Chapter 19

 

Late afternoon slipped slowly into evenings as a cooling breeze from the Atlantic swept over the Maine coast. The brilliant red sunset promised another perfect summer day. Most likely there would be fog tomorrow morning, and then the sun would burn off the gloom and reveal a brilliant day of light and shadow.

Five teenagers from the All Souls’ youth group gathered around me as I gave instructions. We were assembled in the backyard of the church. A rental company was setting up tents and tables in preparation of the upcoming bean hole bean supper. The preparations were all guess work as we had no idea how many people would attend. We could count on most of the church members to show up as well as the opposing softball team from St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. Beyond that it was a crap shoot as to how many others would join us. I enlisted Billy Simpson to help me organize the super. He was glad to have something to do.

“We need three holes,” I said, “each about three feet deep. We need rocks to line the holes and wood to build a roaring fire. Mr. Mallory and Mr. Goulet are bringing in several loads of wood, and we have volunteers out scouring the woods looking for rocks. When you start digging, be sure to dust off and put in a pile any rocks you find. We can use as many as we can get.” The last ice age had insured that Maine soil would never be short of rocks. It was one reason that New England has miles and miles of stonewalls everywhere.

In the church kitchen, the church ladies were busy parboiling the beans and preparing the side dishes and desserts. Without church ladies, I always said, organized religion would never have happened. Three very large, cast iron covered pots had arrived. They were so heavy that it took two men to move them.

There was a festive air to all the preparations. I seemed to be the only one who was worried about the success of the supper. Everyone else was looking forward to tomorrow’s softball game and the bean supper to follow.

Several more youth group members arrived and began stacking wood when Tim and Jason arrived with the load. As was typical of today’s teenagers, the girls made a point of sharing the heavy lifting and digging with the boys. In fact, by the time a truckload of rocks arrived, it was an all girl team who unloaded and stacked the rocks.

Pastor Mary Bailey made a point of circulating around to the various working groups to offer thanks and praise. Once the holes were finished the youth volunteers lined the holes with rocks. Two of the church members were firefighters and volunteered to supervise the teenagers as they built roaring fires in the pit. I had Billy Simpson stand around with a fire extinguisher in case anyone was so unwise as to set himself or herself on fire.

I busied myself coating the cast iron kettles with oil, while another group of church members fired up a gas grill to cook up burgers and hot dogs for the workers’ lunch. Once the fires were going in the pits, we gathered under one of the two tents for lunch. The festive atmosphere continued. The old adage “many hands make for light work” seemed to apply. We had more than enough workers and no one had too much to do.

After lunch the beans were brought out and poured into the cast iron pots. We mixed in onions, molasses, brown sugar, and other seasonings. There were three types of beans. We had navy beans, great northern, and red kidney beans. One type of beans for each pot.

We waited for hours until the fires died down to hot, glowing coals. The stones in the pit would be extremely hot and would retain heat for hours. We had a team lower each pot into a pit and place the heavy cast iron lids on each one. I covered the lids of the pots with aluminum foil to keep out the sand and grit, and then the kids used shovels and buried the beans.

If all went well, when we uncovered the fire pits tomorrow, we would have some of the best beans in the world. If not, well someone would be making an emergency run to the supermarket to buy up several cases of baked beans.

Once all the side dishes were put away, we all went home and hoped for the best.

 

………………………

 

The bases were loaded and the team was ahead by three runs. Unfortunately it wasn’t our team that was ahead. Rhonda was pitching and I was out in left field, hoping I wouldn’t have to do anything. I glanced at my watch. If the game went on much longer I would have to sneak out and begin setting up for the bean supper. Reverend Tom from St. Luke’s was at bat. St Luke’s had two outs and the good reverend already had two strikes. I could see that Rhonda was determined to strike him out. She slowly rolled the ball around in her hands and then quickly threw out a pitch, hoping to catch Tom by surprise.

What happened next happened so quickly that I was caught unaware. Reverend Tom hit the ball and I heard the crack of the bat. I looked up and saw the ball heading directly toward me. Forgetting for a moment that I was a gentleman of a certain age, I leaped up in the air and caught the ball and St Luke’s was out. Unhappily, when I touched the ground it was on one foot, and I heard a crunch and felt a shooting pain go through my foot.

I must have yelled out in pain, because suddenly I was surrounded by players and taken off the field, put in an ambulance and taken to the emergency room. “This is hardly serious enough for all this fuss,” I complained to Tim. “I need to get to the church and get the supper ready.”

“Relax. Billy Simpson can handle the details and you are not irreplaceable.”

“No one likes to hear that,” I said to Tim. A nurse appeared and wheeled me off to x-ray.

Nothing was broken and I was given a prescription painkiller, told to ice the foot three times a day, and use a cane for a few days.

 

By the time I got back to the church, the game was over and St. Luke’s had won. The pain was starting to recede thanks to the pain killers. A line had formed to buy tickets for the supper and the church ladies had put out the salads, corn bread, and sliced ham. A crowd had gathered around the fire pits as members of the youth group began to dig up the pots. Success or failure hinged on what we would find under the lids. We could have baked beans if we were lucky, or we could have an undercooked mess.

I slowly hobbled over to the crowd on my cane. Billy Simpson had taken charge and I was impressed with his leadership. That was a good thing. Billy had had a hard time of it the last several years and needed something to feel good about.

The crowd made way for me as I hobbled up to get a closer look at the pots. Billy picked up a towel and wrapped it around his hand and lifted off the cover of the first bean pot. A cheer went up from the crowd and I looked into the pot to see a bubbling brown mass of perfectly baked beans.

 

There were more people at the bean supper than we had anticipated. Fortunately we had more than enough food to feed the hungry crowd. I had been relegated to light duty and sat in a chair with ice on my foot. The beans had turned out perfect, the weather was perfect, the crowd was enthusiastic, and except for the throbbing pain in my foot, I was having a great time.

I got out of my chair and with the help of the cane I made the rounds of the church grounds. I was standing off by myself when I felt a pair of hands grab my ass. I whipped around to find myself looking into the green eyes of Parker Reed.

“How about we go off for a quick one?” said Parker with a smile.

“Tempting,” I answered. “But Tim owns a gun, and your boyfriend Billy Simpson is over in the kitchen.”

“Ah, well then,” replied Parker with a mock sigh of resignation. “What’s with the cane? Is it a new fashion statement?”

“I sprained my foot trying to catch a softball. It’s nothing serious. What are you doing here?”

“I came to spend the weekend with Billy before I have to go off on the next ten day cruise.” Parker was the skipper of the windjammer Doris Dean. When I first met him back a few years ago he was the first mate and I was filling in for the cook who had jumped ship mid-voyage. We had a memorable summer that year.

“Parker,” said Tim with a nod as he stepped out of the crowd. “Here to see Billy?”

“Sure, that’s it,” answered Parker. It was a typical meeting of two alpha-males. I was beginning to feel uncomfortable. Fortunately Billy Simpson appeared beside Parker.

“Everything is going well. I think we should all grab some food and sit for a while,” said Billy.

“That’s a great idea!” I answered. We stood in line, got our beans and ham, and found a table under the tent. Rhonda and Jackson, Monica and Jason were already there and had saved us a seat.

“I’ve never had bean hole beans before,” stated Rhonda. “These are excellent!”

“It’s the slow cooking that does it. Plus there is very little liquid lost underground. It makes a big difference,” I replied. “Thanks for taking over, Billy. You did a great job.” And I meant it.

“Thanks, Jesse, but most of the work was already done. How’s your leg by the way?”

“Just a little bit of throbbing, but the ice helped. Parker, what’s the ten day cruise about. Aren’t most of your cruises either four or seven days?”

“There’s going to be a tall ships flotilla off the coast of Nova Scotia, and a lot of the windjammers are going. It should be quite an event.”

I was about to say something else when my cell phone rang. Only a few people have my number and most of them were sitting here with me. I looked at the caller ID and saw it was Derek. I knew Derek was working.

“Hello Derek, what’s up?” I listened to what he was saying on the other end. “I see. Thanks for letting me know.” I hung up.

“What’s happening?” asked Tim, looking a little concerned.

“That was Derek. He just got a call at the station. Jim Freeman’s house has been ransacked!”