by Jan Karon
He turned the slip of paper over. “Cirrhosis. Ah.”
“Dr. Harper said he’d always worried Joe would get cirrhosis from drinkin’ brandy, and here he got it from too much iron in ’is system!”
Ironic in the true sense of the word, he thought. “What can I do?”
“He’s been real weak an’ run-down lately, but we thought it was all th’ ruckus with that woman upstairs. Th’ hair business in this town has turned into another Desert Storm because of her. I could take a whippin’ for lettin’ Fancy Skinner sign a lease for two miserable years—and do her dirty work right over our heads!”
He’d never seen Winnie so distraught, except for the time Edith Mallory’s henchmen tried to force Winnie to sell the bakery.
“What can I do?” he asked again.
“Pray!” she said, sounding urgent.
He stood on the sidewalk at the foot of the stairs, looking up.
There was no way he could deliver himself into the hands of Fancy Skinner, even if her haircuts were the only game in town. No way. He was not hauling up those stairs and into that pink room that looked like the interior of an ulcerated stomach. No, indeed! No, no, no, a thousand times no.
He turned and trotted home, put the top down on the Mustang, and roared to Wesley, where, for twelve bucks, he got a decent haircut, albeit with a slightly spiked look, reminding himself all the while that beggars couldn’t be choosers.
In the tiny rest room of Happy Endings Bookstore, Hope Winchester washed down an aspirin with a Coke Classic, something her mother had always done to settle her nerves.
She was going to be calm today, she was not going to study George Gaynor’s profile when she thought he wasn’t looking, and she definitely wasn’t going to compare him with literary figures like Lord Byron or even the fictitious Heathcliff. She was going to be aloof, poised, complete.
Hessie Mayhew stood on her deck, drinking a second cup of coffee with hazelnut Coffee-mate and eyeing the lawn chair blown by a recent wind to the railing.
It was the only chair in a collection of seven with its woven plastic seat still intact. She had been in a quandary about her aging lawn chairs for several years. At times she considered setting them on the street for the Annual Town RoundUp. At other times, she was determined to haul them down the mountain to get the seats rewoven. A note on her refrigerator read, DO NOW!!! Take chairs to Wesley. By loose calculation, the note was five years old.
That’s the way life worked. It raced by. Write a note, look up, and five years had galloped past. While volunteering at the library, she’d studied the old poets in order to write her annual “Lady Spring” column. Old poets had a lot to say about the passage of time, not the least of which was Robert Herrick. “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,” he wrote, “Old time it is a-flying.”
She hadn’t gathered many rosebuds lately. All she’d done was work, work, work. The summer had worn her out, and here was fall staring her in the face with three weddings in Wesley, an ECW fund-raiser at Lord’s Chapel, a missionary dinner at the Methodists’…
Lord knows, missionary dinners didn’t pay anything, they would expect her to practically give them fourteen arrangements. Well, then she’d use leaves—fall color should be great this year because the nights had been cold for weeks, she’d worn a sweater to bed more than once. And of course there were nuts and berries. There were always nuts and berries.
She took a sip of coffee and eyed the chair. Why didn’t she sit down in the blooming thing? Why didn’t she ever sit down? Her grandmother had never sat down, her mother had never sat down, and the gene had clearly passed to her. Refusing to give herself time to think about it further, she thumped into the chair, sighing deeply.
Heaven help her for being raised Baptist. The Baptists hardly ever sat down, unlike the Presbyterians, of which she was now one, who occasionally sat down. Episcopalians were another matter; they appeared to sit down whenever they wanted to.
The trouble with sitting down, of course, is that it made you feel guilty. She pondered this. Maybe what she needed to do was get up and go inside and grab her yellow tablet and bring it out here and, while sitting down, make a list of things to do.
But if she got up and went inside, she would never come back.
She stayed put, deciding to follow an instruction she’d seen on bumper stickers out the kazoo: Take time to smell the roses! Ha! It didn’t take an old poet to come up with that notion.
Hessie scooted the chair back and put her feet up on the railing.
Then she took them down.
She wasn’t the sort to put her feet up on a railing.
Well, then, maybe just one foot.
She put her right foot up, let it rest there a moment, then took it down. One foot on the railing made her back feel like it was going out.
In order to make use of the time, maybe she should meditate. She’d heard of meditating, but didn’t know what you were supposed to think while you did it. Maybe you didn’t think anything, maybe you just sat there.
What a horrible thought!
She was about to jump out of her skin when suddenly she had an idea.
Last Sunday, her preacher asked everyone to go over in their minds who they needed to forgive. He was always giving them something to do: List how many times you pray this week! Make a list of all the times God answers your prayers! Give someone a smile! Think of who you need to forgive—and then forgive them! She never paid attention to these injunctions; it was too much like homework, which she’d never cared for, either.
But maybe she’d do just this one thing.
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Polly Morris!
Hessie didn’t see how in the world she could forgive Polly Morris.
She considered the whole incident from start to finish. How could anybody have taken apart every single centerpiece that she, Hessie Mayhew, had made for the Mitford Country Club Azalea Ball at a discount—at a discount !—and put them back together again in a totally different way that was ugly as mud ? It was a slap in the face! Polly Morris, as everyone knew, didn’t have a life, which gave her all the time in the world to mess with other people’s lives from here to kingdom come!
Hessie felt her blood pressure pounding in her temples. Starting from the chair, she splashed coffee in her lap. “Dadgummit!” she shouted. A bird flew out of a bush by the railing.
Enough of this sitting-down nonsense! Let other people sit down and waste time!
Hessie trotted to the kitchen, mopped the front of her khaki pants with a dish towel, and poured another cup of coffee. Then she snatched her tablet off the breakfast table and scrawled the words, Throw out deck chairs TODAY!!!
“The Enemy will not let you rest!” her preacher had said. “He doesn’t want you to forgive anybody, he wants you to hold all that bitterness and anger inside ’til it turns to sickness and ill health!”
Clutching the mug, she threw open the sliding doors and raced back to the chair; sitting down was working her to death.
She would try one more time, and if that didn’t get results, she was out of here. She had the back porch to clean off, the chairs to dump in the basement ’til the next RoundUp, groceries to buy, a tire to be retreaded. Unlike some people she could think of, she had a life that couldn’t be lived on her rear end.
She closed her eyes and listened to the rasping call of a bird in the maple tree. A squirrel clucked near the creek.
Father Tim. Now, there was somebody she needed to forgive. When she delivered that garden basket to the hospital, the poor man had been in a coma, for heaven’s sake. Or just out of one, or in any case, sick. Very sick. He couldn’t have written a thank-you note if his life depended on it. But Cynthia could have. Yes, indeed, what kind of preacher’s wife couldn’t write a simple thank-you note or make a phone call?
But maybe Cynthia had been so distraught over her husband that she couldn’t think of writing thank-you notes. Hessie understood that. Of course! It had been an oversight.<
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Then Hessie remembered the basket itself and how much it had cost, even wholesale. She thought of the miniature roses and all the other wonderful items she’d tucked into it, not to mention acres of moss from her own special, private place in her own backyard.
“Lord,” she said aloud, “You’re goin’ to have to help me do this!”
She set her coffee mug on the rail and gripped the arms of the lawn chair.
“I forgive Cynthia!”
There.
She took a deep breath. “And Father Tim, in case he had anything to do with it!”
She felt better at once.
“You’ll never guess who’s in the slammer,” said J.C.
Father Tim stirred his tea. “Old Man Mueller ran the red light one time too many?”
“Ed Coffey found Coot Hendrick stumblin’ around in th’ yard up at Edith Mallory’s, lookin’ for that Yankee grave.”
“Oh, boy.”
“And Coot with an honorary appointment to th’ town council,” said Mule. “I hate it when politicians break th’ law.”
Percy refilled the coffee cups. “Beats me why anybody’d want to go lookin’ for a grave full of Yankees in th’ first place.”
“Idn’t that th’ truth!” Velma stood at the counter, wrapping fork and knife combos with paper napkins. “Nobody’ll pay cash money to look at th’ bloomin’ thing if he finds it.”
“He wants to find th’ grave because ’is great-granddaddy shot th’ Yankees, and it’s town history,” said Mule.
Percy snorted. “Let sleepin’ dogs lie is what I say.”
“Look,” said Father Tim, “if his ancestor shot and killed the enemy, he wouldn’t have given them the honor of a marked grave. Marking a grave is a type of tribute, so this grave wouldn’t be marked. Therefore, how could Coot hope to find it?”
“Right!” J.C. forked an entire sausage link into his mouth.
“He told me he’ll just know,” said Mule. “But how come he didn’t go lookin’ before th’ Witch set up housekeepin’ on th’ ridge?”
“Because,” said Percy, “when she bought that parcel twenty years ago, Coot didn’t give a katy about town history.” Percy counted himself among the few who knew what was what in the early days of Mitford; the turkeys in this booth had all come from someplace else. “He was more into chasin’ women.”
“I don’t even want to think about what women Coot Hendrick was chasin’.” J.C. pulled out his handkerchief and mopped his forehead.
“As I recall,” said Percy, “he was chasin’ Emeline Poovey from over at Blackberry.”
“I thought all Pooveys live in Poovey’s Grove,” said Mule.
“Th’ crowd over at Blackberry splintered off from th’ Poovey’s Grove Pooveys.”
“So if he was chasin’ her, did he catch her?”
“Emeline married that big bootlegger that robbed Th’ Local when Avis’s daddy first had it. Sauce Harris was ’is name, he burrowed hisself into a dumpload of roastin’ ears, somebody backed th’ truck up to th’ storeroom in th’ rear an’ dumped th’ corn, then locked th’ storeroom doors and drove off. Sauce got into th’ grocery, eat a smoked ham, guzzled three quarts of chocolate milk, an’ cleaned out th’ safe behind th’ butcher case. Busted through a window and run off with two thousand smackers.”
Father Tim gave his whole wheat toast a light buttering. “That was a lot of money back then.”
“That’s a lot of money today, buddyroe.”
“Right. How did they catch him?”
“Emeline turned him in. Th’ county was about half dry for four years.”
“So how long do you think Coot’s in for?”
“He’ll be out on bail late today,” said J.C. “That reminds me, I’ve got an interview set up in”—J.C. checked his watch—“thirty minutes.”
“Who with?” J.C. surveyed the table with a smug dignity reserved exclusively for the press. “Edith Mallory.”
“What?” Percy set the empty coffeepot on the table, hard. “You’re talkin’ to that low-life, money-grubbin’—”
“Hold on!” yelled Velma, who was setting up the adjoining booth. She grabbed her husband by the arm and dragged him to the grill, where she planted him like a chrysanthemum.
“Now hush up!” she snapped to J.C. “I’ve told you before, don’t talk about that woman in our place, it makes ’is heart act up. If you got to talk about that woman, step outside and do it on th’ dadblamed street.”
“She means business,” said Father Tim, lowering his head in case anything started flying.
“I’m a journalist!” J.C. yelled in the general direction of the grill. “I can’t confine my inquiry to the upstanding, kindhearted, and lovable; it’s my duty to dig down, get at the truth wherever it exists, and report it to the readers—whether some people like it or not!”
“Preach it, brother!” said Mule under his breath. He’d never much cared for Velma Mosley, who, just for meanness and only last week, had served him a side of slaw made with pickles when she knew for a fact that he despised pickles.
Father Tim was surprised to see Ed Coffey out and about in broad daylight. Though often observed chauffeuring Edith Mallory, Ed otherwise kept a low profile in Mitford—some said Ed drove his employer to Wesley, where all grocery shopping and other errands were done. Yet here was Ed Coffey in the produce aisle of The Local, only a couple of feet ahead.
When Father Tim first came to Lord’s Chapel, he’d often seen Ed at the Grill. Everyone agreed he’d been a decent enough fellow, born and raised just down the road, until Edith and Pat Mallory hired him. Soon after Pat dropped dead of a heart attack and tumbled down his hall stairs, the town saw a change in Ed. He became furtive, sullen, and short-tempered, as if Edith’s toxic nature had somehow contaminated him.
Father Tim started to turn his cart around and head in the other direction, but stopped abruptly. No, he wouldn’t go the other way. He rolled his cart alongside the man who, on a warm August morning, was wearing a black raincoat and the billed cap he sported in his role as chauffeur.
“Good morning, Ed.”
Ed Coffey turned, startled.
“I hear you’re mongering some pretty negative stuff about Harley Welch and George Gaynor.” Emma Newland might be a lot of things, but she was no liar.
Ed’s face flushed with anger. “I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, I don’t know anybody named Gaynor.”
“If you did know this particular Gaynor, I believe you’d find him to be upright, law-abiding, and a contribution to our community. As for Harley Welch, he, too, has paid his debt to society and proves daily to be a kind and responsible citizen. I pray you’ll find it in your heart to think twice…before misrepresenting these men again.”
“Where do you come off, tellin’ me what to do about somebody I never heard of? Preachers think they know it all—goin’ around actin’ high an’ mighty, tellin’ innocent people how to live.”
Father Tim walked away, pushing his cart toward the seafood case. Ed Coffey, it appeared, did not take kindly to reprimand.
“Fresh salmon!” he told Avis Packard. “That’s what I was hoping. But of course your seafood comes in on Thursday, and if I buy it on Thursday, I’d have to freeze it ’til Monday.”
“For ten bucks I can have a couple pounds flown in fresh on Monday, right off th’ boat. Should get here late afternoon.”
No one in the whole of Mitford would pay hard-earned money to have salmon shipped in. But his wife loved fresh salmon, and this was no time to compromise. Not for ten bucks, anyway.
“Book it!” he said, grinning.
“You understand th’ ten bucks is just for shippin’. Salmon’s extra.”
“Right.”
“OK!” Avis rubbed his hands together with undisguised enthusiasm. “I’ve got just the recipe!”
Some were born to preach, others born to shop, and not a few, it seemed, born to meddle. Avis was born to advocate the culinary arts. Father Tim
took a notepad and pen from his jacket pocket. “Shoot!”
“Salmon roulade!” announced Avis. “Tasty, low-fat, and good for diabetes.”
“Just what the doctor ordered!” said Father Tim, feeling good about life in general.
After putting the groceries away, he made a quick swing up the hill to the hospital, where he prayed with Joe Ivey. Then he visited the Sprouses, where he dropped off dog treats, delivered a pot of chives for Rachel’s kitchen window, prayed with Bill, and was able to witness, firsthand, Buddy’s Bible quiz. Afterward, he hustled to Hope House, where he sat on the footstool and provided rough harmony for Louella’s rendition of “Bread of Life,” after which he took the elevator to the dining room and found Pauline.
“How do you feel about tomorrow?”
“It’s all right,” she said. “I don’t blame Sammy for not wantin’ to see me. I understand.”
“You do?”
“Yessir, I think I do. Just look at th’ miracles God has worked in our family. But I’m countin’ on Him for two more. Do you think that’s askin’ too much?”
He saw the scar on her cheek from the terrible burn. “Never! Saint Paul reminds us that God is able to do super-abundantly, over and above all that we ask or think. But it may take time.”
“Yes,” she said. “I know.”
He hugged her, wordless. Pauline was the one whom God had chosen to give Dooley Barlowe to the world, to him; he was extra thankful for that gift.
It was a conundrum.
As technological advances increased to make people’s lives easier, life became increasingly difficult, i.e., faster, more frantic, more complicated and demanding, all due, in his opinion, to technological advances.
Nonetheless, he could hardly wait to get hold of his e-mail.
“Everybody’s online,” said Emma, giving him a look that would stop a clock.
“Good for them!” he said, more determined than ever to go against the grain.
Timothy, for heaven’s sake
