Dr. Hanson went in the front door, but I chose the back. Freni saw me float smugly into the kitchen. She was peeling carrots and potatoes, no doubt the beginnings of one of her world-famous stews.
“Ach, such an attitude. Are you shrunk?”
“As much as I’ll ever be.”
“And?”
“I’m normal!” I cried jubilantly.
“Yah? What exactly did the head doctor do?”
“She asked me a few questions about sex and religion, showed me a couple of pictures of walnuts, and that was it. I’m as sane as you and the next person— well, possibly saner than you.”
“Ach! Walnuts? From this she knows you are not crazy?”
“Go figure.”
“Yah, go figure. The English are a mystery.” She scraped the last strip of peel from a long slender carrot and ran the root under the faucet.
“Speaking of mysteries, Freni, yesterday you intimated that those newcomers, the Hamptons, might be a good place to start if I was looking for a source for the drugs that killed Lizzie Mast. Were you basing that on hearsay, intuition, or what?”
Freni tapped her head with the vegetable peeler. “Such fancy words, Magdalena. Maybe you should ask the doctor to shrink your tongue.”
“Freni!” I said sharply.
She stared for a moment behind smudged lenses and then shrugged. “Yah, I spoke too strong. Maybe my tongue should shrink too.”
“Is something wrong, dear?”
She looked desperately away, found a potato, and flailed at it with the peeler. The spud had already been peeled, however, and Freni’s deep strokes produced thick strips of white potato flesh, leading me to conclude that it had been an angry Amish woman in Paris who invented the French fry.
“Freni, out with it!”
She set the spud and peeler down, removed her glasses, and rubbed her eyes with her left sleeve. Then she saw me watching and turned away.
“It’s Barbara,” she said.
“Your daughter-in-law?”
“Ach, what other Barbara is there?”
“Well, there’s Barbara Stucky, Barbara Augsberger, Barbara Stutzman, Barbara Miller, Barbara—”
“Yah, my Barbara! Ach, I mean Jonathan’s Barbara!”
“Your son’s wife. Who just so happens to be the mother of your grandchildren.”
“Yah, but not anymore.”
“What do you mean by that? You can’t take the babies away from their mother, Freni, no matter how much you may want to.”
Freni clamped a pudgy hand over her forehead, to further prevent me from reading her mind. “I would never do such a thing! It is she who takes them from me.”
“How so?”
“She takes them to Iowa.” Freni pronounced the four-letter word bitterly. “To their other grandmother.”
I gasped. “For how long?”
Freni shrugged.
“You didn’t ask?”
“Ach, maybe for three weeks. Something like that.”
“That’s all? Three measly weeks? And this has your knickers in a knot?”
“So maybe she won’t bring them back.”
“Is Jonathan going?”
Freni shook her head no. “Thank God, yah?”
“Yah. If Jonathan is staying here, you have absolutely nothing to worry about. He loves those kids more than I love—uh—well—”
“Money?”
I shrugged. “Whatever. How is Barbara getting to Iowa and back?”
She stabbed the air with her peeler. “Those English.”
“Which English?”
“You know, the ones you just asked about, the ones who bought the Berkey farm.”
“You mean the Hamptons? The man with the perfume and the old woman with the young face?”
Freni smiled. “Yah.”
“How did Barbara meet them?”
“Miller’s Feed Store, how else? She heard them talking about this trip they are going to take. Some place called the Big Canyon. A hole in the ground, that’s all it is. And tourists drive all the way past Iowa to see it.”
“Way past,” I said. “And it’s called the Grand Canyon.”
“Yah, that’s what I said. So, anyway, these English will take Barbara and my three little ones to Iowa on their way to see the big hole, and pick her up on the way back. You think I should trust these people, Magdalena?”
“Do you have a choice? And who knows,” I said wickedly, “maybe Barbara will decide to leave the little ones with her parents and go see the big hole herself. You know how clumsy she is. With any luck she’ll fall in.”
“Yah? You think so?”
“Freni!”
“Ach, you lead me into temptation.”
“Yes, but you come along so willingly.”
Freni grabbed another carrot, and shredded it before my eyes. The guests were going to have to settle for soup instead of stew.
“But, Freni, didn’t you say they might be drug dealers?”
“Ach, they’re English, aren’t they?”
“You can’t just stereotype people like that, Freni,” I sighed.
“Tell you what,” I said, “I’ve been meaning to speak to the Hamptons anyway. Why don’t I pop on over there now? I’ll ask them to take really good care of your grandbabies and to make sure they bring them home on schedule.”
“You would do that for me?”
“Of course, dear. And if Barbara does go with them to the Big—I mean the Grand Canyon—and stands near the edge, I’ll tell them to give her a little shove.”
Freni stifled a laugh with her apron. “But how will you pop, Magdalena, when you don’t have a car?”
“Of course I do. It’s right—oh my gracious, I completely forgot! It’s still at the Keims’ house.”
“Yah, but maybe you can borrow one of the guests’ cars.”
“You can borrow mine,” a male voice said just off my left shoulder.
I whirled. Archibald Murray was standing behind me, not an arm’s length away. How he had managed to sneak up on me, what with my creaky kitchen floor, was beyond me.
“Goodness!” I said and clapped both hands to my bony chest, narrowly missing Little Freni. The poor mite screeched in terror, turned this way and that in her confusion, and even changed cups twice. In fact, it took her several minutes to settle down.
Archibald watched, utterly fascinated, as the contours of my meager bosom rose and fell. “Man,” he finally said, “that’s really something. I’ve heard of hearts pounding in chests before, but I’ve never seen anything like that. Maybe you should go see a doctor, Miss Yoder.”
Freni twittered at the sink.
“That wasn’t my heart, dear,” I said patiently. “That’s my kitten. Now, about this car you offered…”
“Yeah, no problem.” He tossed me the keys to his rental car. “It isn’t anywhere as nice as your BMW, but it will get you where you’re going.” There was maybe just a hint of question to his statement.
“I’m off on an errand of mercy,” I said, and winked at Freni.
She actually giggled, perhaps a first. “Tell them just a little shove.”
Archibald grinned and ran tanned fingers through bleached hair. His eyes were, of course, hidden behind the ubiquitous shades, but I knew he was dying to get in on our private joke.
“You had to be there,” I said, and then excused myself to call the garage.