Joanna Ruocco: The Mothering Coven

Mrs. Scattergood feels goosebumps travel up and down, up and down, all around the helices of her inner ear. Someone is watching her! She glances over her shoulder. She meets the granite eyes of Dorothy Canfield Fisher.

“What’s this?” asks Mrs. Scattergood. She approaches the statue. Dorothy Canfield Fisher seems disapproving. Mrs. Scattergood has always felt intimidated by Dorothy Canfield Fisher. From the look of her, she was an accomplished and disdainful person.

Someone has put a bookmark in Dorothy Canfield Fisher’s book. Mrs. Scattergood takes it out.

The morning star equals the morning star.

The morning star equals the evening star.

Usually, Mrs. Scattergood parses with ease.

“The morning star equals the morning star,” says Mrs. Scattergood. “The morning star equals the evening star.”

“Hmmmm,” says Mrs. Scattergood.

“I am defeated,” she thinks. Dorothy Canfield Fisher remains silent. She is smirking.

“I should take away your book,” says Mrs. Scattergood. “It’s overdue.”

Bryce is late to turn in the horoscopes this week. She wrote them in the alphabet of daggers, a magic alphabet. It took a long time. Will the newspaper office have the right typeface? Bryce carves 26 potato stamps. Off she goes down the sidewalk, pulling her wagon of potatoes. She is wearing a green tunic and her favorite green felt shoes. She whistles. She waves to everyone she passes. She forgets and waves with the hairy palm. Oh well.

[:]

Ms. Kidney is lying on her parka playing a purple finger harp. Strong fingers — where would the organ grinder’s monkey be without them?

“A strange horoscope,” says Mr. Henderson. His hands are folded in his lap. He gives his wheel a small shove. The dry clay particles spin into the air and flurry down.

Mr. Henderson takes a lump of clay from his bucket. He supposes he should try again. He will need a little port.

“There must be a bit of port,” says Mr. Henderson.

“A bit?” says Ms. Kidney.

“A drop?” says Mr. Henderson.

“A nip,” says Ms. Kidney. “There is a nip of port, Sebastian.”

“May I have it?” says Mr. Henderson.

“The shoes in the basement belong to the barefoot,” says Ms. Kidney.

It is not her horoscope. It is the thieves’ creed. It does not vary with nativity.

[:]

In the newspaper office, which is really his parents’ garage, Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels has just finished writing the much-anticipated biography of Bathsheba Spooner. He hopes it can be cross-listed as Regional, Rich & Famous, and True Crime. He fears he may be challenged on his style. The long digressions, the extended metaphors, the sprinkling of epic similes — in his newspaper articles these have passed without comment, but the newspaper is not read by book editors. Usually, the newspaper is not read at all. It is burned in the woodstoves and hearths of the townspeople. Only Mr. Lomberg, the retired fire marshall, would even recognize his style.

“By the scent,” thinks Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels.

Someone is knocking on the door of the newspaper office. Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels puts on his fedora. He opens the door. It is mysterious Anaxamandra Pax Britannica, the horoscope writer. She has a wagonload of potatoes.

“I have changed my mind about the alphabet of daggers,” says Anaxamandra Pax Britannica. “This week’s horoscope will be written in the language of love.”

She gives him a handful of paper. Paper? It is dozens of origami crustaceans. Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels recognizes the starfish, but there are other kinds of stars, six-pointed, eight pointed, twelve-pointed stars, and there are spindle tibias and heart cockles and rose harps. There is a helmet vase, a crowned baler, a boat ear moon.

“What does it say?” asks Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels.

“The first part is an invitation,” says Anaxamandra.

And the second part?

She is pulling her wagon across the yard. Her feet are very wet. Wet feet are the danger with felt shoes.

Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels lines up the crustaceans, two columns on the Vandercook. There is an uneven number. One of the crustaceans remains unpartnered.

“Unpartnered,” says Ace Reporter Duncan Michaels. Is that a word in the language of love?

“This will be a difficult print run,” he thinks.

[:]

Bryce decides to drop by the Greece Trap. It is the town’s only diner. Thank goodness it is a perfect diner. The stools at the counter are always empty. The milkshakes pass the straw test. Bryce sits down on a stool at the counter. She eats a spoonful of strawberry milkshake. She orders a bowl of lemon chicken soup and a cup of coffee. The coffee tastes like lemon. Bryce admires the pictures of Lebanon on the walls of the diner. Lebanon is the most beautiful place in the world.

“Is there a sacred bird of Lebanon?” asks Bryce.

“The city walls are made of glass,” says Mr. Hephaistos. “There is a cedar gate.” He is cleaning the same square of counter over and over again. “I don’t know about birds.”

“Chicken,” says Mr. Dykes. He has just set out a tray of cinnamon donuts. Today Bryce doesn’t want cinnamon donuts. She is thinking about Behemoth, who drank the River of Jordan to quench the desert in her chest.

Will Bertrand offer her flesh for the banquet in the sky?

“Now I’m being morbid,” thinks Bryce. She spoons up the last of the milkshake. She puts the green bill in her pocket. Mr. Dykes has nice handwriting.

Of course, Bryce also fills her pockets with straws and sugar packets. She leaves behind the napkins. She has folded them into chickens. Mr. Dykes can’t remember anymore. Is chicken the sacred bird of Lebanon? It might be the sacred bird of the United States. Mr. Dykes has been away from home for many, many years. A lifetime. Mr. Hephaistos is still cleaning the counter.

He is singing a song in the language of love. It goes like this:

Come with me from Lebanon, my bride, come with me from Lebanon.

Journey down from the summit of Amana,

From the summit of Senir and Hermon,

From the dens of lions,

From the mountains of leopards.

But there are so many languages of love. It might mean something completely different. It might not mean anything.

[:]

Who has RSVP’d?

Leon Czolgosz.

The Venus of Willendorf.

By Agnes’s count, that makes two. But is this really a party? It is more of a holiday.

“Like Christmas,” says Agnes. “You don’t RSVP for Christmas.”

[:]

Mrs. Borage loves to celebrate Christmas. The star of Bethlehem is her favorite star. Of course, it is a false star. There are many explanations for the Star of Bethlehem. Occultation. Conjunction. Comet. Mrs. Borage believes it was a rocket. From France, why not.

[:]

Mrs. Borage also loves Canada Day. Agnes makes Canadian bacon and Canadian muffins and Mrs. Borage smokes her fragrant pipe. What does she put in her pipe?

Canadian hemlock needles and Canadian maple leaves, Canadian pitcher plants, Canadian trilliums, little white hairs from the nectaries of Canadian Madonna lilies, a nice blend of shade tobaccos.

The pipe makes the whole house smell like the woodlands of Canada.

“A breakfast picnic,” sighs Mrs. Borage, “in the woodlands of Canada.” Everyone she has ever known is eating together.

“But the picnic baskets stay full,” remembers Mrs. Borage. “Somehow, there is herring enough.” Mrs. Borage glances around her. She is alone in the kitchen. It smells like glue.

“Herring enough,” she says.

[:]

Agnes is looking at the Petition of Notice and Foreclosure. Are those ladybugs? Agnes picks one off. She licks it.