As The World Churns Part 24

I cupped my hands to my mouth. "There's a cow loose! Help, somebody! Help me catch this cow before she gets. .h.i.t by a car- or eaten by a bear."

For the record, the sound made by two greedy people cras.h.i.+ng through a woods is almost equal to that made by a prize-win-ning cow. I listened happily to the noise, secure in the knowledge that my SWAT team-Scrawny Wanda and Agnes the Tremen-dous-were loosing my loved ones. Stupidly, I neglected to get my own keester out of harm's way while I had the chance.

37.

"Well, well, look what we have here," Jane said. d.i.c.k was less happy to see me. "Forget about her right now. We can't let the cow get away."

"We can't let her get away either," Jane snarled. Fortunately for her, she had a revolver to back up her att.i.tude.

Unfortunately for me, I had only my mouth. "Oh, look, see spotted cow run. See d.i.c.k run. See Jane run. See d.i.c.k and Jane run after cow."

"Shut up!"

"Oh, oh, oh. See, see, see. See Jane get mad. See Jane puff."

"I said shut up. If you don't, I'll shoot."

"Darn it, Jane," d.i.c.k said (although to be sure, his language was a mite rougher than that), "we've got to catch that darn cow, or else we're really up stick creek without a paddle."

"Look, look, look. See d.i.c.k get mad at Jane. See d.i.c.k and Jane get mad at each other. See spotted cow run very, very far. Run, spotted cow, run, run. See d.i.c.k and Jane in jail for kidnapping."

Perhaps I'd gone too far, because by now Jane really was puffing. Even worse, she was holding her revolver at eye level. "You think you're being funny, Miss Yoder, don't you?"

"Perhaps a wee bit."

"It's not funny," she grunted through clenched teeth.

"Come on, you must admit that the thought of you two serving twenty years in prison, thanks to my mother-in-law riding bareback on a cow, is worthy of a chuckle or two." I tried to ill.u.s.trate my point by chuckling, but instead produced several cackles that would be the envy of hens everywhere. "But seriously, folks, I can already picture you two in your prison duds. You, Jane, should opt for orange instead of stripes-if you get the chance. I mean, with your somewhat dumpy figure and all-well, enough said. Unless, of course, you'd like a boyfriend named Baby Sally. You, d.i.c.k, on the other hand, are a very handsome man, and are sure to draw admirers no matter what your choice of prison clothes. How would you feel about a girlfriend named Thumper Bob? He has a six-inch scar across his face and only two fingers on his right hand, thanks to a game called chicken."

Jane's plain little eyes narrowed to slits, and her revolver began to shake. "I will shoot. Don't tempt me."

"Oh, oh, oh, see Jane shoot. Shoot, Jane, shoot. See Jane go to prison for the rest of her life."

"She's right," d.i.c.k said. "If we kill her, we don't stand a chance of seeing daylight for the rest of our lives."

"That's not true at all," I heard myself say. "I heard that they have a little courtyard that they let you wander around in for an hour a day. You have to share it with the other convicted killers, but that goes without saying. I mean, count your blessings, right? Because the rest of the time, you'll be working in a hot, steamy laundry room, or stamping out license plates. My point, dears, is that it won't be all drudgery-just mostly. Of course, to be fair, I must point out that Baby Sally and Thumper Bob will undoubtedly both be eager to offer you emotional, as well as physical, comfort."

Even though it was a moonless night, I could see d.i.c.k's fist resting on his hips. "It's Jane's fault," he said, spitting out the words like they were bits of rhubarb.

The gun swayed widely while Jane struggled to keep her focus. "Oh yeah? You begged me to operate on that darn cow. It was your chance to make a name for yourself, you said. Failed stockbroker who can't make it in the big city finally becomes somebody."

d.i.c.k turned to me. "Don't listen to her. I was a big name on Wall Street. I had Fortune 500 clients."

"Had," Jane said, doing some spitting of her own. "That's the operative word-had."

"Pun intended, dear?"

"What?"

"Never mind."

"Then shut up!"

d.i.c.k was still looking at me. "It really was Jane's idea."

Jane snorted. "At first it was my idea, but I was just joking. We could take a moderately good cow and turn her into a cham-pion-that's all I said. Then he took the ball and ran with it. Got obsessed with it."

"Well, you're both nuttier than a bag of PayDay bars," I said. "Plastic surgery on cow udders is nothing new. That's one of the things judges are instructed to look for."

"Yes, but Jane is perhaps the most skilled plastic surgeon there is, aren't you, honey?"

"I was," she said matter-of-factly. "Then d.i.c.k insisted that I give up my practice and move out of the city. He said he'd always wanted to live on a farm-like Eddie Albert on Green Acres."

"Green Acres? I loved that show! It is the only thing that was ever worth watching on TV, as far as I'm concerned."

"It was hideous. And anyway, the show had nothing to do with d.i.c.k's reason for wanting to leave New York. You see, after he got fired, he didn't want to run into his old Wall Street colleagues."

"You can be so cruel, Jane." d.i.c.k's voice quavered, almost spanning the range of two octaves.

By then I'd lost all my patience. "And you're not cruel? What do you call kidnapping a child?"

"Child?" they cried in unison. "That's no child," d.i.c.k said quickly. "That girl is a holy terror on two tiny feet-uh, you must admit, Miss Yoder, that they are considerably smaller than yours."

"A monster," Jane agreed. "She called us naive and stupid. Said we were a pair of b.u.mbling amateurs. Offered to teach us the proper way to kidnap someone-if we paid her a thousand dollars. It was like a page out of 'The Ransom of Red Chief.' "

"That's my girl," I said proudly.

"I can't believe my ears," d.i.c.k said. "You approve of her behavior?"

"Absolutely not!" I said. "But as long as she was going to charge you anyway, at least her fee structure was reasonable. I'd have been downright ashamed had she asked for any less. Tell me, did she offer an option package?"

"Come again?"

"You know, like RABBLE. Surely you've heard of Rob A Big Bank Lessons."

"Ha!" Jane barked. "You're not so smart after all. You forgot the E."

"I did not; I'm saving it for last."

"Then what does it stand for?"

"Eternity. That's what you'll spend in h.e.l.l if you shoot me."

I heard the safety click off as she stepped forward. She was so close, I could smell sausage on her breath. The gun was now aimed at my belly. Apparently, instant death was too good for me. Instead I would die from blood loss, my innards having been blasted to kingdom come.

Although my faith prevents me from acts of violence-a few of my ancestors have actually died on that account-it also requires that I be a loving parent and a faithful wife. How could I do either if I was pus.h.i.+ng up daisies in Settlers' Cemetery up on Stucky Ridge? Clearly, then, I had no choice but to follow my G.o.d-given instincts.

In one seamless move-no pun intended-I whipped my generous skirt over the vicious woman and clamped her in a headlock. Taken off guard, she dropped the gun, but then immediately began pummeling me about the shoulders and across my back with her fists.

"Duck, duck," she squawked, her mouth filling with gabardine each time it opened. "Hup me, duck."

I was kind enough to translate for d.i.c.k. "She's talking to you, dear."

"Uh-"

"So what will it be, Duck? Are you going to add attempted murder to your rap sheet?"

"I haven't touched you." Indeed, he hadn't moved.

"But you did bludgeon an eighty-year-old man. Either you help me restrain your psychotic wife, or you're about to become an expert on laundry."

"Miss Yoder, I swear, I don't know what you're talking about."

"Au contraire. You were there when dear, sweet Dr. Shafor crawled to the front door of the inn, leaving a trail of blood that led to the barn. Did you know that he wrote a message with his blood?"

"Honestly, I swear on a stack of Bibles, I didn't do it."

"I wish you'd stop all this swearing. You may not have done it-personally-but your wife certainly did. I saw her coming from the barn that evening, around the time it happened."

"Yeh poo-fed idjet," Jane shouted in my ear. "I tound him at tay." Either she was getting tired, or my body was getting used to her pummeling, because her fists didn't hurt nearly as much anymore.

"What Jane's trying to say," d.i.c.k said, "is that she was in the barn checking on Clarabelle-that's our entry, as you know- when she found the old man lying there. He'd already been beaten."

My headlock tightened like a constricting noose. "You left him there? You left an old man bleeding to death? What kind of doctor are you?"

"Mags, stop it!"

Mr. Pearlmutter's familiarity enraged me. "Looky here, slick d.i.c.k," I bellowed, "how dare you call me Mags?"

"No, hon, it's me-Gabe."

"What?"

"Mom," I heard Alison say, "it's all right. You can let her go; Agnes has the gun."

"I sure the heck do," Agnes said. "If either of them tries any monkey business, they'll be minus some toes. I have no problem shooting feet."

Suddenly I was dizzy and weak in the knees, but for some reason I couldn't let go of Jane Pearlmutter's skirt-wrapped head. I seemed to be stuck to her, like Brer Rabbit to tar baby. Who knows how long I may have held her in my grip, had not Gabe's strong hands pried my arms loose.

"I've got you, babe," he said, as I inhaled his safe, manly scent.

A second or two later, I blacked out.

38.

When I came to, my head was in Gabe's lap, and we were in a moving car. Surprisingly, I felt fine. As my dear, sweet husband hadn't seemed to notice my fluttering eyelids, I decided to fake unconsciousness-just for a few minutes, mind you!

"Not only is Magdalena my hero," Agnes said, her voice swelling with pride, "but she's my best friend."

"She's my hero too," Alison said.

"Gosh, but I love her," Gabe said, as he gently stroked my cheek.

How can I be blamed then, for faking it a mite longer? The odds were that the next time I heard accolades such as these, it would be at my funeral. And since then I'd be listening to them from all the way up in Heaven, they'd hardly count.

"Harrumph," Wanda said. "Before youse award her the Purple Heart, just remember that she put a ninety-year-old woman on the back of a bull and sent her off into the woods to be eaten by black bears."

"What? I'm only fifty-four!" Ida suddenly seemed to have lost twenty years along with her accent.

Gabe's hand stopped in midstroke. "But you're okay, Ma, right?"

"I'm better than okay. Riding the bull was the high point of my life. Such a thrill, I tell you. It sends s.h.i.+vers up my dingledorf just to think about it."

"Grandma Ida, do I have a dingledorf?"

I forced myself into a sitting position. Only then did I notice that I'd been lying across Wanda and Alison's laps. Ida was riding shotgun, as they say, and, thank heavens, the normally sane Agnes was driving.

"Hon," Gabe said, "you're awake!"

"Mom!" The relief in Alison's voice made me kvell with love.

I rubbed my eyes for show. "Whew, that was some nap."

"Mom, that weren't no nap; you was out like a cold fish. What did you call her, Grandma Ida? Oh yeah, like a lump of filter fish."

"Gefilte fish," my beloved said.

"Oy, so now the leetle von gets me in trouble. Mebbe I should have stayed in New York."

I managed to rein in my smile. "I won't argue with that, dear." I glanced outside, and could see a sprinkling of lights. "Hey guys, where are we?"

"Almost back to Hernia," Agnes said, always the cheerful servant. "After I drop off your mother-in-law and the little one- and Wanda, of course-the rest of us are headed straight up to Bedford Memorial."

Alison stamped her feet, and in the process all but obliterated the smallest piggy on my right foot. On the bright side, at least now I was as fully awake as I'd ever been. I could also now wear one of those skinny-toed shoes that Susannah refers to as "roach killers" (her friend Gina chases bugs into corners, then impales them on the toes of her designer shoes).

"I am not little," Alison said.