"Batter off Dead" - читать интересную книгу автора (Myers Tamar)

6

“Miss Yoder, you’re up!”

“It’s these ding-dang hemorrhoids-pardon my French, Little Jacob.”

“You know, of course, that’s insulting to the French people.”

“Are ding and dang really swear words?” The first rule of good espionage is that should one get caught, one must rely on the D word: deflect.

“No,” Chris said, “they aren’t, but they are intended as replacements for swear words, so it is as if you said the real words.”

I pretended to let that sink in. “I see your point,” I said after an uncomfortable length of time had passed. “You know, Chief, it just occurred to me that you are no longer quite as sweet and respectful as you were when you first moved here from California.”

His eyes widened in surprise. “I’m not?”

“To the contrary, dear, if you were a character in a book, you might even be labeled annoying. No doubt some impatient reader would toss the book across the room and promise never to buy another of that author’s books ever again.”

The drawer I’d ravaged was still slightly ajar, but young Chris absentmindedly closed it with his knee. “Wow! I didn’t see that one coming.”

“We never do, do we? Now, be a dear and hand me the goodies. You wouldn’t happen to have an extra cup around here for the milk, would you? I’d drink from the carton, but I usually end up spilling on myself, and these maternity outfits are bling-blang expensive.”

“You don’t want it for your tea?”

“What? And ruin a perfectly good, albeit cold, cup of Constant Comment?”

In the end, until we received an autopsy report from Harrisburg, there was nothing young Chris and I could do but make a list of everyone who could have touched Minerva J. Jay’s hotcakes that morning, and then jot down a few notes listing why he, or she, would have, or would not have, done the dastardly deed. There were “would haves” for every possible suspect, if only because Miss Jay was not a likable person.

This not to say, I must hasten to add, that disliking someone gives an individual license to murder-or Lord only knows, I’d be dead-but rather that everything else being equal, and one was bent on killing someone, then why not make it Minerva? I think I speak for everyone when I say that she was not going to be missed; even her pet cat, Mr. Patty-cakes Woo-woo, followed the paper boy home one day.

As for the “would not haves”-while young Chris was willing to cut a few of the older folks a break, I saw them all as having the potential to take a human life. I know, that sounds absolutely horrid of me, and perhaps it was the hormones speaking, but when you really think about it, you need to look no further than the Holy Bible (and the New King James Version at that), to see that this is true.

Folks in the Good Book were always smiting each other, and a lot of the smiters are supposed to be our heroes. Why, just look at King David. He sent poor Uriah into battle at the front of the line, just hoping he’d get killed, so he could do the palace hokey pokey with Bathsheba. Well, guess what? Uriah did get killed, which makes King David not only a murderer, but an adulterer, yet we recite his psalms frequently in church and at just about every funeral.

My point is that if the man who wrote “The Lord Is My Shepherd” was capable of such a dastardly deed, then the hunched-over little old woman with the unromantic name of Frankie Schwartzentruber can also be a dangerous killer. Of course, there was no way someone as inexperienced in life as Chief Ackerman could be expected to reach the same conclusion. So when I was quite through sharing my opinions, and pretending to listen to him (by which time I’d long finished the artichokes and the milk), I decided to hightail my fanny across the street and torture a man who’d made my life miserable as a child.

Sam Yoder and I are first cousins, except that we’re not. That too is a long story, and not one to be covered here, except to say that I only recently found out that I was adopted-oh, not only that, but I’m also a full sibling to my nemesis, Melvin Stoltzfus, who happens to be an escaped murderer. Now, where was I?

“ Magdalena, you look lost.”

“Huh?” I was standing just inside the door to Sam’s shop, and I must admit I seemed to have forgotten my agenda on account of something being not quite right.

“But as beautiful and radiant as ever. I swear, Magdalena, if there is anything sexier than a pregnant woman, it’s you.”

“For your information, Sam, I am a woman. However, in light of the fact that I need to pick your meager brain, I shall interpret what you said as a compliment.”

Sam Yoder’s Corner Market has just three aisles, and as the front door boasts a strap of sleigh bells, it is almost impossible for him not to keep track of his customers. His extra vigilance meant that either he had some particularly juicy (and perhaps helpful) gossip to share, or else he wished to pursue his sex comment further. Just for the record, Sam is an ex-Mennonite, having left the fold in order to marry a Methodist.

“Trust me, Magdalena, I have never doubted your womanliness-not since you blossomed in the fifth grade like an Israeli desert. And of course my brain is yours for the picking, although I prefer to think of it as intellectual foreplay.” He winked lasciviously.

“Shame on you, Sam; you’re a married man.”

“Yes, but unhappily so. The last time Dorothy and I consummated our marriage-”

I clapped my hands over my ears, but not so tight I couldn’t hear the rest of his statement. “Even so, I am a happily married woman.”

“Yeah, finally. But how long will that last? You and Gabe don’t have a trouble-free marriage.”

“Who does?” If I said it breezily, perhaps it was due to the hole between my ears. I made this shocking discovery only recently, when I suddenly realized how little I knew-about anything. Rest assured, however, I was not about to reveal my embarrassing condition to anybody, least of all Sam Yoder.

“You’re a stubborn woman, Magdalena. The more you stand your ground, the more irresistible you become. Right now you’re hotter than Angelina Jolie.”

“You’re a wicked man, Sam. May I assume that the chief told you all about Minerva’s untimely demise?”

My former kinsman snorted. “You call that untimely? I’d have run her over with my delivery truck years ago if I’d thought I could get away with it.”

I couldn’t help gasping. Even for a Methodist that was going a bit far.

“And you call yourself a Christian!”

“Just hold your horses, Magdalena, until you hear what I have to say. But in the meantime, knowing you as I do, would you care to have a snack? I’m working on a couple of boxes of stale cookies and a gallon of slightly off orange juice; can’t afford to throw away inventory just because of due dates. Speaking of which, you look pretty close. Would you like to sit down? I can pull my chair around from behind the counter.”

It saddens me to say that the offer he’d just made was by far his most generous ever. But alas, this sort of miserly behavior is quite in keeping with Sam’s character. When asked for food to contribute to family gatherings, he donates day-old bread and cold-cut packages that have been pried open by cautious customers. However, one must remember not to pile the coals of scorn too high on my pseudo-cousin’s head. I mean, surely a good deal of the blame must lie with his maternal ancestress: persnickety Priscilla Peabody of Parsippany, whose parsimony was legendary. It was said she could squeeze blood from a persimmon, but I again digress.

“I hate alliteration,” Sam said.

“What?”

“I said, ‘You don’t look so hot.’ Don’t get me wrong, you still look hotter than Angelina, but you look kind of sick.”

“Uh-huh. I think I need to use the bathroom.”

He pointed to the rear of the store. “Well, you know where it is. Just don’t blame me if you see anything lying around-you know, like magazines and such-because it’s my private bathroom. I don’t normally let customers use it.”

“Don’t worry.” I hadn’t taken more than three steps when I felt my thighs become drenched with warm liquid.

“ Magdalena! You could have at least held it in a few seconds longer!”

Believe me, I was mortified. Then terrified. It wasn’t time yet, not for that to happen. It was still two weeks too early. Besides, there was no way I was going to even begin the process of welcoming Little Jacob into the world in Sam Yoder ’s miserable excuse for a grocery store.

“I didn’t! I mean, it’s nothing; just a little too much coffee this morning, that’s all.”

Sam may have been a slimy, slithering sleazebag, to put it kindly, but he wasn’t a brainless slug. When it sank into his elliptical bald head that my water had broken, he lunged for his desk phone.

“I’m calling 911,” he said. “Then I’m calling Gabe. Anyone else?”

“Oprah? Sam, it isn’t what you think. It’s just an embarrassing little episode of-holy Toledo!” I all but dropped to my knees as Little Jacob, no doubt inspired by Sam’s lunge, dove for the nearest exit. Honestly, it was an abdominal pain the likes and intensity of which I’d never before experienced.

Sam’s dialing hand froze while a smirk spread across his smarmy face. “Why, Magdalena, I do believe you swore.”

“I did not! But since you’re going to call, call now.”

“All right, all right.” He leaned on his checkout counter while he talked, and he talked far too long. My Amish cook, Freni, could have baked yeast rolls from scratch while he alternately nodded and mumbled.

“Well?” I demanded, quite reasonably after two real minutes (as measured by the clock above the counter) had passed. “What’s taking so long?”

“Shh! I can’t hear what she’s saying if you insist on prattling in my ear.”

I wasn’t anywhere near his ear, a fact for which Sam should thank his lucky stars. “Jumping junipers and a pear tree,” I screeched as a second pain shot like a lightning bolt down my abdomen to my nether regions.

Instead of getting off the phone, Sam stared at his watch while talking louder. “Yes, that was her. Look, you’ve got to send someone out; I can’t do this alone.”

The hairs on the nape of my neck stood up as I, true to form, assumed the worst. “Do what?”

“But I’ve never birthed a baby before,” he all but shouted into the phone.

“And you won’t now! Give me that dang thing!” Normally, given his strength, playing keep-away with Sam would be a losing proposition for me. But by leading with my belly (sorry, Little Jacob) I was able to unnerve him to the point where I could have grabbed a million dollars in cash from his register. Wresting the phone from him was child’s play.

Nonetheless, Sam had to catch his breath. “You don’t want to know, Magdalena.”

“Yes, I do,” I hollered into the receiver. “What is going on?”

The person on the other end of the line swore at me for shouting but caught herself after the third invective. “Why, Magdalena Yoder, is that you?”

“Thelma Liddleputt?”

“Indeed it is. I don’t believe we’ve spoken since the tenth grade.”

“And there’s no time to speak now, dear, unless it has to do with the situation at hand. Where is the ambulance, and what is all this about Sam birthing my baby?”

“Uh-I take it he didn’t tell you?”

“No, we’ve been too busy having tea and crumpets. Of course he didn’t tell me-he just got off the phone!”

“ Magdalena, sarcasm does not become you; it never did. Remember that time in biology class when we were lab partners and we had to dissect a-”

“Tell me where the ambulance is, Thelma, or I’ll crawl through this phone line, belly and all, and do to you what we did to that frog-oops! I’m sorry, Thelma, I really am. The Devil made me say that.”

There followed an unforgivably long pause. “I’ll forgive you, Magdalena, but only because you’re in the final stages of labor, and due to the mass poisonings at your church, there isn’t an ambulance available in the tri-county area.”