by Tamar Myers
“Hoo-ha!” she hooted. She flapped about noisily in her glee. “So you’re not the big shot you think you are, are you? No, of course not! You’re just a two-bit bed-and- breakfast owner who’s gotten too big for her britches. Now, get out of my store before I give them all a chance to see nothing again.”
I would have pondered longer what to do, but one of the pails had given me a pounding headache. I cannot be blamed, then, for appearing to leave at Elspeth’s request. Needless to say, Miller’s Feed Store would never have my business again. Neither would Freni or Mose ever darken that doorway, not if I could help it. Even if I had to drive all the way to Somerset to buy a bag of seed potatoes next spring, I determined never to let one more coin of mine clank into that cursed coffer.
I had just stepped outside into the warm, welcoming sunshine, when I nearly tripped again. This time it was not a pile of pails that impeded my progress, but my milk-livered cousin himself, Roy Miller.
“Pssst, Magdalena.”
I caught my balance by clutching at the corner of a buggy parked too near the door. It must have been an old buggy, because a swatch of heavy black canvas tore off in my hand. Hopefully the buggy belonged to Jacob Beiler. I dropped the swatch and caught my breath. “‘Pssst’ is something they say in books, Roy, not something real live folks say to one another.”
“Pssst,” he said again. He crooked and flexed his index finger several times, and then just as dramatically slipped out of sight around the side of the store.
Foolishly, I followed him. Roy Miller might not be able to stand up to his diminutive wife, but that didn’t preclude any dangerous dementia on his part. He was, after all, my blood kin. Anyway, it was a bright, sunny day, and the birds in the overhead maples were singing their little heads off. Since we all have to check out sometime, it may as well be under these conditions.
I need not have worried. Roy only wanted to talk. “You won’t sue us, will you, Magdalena?”
“I suppose not this time,” I said reluctantly. I wasn’t sure if one had to have witnesses to sue, and even if not, it really wasn’t the Christian thing to do. My branch of the faith exhorts me to turn the other cheek when I am accosted.
Roy breathed a deep sigh of relief. “I’m awfully sorry about the fall you took. Really I am. If—”
“It wasn’t a fall, Roy. I was pushed.”
He blinked nervously. “Yeah, well, what I really wanted to say is that the other day there was a man from that movie company looking at the pitchforks, and it must have been him who turned that fork around. I’ve been meaning to hang it back right, but I just haven’t had time.”
If I had kept my mouth open any longer, Sophie Shrock’s bees could have built their hive inside it. “What man? What was his name?” I asked as soon as I regained the use of my most valuable asset.
“Don’t remember exactly,” said Roy, brightening, “but I think it had something to do with insects.”
Melvin Stoltzfus flitted through my mind, but surely Melvin had no idea I thought of him as a praying mantis. “You mean like a bug? That kind of insect?”
“That’s it! Bug Somebody. You know him? Is he famous?”
I hate it when I snort derisively. It is so unflattering, given my rather long teeth. “More like infamous, I’d say. And don’t get your knickers in a knot, Roy, he is not an actor. Rumor has it he might have Mafia connections. Of course all this is hush-hush. You understand?”
Roy nodded happily. Spreading rumors was one thing he undoubtedly did better than his wife.
“Tell me, Roy, was Bugsy looking at the pitchfork before or after Don Manley was murdered?”
Roy’s usually placid face contorted with concentration. “Well, let’s see. I think it was just after Mabel Ediger bought the fifty-pound bag of pickling salt. Or was it paraffin? Yes, it had to be the paraffin, because Mabel didn’t put in cucumbers this year.”
“Praise God,” I said in all sincerity. Mabel’s homemade pickles would make a pig pucker, and she not only serves them at all the church suppers, but insists that everyone have a helping or two.
“And it was just before Martha Sims bought—”
“Was it before or after the murder, Roy?” I didn’t really raise my voice that loud. It was mere coincidence that the birds stopped singing.
“Uh—uh, before, I think.”
“Thanks, Roy.”
I walked briskly to my car. I do not run in public. Just before I slammed the door, I could hear those foolish birds start singing again.
I found Steven in the barn, busily blocking out the morning’s first scene. He was not at all happy to be interrogated. I’m sure he would have refused altogether, but I threatened to write his mother a detailed account of what Susannah had told me he’d done the night before in Bedford. Of course, I hadn’t seen my sleepy-headed sister that morning, but with the Hollywood crowd, that sort of threat is a sure bet.
“This better be good,” Steven snapped.
“I’ll say, buster. You want to tell me just what in the world you were doing in Miller’s Feed Store the other day?”
Bugsy brushed a fly from his cheek. “Buying a damn pitchfork, what else?”
I must confess to being a bit taken aback by Bugsy’s honesty. I had expected him to deny even being there. “You mean you confess to everything? Just like that?”
“Confess to what?” Steven snarled.
“Everything!”
Steven squinted at me. It was clear he realized what I knew. “Okay, okay, I confess to everything. I did have them put the damn pitchfork on your account, but only because I had left my wallet back at the motel in Bedford.”
“That’s it? That’s everything?”
Bugsy blushed. “You’ll have to ask your sister if you want details. The bridle and reins were her idea.”
I struggled to block out what Steven, alias Bugsy, had implied. It should have been Susannah my parents named Magdalena, not me. “You mean you really did buy a pitchfork for the movie?”
Steven smirked. “Bingo.”
“So, I guess you bought this pitchfork after Don’s murder?”
Bugsy bellowed something that isn’t fit to print, and stalked rudely away. I decided to grill Susannah and write his mother after all.
Chapter Twenty-four
My first scene of the day wasn’t scheduled until after lunch, and it was far too beautiful a day to spend the morning hanging around the set. Narrowly escaping the treacherous tines of a pitchfork is a tonic I can heartily recommend. Cheating the jaws of death had filled me with a strange elation. Therefore, I decided to take a walk. If that sounds indolent to some, so be it. I alone will have to answer to my Maker—and Mama—when I cross that Great Divide.
After lunch, there would be plenty of opportunity to put my nose back to the grindstone. In the meantime I just wanted to be me. To walk across Hertlzer Lane, climb Aaron Miller’s fence, and pick my barefoot way quite carefully through his cow pasture to the bank of his pond. Then I planned to dangle my feet and gaze up at yet another cloudless August sky.
I stopped at the house to shed my shoes and grab a banana.
“The kitchen is closed,” Freni said crossly. “I can’t for the life of me figure out this recipe I plan to make Arthur for lunch. Who ever heard of such a thing as a beef salad?”
‘‘Speaking of lunch, I may skip it. I’m going to walk over to Aaron’s pond. Care to join me?” It was a safe question. Freni walked to work from her farm every day. The last thing Freni wanted to do was to walk for fun.
Freni scowled and shook her finger at me, but it was all for show. “Don’t eat the banana till you get there. Your body can’t digest food while it’s walking, Magdalena. You’re either going to end up constipated, or with heartburn.”
“I’ll take the constipation. Unless you want it again.”
I waved at Mose, who was leading Bertha out of the milk shed. He waved me over.
“Magdalena, I’m afraid I have some bad news.” For Mose, th
at was beating around the bush.
‘‘Is Bertha sick?”
“Ach, no, she’s fine. This is about that new pitchfork Mr. Freeman bought. He said I could use it when he wasn’t filming. Now I can’t find it.”
My good mood could not be shaken. “I’m sure it will show up, Mose. Keep looking,” I suggested kindly.
Mose grumbled something about Steven blaming him for the missing pitchfork, but I didn’t stay to listen. The beauty of the morning was calling me.
I sang to myself as I climbed Aaron Miller’s fence and traipsed across his field. Partly I sang out of joy, and partly to keep his cows at bay. Cows are curious creatures. They’ll investigate anything unusual as long as they aren’t intimidated by it. A barefoot woman in a blue dress is certainly worthy of investigation. Although normally quite docile, cows can do a lot of unintentional damage. An eight-hundred-pound cow accidentally stepping on my bare foot is not my idea of a good time. By singing I hoped to intimidate the cows just enough to keep them out of stepping range. Not that I’m such a bad singer, mind you, even though there was that anonymous petition passed around our church asking me to resign from the choir. That was before the reverend’s wife lost her panties.
The cows left me alone, and I didn’t step in any of their pies, so I was still in a good mood when I reached the pond. In my opinion, Miller’s Pond deserves to be called a small lake, but no matter what you call it, it is just plain beautiful. I sat on the soft grass near the bank, and leaned back against a young pin oak with the morning sun, which was shining from across the pond, full in my face. I closed my eyes and soon slipped into a blissful state halfway between sleep and waking. So far it could not have been a more perfect day.
“Perfect day,” someone said. Probably the beginning of a dream.
“You can say that again,” I agreed heartily.
“Perfect day.”
I opened my eyes, and then felt them with my hands to make sure I really was awake. As far as I could tell, I was. I could feel the rough bark of the pin oak against my back. I could feel the grass between my toes. I could see the sunlight dancing off the pond in front of me, and I could even hear the cows grazing somewhere to the left.
Having concluded that I was indeed awake, I gave myself a quick mental test to see if I was crazy. I passed it— with flying colors I might add—which meant I had to think of another explanation. Perhaps it had been God speaking to me. Such things happen, you know. If you doubt me, just read the story of Samuel in the Bible.
“Yes?” I asked tentatively.
“Yes, what?” Frankly, it didn’t sound like God. This disembodied voice sounded a couple of thousand years younger than God, and a bit sexy to boot. God, I know, doesn’t sound sexy.
“Yes, what is it you want? And who are you?”
“Ah, it’s time for introductions, is it?” At that, the voice took shape by swinging down from the tree.
I hate to admit it, but I screamed. After all, wasn’t that a serpent up in the tree who spoke to Eve in the Garden of Eden?
“Sorry about that,” said the voice. It was by now wearing a drop-dead-handsome man’s body. I know such things are subjective, but this body was about six foot two, lean but not skinny, and was topped with a strong-jawed head that sported two intensely blue eyes and a lot of very dark, almost black, curly hair. Who’s going to argue with that?
I’m only slow, not impossible. By this time my brain had completed its processing and come up with the conclusion that this was a real live, flesh and blood man who deserved a real live, flesh and blood response. I gave him one that would have made all my pacifist ancestors disown me.
“Damn!” he said as he cautiously moved his arm away from his face. “You pack quite a punch there.”
“That’s what you deserve for sneaking up on me like that.”
He laughed easily. “I didn’t sneak up on you. I was already in the tree when you sat down.”
“Well, you should have said something!”
“I think I did. That’s why I frightened you.”
If I weren’t a pacifist, I would have punched him again.
“I wasn’t frightened, only startled. And you should have said something immediately!”
“And that wouldn’t have frightened you more?”
“Just go away and leave me alone,” I said quite reasonably. “You’re spoiling my quiet time.”
“Ah, but I was here first, remember?”
I tried a new tactic. “Look, buster, if you don’t beat it, I’ll sic the owner on you.” Fat chance of doing that. Unlike me, Aaron Miller was a Mennonite who lived by his pacifist faith. He was also about seventy-eight years old, and had been bedridden ever since slipping on the ice back in March.
The handsome but loutish oaf in front of me had the temerity to grin. “So sic him,” he said mockingly.
I faked it as best I could. “Aaron!” I called through cupped hands. “Aaron, you have a trespasser!” The Miller farmhouse wasn’t even in sight, and I doubt my voice carried even halfway across the pond, but still, my ruse should have worked. I know I always get scared and run when I’m challenged. In a manner of speaking, that is.
“You called?” The grin had become a smile that displayed obscenely white teeth.
That did it. That made me madder than a wet hen. Even madder than a plucked goose. I lunged at the interloper, hoping to catch him off guard and push him into the pond. Unfortunately, he had great reflexes and sidestepped me as neatly as a matador does a bull. The result was that I ended up in the pond instead. When I finally quit sputtering, I shouted something shamefully wicked at him. Mercifully, I have since erased the exact words from my memory.
Rude and Handsome only laughed.
“You think that’s so funny, do you?” I screamed. “Well, come on down here and fight like a man, then!”
He came down to the edge of the pond, but only to offer an extended hand. “Here. Better get out of there. When I was a kid I stocked this pond with Mississippi River catfish. They get to be eight feet long sometimes, and have been known to nibble on fishermen. They’re especially fond of bare toes.”
I dug my toes safely down into the mud. “Who are you?”
The blue eyes danced, or maybe it was the sunlight reflecting off of the pond. “I’m Aaron. Aaron Miller, Jr. My pop owns this place. Now, who are you?”
“That’s for me to know and you to find out.”
Rude and Handsome laughed again. “I intend to find out. You know, in some places trespassers are shot.”
“But I’m not a trespasser. I live—” My jaws clamped shut with more force than those of a Mississippi catfish. I couldn’t believe how stupid I had almost been.
“Well, you do look familiar.” He paused and stroked that sinfully handsome chin of his. “You wouldn’t happen to be Susannah Yoder, from across the road?”
“That slut?” I shook my head in bewilderment. Anger and flattery are harder to mix than vinegar and water. Either those blue eyes were blind, or I was being toyed with. Susannah is ten years younger than I, and frankly, she looks it. Of course, Susannah spends a fortune on beauty routines, whereas the only mud pack I had ever worn, I was wearing right then.
“Susannah had a sister,” he said, pretending to be thoughtful. “Now, what was her name. Matilda?”
“It was Jennifer,” I said. “And she died. About four years ago, visiting her cousin in Nebraska. Got caught in a combine while helping with the wheat harvest. The combine sucked her in and she was never seen again. That is, until that woman up in Michigan found parts of her in a cereal box.”
I must admit that young Aaron Miller had a sense of humor. His laugh was actually quite pleasant once it was directed at something I said, rather than at me.
“I’m glad you find that so funny,” I said, trying to sound as angry as I could. “It just so happens that Jennifer Yoder was my very best friend. And anyway, I don’t think you are Aaron Miller, Jr. Little Aaron left Hernia after high school
graduation, and was never seen again. I think he joined the army and was sent to Vietnam. It broke his father’s heart to have him join up like that. Being a Mennonite, he could have gotten a deferment on religious grounds, but he didn’t even try.”
That face was just as handsome serious as it was smiling. “You’re right. It did break Pop’s heart. But that was then, and this is now. Fortunately Little Aaron is not the same person now that he was then. And I suppose that Jennifer has changed some too.” There was an annoying hint of query to his voice.
“I am not Jennifer,” I snapped. It was, after all, an honest response. “Anyway, I better get going. I have to get to work.” I sloshed out of the pond, all ten toes still intact.
“Just what kind of work do you do?”
“I’m an actress,” I blurted out stupidly. I mean, how dumb can you get? Hernia is not Hollywood. The only acting game in town was one pasture away. It wouldn’t take Sherlock Holmes to track me down. Even Watson could then figure out that I really was Jennifer, so to speak, and that I hadn’t ended up on a breakfast table after all. I suppose this shouldn’t have mattered so much, but I didn’t want Little Aaron, who was now anything but, to formally make my re-acquaintance until I’d had time to wash the mud off my face. A lot of time.
“Well, see you around,” said Aaron. He didn’t sound like he cared one way or another.
“I doubt that. I’ll be much too busy working to come back here,” I said nonchalantly.
“All right, then. Bye.”
I don’t tolerate indifferent dismissals. When I was still in my twenties, when Mama and Papa were still alive, and the PennDutch not even a gleam in my eye, I once worked as a secretary in Bedford. Unfortunately I caught my boss, Mr. Oberlin, in a compromising position with Annette, another secretary. Thereafter Mr. Oberlin refused to speak to either Annette or me unless it was about official business. We may as well have been voice-activated office machines. But I didn’t take it lying down like Annette did. I fixed his wagon good. I dissolved four of those chocolate-flavored laxative bars in his cup of hot chocolate an hour before a very important business meeting.