"Coffee better be strong," growled the Congressman. "Damned impossible to get any sleep around here. First that young bimbo goes into histrionics, then some mystery guest takes a header down those wicked stairs of yours. I can hardly wait to see what you've got planned for tonight."
"There is a banister," I pointed out quickly. "And it's fastened to the wall quite securely. The stairs are really very safe."
"And charming, too," said Lydia graciously. "Very Old World in style. They remind me of Europe."
I flashed her a grateful smile. "Thank you."
"Better do something with those damned stairs," snarled the Congressman.
"Is that a hint?" I asked sweetly. If he's not looking, a woman can push a man down a flight of stairs, just as easily as the other way around.
The three of them sat down and began to eat. I stole another glance at Delbert, and then at the Congressman. They both seemed half-asleep. Like Lydia, they were wearing brand-new duds. Why on earth, I wondered, would anybody wear new clothes to tramp around in a woods, unless they planned to be seen? Granted, these were not your typical interview clothes, but they had to be a long way from comfortable.
"Everything all right, folks?" I asked. Perhaps I was just a wee bit brusque because no one, not even the Congressman, responded right away. Like the obedient child I used to be, they ate in silence.
"Got any more of that delicious apple butter you served last night?" asked Delbert after a while.
"Coming right up."
"Any more of that nice, crisp bacon?" asked the Congressman, suddenly coming to life. For a second I was flattered, but then he added, "Or were those charcoal briquettes?"
"He's only kidding, aren't you, dear?" said Lydia quickly. Her face had colored to the point that it almost matched her shirt.
Frankly, I felt more sorry for her than I did angry at the Congressman. I got paid to put up with his rudeness. She, on the other hand, paid his bills. At least that's what the papers said.
"The hell I am," he snapped. "The food here is garbage. The service stinks. The - "
Lydia clamped a dainty, manicured hand over her husband's mouth. She couldn't have been more foolish had she tried to muzzle Shnookums. The Congressman may not have been in the habit of biting, but he showed no hesitation when it came to hitting. The blow he gave her was on the side of the head and with the palm of his hand. It was hard enough so that she tipped back in her chair and had to struggle to regain her balance. Why he simply didn't push her hand away, was beyond me. Papa had never hit Mama to my knowledge, nor she him, and neither of them would so much as raise their voice in front of strangers, no matter how vexed they got.
"What the hell!" said Delbert, jumping up, but beyond that he made no move to intervene.
"Stay out of this," growled the Congressman. "This is a family matter." He stood up himself and grabbed his wife by the arm. "Bring the car around in half an hour," he said, presumably to Delbert, then he dragged his wife out of the room.
Delbert sat mutely down. Not knowing what else to do, I scurried into the kitchen and got the apple butter. When I returned, Delbert was sitting just as I'd left him.
"Does he do that often?" I asked, setting the apple butter down in front of him.
Delbert appeared to shake himself mentally, and offered me a weak smile. "Of course not."
I leaned forward in my best conspiratorial stance. "I don't vote," I whispered. God forgives unselfish lies. "And I can keep my trap shut tighter than a cork on a jug of raw cider." Oh the shame of having read so many dime novels as a child.
"If he lays a hand on her one more time, I'll kill him."
"Poor woman." "The man's a bastard. She doesn't deserve any of it."
"Why does she put up with it?"
He shook his head. "Damned if I know. She doesn't need -him. It's him who needs her. Her money, her connections. He's just small potatoes politically, and will always be without her support."
"Maybe it's love?" Love had never even managed to sweep me off my feet, much less moved me to accept being boxed up the side of the head.
"Love? Ha! Try pity."
Even that was hard for me to understand. "Maybe you're right. But why do you put up with him? Aren't there other
Congressmen you could work for? Or, why not just run for office yourself?"
Delbert stirred the apple butter, like a witch stirring her pot. "There are many mysteries to this world, aren't there, Miss
Yoder?"
"The English are full of mysteries," said Freni. I nearly jumped out of my shoes. "Where in tarnation did you come from?"
"I work here, remember?"
"I thought you quit."
"So, I un-quit. You want a cook for breakfast, don't you?"
I wasn't so sure. Now that the meat-eaters had eaten, and the veggie-devourers were about to descend. Freni might be more of a liability than an asset. "Why don't you cook breakfast for Mr. Grizzle when he comes down," I suggested, "and I'll handle those other picky eaters."
Freni folded her stubby arms over her crisp, starched apron and glared. "Magdalena, I am not the fool you take me for.
I've got brains. I can tell when it's time to make a few changes. And I'm not such an old dog that I can't learn new tricks. If it's raw carrots those English want for breakfast, then that's what I'll give them."
If I'd had any brains of my own, I would have come up with a good excuse and sent Freni home with pay. At least just for the next few days. But, alas, at times I can be stupider than Melvin Stoltzfus, who tried to milk a bull and got kicked in the head for his efforts. Mercifully, Melvin was thereafter never fully conscious of his blunder. If only I could be so lucky.
"Just kick me in the head," I said to Freni, "and start cooking."
"What?"
"I think I'll leave you two ladies to your work and check in on the Congressman," said Delbert politely. He was obviously a man who had been well brought up and knew when to be discreet.
After he'd gone, I began to clear off the table, but Freni didn't budge.
"Well," I said at last, "isn't it time to start frying some eggless, milkless, buckwheat pancakes - in vegetable oil, of course?"
"Not until you apologize."
"For what?"
"For firing me, that's what!"
"I didn't fire you, dear. You quit!"
"You should still apologize, Magdalena Yoder. Your mama would never have treated me this way."
That did it. Even after ten years, just the mention of Mama or Papa has a powerful effect on me. Freni knew this and was playing dirty. What she didn't know was that I had been awakened in the wee hours by a screaming arachnophobiac and had been mangled by a midget mutt. Throw in a crumpled corpse, and I had a full plate. I was in no mood for one of her guilt trips.
"Okay, Freni. Since you 'un-quit,' I'll 'un-apologize.' " I think Freni also has a Stoltzfus up her family tree.
"Apology accepted. Shall I serve butter with the pancakes?"
"Just put it on a plate for those who want it. Mr. Grizzle, however, gets bacon with his."
Freni was remarkably cooperative that morning, and I confess to being lulled into a false sense of complacency. I didn't even get my feathers ruffled when Jeanette Parker came bustling in and demanded to know if the hunting party had left yet.
"I don't know," I said honestly. "Did they eat?"
I studied her calmly. She was wearing a loose, pajama-like outfit that looked as if it were made from burlap sacking. A matching strip of the coarse brown fiber was tied around her head like a scarf, and knotted on top. The two ends stood almost straight up and looked for all the world like deer ears. Almost none of her carrot-red hair was showing.
"What color is your coat?" Too much had happened for me to remember it from the day before.
"What?"
"Your coat. Is it at least red or blue?"
"My coat is none of your damned business, Ms. Yoder!"
"Suit yourself." Even Mama would have lost patience with this woman.
"Well, have they eaten or not?" She was tapping away impatiently with a brown brogan. A flamenco dancer she was not.
"I don't divulge my guests' activities. Even yours."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
I didn't know. But now I wished I did. For a brief moment Jeanette looked like the cat who had been caught with her paw in a fishbowl.
"Orange or tomato juice?" I asked as pleasantly as I could.
Just then Freni entered with a stack of buckwheat pancakes and a jug of warm, homemade maple syrup. Just before she sat down, I could see Jeanette's brown, burlap-covered chest inhale the aroma that was wafting from the plate.
"Any more for me?" I turned to see Billy Dee Grizzle standing in the doorway. The dark circles under his eyes made him look older than I had remembered. Much too old for Susannah, for sure. And there seemed to be a bruise or a scratch on his right cheekbone that I hadn't noticed before. Perhaps he had whacked himself with the shovel while digging for night crawlers. That sort of thing happens, you know. Myrna Stoltzfus, who was my best friend in grammar school, once knocked herself out with her own lunch pail.
"There's plenty more," I said. "Do you want coffee?"
"Caffeine has been shown to cause cancer in laboratory rats," said Jeanette, her mouth already full of pancake.
Billy laughed. "So has too much sex."
"What?"
Billy ignored her and sat down. "I'd love some coffee, Miss Yoder."
"Magdalena," I mouthed. As I was pouring his coffee, Joel and Linda came into the room. "Have they left yet?" they both asked at once.
"That's what I want to know," said Jeanette. Her mouth was again full of pancake, and little pieces sprayed out when she talked.
"Well, come on, guys, we gotta find out," exhorted Linda. She, for one, seemed pretty chipper. It was certainly not obvious that she had recently suffered a near death experience at the hands of something with eight feet.
"Relax, folks," drawled Billy Dee. "Garrett's Buick pulled out of here about twenty minutes ago. They're long gone."
Jeanette brayed and sprayed something unprintable, and then shoved in another bite.
"Well, we can still catch up with them, can't we?" asked Joel. Judiciously, he chose to sit as far as he could from Jeanette.
Linda sat down beside Billy.
"It's worth a try," said Jeanette, showing me more pancake than I cared to see. "Even a forest filled with hunters is bound to be safer than this dump. I say we hit the road, and pronto."
"A state forest is an awfully big place," said Linda. I examined her face for signs of Stoltzfus blood.
"It doesn't matter a hill of beans," explained Billy Dee patiently. 'We want to catch them coming out with their buck, not just tramping around in some dang woods. We want a picture the reporters can sink their teeth into."
I swallowed hard. "Reporters?"
"At the woods," Billy reassured me, "when they come back to the car. Not here, Miss Yoder."
"But what about their poor deer?" Linda cried.
Billy patted her shoulder.
"Don't worry," I hastened to reassure her, "hundreds of other deer will be killed as well." Come to think of it, great- grandmother Kauffman was originally a Stoltzfus.
Even Linda surprised me then, by bursting into tears and burying her head in Billy's brawny shoulder.
Jeanette glared, but I couldn't tell if it was at me or at Billy, who was sitting opposite me. Then her mouth flew open and the remnants of at least half of a buck-wheat pancake came spewing out.
"Gross," said Billy Dee, who is otherwise so polite. "Eggs!" she rasped.
"What?" I demanded. I was in no mood for false accusations.
"There's an eggshell in the pancakes. So there's got to be eggs!"
"Prove it."
Jeanette poked around in the detritus on her plate and eventually came up with a little white speck that shouldn't have been worth mentioning. "There!"
"Freni!"
Freni materialized almost immediately, wiping her hands on her apron. "Yes?"
"Freni, did you put eggs in those pancakes?"
Freni looked me straight in the eye. "Didn't the children of Israel put straw in their bricks?"
"What?"
"She's nuts," Jeanette had the nerve to say.
"Freni, you weren't making bricks, you were making pancakes. Did you use eggs?"
