anyway? One of the boys at school said he was gay—the cop, not him—but I say, no way, José, ’cause whenever he looks at me, he has lost written all over his face.”
I opened my peepers and peeped through a crack in my fortress. “Lost?”
“Yeah, ya know. Like the preacher’s always yapping at church, about lost being one of them big sins. I didn’t know what it was at first, so I asked Auntie Susannah, and she said it was like the hots.”
“The whats?”
“Ya know, like sex. Anyway, this cop’s got a bad case of that.”
“Oh, you mean lust!”
“Whatever.”
Fortunately for Alison, the bus driver, Miss Proschel, leaned on her horn. When she was gone I said my morning prayers, after which I took a spit bath and dressed for the day. Because my first stop was going to be the home of Hernia’s horniest bachelor, I put on my sturdiest Christian underwear. One has to search high and low, and pay a king’s ransom, for a brassiere with six hooks, and panties that come with a padlock, but trust me, there are times when they are well worth the cost and effort. Only a jewel thief with exceptionally nimble fingers could crack my code.
28
Doc Shafor lives on the other side of Hernia, in the shadow of Stucky Ridge, with a great view of Lovers’ Leap. When I slowed to turn into his long drive, and saw him and his faithful hound, Old Blue, coming my way, I wasn’t the least bit surprised. I lowered my window.
“Don’t tell me,” I said, “let me guess. Old Blue smelled me coming before I even left home, and after you prepared a delicious breakfast for me of ham and eggs and batter biscuits, the two of you have come to meet me.”
The old geezer grinned. “Wrong. Old Blue smelled you coming yesterday, which gave me time to get up at five this morning and bake you a batch of yeast biscuits. Whipped up some honey butter for you as well.”
“Will there be hot chocolate?”
“Do you think I’m an idiot? Of course there will.”
“Then hop in, dears.” Since both are a mite incontinent, you can see how much I adore the two of them.
We drove in amiable silence and, likewise, said little during the meal. Doc takes eating seriously, and given that he can cook circles around Freni, who is a great cook in her own right, I am serious when I eat his meals.
It wasn’t until I’d drained my second cup of cocoa, and he his third of coffee, that we got down to business. “So, Magdalena, is my hunch right? Have you finally come to seduce me?”
I shook my head. “I keep telling you, Doc, I prefer older men.”
“Older than eighty-two?”
“Much older than that. Try again when you reach a hundred.”
“I’m going to hold you to that.”
“I’ll look forward to it.”
“Well, then, if it isn’t this fabulous gnarled body you’re after, why the long trek out here? You break up with your New York studmuffin again?”
“It’s for good this time, Doc.”
“You always say that. A month from now you’ll be sitting in that very chair telling me what a hottie he is.”
“That’s the second time this morning I’ve heard that word used in a vulgar way. How did you get to be so hip, Doc?”
“Which word is that?”
“Hot.”
Doc leaned back in his chair and laughed. “Oh boy, if that’s vulgar, then I better start training you a long time before Willard Scott wishes me happy birthday.”
“Just so you know, I’m wearing my ultra-Christian underwear.”
He laughed again.
“I’m serious.”
“I know you are. That’s what makes it so fun—Oops, I’ve offended you, haven’t I?”
I fought back the tears. “I’m fine. No, I’m not. But it doesn’t have anything to do with your teasing. Like I said, this time it really is over. With Gabe, I mean.”
“Too much Ida? That, I understand. The time you sent us on that trip—”
“It’s not Ida. I actually kind of like her. You and her—well, there’s not many other people I can verbally spar with. Not equals, at any rate. No, it’s the faith card.”
Doc straightened. “He doesn’t believe your way?”
“It’s not my way; it’s the only way.”
“And you think he’s going to burn in Hell forever and ever.”
“What I think doesn’t matter. But yes, it’s what the Bible says.”
“Sorry, but I can’t help you with this one. I stopped believing in a punishing God the day my Belinda died.”
“God punishes us only because we sin.”
“Save your words, Magdalena. I don’t need to hear about a gift of salvation through the death of Jesus, because if we don’t choose the gift, then bam, we’re doomed. What kind of free will is that?”
“Doc, have you become a Democrat?”
“You’re kidding, right?”
I shrugged. I didn’t know if I was kidding or not. I was as mixed up as a Jell-O fruit salad; that’s all I really knew. That, and the fact that I hadn’t really come to talk about Gabe
.
“I’m switching subjects completely, Doc.”
“Always a woman’s prerogative, but thanks for the warning.”
“As I’m sure you’ve heard, via Hernia’s stupendous grapevine, I’m doing some investigating into the death of Cornelius Weaver, our town’s second most notorious bachelor.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment. And yes, I’ve heard. He supposedly died of a heart attack, but there was a high dose of Elavil in his blood, right?”
I stared at him. “How did you know about the Elavil?”
“I have my sources. And yes, I know, they’re not real, but then again, at my age I have some man-made parts as well.”
“That Priscilla Livingood sure gets around.”
“She’s just living up to her name. But she’s really a nice woman, Magdalena. I think you’d like her.”
“I do.”
“So, who are your other suspects?”
“Well, Alice Troyer, for one.”
“Ah yes, one of this tiny burg’s many claims to fame. A professional Mennonite comedienne. Won’t wonders ever cease?”
“She’s no longer a Mennonite—at least I think she’s not. Anyway, we didn’t talk about religion; we talked about the fact that Cornelius led her to believe she was the one he intended to marry. They even went ring shopping in Pittsburgh.”
“Let me guess—the ring had to be sized before she could wear it.”
“How did you know?”
“Oldest trick in the book. Hook them with promises, bed them, and then shove them out the door.”
“Doc!”
He chuckled. “Not me, Magdalena. I don’t promise them anything—except for a good time.”
I blushed to the tips of my stocking-clad toes. “Spare me further details. Like I was about to say, Alice Troyer is livid. But still, she pointed the finger at Caroline Sha.”
“Now there’s a looker!”
“Excuse me?”
“The fact that she’s bald only emphasizes her perfect features. Great body too.”
“Yes, but you said ‘there’s a looker,’ as if I wasn’t even in that category. So what am I, Doc, chopped liver?”