As the World Churns (5 page)
Vance suppressed a laugh, which annoyed me to no end.
“Well, I have,” I snapped.
“Shame on you, Mr. Brown.
Your children are half Polish, so if you look down on this lovely woman-”
“Not that kind of pole!”
I clapped my hands to my face in dismay.
“Oh no.
Don’t tell me that now there’s a dance hall in Antarctica.”
“Miss Yoder, you’re a hoot.”
“And a holler.
But this isn’t at all funny; sin never is. Because the Bible tells us to carry salvation to the ends of the earth, I’ve often wondered about sin down there. I mean, I sort of knew there had to be sin going on in Antarctica, given all the scientists working in such close quarters, but I was curious as to which kind. What would there be to steal, and how could you conceal it? Murder would be stupid, because there is nowhere to run to hide. And you couldn’t very well covet your neighbor’s ass down there, could you?”
The Browns looked a mite confused which, sadly, is par for the course with folks lacking a proper spiritual upbringing. I would have plunged on with my analysis of antipodean iniquity, had not a fourth truck and trailer turned into the drive.
The last guest to arrive was a Mrs. Gertrude Fuselburger, an elderly widow from western
Fortunately, she was accompanied by two male employees, both of whom appeared to be of Latin American descent. They carried her bags into my tiny lobby, and then set about unloading her Holstein, all without saying a word. I had not been introduced to the men, both of whom managed to avoid eye contact, so you can imagine my confusion.
“Where will your employees be staying, dear?”
“I don’t believe that’s your concern.”
“I’m just curious, dear,” I assured her. “It’s not that I think they’re here illegally, because I don’t-well, maybe I do, but as proprietress of this fine, upstanding establishment, I merely want to ascertain whether or not you plan to have them stay in your room with you.”
“They most certainly will
not
be staying with me.”
“But you see, dear, there are no other rooms available, anywhere in the county.”
“Miss Yoder, I must insist that you mind your own business.”
“Well, I never!
Actually, I have, but I didn’t like it much. After all, minding our own business is an unnatural act, right up there with dying one’s hair black after the age of sixty.” Oops. That last remark just slipped out, like a bean-salad serenade at a family picnic.
“
What
did you say?”
“I said
,
if the Good Lord had wanted us to mind our own business, he wouldn’t have instructed us to be our brother’s keeper-or innkeeper, for that matter.”
“You were commenting on my hair.”
“I was?” In truth, I was. I have never understood the desire of some women to hang on to the hair color of their youth, when their faces have long since moved south to join the rest of their bodies. In my humble-and not yet gray-opinion, dyed hair only accentuates wrinkles.
“Are you stupid, as well as rude?”
Now that hiked my hackles. During all those years when I’d believed myself to be as ugly as a stump full of spiders, I’d comforted myself with the fact that I have an IQ well into the triple digits. How dare she ask if I was stupid? As my hackles hiked even further, I could feel my self-esteem plummet to the floor.
“Miss Yoder, are you just going to stand there like a post, or are you going to show me to my room?”
I brushed off my bruised ego before taking the high road. “Let’s take the impossibly steep stairs, dear.
But not to worry.
Only one person has ever fallen to her death on it, and she was pushed.”
“What’s wrong with your elevator?”
“It stopped working about six months ago, about the time that Japanese couple went missing. Funny, shortly after it stopped running, it started making these strange noises. After a week or so the noises stopped, but then there was this terrible odor-well, I’ve been meaning to have it fumigated, but just haven’t gotten around to it. You know how busy we innkeepers are.”
“The stairs will have to do.”
“I’m putting you in room four. It has a
single
bed. Occupancy is
one
. You’ll be pleased to know that it has a view of both Stucky Ridge and
“Miss Yoder, either you are stark raving mad, or the most delightful person I’ve had the pleasure of meeting in the past half century.”
“I’m nuts, dear.
Nertz to Mertz.
I guarantee you that after spending a week with
me,
you’ll run screaming from the inn.”
“You’re delightful, just delightful. You may call me Gertie, if you wish.”
“Must I?”
“We’re going to be best friends, Magdalena, just you wait and see.”
Seeing as how he is a dear friend of mine, Doc Shafor was never on Melvin Stoltzfus’s short list of friends. When asked if he would like to stay with Gabriel and company across the road, instead of in his somewhat isolated house on the other side of town, the kind old gent immediately agreed. I had no doubt, however, that perusing me had something to do with his decision.
Doc and Ida Rosen used to have a “thing.” In fact they almost married. Although they are no longer a couple-they claim to hate each other-they are still quite involved, if you get my drift. I think the young people these days call it “benefits without friends.”
At any rate, Doc, who was my papa’s best friend, has had at least one of his bloodshot eyes on me since the day I became legal in the eyes of the law. To be fair, this interest in me began a respectful length of time
after
the death of his beloved wife, Belinda. By then, Doc had learned to cook, and his attempts to woo me have always involved food.
Although I can usually boil water without burning it-I once prepared a delicious meal of fried ice-I have little interest in cooking. For Doc, on the other hand, the preparation of calorie-laden meals has become a passion. Even when he’s expecting to eat alone, he prepares a feast. I used to wonder about all that waste, but then one day, to my shame, I learned that Doc delivers his bountiful leftovers to the homeless shelter over in Bedford.
Now where was I going with all this? Oh yes. I had just gotten word that my fifth party of guests was canceling-apparently their Holstein was having a nervous breakdown from travel stress-when I saw Doc exit the Rosen house and head my way. I decided to meet him at the end of my long drive. After my encounter with Miss Fuselburger, I needed a breath of fresh air.
Doc always kisses me on both cheeks and then aims for my lips. I always evade him by snapping my head to one side, thereby making him kiss my ear. Lately he’s come to enjoy this, so this time I dropped my head and made him kiss the crown.
“Mmm.
Your hair smells like Midnight Pleasure.”
“But I showered since then!”
“It’s the same perfume my Belinda used.”
“Oh.” There was no point in informing him that I don’t use fragrances of any kind. “Say, Doc, what brings you to this side of
“I came to see the cows-if that’s all right.”
“Of course.
After all, the competition was your idea.”
“Yeah, sorry I couldn’t have been one of the official veterinarians like you asked. But at my age-well, the younger ones need the opportunity to shine.”
When he’s not pursuing me, Doc is a wonderful friend. Except for the crunching of gravel beneath our feet, we walked in companionable silence up the lane, and then left to the barn. About thirty yards from the barn, we both stopped suddenly and sniffed the air.
“Now
that’s
perfume,” we said simultaneously.
“Jinx, you owe me a Coke,” I said, when we were through laughing.
“What?”
“It’s something I picked up from Susannah. When two people say the same thing at the exact same time, the first one to say that phrase gets a free soft drink.”
“Ah. But you have to agree, Magdalena, few things on this good earth smell better than cow dung.”
I did agree. Maybe it’s because I was raised on a dairy farm, or maybe it’s in my Swiss genes, but the odor of manure is indeed perfume to my nose. However, let me make it perfectly clear: my attraction to mammal emissions applies only to herbivores, and primarily cattle. Cat and dog poop need not apply.
Doc was impressed with the trouble I’d gone to in order to see that each group of entries had equal, but separate, accommodations. He was also quite impressed with the entries themselves. At each pen he paused to shake his head in appreciation. “Now that’s a fine animal,” he’d say.
Indeed, they were all fine animals. No doubt about it. The crème de la crème, pun quite intended. And, at the risk of sounding proud, Doc thought my two girls belonged to a guest. He told me that next year I should dissociate myself from the event and enter one of them-which, of course, I’d already considered. He was particularly taken with Matilda Two’s exceptional udder.
“You don’t see many that well-endowed,” he said.
“How many gallons?”
“Six.”
“Wow. Isn’t that a record?”
“Record’s six point two.”
“When I was a young shaver-”
“Shafor shaver-”
“But just barely shaving then.
Anyway, when I was just out of vet school, we were lucky if cows gave half that much.”
“The breed has evolved-well, not
evolved
evolved, since evolution doesn’t exist, but-you know, changed.”
“Magdalena, Magdalena, whatever am I going to do with you? Your apple not only stayed close to the tree, but it’s still firmly attached.”
“Meaning?”
“I am merely observing that you choose to ignore scientific evidence so that you can cling to your literal interpretation of some three-thousand-year-old documents that were meant for another people living in another time.” He said it without pausing. Surely it was a remarkable feat for an octogenarian, and would have been quite impossible had he been president.
“Doc, I’m not going to argue theology with you.”
“Because you’d lose?”
“Because you’re wrong, and I’m right.”
He grinned. “I still say we’d make a mighty fine couple. I’d be the spit, and you’d be the fire. If you ever decide to ditch that young whippersnapper of yours-”