The City Baker's Guide to Country Living

by Louise Miller

  “I haven’t told him yet.”

  “What on earth are you waiting for?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t want to be the reason he gives up his dream. He’s out there on the road. I figure the baby is going to come whether or not he’s on tour.”

  “People can have more than one dream, dear,” she said. “And it’s not for you to decide which one they should follow. Tell the truth and step aside, I always say. But I won’t mention it. Just do an old woman a favor and tell him soon, before someone like Frank Fraser does. If he asks me, I won’t be able to lie.”

  “Thanks, Dotty,” I said, suddenly feeling shy. Dotty and I would be bound by this newest member of her family growing inside of me.

  “I wish Henry could have been here to meet her,” Dotty said, her face softening.

  I squeezed her hand. “Me too. Although don’t you think he would have been angry?”

  “Oh, he’d be angry at Martin for not marrying you yet. But he already saw you as family, dear. I think he would have been very happy.”

  Margaret came over and handed us each a glass of iced tea. She looked down at her watch. “I’m looking forward to twelve hours from now, when the entire White family is off my land.”

  Dotty raised her glass in the air and said, “Amen.”

  I clinked glasses with her and took a long sip, trying to quench the burning urge to point out that this wouldn’t be her land if she went through with the sale.

  Sarah pushed in through the swinging doors. “The first group has arrived. Can someone bring some more ice out to the bar?”

  I hoisted myself up out of the chair and pulled one of my old chef’s coats over the Clash T-shirt I was wearing. “I’ll start traying up the canapés.”

  The staff moved smoothly from hors d’oeuvres to the first course, and the entrées were served on schedule. We were just wiping down the tables when Sarah came rushing back in.

  “Alfred, two of the dishwashers are having a fistfight out back—can you deal with them before they bleed on a bridesmaid?” Alfred dashed out the back door. “Oh,” Sarah added as she reached for the silver coffee pots, “Mrs. White is demanding the cake.” It had been too humid earlier in the day for us to set out the cake for display. I looked over at Margaret. I hadn’t known it was possible for her back to get any stiffer. She marched into the pantry and returned pushing a large steel cart on wheels. “We can wheel the cake down to the tent on this.”

  “Shouldn’t we wait for Alfred?”

  “Nonsense,” she said, disappearing into the walk-in. I dashed in behind her to keep her from trying to lift the cake by herself.

  It was a stunning evening. The sun was low in the sky, and the white steeples of the churches in the valley glowed. The guests were mingling and refreshing their drinks at the bar. The bride and groom moved from table to table, receiving kisses, congratulations, and not a few white envelopes. The DJ was playing Glenn Miller, and the dance floor was already packed, mostly with the silver-haired crowd. Margaret and I carefully wheeled the cake over to the dance tent. The dance floor was raised off the ground.

  “We’ll have to carry it from here,” I said, a little nervous about the distance between the cake table and us.

  I had decorated the cake on a thick wooden base covered in gold foil. Margaret and I each took hold of a side and carefully lifted it off the cart. It must have weighed fifty pounds.

  We were clutching the base of the cake, one foot each on the dance floor, when a voice behind us said, “The two of you could be mistaken for mother and daughter.” I didn’t need to turn around to know it was Jane White. I felt Margaret pause, and I gripped my edge tighter, as if that would help.

  “Just lift up your other foot,” I instructed, but Margaret remained in place.

  “But that’s impossible, isn’t it? Since you never had any children.” The song ended, and the stage fell silent as the DJ furiously pushed a button on his laptop, trying to get the next track to play.

  I craned my neck to see Jane leaning against the cake table, which was inching away from us.

  “It’s funny, I never thought about it before,” Jane said, her voice at full volume. “She’s just about the age your daughter would have been, isn’t she?” Jane paused, looking around the dance floor. “Well, we mustn’t question God’s plan.”

  The only sound under the tent was the click of high heels against the floor.

  Louis Armstrong’s gravelly voice broke the silence.

  I gripped the edge of the cake base and looked at Margaret. All the blood had drained from her face and her bottom lip quivered. Sweat gathered at her brow line.

  The cake began to wobble.

  “Margaret?” I felt the cake slipping from her hands.

  My hands gripped the cake base. At least it wasn’t on fire. I tried to reach around to take Margaret’s edge, but my belly got in the way. I will not drop this cake, I will not drop this cake, I murmured to myself. The baby chose this moment to practice mixed martial arts in my womb. “Oh,” I gasped.

  The photographer, who had been capturing the bride and groom’s first dance, dropped his camera and raced over, grabbed the cake from Margaret’s hands, and together we placed it carefully on the table. I spun around. Jane White was dancing with a silver-haired gentleman whose resemblance to John White was so striking it startled even me, who had never met the man. Jane gazed up at him, a smug look on her face. Margaret stood at the edge of the floor, frozen.

  I climbed down, took her by the elbow, and led her back toward the inn, abandoning the cart near the tents. “That bitch,” I said under my breath as we weaved our way through the crowd. When we reached the sitting area, I brought Margaret to one of the couches in the back and sat down beside her.

  “My God. What is up with her? What does she want?”

  “Something that she can never have,” Margaret said, her hands folded neatly in her lap. She sat as still as an ice carving, her eyes unfocused and glassy. “And I’ll tell you something, Olivia,” she said in a flat tone that frightened me. “I’m tired of it. Tired of running this inn by myself. Tired of being alone. Tired of Jane White. Tired of that goddamned pie contest.” She rubbed her hands on her thighs, rocking slightly. “What’s the point of it anyway? I don’t have anyone to hand the tradition down to. Foolish.”

  Two young women with champagne glasses came giggling into the foyer.

  “Margaret,” I asked before I could put all the pieces together, “your daughter?”

  Margaret’s composure crumpled. She pressed her hands to her face so that I wouldn’t see her crying, but her slender shoulders shook.

  I ran over Jane White’s words in my head. I thought of Margaret’s reaction to my pregnancy. My assumptions had been right. “Oh, Margaret.” I placed a tentative hand on her knee. “Did you—I mean, it was you that your aunt helped?”

  Margaret brushed my hand away, stood, and walked briskly toward the kitchen. Dotty stepped through the swinging door.

  Dotty came into the room. She took in Margaret’s expression and quickly stepped aside to let her by. “Livvy, what just happened?”

  “I’m not exactly sure,” I said, toying with the cloth buttons of my coat. “Jane White—she said some awful things.”

  Dotty looked down at my belly, where my hands reflexively rested. “Come out back with me.”

  • • •

  Salty, lying in a patch of shade behind the inn, thumped his tail against the grass when he saw me come around the corner. Dotty and I sat on a bench facing the apple orchard as strains of music and laughter drifted over from the party.

  “You must know what’s up between Margaret and Jane,” I said.

  Dotty nodded, but she remained silent.

  “You’re her best friend. I’d understand if you don’t want to tell me.”

  Dotty settled back and took
a deep breath. “When we were girls, Margaret fell in love with a man named John White. He was nineteen at the time; we were only fifteen or sixteen.”

  I thought back to my sixteen-year-old self, parentless and alone. It was the age when you thought you were all grown up but were actually still just a kid.

  “He worked in his father’s grocery store. They were the only market in town in those days. If you needed flour, that’s where you went. Margaret’s mother had a bad hip and relied on her to go into town and run her errands, so Margaret saw him often enough.”

  “He must have been smitten. Margaret was gorgeous.”

  “She was a beauty. Still is, if you ask an old lady like me. Well, John asked her to the fair the summer we turned sixteen. Her father wouldn’t let her date, and his family wanted him to marry into one of the more established families. They were snobbish like that. So she and John had to hide that they were together.”

  “It sounds like a movie.”

  “It did seem exciting at the time. She told her parents that she was going to the fair with Henry and me, but she slipped off as soon as we arrived. Her first kiss was at the top of the Ferris wheel.” Dotty looked out toward the apple trees. “From that night on, they would meet up in barns or in the woods or at dances after her parents had left. They were serious about each other from the start. When she got pregnant, John gave her a string of pearls his grandmother had left him, as a promise.”

  My heart sank. Margaret wore those pearls every single day.

  “He went to his family to tell them he was going to marry her. Of course, his father put his foot down. They were pushing him toward a girl in the next county.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “John had gone out a few times with a girl his parents had set him up with, just to appease them.”

  “You mean Jane?”

  “Yes It didn’t bother Margaret at the time—she knew he loved her and it was all for show. I worried, naturally. I wanted her to be as happy as I was with Henry. It was tough on them, sneaking around.” Dotty smiled and took my hand in hers. “Martin always complains about what a small town Guthrie is. Well, he should have seen it back then.”

  “I can’t imagine.”

  “You couldn’t get away with anything. When Jane found out about Margaret, she lied to her parents and said John had taken her virginity. Her parents insisted that he make it right with her, and his agreed.”

  “But Margaret was pregnant. What about making it right with her? What about her parents?”

  Dotty hesitated. “Margaret thinks John’s parents might have given her father money to keep quiet. They’d barely been scraping by. Then, shortly after Jane’s engagement was announced, Margaret’s father bought this house and turned it into an inn.”

  “What about John?” I asked, furious on behalf of Margaret’s teenage self.

  “His family eventually wore him down.”

  “And then Margaret’s aunt—?”

  “Her aunt came, and they took care of things. John married Jane and moved her here to Guthrie.” Dotty pulled a handkerchief from her skirt pocket and dabbed at her eyes. “But he still loved Margaret, and Jane knew it. Thanks to her, it wasn’t long before people in town caught wind that Margaret had been pregnant. No one would have her then. But she refused to leave Guthrie. Folks here have long memories.” She looked me in the eye. “You keep that in mind.”

  I nodded, not wanting to interrupt.

  “Margaret met Brian Hurley when he came to stay at the inn. They married soon after. Margaret was forty then. She got pregnant right away, but she miscarried. They stopped trying after awhile.”

  I swore under my breath. No wonder Margaret wanted to sell the inn and finally get out of here. I thought of the many generations of Whites out in the field, that big extended family that could have been hers. “That’s so unfair.”

  Dotty patted my leg. “A lot of things in life are.” She looked down at my bulging belly. “Henry always used to say, ‘It’s not what happens to you but how you respond to it that matters.’ I’ve never seen anyone handle hard times more gracefully than Margaret.”

  A mixture of sadness and anger washed over me. I wanted to do something for Margaret, to let her know she was worth a million Jane Whites, but the only thing that felt big enough was to win the damned pie contest.

  “What about Margaret and John? They must have seen each other. It’s a small town.”

  Dotty smiled a shy smile. “They met on the Ferris wheel every year until he died. Just to talk, of course,” she added, but her lips curled up into a little grin. “He passed away four years ago.”

  I leaned back on the bench, trying subtly to scratch my belly. Salty kicked his legs as if he were chasing rabbits in his dream. “Does anyone else know all of this?”

  “Oh, people know bits and pieces. But I’m pretty sure it’s just you, me, and Margaret who know the whole story.”

  “Why are you telling me? You’re her best friend. Aren’t you breaking some sacred code?”

  Dotty took my hand back in hers and squeezed. “Because we need each other, dear. You don’t have to do everything on your own. That’s something you and Margaret both need to keep in mind.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  July

  Pour-through, crumb crust, Dutch, and dried apple—I made them all. Hazelnuts in the crumb, in the crust, then pecans. I changed the spices, tried every variety of apple I could get my hands on, but in the end I couldn’t improve on what Margaret and I both loved best—Cortland and McIntosh, sautéed in butter and lightly sweetened with good old white sugar, with a half teaspoon of cinnamon and a pinch of nutmeg, piled high and tucked in with a top crust. No bells and whistles. Perfect in its simplicity.

  The month leading up to the fair drifted by like a dream. A record-breaking heat wave hit the mountains and I would rise early and test-bake a pie before the kitchen grew too hot. The rest of the morning was spent baking desserts for the inn. As soon as lunch service was over, Sarah and I would change into bikinis and drive over to Lake Willoughby, where I would float on my back, my bulging tummy glowing brightly against the dark glacial water, a giant marshmallow in a deep vat of hot chocolate.

  I did end up moving into the Sugar Maple, purely for the indoor plumbing, but I liked to go back to the sugarhouse in the afternoons and sit in one of the rockers on the front porch, watching the bees float through the orchard, daydreaming about the baby, until I was dragged down by the undertow of sleepiness and had to curl up on the futon to rest until sunset. In the evenings, Margaret and I joined Dotty for dinner, and we would try the test pie afterward. Sometimes one of Martin’s brothers and his family would join us, but no one mentioned the baby. I felt suspended—as if the baby would live inside me forever, the fair would never come, Margaret would always own the Sugar Maple, and summer would never end.

  • • •

  The first sign that the fair was coming was the traffic. Margaret kept sending me into town on small errands, insisting that the cinnamon wasn’t fresh enough, or the butter was too salty, and on each trip I would be gone for hours, stuck behind the trucks that towed the stands from which teenagers would soon be hawking French fries and funnel cakes. Then came the midway crew. The carnival rides seemed to arrive overnight, and with them a rough group of men who filled up the booths of the Black Bear and the Miss Guthrie. The RVs came next, driven by the farmers and their families ready to spend their one yearly vacation camping in style.

  I decided to take the back roads up to the inn one afternoon, after finally tracking down the brand of all-purpose flour that Margaret remembered her mother using. I drove slowly by the McCracken land, passing the field of Christmas trees, then the apple orchard, before reaching the driveway to the farmhouse. Mabel and Crabapple looked over the car with their blank almond-shaped eyes. Henry’s tune played in my mind, and I tapped the rhy
thm of it on the steering wheel. With a sudden, sharp turn of the wheel I drove back down the hill, pulled over onto the shoulder where it widened, and pulled out my cell phone.

  It rang once before I heard his recorded voice.

  “Hey, it’s me,” I said lamely. “Um. Livvy. I forgot about the time difference. It says on the band’s Facebook page that you’re in Berlin. What time is it in Berlin?” I leaned back heavily in the car seat, my heart racing. “I’m here. In Guthrie, and I wanted to say hey. Hey. Also, I’m pregnant. Since December pregnant. You don’t have to do anything. Just call me at the end of the tour.” I pressed the red dot, tossed the phone into the backseat, and pushed my foot onto the gas pedal, kicking back rocks as I sped back to the inn.

  • • •

  The Coventry County Fair was always held on the last weekend of July. Members of the high school marching band played on the backs of tractors decorated with yellow and orange ribbons, parading down Main Street to the fairground. Margaret had pressed me to go with her and Dotty on opening night—“It’s tradition,” she insisted—but she relented after I showed her my ankles, which after a morning on my feet looked like overproofed croissants. I waved to Margaret and Dotty from the porch as they climbed into Margaret’s station wagon, dolled up in cotton sundresses with cardigans draped over their shoulders, looking like schoolgirls off to see which of the farm boys had started shaving over the growing season.

  • • •

  I made three pies Friday night: one for the judges, one for us to taste, and one, at Margaret’s insistence, for good measure. I knew the extra pie was really in case I dropped one on the floor, which, given that the baby seemed to be draining all of my hand-eye coordination, was fine by me. When I pulled the last pie out of the oven, golden brown and bubbling, Margaret popped the top off a bottle of sparkling apple juice and poured us each a glass.