Hens and Chickens (23 page)

Hobart, spying Lila, excused himself abruptly from his conversation with Maude, stood up and strode to her side. “You look beautiful, darling,” he said, slipping an arm around her waist and pulling her to him. He kissed her on the cheek. He could not have announced their relationship to their friends any more clearly than had he asked them to stand with him and Lila at the church altar.

Lila flushed happily, and the world became rosy once again.

Rebecca invited everyone into the dining room just as the gingerbread clock on the living room mantle
clanged
2 p.m. She easily indicated where each of the guests was to sit, and they all pulled up their chairs and settled down like setting hens to get to work on the business before them. The cheerful table was laid with Rebecca’s steaming feast and many hearts quickened. There was an expectant pause, however, as seven sets of eyes automatically turned to the head of the table, where Wendell was carefully unfolding his cloth napkin onto his lap. 

Wendell felt the amplified attention. He looked up and was momentarily flummoxed. He realized that Sunday dinner etiquette required some few spoken words from the head of the table, but his Quaker heritage relied upon quiet not vocal prayer. He recoiled inward, and regretted that he had been so quick to secure the plum post.

Miss Hastings, sitting at Wendell’s right hand, leaped to the rescue. “We thank the GOOD LORD for bringing us together here today,” she gushed; “and thank our hostesses for providing us with this WONDERFUL food! Amen.”

“Amen!” repeated the little group, of which the loudest was Wendell Russell.

The food was passed around with the joking and jostling characteristic of intimate dining, and the meal proceeded under the watchful consideration of Rebecca. She kept an eye on every dish, noted the piles of food on every plate, and mentally measured the liquid level in every water glass. The first 10 minutes progressed with no remark more scintillating than a few humorous exclamations and directives such as “pass the butter, please.” A good deal of quiet attention was paid to eating, however, which is the highest compliment any chef can receive—and Rebecca was gratified by it.

Maude Gilpin, always the consummate hostess herself, shortly initiated the conversation. “Thanks for all those lovely fiddleheads, kids,” she said to Mike and Lila, who were both close at hand. “I’m baking my usual fiddlehead quiches for the church fundraiser in two weeks. I’ll let you know ASAP how many eggs I’ll need,” she said to Lila. “Last year I think I used 30 dozen.”

“Thirty dozen!” exclaimed Lila. “How many quiches do you make?”

“I baked about 100 last year. I think the two pails of fiddleheads you gathered are enough to do that again.”

“Oh, my goodness!” exclaimed Rebecca, dropping her fork and losing her concentration altogether. She was the only one present who truly understood how much work the baking of 100 fiddlehead quiches represented.

“Folks come from three counties to buy one of my Maude’s fiddlehead quiches,” Ralph said, proudly. He threw his left arm affectionately around his wife’s fat, round shoulders. “Thet church would be on life support if it warn’t for my Maude!”

“Is that the little white church at the corner?” Lila asked, curiously.

“Only one we got in town,” said Ralph. “A white dinosaur, if ya ask me.”

“I’ve wanted to stop in and see that church ever since I came to Sovereign!” said Rebecca. “It’s such a lovely old building.”

Maude leaned in front of her husband to catch Rebecca’s eye. “Feel free to stop into the church anytime, dearie,” she encouraged. “The door is always open. It’s a quiet, calming place. Sometimes I just stop in so’s I can have some peaceful time to myself.”

Gilpin guffawed, and his grandson tittered.

“How many people go to church there?” Rebecca asked.

“Ain’t many,” Ralph answered her. “They ought to shut them doors for good, but the townfolks won’t let ‘em.”

“Don’t be sayin’ negative things, now,” Maude chastened her husband. “That church is a piece of our history!” She gathered herself and addressed the table at large. “Most folks don’t know it’s a Union Church – a joining of the original Quaker, Methodist and Universalist churches we once had in town,” she said. “SOME of us are trying to keep it part of our future, too. And to answer your question, dearie, we’ve got about a 150 members, but only 25 or 30 attend like we do on a regular basis.”

“Course ‘twould probably help if there was a regular minister,” Wendell suggested, getting his vocal sea legs again.

“Ayuh,” Ralph agreed. “The one we got’s only in the pulpit every
other
Sunday.”

“She’s an itinerant,” Maude said, defensively. “She’s got other churches to cover. She can’t be here all the time, because we can’t afford a settled minister.”

“That’s too bad,” Rebecca empathized.

“She sure is an odd duck,” continued Ralph; “what with running naked through the goldenrod in summer, ‘n all!”

Wendell chuckled. “Traffic does kinda pick up on the Cross Road come August, don’t it?”

“What’s that?” said Lila, intrigued. She looked from Wendell to Ralph, inquisitively. “Why does the traffic pick up on the Cross Road in August?”

“Thet’s where the minister lives,” replied Ralph. “Come August she strips down bare-ass naked and goes runnin’ through her field of goldenrod like Lady Godiva, only without the hoss!”

“Shushhh! There’s children present!” exclaimed Maude.

“I’m 15, Grandma; I ain’t a kid.”

“Ain’t like
she’s
a kid no more, neither!” Ralph quipped

“Well, she’s a dahrrrling woman,” interjected Miss Hastings. “Her sermons are WONDERFULLY funny. I go almost every Sunday she’s preaching just to get a good laugh, even if it IS sometimes at myself!”

“Didja know she’s a Quaker, jest like ole Wendell here?” Ralph said to Miss Hastings.

Miss Hastings shook her head. Her rioting dark hair threatened to come unglued and tumble to the table like a dropped can of worms. “I knew there was something special about her!”

“Say, buddy, how’d you like that lawnmower?” Hobart asked Gray, calculating that it was time to turn the table conversation in another direction.

“It’s awesome!” Gray exclaimed. “I’m comin’ over next Wednesday to mow the yard.”

“Kid ain’t never used a ridin’ mower before. I’ll probably never git him to mow our lawn evah agin,” grumbled Ralph.

“I will if ya pay me, Grandpa.”

Under the watchful eye of his wife, Ralph choked back the sharp retort aimed at his grandson. “Thanks for gettin’ the thing up and runnin’, Mike,” he said, instead.

“No problem. I used to mow lawns for spending money when I was his age.”

“Well, dahrrrling,” Miss Hastings said to the teenager; “you’ll just have to drive that big old rig right up the road to my house and mow MY lawn, too!”

“Awesome!” repeated Gray, quickly calculating in his mind how rich he would become by the end of the summer.

Lila, who wanted to hear everything there was to hear about Mike Hobart’s childhood in Maple Grove, was disappointed when the conversation turned away from him. Her mind momentarily wandered off, but she came to, startled, when she felt the proprietary touch of a masculine hand on her right thigh beneath the tablecloth. She flushed with pleasure and glanced at Hobart. He winked, and squeezed her leg. Lila’s heart swelled like a tree frog in full song.

The main course proceeded until nearly all the food was abolished. Rebecca and Lila then began a steady stream of removing the plates and serving dishes, and preparing the pies, coffee and tea for the dessert course. Maude offered to help, but when her assistance was graciously declined she turned to keep the guests occupied, respectful of Rebecca’s sovereign right to the kitchen duties.

After the hot beverages were served, the custard and strawberry-rhubarb pies were produced with a stack of dessert plates to the open admiration of those present. Rebecca seated herself in front of the pies with her porcelain pie server and expertly began carving up pieces and dishing them out to the expectant guests. She served Miss Hastings first, and then went around the table proffering juicy slices based on the traditional etiquette with which Emily Post adherents will be well acquainted. Rebecca served herself last, and settled back into her chair to enjoy her own two slivers of pie.

In the seat next to her, Wendell smacked his lips with satisfaction. “Thet’s the best strawberry-rhubarb pie I evah et,” he pronounced, earnestly. “Not even Grammie Addie coulda done bettah!”

“Oh, well, my!” Rebecca said, blushing.

Wendell’s acclaim was echoed around the table. Maude even went so far as to ask for the recipe, which to Rebecca, still marveling over the 100 quiches, was the highest praise of all.

“Thet custard’s pretty darn good, too,” said Ralph. “Must be them eggs!” He chuckled pleasantly at his own backhanded compliment to Lila and
The Egg Ladies
.

“I just hope I’ve got enough eggs for Maude’s fiddlehead quiches,” Lila said, worriedly. “I’m getting almost eight dozen a day, now, though, so I should be alright!”

“Just give those hens an extra charge of sunflower seeds and you’ll get more eggs than you know what to do with!” exhorted Miss Hastings.

Lila smiled. “I’ll need a lot more than 50 pounds!” she replied, her heart skipping happily over the memory of the big bag of sunflower seeds that had brought her and Mike Hobart together.

“I’ll help unload ‘em,” Hobart offered, innocently; and everyone laughed.

Once again, Lila found herself marveling how differently her life would have been had Joe Kelly NOT fired Rebecca, and had she not quit her job in protest. She said a little private prayer. And then she was even emboldened enough to search for Mike Hobart’s hand beneath the tablecloth!

Chapter 22

“I Can’t Do This!”

When the dessert plates were being cleared away from the dinner guests, Gray eagerly excused himself to return to the youthful delights encompassed by the barn and the riding lawn mower. Rebecca refilled the coffee and tea cups, and the pleasant aromas unconsciously refreshed the spirits of her guests. She reclaimed her seat, and a satisfied silence descended on the little group of adults. It was a sensation not unlike the palpable, heartfelt
hush
that settles over a quiet, unprogrammed Quaker meeting. One could almost feel the presence of a sacred mother hen gathering baby chicks under her heavenly wings:
“For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

After a minute or two of comfortable quiet, Miss Hastings spoke up. “That was a WONDERFUL meal!” she proclaimed. “You could even give my old friend Ma Jean a run for her money!” she added, speaking directly across the table to Rebecca.

“Thank you
so
much,” said Rebecca. “Lila and I wanted to take the opportunity to show our gratitude to all of our new friends in Sovereign.”

“Absolutely!” Lila avowed. “We couldn’t have gotten
The Egg Ladies
off the ground without ALL of you!”

“Hear, hear!” said Ralph Gilpin, thumping the table with his arthritic fist.

“Amen!” added Wendell with religious fervor, perhaps making amends for his earlier balk.

“How does it feel to be back in the old place, Wendell?” Mike Hobart asked, regarding the chicken farmer curiously. “Does it seem strange to be here?”

Wendell took a moment for consideration. “Wal, you know, feels pretty good. Course I didn’t used to sit
heah
at the table,” he admitted. “This was old Pap’s spot. And after Pappy died Grammie Addie jest left his chair empty.”

“Where DID you sit?” asked Lila, glancing around the table, attempting to picture the extended Russell family at a Sunday dinner in 1950.

“Wal, right there in yore seat,” he replied. “Next to Grammie Addie. She kept me pretty close at hand to make sure I et all my vegetables.”

The little group laughed. His reply gave Rebecca an idea, however. “Why don’t you tell us a story from your childhood, Wendell,” she said, lightly touching his flannel shirt sleeve. “Would you mind?”

Wendell Russell’s worn-out old heart did a backflip at Rebecca’s intimate touch, and new power surged into his tired battery. “Wal, you know, I don’t mind,” he said, flashing a gold-toothed grin.

The little group settled back into their seats in anticipation. Hobart, whose left hand was reclining on Lila’s leg, reached up and secured hers from where it was resting on the table. The eyes met, and he gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. Lila heard the joyful sound of sleigh bells in her heart.

“Course ‘twas pretty hard work ‘round heah most of the time,” Wendell began; “I never see Grammie Addie sit down ‘cept for meals. But every year in May – when the sun got good ‘n hot but jest afore the black flies come out – we’d all git dressed up in our Sunday best and take a picnic down to the Millett Rock.”

“I’ll be goddammed,” said Ralph. “I ain’t thought of the Millett Rock in 50 years!”

“Shushhh,” said Maude. “It’s
his
story.”

“What’s the Millett Rock?” asked Lila, momentarily distracted from Hobart’s attentions.

“She’s a big ole boulder the glacier left behind on its last pass through, ‘bout the size of thet white church down to the corner,” Wendell said. “Thet rock’s been parked in the woods ‘cross the way for 11,000 years, like a broke down tractah no one could git stahted agin. We used to climb all ovah the Millett Rock when we was kids, and Grammie Addie always put on her big ole bonnet and packed us all a picnic to take down to the Millett Rock every May. ‘Twas ‘bout the only recreation she evah had. She looked forward to thet May picnic more ‘n we kids looked forward to Christmas. I kin still see her scamperin’ up thet rock in her silk dress jest like a young heifer let out of the bahn after a long wintah.”

“We should take a picnic down this year!” Lila said.

“What a WONDERFUL idea!” Miss Hastings concurred.

Wendell looked dubious. “Wal, I ain’t shore if we kin git in there now,” he said. “She’s pretty growed up, what with trees and puckerbrush. Course it used to be all pasture back then and Grammie Addie rode Charity down, she was ole Pap’s favorite work hoss.” He looked apprehensively at 87-year-old Miss Hastings.