The Daily Novel

CHAPTER XXVI

“What the hell is a turducken?” Gloria yelled from one of the bedrooms. She was putting out fresh towels and making sure the rooms were ready for company. Fritz had called to inform them that he was bringing a culinary triumph for their Thanksgiving meal. He instructed Harlan to have his oven ready to go when he and Bobbie arrived, a slow oven in which the turducken would be roasting all night.

“I don’t know,” Harlan called back. “Check on Google if you can’t stand the suspense.”

The weeks since Bobbie had run the story on the mystery motorcycle couple had not been as bad as Harlan and Gloria had thought they would be. The answering machine had filled up with a mix of polite and not-so-polite requests for interviews from the local stations in nearby Evansville. Harlan had taken the task of returning the calls and declining the opportunities. Gloria had, tongue-in-cheek, noted that she, perhaps, was not the one most suitable for interacting with the media.

Harlan’s sister, Ann, called and passed along an offer from her friend Deanna. She said that Deanna would be honored to take on the job of publicist for them and take over the burden of dealing with all of the media inquiries. Harlan allowed as how it didn’t seem like a good use of funds to pay someone to say no. He thought he could handle that pretty well himself. Ann agreed.

The gate Harlan installed at the top of the driveway from the road was working out well. He had located it a hundred feet or so from the highway, so it was not in plain view. It spanned the black top at a point where steep banks and trees came right down to the road surface. As a result, they did hear the occasional vehicle having to reverse out of the driveway. The gate had a latch, not a lock, but it looked like a lock. Invited visitors or those who knew they were welcome easily opened the gate and drove in. Jack Lutz, from the sheriff’s office, was a daily visitor. He told Harlan that he would be visiting until there was some word on Calvin Fuller.

On today’s visit, Jack brought two entire tenderloins of venison, wrapped and frozen.

“This time of year,” he explained to Harlan, “every one of us carries a tarp, a knife, and the gear to dress out a deer. Call comes in about a car hitting a deer, the race is on. Luck of the draw, I’ve been on the spot four times this season, and three times it was a doe and two of those were still living. I had to put them down. We all help each other out, cover for the time spent on the deer, share the meat around. Anyway, these are two tenderloins from does, sweetest meat in the world. Don’t mess around with soaks or marinades. Just cook it up like a piece of prime roast beef. Maybe drape a little bacon across the top.”

Harlan thanked Lutz and gave him a case of ‘two-bottle-stupid’ for his Thanksgiving feast. Lutz had just solved the ‘what’s for dinner?’ problem. Christmas Eve was always Chinese carryout. Thanksgiving eve did not have a tradition for the Stones. Harlan had given some thought to going into town for Chinese. Now he didn’t have to.

The coverage on Congressman Graves had ebbed. Only the Fox news cable continued to milk the story, mostly with lurid tales of sexual misconduct in the hallowed halls of Congress. They ran segments with obscured faces and distorted voice interviews with former interns claiming to be in fear of retribution. Even those stories had started to ebb. Harlan and Gloria didn’t notice. Fox was not one of their primary sources.

Bobbie and Fritz were due to arrive sometime in the afternoon. Bobbie was certain she remembered how to get to the spot on the highway where Harlan’s driveway began. Harlan had explained to her the operation of the gate. Craig, Harlan and Gloria’s son, was driving in Thanksgiving morning. He did have a new woman in his life, and they had reached a compromise with her family: Wednesday evening with them and Thursday morning in Newburgh. Craig suspected that his parents’ celebrity status helped with the compromise. He promised autographed pictures.

Fall weather was moving in for the holiday weekend. Lows overnight would be in the twenties and highs Thanksgiving Day would be in the low forties. The leaves had dropped. Actually, they had been hammered down by a driving rain the past weekend. Harlan swept and mulched the accumulation of leaves on the driveway and around the house. The rest he left to nature.

They had decided that they wouldn’t be traveling any more that season, so Harlan had gone ahead and winterized the RV, running the grain alcohol solution through the pipes after multiple flushing on the gray water and black water systems. The RV’s hard stand was on the east side of the house, protected from the weather, most of which came in from the west. The leveling jacks were in place, taking some of the pressure off the tires. The schedule for starting and running the engine was already posted in the kitchen.

Harlan walked up to his kitchen. He was baking salt-rising bread for use tonight and tomorrow morning. He had four loaf pans sitting at the back of the stove, filled with expanding dough. The awful smell the salt-rising bread causes happens in the early stages of the making, when the potato water really begins to ferment. At the final point, there is no bad smell and, when it was in the oven, the wonderful smell of baking bread would take over. He checked under the damp linen towel and found the dough ready to bake. Turning on the oven, he put some water on the stove to boil.

While the heat was building up in the oven, he opened the secret passage and put two cases of beer out on the kitchen floor. After resealing the passage, he took the cases out onto the porch next to the door. The outside air would chill them nicely, and the alcohol content would protect them from freezing overnight.

Back at the stove, he carefully removed the towels from the loaf pans and set them at the front edge, ready to go into the oven. He used a large metal ladle to dip boiling water into a shallow pan at the bottom of the oven, then quickly put all four loaves in to bake. The steam would give the bread an extra-crisp top crust. He closed the oven and set the timer, the one he carried on the hammer loop of his overalls when he was cooking. He had learned that a timer is useful only if you and the timer are in the same place when it goes off. Clipping it to his overalls was the solution, once he figured out that staying in the same place was rarely likely to happen.

When Fritz announced that he was bringing the main course, a turducken, Harlan agreed that he and Gloria would be responsible for all of the rest of the meal. Gloria had pies in the oven all afternoon—mince and pumpkin. Everything else would be prepared tomorrow morning, after breakfast. Fritz promised that the turducken would generate ample pan juices for a bounty of gravy, calling for a bounty of potatoes. The stuffing was somehow already incorporated in the turducken thing.

Just in case they were in the mood for it, Harlan set up the big fire pot just below the porch toward the down slope side of the house. He brought out chairs, set up the big pot, and loaded it with firewood. He had no doubt that they would use it at some point during the long weekend. Bobbie and Fritz were planning to stay until Sunday afternoon. He was back at the kitchen, about to go inside, when he heard a car approaching.

Harlan guessed he was subconsciously expecting Fritz and Bobbie to drive in her Metropolitan. Instead, he saw a late model van—a Voyager or Caravan or something. He stopped on the path and watched carefully as the car approached. Then he saw Fritz’s face through the window and then Bobbie’s. He checked the timer on the hammer loop  and determined that he had enough time. He picked up an opener from the porch rail, grabbed three bottles of beer in the fingers of one hand, and headed across to the apron where they were stopping, in front of the garage.

Bobbie and Fritz were both out of the car when he got there, stretching legs and shaking arms. Gloria came out the side door of the house and walked along the porch to the front. Everyone met at about the same time.

“Well, there you are, and welcome,” Gloria said. She stepped off the porch and walked toward the van. “What’re you doing with a soccer mom car?”

“Fritz’s idea,” Bobbie answered. “Says he likes them. They do drive well, I have to admit.”

Harlan popped the tops off the beer and handed them to Fritz and Bobbie.

“Thanks,” Fritz said. “You do run a great welcoming party.” He took a big swig of the beer.

“What do you need help with?” Harlan asked.

“The guest of honor,” Fritz said, smiling. He opened the sliding door and disclosed a large block of Styrofoam, larger than any standard cooler.

“Yeah,” Bobbie said, “that’s why we’re a little late. Dr. Kaplan had to put the finishing touches on his work of art. Then we had to lug it out through the carriage house to the alley and load it. I thought sure we were going to get nailed by the traffic, but it wasn’t bad.”

“What kind of cooler is that?” Gloria asked, walking closer to look.

“You don’t want to ask,” Fritz said. Gloria stopped short and looked at him. He just smiled. “Have to keep that baby cool until it goes in the oven.”

“If it’s in a body bag, I don’t even want to hear about it,” Gloria snapped, then backed away from the van.

The timer on Harlan’s overalls began to beep.

“You have a pager?” Fritz asked.

“No, it’s my bread paging me,” Harlan answered. “I have to get it out of the oven. Want me to grab one end of the cooler and we’ll take it up now?”

The foam box had handles and was more bulky than heavy. Harlan and Fritz carried it easily and set it on the porch next to the beer. Bobbie and Gloria took the luggage out of the van and into the house.

“So, this is the kitchen,” Fritz said. He walked around, checking things out while Harlan pulled the loaf pans from the oven. “Bobbie said the coal mine entrance is back here. Right?”

“That woman can’t keep a secret,” Harlan said, pretending to be miffed. “Guess that’s why she’s a reporter.” He closed the oven. “When do you want to start cooking the turducken?”

“As late as possible,” Fritz said. “It needs about thirteen hours, so if we put it in at ten, we can pull it at eleven tomorrow. Gives us plenty of time to work on gravy and stuff.”

“Sounds like we’ll eat at one,” Harlan said. “That works. Craig and his lady will probably be here by ten.”

“Coming in from . . .?”

“Cincinnati,” Harlan supplied. “He’s in banking in Cincinnati.”

Harlan was tipping the loaves out of the pans and setting them on racks to cool. They were a deep golden color, and the crust was beginning to crackle as the loaves cooled. Fritz stood beside Harlan and studied the bread. “What is it?” he asked.

“Salt-rising bread,” Harlan answered. “Best bread in the world, I think. Especially toasted for breakfast. It has flavor that plain old sourdough could never achieve.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Fermented potato water,” Harlan said.

“Aha,” Fritz, who knew his biochemistry, said. “That’s why you got kicked out of the house.”

“It was the straw, so to speak,” Harlan admitted. “You want to see the mine shaft?”

“I do, I do,” Fritz answered. “I have to see if it’s as eerie as Bobbie describes it.”

Harlan released the panel and pushed it inward, then stepped through and flipped on the light string. Fritz stepped in behind him.

“Yep. Exactly as eerie as Bobbie said,” he commented, staring down the shaft to where the lights ended. “And you’ve been how far into it?”

“The first time we checked it out,” Harlan said, “we went quite a ways in, down far enough to get into some water. That was with my son and a couple of his friends. They seem to know their way around in the mines pretty well. Youthful activity about which Gloria and I knew nothing.”

Fritz ventured down the shaft about half the length of the lighted section, then returned.“Okay,” he said, smiling. “I did it.”

“Gloria thinks I should install a forged iron gate down there, to keep the . . . well I’m not sure what. Anyway, to keep whatever out. She can’t accept the logic that there ain’t nothing going to be coming from that direction.”

They stepped back into the kitchen, and Harlan eased the panel closed.

“Let me grab a couple of these loaves, and we can head down to the house,” Harlan said.

“Do you have a big stockpot up here?” Fritz asked.

“Think so,” Harlan said and pulled one from a cabinet. “Is this big enough?”

“Perfect,” Fritz said. “I’d like to get the stock going now, if that’s okay. I have a huge sack full of bones.”

“I’ll fill the pot, you get the bones,” Harlan said.

Fritz opened the large cooler and retrieved a clear plastic bag that contained all of the bones from the three birds that were the turducken.

“See,” he said to Harlan, “no body bags, just good old, store-bought storage bags.”

Once the stockpot was squared away, the two men washed their hands, grabbed the bread, and headed for the house.

“When we put the turducken in to roast tonight, I’ll set the stockpot out on the porch, if that works for you.”

“Absolutely,” Harlan said. “I am a proponent of natural refrigeration.”

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Bobbie and Gloria hauled the personal bags in through the side door. Gloria set her share in the entranceway to the hall.

“There’s four bedrooms down there. Nobody has dibs on any of them. You guys can use one or two, doesn’t matter. When Craig gets here, they’ll use only one. He never brings someone here unless the relationship has gone past the separate bedrooms stage.”

“Thanks. I’ll put the stuff away and be right back. You need any help with the kitchen?”

“Harlan got some venison today from the guy we know who works for the sheriff. I think he plans to get Fritz to help him cook it.”

“Sounds both easy and yummy,” Bobbie said, and disappeared down the hall with the luggage.

When Harlan and Fritz came in, the group gathered near the fireplace and settled in. Harlan went to the freezer and came back with a stoneware jug.

“Shelby Logan, the detective, brought us some moonshine, sort of in exchange for the beer I gave him,” Harlan explained. “The only way to drink it, I’ve found, is from a narrow-top jug and straight from the freezer.”

He took a swallow and passed the bottle to Bobbie. Bobbie just stared at it, then at Harlan.

“I think Fritz can confirm that germs don’t have a fighting chance against that stuff,” Harlan said.

“And don’t worry,” Gloria added, “take a small sip the first time. I think you’ll like it.”

Bobbie took her sip and passed the jug on to Fritz. The she sat back in her chair and swallowed. Her eyes widened and she smiled.

“Wow!” she whispered, “that is warm all the way down.”

“Knew you’d like it,” Gloria said.

“I’ll do supper in little while,” Harlan said, “with Fritz’s help. We got some venison tenderloin from a friend.”

“Venison?” Fritz asked. “How the hell do you get venison?”

“The way Jack tells it, this time of year, when all the deer are out roaming around and getting in front of cars, there’s a race any time a call comes into the police. First one there claims the deer and everyone helps out dressing it.”

“So you’re saying we’re having road kill for supper?” Bobbie asked.

“Jack said he had to shoot this one when he got there, so, no, technically it’s not road kill,” Harlan explained. “Besides, this is the only way to get doe meat. It’s illegal to hunt does.”

“You ever hunt, Harlan?” Fritz asked.

“Nope. Never did,” Harlan answered. “Gave the firearms my dad had to my little sister. Her husband hunts. We don’t have a gun in the house.”

“What the hell is a turducken?” Gloria asked out of the blue.

“Simple,” Fritz answered. “It’s a turkey, duck and chicken, all completely boned and left intact. Stuff the chicken with one kind of stuffing, plain old sage and onion. Then put the chicken inside the duck and add the cranberry and wild rice stuffing to the duck. Then put that inside the turkey with the sausage and corn bread stuffing. Pull it all together just right and it looks like a roast turkey. Cook it forever and, tomorrow, you’ll swear it’s just a golden roasted turkey. Then you’ll marvel as we take a long knife and slice it like a jelly roll.”

“You get all three meats and all three stuffings in one big piece,” Bobbie added. Gloria looked at her quizzically. “Fritz explained it on the drive over.”

“It’s all set to go,” Fritz added. “We can put it in right before bedtime, let it cook all night.”

The afternoon gave way to evening. The jug passed around a few times, then Harlan put it back in the freezer. He and Fritz prepared the venison roast simply and served it with game chips and a salad. The foursome loaded their plates in the kitchen and returned to eat by the fire. Gloria and Bobbie had jug red wine with the meal. Harlan and Fritz drank the beer. The weather channel played continuously in the corner of the room, the sound muted.

Later in the evening, Bobbie went to the bedroom and brought back a portfolio.

“This is the series of stories printed out on special paper,” she told the group. “I brought it for you two to have. There’s also a bunch of prints from the photo visit. There’s some really great shots we didn’t have room to use.”

“Well, thanks,” Harlan said, accepting the package.

“Harlan’s sister sent us a copy cut out of the paper and all folded up,” Gloria said. “We read the story on line and saved it to disk. This’ll be nice to have.”

When the yawns started, Harlan stood and signaled to Fritz. They walked up to the kitchen through the crisp, chilly air to get the turducken started. Bobbie and Gloria picked up the remaining bottles and glasses and stacked them in the kitchen.

“What time’s reveille around here?” Bobbie asked.

“Don’t take this as a challenge,” Gloria said. “Take it as a statement of fact. You’ll never be up before Harlan or me, so don’t worry about it. When you roll out, just wander on into the kitchen. There’ll be coffee, guaranteed.”