Hell Hath No Curry (26 page)

The doorbell rang again. More than a bit annoyed at having my lecture interrupted by an impatient guest, I gave the door a good yank.

“Oh, my stars,” I said when I saw what was standing there.

“Oh, my ding-dang-dong stars.”

34

Cows seldom ring my doorbell. Therefore, it is quite understand-able that I should swear again, this time upon seeing a black-and-white cow, standing upright, on my front porch.

“Hello, Magdalena,” it said.

“Excuse me, dear, while I pinch myself.” I gave my arm a good tweak, but the bovine specter did not disappear. That meant either I was still asleep, or the next car to pull into my driveway would contain the men in white coats.

“Please tell me I’m not the first to arrive,” the cow said.

“There’s more of you? You mean like a herd?”

The cow snorted, sounding more like a horse than a Holstein.

“That depends on how many you’ve invited. Who knows how many of us there are altogether.”

I gave her the once-over. She had a small udder but sizable teats. When freshened, which is farm talk for having been caused to lactate, she could be a decent milker.

“What’s your capacity, dear? How many quarts?”

“A gallon even, morning and night.”

“I already have two Holsteins that average better than that.

So listen, dear, can you move this dream along a little bit? Better 220

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yet, morph into a handsome man in his late forties. Just be sure he’s single, but not commitment phobic. Oh, and he has to floss and trim his nose hair on a regular basis. I don’t know why men want us to be well groomed, but they can’t be bothered themselves. Not that good grooming was ever an issue for the Babester. He excelled at what he called his ‘metrosexual routine.’ Hmm, in retrospect I wonder if that was part of the problem.”

“What?”
The cow pulled off her head. “Magdalena, you’re even weirder than they say.”

I stared at the headless cow—except that she wasn’t really headless. Protruding above what I could now see was a cow costume was the not-so-comely head of Alice Troyer, the comedienne.

Perhaps the fact that she was dressed in a Halloween costume should not have come as a surprise to me, but I’ve had a hard life and, in particular, a very difficult last few days.

“Alice! It’s you, and you’re not really a cow!”

“Magdalena, enough with the pretending. Who else is here?”

I willed myself to appear as sane as the next person. Given that the next person showed up to a dinner party dressed as a cow, it didn’t take a whole lot of work.

“Caroline Sha is here. And to answer your earlier question, I’ve also invited Thelma Unruh, Drustara Kurtz, and Priscilla Livingood.”

A smile spread slowly beneath her radish nose. “That’s it?”

“Isn’t that enough?”

“You know what I mean, Magdalena. I know you do. You didn’t fool me for a second. I’d bet my life that everyone here tonight—with the exception of yourself—has thrown herself at Cornelius Weaver. May he rest in pieces.”

“How unkind of you!”

“Okay, so maybe you too were a victim of his charm.”

“That’s much better. Now, come on in. I’m about to freeze my tootsies off.”

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* * *

The rest of the Weaver harem arrived momentarily, and after a minimum of hissing and claw baring we proceeded straight to the dining room. I, of course, took my rightful seat at the head of the table, but not until I’d served each a tall glass of milk and two slices of homemade pizza from a box. As was expected of me, I said grace, extending the prayer until the milk was warm and the pizza cold.

“Is there something to drink besides milk?” Caroline asked the second I said “amen.”

“Water.”

“What’s wrong with milk?” Priscilla said. “The female cow hormones help keep one’s skin smooth.”

“I thought that was called an acid peel,” Alice said. After having received barely a snicker from the others, the standup cow-cum-comedienne had changed into proper clothing.

“Cow’s milk,” Caroline said, “is meant for baby cows—calves, that is. What right do we have to drink it at their expense?”

“That’s not how it works,” Drustara said, shaking her lovely auburn locks. “Modern dairy cows produce far more milk than their calves require.”

“You’re missing the point,” Thelma Unruh said, adjusting her tinted glasses. “Caroline eschews animal products.”

“So
that’s
how
eschew
is pronounced,” I said.

Priscilla patted milk residue from her lips, which were full to bursting with collagen. “But that’s ridiculous—drinking soy milk instead, I mean. Doesn’t that keep mama soybeans from making baby soybean plants?”

“Ha!” I shall not divulge the identity of the childish person who drew a numeral one sign in the air to signify a point scored.

Drustara’s emerald green eyes narrowed into slits. “All this talk about not drinking milk is ridiculous. What you should be upset about is the way veal is produced.”

“Pray tell,” I said, although I already knew.

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“The calves are isolated from their mothers and kept in pens so small they can’t turn around, or stretch out when they lie down.

The reason they spend their short lives standing in one position is so that their muscles atrophy, keeping the meat soft and tender.

They are also kept in the dark, and never get to see sunshine. They never get to run and play, or be nuzzled by their mothers. Their liquid food is intentionally low in iron, which makes the calves anemic, producing the pale color of veal. These are baby animals, mind you, not cabbages. Anyone who eats veal, in my opinion, is either ignorant or heartless.”

“But I love veal,” Priscilla said.

“How do we know this isn’t propaganda?” Thelma said.

“Because we raised dairy cows,” Drustara said. “Papa sold the extra calves to Mr. Kleinhoffer, who produces veal. I rode along with him once and saw what happens with my own eyes.”

“Ladies,” I said pleasantly, “don’t you think it’s odd that Alice showed up in a cow suit, and that’s all we’ve talked about so far?”

“It’s not odd at all,” Thelma said, putting her two cents in.

“Visual stimulation is very powerful. If she’d come dressed as a carrot, we’d probably be—”

“If we didn’t kill animals at all,” Caroline said, “we wouldn’t be having this conversation, and the calves would be out in meadows frolicking with their mothers, and not held in torture chambers.”

“And you,” Thelma spat the words, “wouldn’t be interrupting me.”

The room erupted into righteous rancor as my guests debated whether or not plants had feelings, the pros and cons of drinking cow’s milk, and whether laws should be enacted preventing the raising of veal calves. While I don’t mind spirited conversation, chaos was not going to advance my agenda.

I tapped on my water glass with a knife. Ruth Redenbacher, who attends my church, can play entire hymns just by tapping on HELL HATH NO CURRY

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partially filled glasses. She supplies her own glasses, which some say are of an exceptionally fine quality. My tumblers are cheap, as is my cutlery, so the ensuing sound was anything but musical.

“Order in the house, order in the house!”

That brought the volume down to a dull roar. I kept tapping until the irritating sound was all that could be heard.

“Really, dears, you’re almost as bad as my fourth-grade Sunday school class. They, however, are forced to be there by their parents. You, on the other hand, are my guests, here by your own volition to enjoy my largesse.”

“Then, bring it on,” Alice said.

“Excuse me?”

“I’ve eaten cardboard tastier than this pizza. Please tell me this isn’t all there is to eat.”

“Are you in the habit of eating cardboard on a regular basis?”

Everyone laughed, except Alice Troyer, who scowled at me.

“Magdalena, you’ll never make it as a comedienne.”

“You’re quite right. Thank heavens, that was never my intention. But now storytelling I’m rather good at that, if I must say so myself. So ladies, feel free to eat your tasteless pizza, while I amuse you by telling you a story I heard recently, and thought you might all enjoy.”

I ignored the moans.

“Once upon a time,” I said, “there was a handsome prince named Conrad, who lived in a castle in the center of town. He was the richest man in the kingdom, and every maiden longed to be his wife. The prince, however, had no intention of settling down—”

“Yes, he did,” Priscilla practically shouted.

I glared at her. “This is
my
story, and in my story he never intended to get married. So anyway, the maidens could be rather pushy, but the prince, being a man, didn’t really mind. He set up a schedule and saw the women on a rotating basis, somewhat like 224

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in a harem, and might have gone on doing that forever. However, one of the fair maidens grew intensely jealous of the others, and whenever it was her turn to see the prince, she managed to slip a drug into his mead—there, I’ve always wanted to use that word in a sentence. At any rate, the drug wasn’t potent enough to cause any harm by itself, but the prince, you see, had a heart condition. One day this drug triggered a heart attack and the handsome prince died.”

“Was the prince misbehaving with the village constable?” It was Alice Troyer, of course, but no one laughed.

“That wasn’t funny,” Thelma said. “I loved the prince—I mean—well, you know what I mean.”

“Indeed, I do,” I said. “That’s why you’re all here. Now back to my story, dears. You see, unbeknownst to all the women in the prince’s life, he was a very paranoid man. I have heard that great wealth sometimes does this.”

Drustara tossed her fiery mane indignantly. “Who better to know this than you, Miss Yoder?”

“I wouldn’t talk,” Priscilla said. “I hear that you made a million dollars just from being on the
Oprah
show.”

“You heard wrong; it was closer to two million.”

Everyone gasped, except for yours truly.

“Then what,” said Thelma Unruh, “are you still doing in this backwater town? If my bed-and-breakfast takes off, I’m out of here. I can’t wait to leave this pitiful mind-set behind me.”

“Magdalena stayed,” said Caroline Sha.

“That’s because she has family here,” Alice said, much to my surprise. “And that’s why Drustara is still here, even though her family doesn’t speak to her.”

“And don’t you presume to speak for me,” Drustara snapped.

I tapped my glass again, as much for the irritating noise it produced as to get their attention. “Ladies, please. I haven’t finished my story. As I said, the prince was paranoid, and installed hidden HELL HATH NO CURRY

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video cameras in each room. After he died, the village constable found the cameras and was able to catch the woman who had slipped him the drugs.”

“Bull,” Thelma said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me. There weren’t any hidden cameras in that house.” She turned to the others. “She’s just trying to scare us.”

Alice snickered. “You meant palace, didn’t you, Thelma?

Thelma removed her tinted glasses, the better to glare. “I meant what I said. Come on, girls, don’t be stupid. You know she’s up to her games, and we all know we’re the mice she’s trying to catch.” She turned to me. “And you’re the big old Cheshire cat, Magdalena. That big grin of yours makes me sick. Just because we loved a man who was incapable of loving us back, that’s no reason to mock us.”

“But he did love me back,” Priscilla said, sounding on the verge of tears. “We were getting married. In just three more days.”

“There, there,” I said comfortingly. Of the five of them, she was my favorite. Thanks to her, and Dr. Skinner, I had an entirely new self-image.

“Face it, Priscilla,” Alice said. “Take away the silicone implants, collagen injections, artificial bone implants, cadaver skin grafts, not to mention the fat either sucked away or relocated, and Cornelius would never have looked at you twice. You were to be his trophy wife—all sixty percent of you.” She leaned forward, pretending to examine Priscilla closely. “Joan? Joan Rivers? Are you in there?”

“Alice is full of malice,” Thelma hissed.

Caroline stood, her fluttering robes creating a soft breeze.

“I’m not sticking around for this. There’s enough bad karma here to hold me back for another two lifetimes.”

I smiled kindly, ever the generous hostess. “Would you like some pizza to go?”

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“No, I would not. Magdalena, you are what you eat, you know. Processed flour, animal milk cheese—it’s a wonder you look as good as you do.”

“It’s all in the genes, dear, and I don’t mean my Levi’s. Of course I don’t own any pants, because pants are men’s clothes, and the Bible wants me to dress like a woman, which is really confusing if you ask me, on account of all the pictures of men in my King James Bible show them wearing long dresses, but I digress.

Now, where was I? Oh yes, I’ve always heard that it’s not what you put into your mouth that counts, but what comes out.”

“And I don’t disagree with you. I don’t gossip, or call people names, and I try really hard not to let negative emotions, like jealousy, take over. So if you’re still bent on catching Cornelius’s killer by provoking someone into a confession, or even just a slip of the tongue, you won’t be needing my presence.”

“Nor mine,” said Drustara. She stood as well. “I had a hard time finding a babysitter on such short notice, and may have imposed upon my neighbor too much. I thought this evening was going to be one of remembrance, not a mystery dinner theater.”

“Here, here,” Alice said, as if she wasn’t to blame for anything.

“Bull,” Thelma said. “You’re probably having a blast dredg-ing up material for your comedy routine. Well, I have news for you, missy, there’s nothing funny about this, just like there’s nothing funny about your show.”

Alice’s radish-shaped nose was now radish-colored. “You little—”

Thank heavens the phone rang. While I ran to answer it in the kitchen, I waved at the women.