“As big as life and twice as ugly.”
It was a true statement. Indeed, there she was, Grandma Yoder, in all her fierceness, complete with bristling bun and bristling mole. The only problem was that Grandma Yoder had been dead for thirty years-no, it was closer to forty by now. How time flies, even when you’re not having fun.
“Don’t look so surprised, Magdalena Portulacca; you’ve seen me before. The fact is, you see me just about every time you manage to-uh-you know.”
“You mean ‘screw up’?”
Apparently Apparition Americans can be just as sensitive as their real- life counterparts were. Grandma Yoder’s face turned six shades of white as she raised a knobby finger, which she pointed just inches from my face.
“I have half a mind to wash your mouth out with soap, little girl.”
“I’m not a little girl, Grandma; I’m fifty-two years old.”
She stepped back and gave me the once-over, as if really seeing me for the first time that evening. “Hmm, so you are; but this is still my house, and I won’t be having you using that kind of language.”
I pushed the chair aside and took a step forward. “No, it’s not your house anymore, Grandma; you died. And Mama and Papa died. This house is mine now-in fact, this isn’t even the same house; the original blew down in a freak tornado.”
“Ha, but can you blame it? Look at the way you’ve been treating this one? There’s a scuff mark on the wall over by the door, and that left lower screw on the hinge should be tightened by a quarter turn.”
“Still a stickler for minutiae, I see.”
“It’s won or lost in the details, Magdalena; that’s what you still don’t seem to understand.”
“What is? What’s lost in the details?”
“It.”
I wanted to grab her by her bony shoulders and shake her. In fact, I tried to, but there is no grasping an Apparition American; they are as ethereal as a Middle East peace plan. Anyway, she’d never get me to agree with her-even if just out of spite-although I really did believe that “broad strokes” approach was the only way to accomplish anything in the rat race this world had become.
“Your way might have worked for you, Grandma-although from what I’ve heard, you were about as happy as a petunia in an onion patch-but I think I’m finally old enough to make my own mistakes-uh, decisions-thank you very much.”
Grandma sighed, an action that has been known to keep dust motes afloat for half an hour. “Fine, have it your way-as
“No, Grandma. Samuel was Grandpa’s name.”
“Well, there’s no need to get huffy!”
“I didn’t. But since you’ve obviously been hanging around for some time, you should have been paying better attention to your great-grandson’s name. And what kind of Mennonite grandma says ‘hunka hunka burning love’? You didn’t listen to the radio when you were alive; you said the Devil lived in there, and inside every TV set in America.”
“And I was right! But I was wrong about Elvis. He’s da bomb. We listen to him all the time over here-but in person. In fact, your grandpa and I are going to a concert tonight.”
At that point I knew that either I was doing some serious hallucinating, or else I had somehow managed to fall asleep and was having one heck of a nightmare. Grandpa Yoder watching Elvis Presley shimmy those hips was as close to being sacrilegious as saying that Noah’s ark was just a story, because there are at least five million insect species in the world, and they would have had to enter in pairs, and just the weight of them alone would have sunk that wooden tub (of course,
“ Magdalena, get ahold of yourself,” I said. At least I thought I said that, but my teeth seemed to be stuck together with taffy, and although I could move my lips, no sound was coming out of my throat.
I tried again. And again. Then again. Finally I could hear a muffled sound, like a voice underwater. I started struggling physically, making swimming motions, even though I was standing in the middle of the parlor-except that I wasn’t.
“Well, ding dang dong dang it!” I swore, when I woke up on the settee, having whacked the back of my hand on some carved wooden roses along the back. “I must have fallen asleep on this genuine reproduction Victorian love seat.”
There was no response-from anyone. No withering, critical grandmother to tell me that I’d paid far too much for a fake that was probably carved in a sweatshop somewhere in China from wood that had been stripped from the last of patch of rain forest on the island of Borneo. I was alone in my inn, alone with my mouth and my thoughts, and the realization that it was really all my doing.
However, since there is nothing to gain by dwelling on the past-at least, not without an audience-I quickly decided to concentrate on the future. The near future. After all, the evening was yet young, and I had miles to go before I’d peep.
“You want to do
“You heard me: I want to play Peeping Magdalena.”
“You’re my best friend, and I thought I knew all your tricks, but this is a new one.”
“Well, I’m all alone-and don’t ask why-so I thought this might be the perfect time to fit in some sleuthing.”
“The Russian!” I felt a mild shock, as a surge of electrical impulses flowed from Agnes over the wires and to my ear. The woman was besotted with Surimanda Baikal. Frankly, it was unseemly-it was probably even forbidden somewhere in the Book of Leviticus.
“No, dear, not her-although come to think of it, I should take this opportunity to hoof it up my impossibly steep stairs and riffle through her belongings.”
“You wouldn’t!” Agnes sounded positively gleeful. “ Magdalena, what if you get caught? What if it’s a trap of some kind?”
“Riffle first, rue later,” I said blithely.
“Ooh, you’re bad,” she said. “In a fun sort of way. Me? I’m just plain old boring Agnes. Boring, fat Agnes. Do you know I haven’t had a single date since that jerk dumped me?”
She was referring to a visitor from one of the square states who swept round Agnes off her feet, proposed marriage, but then left her standing at the altar. If you ask me, she hasn’t quite found her footing since then.
“Well, tonight’s your chance to shake it up a bit, because I’m inviting you to come along peeping with me-nay, I insist that you accompany me.”
“Really?”
“Forsooth. I’ll be there in twenty. We’ll split the difference and meet in ten in front of the police station. I’ll drive from there.”
“Uh-hey, you know I’d really love to do that; in fact, you don’t know how much I’d love to, but tonight’s really not good for me.”
It was then that I first heard a voice in the background. A woman’s voice, perhaps.
“Oh,” I said. “Do you, perchance, have company?”
“Don’t be absurd, Magdalena. You know I never have company-well, sometimes I still get my monthly visitor, but the doctor says even he won’t be stopping in much longer.”
I jiggled a pinkie in my ear to make sure it wasn’t clogged. “You’re monthly visitor is a
“Well, I guess I never thought about that until now. But he’s silent, messy, and a pain in the-”
“There! I heard it again. Whose voice is that?”
“No one’s.”
“No one doesn’t have a voice, so I’m not buying it. Are the uncles over? Did they bring women? Because I thought they were gay.”
“Only one is gay,” Agnes whispered, “and for the millionth time, I’m not telling you which one. But no, it’s not them. It’s the strumpet.”
“Who?”
“Dorothy Yoder.”
“Oh. What’s she doing there?”
“She says she’s lonely. She’s tired of her life of debauchery and wants to walk the straight-and-narrow path again, but none of her old friends will take her back.”
“I didn’t know she had any.”
“Did you know she played the trumpet?”
“You’re kidding.”
“I wish I was. Now that she has the breath to blow it, she practices almost nonstop. She says it brings her peace, but it’s driving me crazy.”
“Hmm. Well, I don’t hear it now.”
“That’s because I’m trying to keep her mouth full of food. Right now she’s eating a crumpet.”
“Somehow I don’t think that’s such a smart plan. If she balloons back up again, it’s going to be all your fault. She’ll hate you for it.”
“I’ll just have to lump it.”
I’m not normally a jealous person, and my pendulum does not swing the other way-not that I judge, mind you-but Agnes was my best friend, and it was my duty to make sure she stayed that way. This was for her sake, as well as mine.
“How long is she staying?”
“Well, that’s the thing: she and Sam got into a slight misunderstanding-”
“You mean a big fight?”
“And how. At one point she climbed out of a second-story window and threatened to jump. It was horrible; Sam just egged her on. ‘Go ahead and jump,’ he said. ‘You don’t weigh as much anymore; it won’t harm the sidewalk.’ ”
“That’s awful! So what did she do? I mean, obviously, she didn’t-right?”
“Right. But when she backed down and wanted to just get away, she couldn’t because he’d hidden the car keys. He did it to be mean, of course.”
“What a grump.”
“It was awful being around him, to hear her tell it. Anyway, she had to ride his bicycle all the way over here, but first she had to fix a flat-pump it up and all that. But since it’s almost eight miles out here she decided to take a short cut across the Neiderlanders’ pasture, which at night, as you know, is as dark as the ace of spades.”
“You know I don’t play with face cards, dear, as they are used for gambling; I only play Rook.”
“Yes, well, she hit a stump-it was only a little one, but enough to cause her to fall on her rump. Somehow she ended up in the old village dump. It was the funniest thing-well, to hear her tell it at any rate.”
I sighed. “Well played, Agnes. Now, can we finally get back to business?”
“Business?”
