by Tamar Myers
If Doc was any the wiser, he didn’t let on. Neither did Agnes. When I drove away the two of them looked as content as cats that had just finished licking out bowls of heavy cream. At any second I expected them to start licking each other; that’s when my belly would roil. Don’t get me wrong; we Mennonites are very sexual creatures. We’ll submit to our husbands two or three times a year, whether it messes up our hair or not, and on a bad year, we’ll even submit four times. Premarital sex, however, is a very big sin – not as bad as adultery (which is right up there with dancing), but a big ‘no-no’ nonetheless.
One thing I need to make as clear as the space between my ears is that I was not trying to push Agnes and Doc into bed with each other before the bonds of marriage had a chance to trap them into the purgatory that is marriage for all eternity. Marriage is sacred; it is certainly not for sissies, or repeat-offenders. What I was doing was trying to push them into holy matrimony. True, Doc was so old that he could remember when the rocks in his yard were still sand, but who knew, he could still have another eighty-five years left in him.
What I didn’t do was pay much attention to the road after leaving Agnes at Doc’s farm. There is a particularly sharp bend in it called Dead Man’s Curve for a reason: six Amish children perished when the horse-drawn buggy that they were riding in was rear-ended by a motorist driving just fifty miles an hour.
When I flew around Dead Man’s Curve that afternoon my speedometer read sixty-five, and when I saw the buggy in front of me I thought I was going to faint.
NINE
Tell me, what should one do if one knows unequivocally that one is going to plough into an Amish buggy and kill everyone in it, and most likely the poor horse as well? Should one just close one’s eyes, pray, and pump the brakes as if one were inflating an air mattress?
When death is a fait accompli, perhaps all that pumping is unwarranted. Perhaps I should have kept my eyes open and enjoyed my brief time sailing through the air. After all, Nearer My God to Thee has always been one of my favorite hymns, and being airborne, as I was, I was substantially closer for a second or two. Besides, this was my first opportunity to observe the landscape from that altitude.
The amazing thing is, however, that I killed no one – not even the horse. Neither did I demolish the buggy. In fact, there was no horse and buggy. There was only my very fertile imagination or – and I beg you to consider this – the buggy and the Amish family riding in it were an apparition. These were not a product of my imagination, mind you, but ghosts. Genuine Apparition-Americans.
For the record, I am not the only person to have seen the Kirschbaum family and their horse after that tragic accident that claimed their lives eight years ago, either. To my knowledge there have been at least a dozen sightings reported by sober, church-going adults during daylight hours, and perhaps three times that many at night or when it’s foggy. The rate is, of course, much higher amongst drinkers. In our community the only folks who drink are a handful of Baptists, nine Methodists, two Anglicans and our teenagers during their rumschpringe, which is a church-sanctioned period of rebellion.
When my borrowed police cruiser had screeched to a stop on the shoulder of the narrow road, I allowed myself a moment to recover my emotions. I will admit, even, to swearing.
‘Ding, dang, dong!’ I said. Usually that is as bad as I can swear, but this time I was so shaken up that the Devil made me reach into the darkest part of my soul and add a new phrase to my compendium of evil expressions. ‘Dang nab it!’
Having quite gotten all the bile out of my system I continued driving through the bucolic countryside of southern Bedford County. Mama – may she rest in peace – used to say that there was no scent more pleasant than that of road apples on asphalt warmed by autumn sunshine. Mama was two sandwiches shy of a picnic, if you get my drift. Cow pies have it all over road apples in the bouquet department; ask any farm girl, just not the rich horsey types who have somebody else shovelling it for them.
Now where was I? Ah yes, I was lulled into a peaceful state of semi-somnolence by the pervasive smell of thoroughly ruminated grass when at last I saw the handsome sign that announced Hernia, Population 2,103 and a half. Just beyond the sign was our sturdy new bridge that spans Slave Creek. Until very recently Hernia was a homogenous settlement of Amish and Mennonites of Amish descent. Then Baptists began to trickle in (they cannot be stopped!), followed by Methodists and even a few hip-waggling, dancing Presbyterians. Then along came an Episcopalian (which is American for Anglican), then another, and then even a family of Muslims. Soon we might have to admit Roman Catholics and atheists. The more the merrier, I say, but not everyone feels this way; there are some who think that we should evict the Presbyterian gal who started all the dancing. That last idea is a moot point because the guilty gal is no longer living in Hernia. She has run off, who knows where, and is aiding and abetting a man accused of murder.
Did I mention that the dirty dancer also happens to be my baby adoptive sister, Susannah? I know it was my intent to leave out the fact that her killer boyfriend (I know in my bones that he’s guilty) was my biological brother, Melvin Stoltzfus. Although we emerged from the womb of the same evil Elvina Stoltzfus, I more or less resemble the common human being, whereas Melvin is an almost exact copy of a praying mantis – a bit larger perhaps, and a few shades less green. It wasn’t the bony carapace of his chest, his wire-thin neck, or his tiny nub of a head that I found so disturbing, but the fact that his bulbous eyes were capable of moving in opposite directions simultaneously.
What is it about truly evil men that some women find so attractive? In my brother’s case, he has dozens of women who call themselves Melvinites! The truly sad part is that many of these are ex-Mennonites – although two of them used to be Baptists, and one even claims that she started out as an atheist! Ha! I should think that it would be the other way around. At any rate, these poor, miserable, misbegotten souls literally worship Melvin. They claim to have started a religion that they call Melvinism, with its own set of religious rules, and they’ve actually assembled a book of hymns praising Melvin.
Just last week I read in the Hernia Herald that the Melvinite Missionary Society baptized its first two male members in Slave Creek. No circumcisions were required of these men either. The self-styled nuns at the Convent of the Sisters of Perpetual Apathy were anything but apathetic about this new development. My mother-in-law, Mother Malaise, flew into such a rage that for once I could discern immediately that she was upset about something that had happened in the outside world, instead of just expressing her intense hatred of me.
How ironic was that? The village of Hernia had been founded by my Amish ancestors who had fled religious persecution in Switzerland. Now a good many of their descendents were at war with each other, battling over false doctrines that were so ridiculous that it was amazing neither side had yet to field a call from the Jerry Springer Show. Just what business was this of mine? any sane person might ask. Why was I so hot and bothered by this meshuggeneh behaviour? Because I owned Hernia. That’s right.
I was the little red hen who found the grain of wheat, who planted that grain, who watered and tilled the soil, who harvested and milled the wheat that grew on that stalk, who took the milled flour and kneaded it into dough and who baked the dough into bread. Then, because I was a good Christian woman, and humble to boot, I shared that bread with all the residents of Hernia. In other words, I had been fortunate enough to work my slender fingers to the bone, thanks to the PennDutch Inn, all the while fleecing the über rich who wanted to buy an authentic American folk experience. When all was said and done, having lined my pockets, it was expected of me to empty them for the good of others.
Thus it was that the citizens of Hernia received free utilities, police protection and an ambulance service, as well as regularly maintained streets and roads, and extra teachers and aids in the schools at all grade levels – courtesy of moi. I relate this not to brag; au contraire, with ownership came great responsibili
ty. The death of that voluptuous temptress, Ramat Sreym, had clearly thrown our new Chief of Police Toy into a tizzy, and thus it had fallen upon my thin shoulders to ferret out the foreigner’s killer.
Suddenly I had a terrible, chilling thought that sent shards of ice coursing through my veins. I mean that literally – in the same way that everyone else misuses this poor, tired word. What if, I thought, Miss Sreym’s killer had been none other than the nefarious Melvin Stoltzfus? What if her murderer had been the slime-ball subject of a hundred hymns, the messiah to three hundred mush-brained New Agers who laughed at the Holy Bible, but then had the temerity to write one of their own? (And this long after King James is dead, mind you!)
The second I’d fully processed this thought I decided not to cross Slave Creek and enter my sweet little village of Hernia. Instead I pressed the pedal to the metal and virtually – not literally, for goodness’ sake – flew the miles back up Route 96 to my farm and the PennDutch Inn. In a spray of paint-pocking gravel I skidded to stop inches from the kitchen steps.
‘Batten down the hatches!’ I cried as I burst through the door – again, not literally.
Unfortunately my poor family is quite used to my, uh, I like to think of them as heightened states of awareness. My husband, who was feeding the baby supper, barely glanced away from the spoon in his hand.
‘Hi, dear,’ he said. ‘Supper’s ready.’ Then quite needlessly he added the following: ‘As you can well see.’
As for Little Jacob, he opened his mouth wider and waved his arms in order to get his father’s attention. The precious little tot didn’t even look at me. The same thing went for the sweet, elderly cousin who had apparently decided to stay on for supper; she was too busy eating to turn around. Now that wasn’t like Freni at all. Most probably she was having trouble again (in her mind, at least) with that ‘too tall’ daughter-in-law of hers, Barbara, who hailed from Iowa where nobody ever did anything right, least of all raise children correctly.
The first thing I did was to sigh dramatically to let everyone know just how disappointed I was in their responses to my dramatic arrival. In a world of ‘tit for tat,’ in which I don’t know how to tat, and have a shamefully small bosom, I can at least sigh loudly. That is my forte.
The next thing I did was hook the strap of my handbag over a wooden peg before turning my attention to hooking the screen door and locking the sturdy main one. Being a strong believer in the ‘more is better’ school of thought, I grabbed an empty side chair and crammed it under the doorknob.
At that my Dearly Beloved put down the spoonful of peas that was headed toward my baby’s yawning maw and gave me a closer look.
‘You didn’t wreck the car, hon, did you?’
‘What? How did you get that from “batten down the hatches”?’
‘Oh, is that what you said? I didn’t quite hear you; perhaps because you just spoke four words, all of which were wasted on me. Anyway, you look a bit dishevelled.’
Dishevelled? Well, la-dee-dah! That was a bit harsh coming from a man who supposedly looked like the actor Cary Grant at the height of his film career, and who couldn’t look dishevelled even if he’d been run over by a steam-roller whilst napping on a bed of nails. At that moment, while feeding the baby, Gabe was wearing one of Freni’s crisply starched white aprons over a sky-blue shirt and cream-colored slacks. While there may have been food on Little Jacob, his high chair and the floor, my Dearly Beloved, as ever, remained annoyingly pristine.
‘Your brand of flattery might not get you everywhere that you wish to go, kind sir,’ I said. I’ve heard it said that sarcasm is the weapon of choice for the weak-minded; it’s also been said that I have an uncommonly sharp tongue. I choose not to believe either of these two sentiments, nor a third which states that I might, at times, be a wee bit opinionated.
It was then that my dear, sweet cousin Freni Hostetler deigned to turn her stout frame and give me the once-over, except that it wasn’t Freni! As I hope I have made very clear, normally I am not a swearing woman. Guests who swear are subjected to steep fines and the most unpleasant of chores. It is a sad and broken world that we live in, after all. That said, over the years in my career as an innkeeper I have heard just about every curse word imaginable, and sad as it may sound, absorbed a few of them into my vocabulary by the process of osmosis.
‘Holy guacamole!’ I cried, having been shocked – literally, this time – out of my shoes. I stuffed my boat-sized feet back into my enormous black brogans. ‘You’re not Freni, you’re my mother-in-law! Mother Mayonnaise.’
‘Her name is Mother Malaise, not Mayonnaise,’ my Dearly Beloved said. ‘Please, Mags, don’t cause trouble. I asked her over because Freni had to leave early on account of a headache and I needed someone to watch Little Jacob while I finished getting supper ready – oh, and milked both cows.’
‘Yah, und he milk de cows, vhile you vas off gallivanting wiz your fat friend, vhat dat has ze nekkid ooncles.’ Mother Malaise, aka Ida spoke, all the while nodding with the rhythm and regularity of a sewing machine needle ploughing its way through leather.
When I look back on that moment, I am embarrassed to think that my first thought was: how lucky I am that I was not born into some nomadic tribal society that required hosts to be generous with their guests for three days. My second thought was: why is this self-styled Mother Superior not wearing her wimple? Had she finally seen the light and come back to the bright side? Those questions, however, could wait.
‘Look, dear,’ I said. ‘You can’t get away with calling my friend fat because she’s not; she’s horizontally-challenged with a pleasing spherical shape. You wouldn’t like it if I called you short, when in fact you’re merely squat and built like a bulldog on steroids – although you’re a bit hairier and with a longer tail.’
Mother Malaise was not amused by my analogy. Quite possibly she would have huffed and puffed and blown my house down had not the Babester come to its defence, by first coming to hers. Oh, yes, my dear husband always picked his mother’s side over mine in a squabble. When I told him that even Jesus said that a man should leave his mother to ‘join with his wife,’ my Jewish husband had the chutzpah to remind me that his Bible didn’t contain such an injunction! Oy vey, what’s a Mennonite wife supposed to do?
‘Don’t be giving Ma a hard time,’ Gabe said. ‘She’s just helping out. So please, Mags, don’t start anything.’
‘“Don’t start anything”? How is this my fault?’
‘You started by calling her a name.’
‘Mayonnaise? That was cute.’
‘Cute my patooty, you knew that would get her goat.’
‘I did? Are you sure? But speaking of goats, dear, I spent the afternoon over at Doc Shafer’s house, turning the screws on his thumbs. Meanwhile, my bestie, you know, Agnes Miller, and old Doc fell head over heels in love with each other and started making the most pitiful, mewling sounds you ever did hear. They sounded like a box of newborn kittens—’
The more I embellished, the more I sensed Ida being drawn into my tale and the more I resented it. Well, if Ida wanted a tale, that’s what she was going to get.
‘So Jack had no choice but to trade them to the man with the magic beans. But when Jack’s mother saw the beans, she got so angry that she tossed them out the window. The very next day, when Jack woke up and looked out the window, he saw a new car—’
‘Stop it, Mags,’ Gabe said sternly.
‘Yah, shtop,’ said his precious ma.
How can I maintain a gentle, peaceful heart when I have to put up with a mother-in-law who grates on me more than a thousand chalk boards and ten thousand fingernails ever could? I try, believe me, I do. Ultimately I know that the problem is mine, but still, as I have already intimated, I still can’t help but think that my Dearly Beloved, who was once a renowned New York City heart surgeon, is still tied to his mother by her apron strings.
‘Yah, so I shtop already,’ I said.
‘You see?’ Gabe said. �
�There you go again, making fun of her accent. That’s just cruel; that’s not the Magdalena I married.’
‘The Devil made me do it,’ I said. ‘That’s something you wouldn’t know about, since you Progressive Jews don’t believe in the Devil. But speaking of the Devil, the reason you shouldn’t be sitting there, heaping coals of fire upon my head whilst shovelling peas into my baby’s mouth is that I have reason to believe that the Devil incarnate may be back in town.’
‘Like I alvays said, dis von is meshuggeneh,’ Ida said. She had the ‘noive’ to say this without turning around, and while making circles next to her oversized head with a stubby finger.
‘Hey,’ I said. ‘I just noticed; why isn’t that one wearing a wimple?’
‘That one is my mother, Magdalena. She deserves our respect.’
‘Zee vimple eez dare-tee,’ Ida said. She paused to slurp whatever it was in the bowl in front of her. ‘I vas tinking dat you vould vash eet for me.’
I was about to make a perhaps not-so-helpful suggestion when my sweet baby’s father came to his ma’s rescue. ‘Mags, are you saying that your brother may be back in town?’
What a shame that it has taken me nearly half a century to learn that by gritting one’s teeth, all that one truly accomplishes is wearing down the enamel, perhaps even piling grit on the floor which, of course, results in the need to vacuum. On the other hand, I would never truly say what was on my mind, seeing as how I really do struggle with what is right, and what is wrong, but even though I am wrong, more often than not I am right. At least I try to do right, and I don’t judge others, like some people I know.
‘Please do not call him my brother,’ I said. ‘We weren’t raised together, and for his entire miserable life – ever since he was hatched from his mantis egg sac – he has been my nemesis. Besides, if you insist on a family connection, then remember that Melvin the Monster is also our son’s biological uncle.’