Killer Confections8 Delectable Mysteries(560)

Much to my surprise, Melvin accepted my advice. He told everyone except Freni that no charges had been levied yet but that none of them was to leave the township of Hernia until the coroner’s report came in. I was surprised again when virtually no one complained about having to spend another night at the Inn. Perhaps it was because they were all paid up through the end of the week. At any rate, even the Congressman seemed to have calmed down a bit.

To Freni, Melvin said not another word. The Hostetler farm, incidentally, lies just over the township boundary, a fact undoubtedly known to Melvin. I think Freni should have been grateful that he seemed to have dropped the matter, but of course she wasn’t. She didn’t even bother to put her supper makings back into the fridge before she left.

“I will not be spoken to like that by Sarah Stoltzfus’s grandson, Magdalena. Your mama would turn over in her grave if she knew that little Melvin had accused me of murder.”

“Leave Mama out of it, Freni!”

“And don’t you use that tone of voice on me, Magdalena. I won’t stand here and take that.”

“Then go home, Freni.”

“Good. I will. I quit!”

“Until next time, Freni.”

Fortunately, at that point Mose managed to shuffle his wife out the door. Needless to say, I felt sorry for him. He was forever having to extricate his wife from unpleasant situations—situations caused by distinctively un-Amish behavior on her part. Freni needed either to see a therapist or to seriously consider becoming a Baptist. A pacifist, she was not.

I looked at the mess Freni had left spread out on the table. Whatever it was she had planned for supper, it was beyond me. Something with pig’s knuckles and spiced apple rings, no doubt, but certainly not a menu that would garner even the majority approval of our guests.

“What can I make for supper that everyone will like?” I asked myself. Several times. It is a well-known fact that talking to one’s self is proof of high intelligence.

The very intelligent, of course, talk back to themselves. “Why bother to even try,” I heard myself eventually answer. “Just make them tomato soup and grilled peanut sandwiches. Given the circumstances, they should be happy to get anything.”

And for the most part, they were.





Chapter 22





Jeanette didn’t even come down to supper. I can’t say as I blamed her. When Mama and Papa died, I went about a week without eating. Anyway, I took a bowl of soup and a grilled peanut butter sandwich up to her when supper was over.

“Thanks,” was all she said.

I couldn’t believe it. I’d expected at least one heavy-duty criticism, maybe even a repeated accusation, but such was not the case. “Let me know if you need anything,” I offered. I meant it.

“Thanks,” she said again.

I went back downstairs feeling more than a little uneasy. This was not the same Jeanette who had flung accusations at me in the parlor just hours before. This woman was almost a stranger.

Her subdued responses aside, there was something very different about the woman. I couldn’t pinpoint what it was exactly, but I thought it might even have something to do with the way she looked. The intense energy, albeit negative, that Jeanette usually projected, was curiously absent. This Jeanette looked about as perky as I must look when I wake up from a too long nap.

Of course I didn’t dwell on Jeanette. She was a big girl, after all. And anyway I had problems of my own to contend with.

“How dare you?” screamed Susannah when I got back to the kitchen.

“How dare I what?”

“Melvin just called, and he’s canceling our date tonight altogether.”

“Somebody should be grateful.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? Magdalena, this is all your fault. If you hadn’t gone and opened your big yap, I’d be in Breezewood right now, buying popcorn for the movie.”

“Did you wash the quilt and Linda’s sheets like I asked?” With Susannah, you stand at least a fifty-fifty chance of deflecting her if you abruptly change the subject.

“Yes, I washed them. And that’s another thing, I don’t see why that had to be my job.”

“You do want clean bedding for tonight, don’t you?”

Susannah stomped her right foot and slapped the kitchen table so hard it must have jarred poor Shnookums. At any rate, he yelped. “Oh no, I’m not, Magdalena. I’m not sleeping up there where somebody just died.”

“Then pick a spot on the floor in the parlor,” I told her. “You’re for sure not sleeping with me.”

“Magdalena!”

I reminded Susannah that Grandma Yoder had died in my bedroom, in fact in my very bed. That did the trick. Susannah had always been a little afraid of Grandma Yoder, although I can’t say that I blamed her. Grandma Yoder had been a gaunt, hollow-eyed, perpetually angry woman as far back as I can remember. She died when Susannah was only five, but my sister remembers seeing the old woman standing at the foot of her bed on at least two occasions after that. And, as I’ve already shared with you, I’ve seen her about myself a number of times. Apparently these were facts Susannah had forgotten.