Serendipity

by Cathy Marie Hake

Over rabbit pie that night, he asked for the Lord to send rain soon. All the hard work in the world and a miraculous jump in the price for grains wouldn’t matter if the crops withered for want of water.

  The next morning, Maggie said the blessing and thanked God for the dew on the ground. The woman was a cockeyed optimist if she believed it would make any difference. Todd didn’t tell her so. Faith the size of a mustard seed – that’s what the Bible said it took for a miracle. No use crushing the very innocence that might move this mountain.

  But if she were innocent in that aspect, she certainly bore a pack of guilt when it came to her conduct. Folks continued to stop by, and whether they came to be sociable or to trade didn’t matter to Maggie. She treated each visit like a business opportunity. When asked what they needed, folks answered – but Todd felt it was out of politeness, not because they wanted to confess money was tight and they couldn’t much afford anything extra. Knowing the state of their own finances, Maggie hadn’t asked him for a thing. But now she was dealing with neighbors, plainly saying what she wanted or needed and procuring things he ought to have supplied.

  His wife might as well wear his pants.

  When Jakob and Hope Stauffer came late in the afternoon, it didn’t take long for Maggie to snoop into what they might want. At least she deferred to him when it came to arranging for Adam and the Stauffers’ mare to share time in a paddock. Jakob traded his second milk cow for several tools. They would return the calf when it was ready to be fattened, but receive half of the meat. Jakob frowned. “This is not fair. We still will owe you.”

  “Twaddle! Tryin’ to cook without milk or butter’s been a mite wearing.” Magpie flashed a smile. “I’ll be in a much better mood, so mayhap Todd will owe you his sanity, too.”

  Gritting his teeth, Todd let out an obligatory chuckle. He’d failed to supply one of the most basic necessities – a milk cow. And his wife’s bartering just got them one and put meat on the table. It was one thing for her to grow their food; another issue entirely when her haggling made them look like beggars.

  “I’ll go on home with them and bring back the bossy and her calf.”

  His wife frowned at him. “Todd Valmer, you’re spoiling things.”

  Maggie twined her arm around Hope’s. “We’re asking the Stauffers to supper. Jakob can go home and round up his sister, Annie, and her husband, Phineas, and little Emmy-Lou whilst Hope and I visit over the stove.”

  “I do not think we need a bossy. My wife is giving orders enough to – ”

  “Pay no mind to him,” Maggie interrupted, thoroughly embarrassed by what he’d said. Surely he couldn’t have meant it the way it sounded.

  Hope’s laughter filled the air. “Just the other day, Jakob told me I’m off my feed! That’s what we get for marrying up with farmers.”

  It wasn’t long before everyone from Stauffer Farm arrived with the cow and calf in tow. Hope showed Maggie how to bake biscuits in a Dutch oven by an open fire. Maggie brewed coffee and made succotash out there, too. With that well underway, giggles filled the cabin as they cut up the meat, breaded, and fried it. Legs, thighs, and breasts formed a gigantic mountain on Maggie’s largest platter. Excitement surged through her. She’d already planned a nice supper, and this would be their first time having another family as guests.

  “Look here!” Todd brought in a leaf for the table. “We’ll all be able to eat together.”

  “And why wouldn’t we?” Maggie asked as she helped him slip it into place.

  “The table would be too crowded.”

  Hope leaned into her and whispered, “German farmers – well, not just German, but especially them, when it’s harvest or when it is crowded, the men eat first. Then the women come second.”

  The thought appalled Maggie. Back home, a man gave his seat to a lady. They’d never do anything so rude. She muttered, “The way they eat? It’s a wonder and a marvel the women have strength enough to set the table, let alone cook!”

  Emmy-Lou slid the flowers she brought into a canning jar, and Annie let Ma hold her baby boy so she could set the table. By leaving the door open and scooting the table over, Todd sat on a chair straddling the threshold and they all crunched together at the table. Heart overflowing, Maggie declared, “I’m afraid to close my eyes for prayer, because when I open them, everything and everyone will be gone!”

  “Not everyone,” Ma said, “but most of the food would be missing.”

  Ma? Ma had a sense of humor? Maggie tried not to gape. As soon as the prayer ended, a flurry of activity began.

  Sitting on her mama’s lap, Emmy-Lou sniffed appreciatively. “Do I get the wing?”

  “Have a leg. Here you go.” Hope served them and passed the platter.

  Ma decided, “You can give me the wing.”

  “A leg will be easy to eat.” Maggie stuck a fork in a juicy piece. “Here you are.”

  “I said I’d take a wing.”

  “The leg is handy, Ma.” Todd reached over and steadied the platter.

  Emmy-Lou got the giggles. “That’s funny. Legs being handy.”

  Everyone set to eating, and Ma made short work of her piece. “This tastes like my recipe.”

  “Delicious,” Jakob declared, helping himself to his third piece.

  Busy holding her baby, Johnny, Annie leaned over and took a bite Phineas held out. “Mmm.” The graveyard of bones on Phineas’s plate declared he agreed.

  Todd lost his sour look and actually winked at her! This was her first time truly entertaining, and Todd kept the conversation lively. He even fetched the coffeepot! Working together – they did that well, whether at work or play.

  “It’s yummy.” Emmy-Lou’s face lit up. “Who gets the gizzard?”

  “There aren’t any,” Maggie nudged the jam toward her husband.

  “Hope!” Phineas teased. “Did you sneak the gizzards?”

  “Of course she didn’t. The doctor told her to eat liver.” Jakob’s chest swelled. “For the baby.”

  Pink rushed to Hope’s cheeks. “Well, you just let the chicken out of the bag!”

  “It’s not chicken. It’s cat,” Ma corrected.

  Hope looked puzzled. “Ain’t cat, neither. It’s whistle pig. Didn’t all y’all notice all the legs and no wings?”

  “Are you feeling okay?” Maggie asked her new friend, giddy about the happy news of a baby. Ma started choking, and Maggie patted her on the back and kept talking to Hope. “You look chipper as a – ”

  “Whistle pig?” Todd dropped the picked-clean bone onto his plate to join the pile already there. His voice sounded a little strange. “What is whistle pig?”

  “My daddy called ’em woodchucks.” Maggie held a water glass to Ma’s mouth.

  “I mostly hear them called groundhog,” Jakob added as he helped himself to another biscuit. “Good eating.”

  Not wanting Ma to feel left out of the praise, Maggie said, “Since it tastes like your recipe, Ma, we’ll have to compare – ”

  Ma started moaning. “I don’t feel so good. I need to lie down.”

  “Her tummy’s full because she ate lots,” Emmy-Lou said. “I do that sometimes, too.”

  Phineas snickered behind his napkin.

  Todd repeated, “Groundhog.”

  “Not many people fix it up so juicy and tender.” Hope wiped her little girl’s fingers. “Your bride did quite a job of it.”

  “She sure did.” Todd’s agreement sounded less than sincere.

  “Maggie,” Annie handed the baby to Phineas. “I’ll help you get Mrs. Crewel to bed. All of a sudden, she’s looking poorly.”

  Understanding that Ma was frail, the guests took their leave quickly. Good thing, too. Ma got sick to her stomach. Maggie cleaned her up and tucked her in. Most men didn’t handle sickness well, so she figured Todd hiked off to the barn for a while. Dishes washed and put back on the shelf, the table scrubbed, and a bit of rose lotion on her hands, Maggie stepped outside for some fresh air.

  Her husband sat
on the ground, leaning against the cabin. “The night we arrived in Carver’s Holler, one of your uncles told me. But I didn’t understand.”

  Stooping down, Maggie worried, “What? What’s wrong?”

  “He said you could fix anything and make it taste good.”

  Relief flooded her. She plopped down beside him. “You don’t have to thank me, Todd.”

  “Thank you? Thank you?” he roared. “You fed our guests groundhog!”

  She let out a big sigh. “From the way you gobbled it up, I reckoned it was one of your favorites. You don’t have to worry that we’ll run out. I already have a couple more soaking in brine.” Snuggling up against him, she added, “Cooking with Hope was a lot of fun. We traded a few recipes.”

  Todd poked at the bowl the next day and gave Maggie a suspicious look. “Grits?”

  “Aye. What with us having a cow now, there’ll be butter tomorrow.”

  “Hmmpf.” It looked safe enough. Tasted okay, too – but so had the whistle pig. Maggie had fed them vermin. God bless Jakob and Phineas, they were true friends for not hurting his Maggie’s feelings and spitting out what they’d had in their mouths.

  Todd might have thought it was a joke, but Hope Stauffer didn’t have a drop of guile or ability to put up a pretense. She’d cooked right alongside his wife, making it seem like everyone ate . . . it. He’d had nightmares about what Maggie would make next.

  “Baked some prune bread, special just for Ma.”

  Normally, he’d laugh. Ma hated prune bread, too – but this was no time to mention that. Last night he hadn’t had the words to explain the error of Maggie’s ways. But he needed to set her straight.

  Still looking peaked, Ma asked him to put her back to bed. She whispered, “We’ll take turns asking. My new policy is ‘Look before you leap and ask before you eat.’ ”

  “What about, ‘What you don’t know can’t hurt you’?”

  “What you eat can,” Ma fired back.

  Maggie’s shadow fell over the bed. “Is there a problem?”

  Todd grimaced, but Ma hopped right in. “Your cooking. What possessed you to cook hedgehog?”

  “I didn’t. Hedgehogs don’t live in America. Porkypines do, though. Haven’t ever cooked one, but I hear it’s mighty toothsome. Mayhap I can trade for some. Or even armadillo.”

  Immediately, Todd ruled out those dishes. “Armadillo shell is too troublesome and porcupine has nasty quills.”

  “Nothing’s too good for my family.” Maggie swished her hand in the air. “Don’t trouble yourself over the work. One meat’s about as easy to cook as the other.”

  “But,” Ma coughed, “they are not as easy to eat.”

  “Ma,” Maggie stroked her cheek. “Chopping it up for you is no bother. I’m proud of your good appetite.”

  “My appetite suddenly plunged.”

  “We’ve got a few days to perk you up. Remember – on Sunday we’re a-going to eat at Parson and Mrs. Bradle’s!”

  “By Sunday afternoon I’ll be ravenous.” Ma glowered at Maggie. “Mrs. Bradle serves decent food. You shamed us all last night.”

  “Shamed!” His wife looked every bit as astonished and hurt as she sounded. “You said supper was good – just like your own recipe!”

  “People don’t eat rodents.” Todd tried to keep his voice soothing, yet firm.

  “Squirrel! Squirrel’s fine eating and they’re rodents, too. God provides a bounty – possum, beaver, frog legs . . . Waste not, want not.”

  “I don’t want any of that,” Ma stated baldly.

  “Then why did you have a recipe? We thank God for our daily bread – ”

  Grabbing that lifeline, Todd declared, “Bread sounds great!”

  Fierce as any badger she’d refuse to eat, Ma stood her ground. “I thought it was chicken.”

  “Then what’s a-wrong? If you can’t tell the difference, then there’s no reason to fuss. Our neighbors knew what they were tucking away, and – ”

  “Good manners,” Todd explained.

  “Hogwash!” Maggie’s confusion had slid into frustration – but temper now fired that exclamation. “Hope said she and Annie just baked them up a tasty whistle-pig casserole.”

  “Low-class, white trash – ”

  “Silence!” He grabbed Maggie as she recoiled from Ma’s ugly words. “Forgive Ma. She’s still sickly and spoke too harshly.”

  Precisely, carefully, Maggie twisted her hand and released herself. Her voice shook. “About the food I cook? Or about how she’d attacked our neighbors’ dignity? Or just about how she’s demeaning me? Because I want to know exactly what harshness I’m to overlook.

  “And you, Husband. You believe good manners led my sweet friend to cook alongside me and her family to eat with gusto when they could have just nibbled?” Aching hurt tainted her voice. “You’ve condemned me for having no manners – or bad ones.”

  “Don’t put words in my mouth!”

  “She doesn’t have to. She already filled your mouth with – ”

  Todd bit out, “Ma! That’s enough!”

  “No, it wasn’t. It was just right.” Maggie gave him a brittle smile. Her skin was normally fair as could be, but it had gone stark white. Her eyes darkened to indigo, and tears sheened them. “A woman deserves to know where she stands. I’ve just been soundly put in my place.”

  “Your place is beside me, as my wife.” He thought to reach for her hand, but she’d crossed her arms and was hugging herself. The best thing he could think of was to move and stand by her and slide his arm about her shoulders. “This is simply a misunderstanding. Our ways of living are different. You are a barterer. You know it is possible to come to an agreement.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. I don’t barter when there’s no respect.” Leaning away from him, she oh so carefully unlaced Ma’s boots and removed them. Then she rolled up a towel and tucked it beside Ma’s hip and thigh so her weak leg wouldn’t rotate out and make her ache. Maggie pulled up a quilt, set the bell within Ma’s reach, and wordlessly slid the breakfast dishes into the washtub.

  “Yesterday was Proverbs nine. ‘She has killed her beasts and mingled her wine, she hath also furnished her table.’ And that’s what I did.” She left the cabin and shut the door very quietly behind herself.

  “She cannot pick and choose verses. The same chapter says “ ‘A foolish woman is clamorous: she is simple and knows nothing.’ Ach! What a disgrace that girl is!”

  Looking at his mother, Todd’s heart sank even further – if that were possible. “Margaret is knowledgeable and she followed the Word. She was not clamorous. The disgrace is not on her. My wife deserves respect, not insults. This will not happen again.”

  “I’m not eating hedgehog again, either!”

  “Groundhog, Ma. And if my wife fixes it, we will eat it,” There. That settled the issue – or at least a very small part of it. He still had to deal with Margaret.

  “You’ll still read the Bible to me.” Ma sounded tearful. “Just as your father did. Ja? That will not change, too, will it?”

  For a second, he paused. When upset, Maggie seemed to like a little time alone. He owed her that, and there was no better place to go for guidance than the Bible. He lifted the black leather book. “ ‘Hatred stirreth up strifes; but love covereth all sins.’ ” He paused for that verse to sink in, then continued. The last verse hit hard. “ ‘The lips of the righteous know what is acceptable; but the mouth of the wicked speaketh forwardness.’ ”

  “See! It is our duty to tell her what is acceptable.” Ma snuggled down.

  “Acceptable by whose measure? Everyone else liked it. You speak of shame – but the shame was our ingratitude and your contempt. Asking her to forgive you because you are still weak – it was wrong of me. Your body is afflicted, but your mind is sharp. Ja, and your tongue is sharper still.”

  Ma snorted. “Sharp tongue? She bosses me and prods and nags. The way you twist a pretzel – that is what she does to me. This way and that.�
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  Livid, Todd grabbed her footboard. “All for your welfare. She cares for you, and you complain. You embarrassed yourself and me, calling her a vile name and complaining. There will be no hatred or stirring up strife.” He paused before speaking slowly and precisely. “It will not happen again.”

  Todd strode outside, determined to set matters straight. Maggie wasn’t in the garden. He walked into the barn. Something dropped down on him, and everything went dark.

  Sixteen

  Maggie froze at the deep bellow. She hadn’t known Todd was below. Peeping over the edge of the loft, she spied Todd’s arms windmilling as he fought his way free of the quilts she’d dropped. He tilted his head back and spotted her. He looked hostile as a bull in midcharge.

  “I’d apologize, but I don’t have any manners.” The second the words left her mouth, she jerked back out of sight. It would be wrong to laugh. But she did, and she made no attempt to muffle her reaction. Either she’d laugh or she’d weep, and Todd Valmer wasn’t going to see her cry. Nay, he’d not. She’d kept her tears from falling while in the house, and that counted as a miracle. Only now she’d had a few moments to think matters through, and anger replaced the hurt. Resilience. Uncle Bo taught her well.

  “It tasted good, Margaret.” Todd’s deep voice carried to her. “The groundhog. I’ll eat it again, and so will Ma.”

  Todd expected her to come down the ladder. Maggie could hear him waiting beside it. But he’d miscalculated. Arms stuck out to balance herself, she walked almost all the way across a beam. As the space narrowed, she sat and straddled the beam, scoot-hopped another couple of yards, and bit her lip.

  “Margaret, come on down.” The coaxing tone of his voice brought back memories she quelled at once.

  Adam shuffled below. From the way he snuffled, he smelled her, and that gave her a burst of confidence. Maggie held the beam and slid her leg over, then barely kept from losing her grip as her body swung with the force of a wild pendulum. Pointing her toes to add a few more inches’ reach, she searched in vain for Adam’s form beneath her. Though not afraid of heights, Maggie didn’t want to look down. She kept craning her neck, trying to see the base of the loft’s ladder.