The Witch and the Borscht Pearl (2 page)

As two o’clock approached, Ike gave a great sigh, wiped his ham-sized fists on a clean paper towel and brought out a large covered plastic container from the cooler behind him. He handed it to me. I didn’t want it, but as happened daily, he insisted, kissing me on the forehead. “You’re getting too thin,” he said to me, as he did every day lately. “You waste away before my eyes and I want you healthy and strong.” He patted my behind to push me on my way to the back room of the market. He added, “To please your Ike, okay? Just for me, eat it all.”

I nodded and left, but then hovered just out of sight behind the door, still curious about the witch.

Wiping his hands again, he turned, beaming, to confront Jezebel. Lifting three small silvery fish from the ice, he laid them on a china plate with a flourish probably inspired by the witch’s close scrutiny.

“Sweet and fresh, just for you,” he pronounced. Jezebel greedily pounced.

The witch began a leisurely approach to the counter. I ducked deeper into the shadows of our back room. “That was very touching, just now,” I heard her say.

“What, feeding the cat?”

“Feeding your wife. What was it? Is she ill and is it medicine?”

Ike waved away such suggestions. “No, no. She’s just so pale these days, with the heat. I fix her lunch every day, just like she fixes my breakfast. It’s only fish and pasta, with chopped potatoes, peppers, and vegetables. Things that’re good for her. She’s not as strong as me, and it’s a lot of work, running this place every day. I take care of my wife.”

“She’s always seemed quite robust to me before.”

“It’s just the heat, just the heat.” Ike pulled his apron from around his immense middle, and with the clean side of it wiped his face, which was red from exertion and sweaty despite the extreme coolness of the shop air. “Affects me, too. I try to keep her from working so hard, but she won’t listen.”

“I noticed she tries to wait on customers, but you won’t let her.”

Ike shrugged. “The men’re rude, half of ’em. I won’t have them talking to my wife that way.”

Mrs. Risk’s eyebrows rose. “Asking for fish?”

“Yeah. And the women are worse, they don’t know what they want, most the time. Keep her standing around while they ‘think’. She’s got better things to do.”

He threw up his hands in disgust. “And for the last month, instead of resting in the evening, she spends her time fiddling with those flowers in the yard. You’d think her whole future was invested in those things, instead of keeping herself for me and the work at the market, here. The way she slaves over ’em, digging and poking and—” He reached behind him, brought out a pail of fish guts. “She even buries this stuff under them, can you beat that?”

Mrs. Risk smiled. “I told her it was good for them. Makes this sandy barren soil better, Ike. Let her play with her flowers if it gives her pleasure.”

Ike shrugged, then smiled. “What can I have the pleasure of getting for you today?”

I left them to their conversation, too tired to stand up any longer.

The back room was as close as an oven. It had only two windows, which I kept open. They were too small and faced the wrong way for light, but I left the room dark. To turn on a lamp would only add to the heat. I slumped onto a plywood crate and pressed my forehead against the screen. If the slightest breath of air would stray in from outside I didn’t want to miss it.

I’d just closed my eyes and braced myself for my first bite of food, when a peck at the screen made me start. I looked and there she stood.

Mrs. Risk asked, “Dear, you look terribly hot in there. Why don’t you eat in the shop, where the air conditioning is? Or come outside, sit on the dock across the street?”

My mouth twisted wryly in spite of myself. “Because customers might see me eating. Doesn’t look good.”

“Who said?”

I shrugged.

“Ah. Well, at the very least, don’t eat that stuff if you don’t want it. It can’t be settling on your poor stomach very well at these temperatures.”

“I have to eat it.” Involuntarily, I cast an anxious look behind me. “Ike gets very angry,” I added reluctantly.

“What, does he check?”

I made no answer. It wasn’t her business.

“Look. I’ve decided to bring your darling husband something in gratitude for his treatment of Jezebel; but for you, my gift to you is to take something away. Let me have that.” With a swift motion, she swung open the screen on its hinge and before I could react, the entire contents of the box were dumped into the depths of Mrs. Risk’s basket.

“There.” She handed the empty plastic box back to me.

“Men can be incredibly impractical at times,” Mrs. Risk continued. “Now, don’t tell him. He means well and we must consider his feelings. Agreed?”

I goggled. From the stillness of the basket on Mrs. Risk’s arm, I could only assume Jezebel was still in the market, eating her fish. Gratitude filled my throat, choking off any ability to speak.

Mrs. Risk then said, “You receive your lunch from him every day around now?”

I nodded.

“And he always inspects to make sure you finished it all?”

I nodded again, still speechless.

“I’ll be here every day at this time. Wait for me if I’m late. Don’t eat this heavy mess until the heat wears off the summer, and I’m betting you’ll feel excellent for it.”

I finally started to say something, but Mrs. Risk held up her hand and said, “Hup! Never mind. See you here tomorrow. Not a word to Ike, remember.”

For a week this continued, myself meekly handing over the contents of the large plastic container and Mrs. Risk depositing it inelegantly into her basket, the process taking seconds. Mrs. Risk would return to the boardwalk and continue on her way before anyone had a chance to notice that she’d been standing at the back window of the fish market.

And daily, in the early hours, Mrs. Risk would glance up at the roof of my house. What she was observing I couldn’t imagine, but I felt better and better. Always, before passing on, Mrs. Risk would inquire pointedly about Ike’s blood pressure and how well he was taking his medicine.

One day, as Mrs. Risk disposed of Ike’s well-intentioned lunch, I hesitated for a moment, then leaned close to the screen and whispered faintly, “I feel I owe you … Ike feeds your cat only because when you come into the shop, it impresses the other villagers and brings him business. It isn’t … it isn’t …”

“It isn’t because he loves cats? I know, dear. But deplorably, Jezebel’s a slave to her appetites. She’ll take fresh fish however she can get it.” She twinkled at me.

Another week passed. My garden thrived as if in sympathetic delight with my own increasing well-being.

After yet another week had gone by, I saw that Mrs. Risk had once again witnessed the milkman darting furtively back to his truck from my house. I observed with curiosity that she signaled to him, but it was none of my business, I thought, and forgot about it. But I was wrong. It was entirely my business.

I wasn’t present at their meeting, but was told the following later by both Charlie the milkman and Mrs. Risk, after everything had happened. For clarity’s sake, I’ll tell you now, to keep a proper order.

That evening, following her instructions, the milkman parked in the graveled lane that led to the witch’s cottage. He waited.

“Hello, Charlie.”

He jumped, nearly falling because of the foot he’d left propped on the running board of his ancient panel truck. “Hi, uh, Mrs. Risk. I came like you asked me to.”

She studied him as he stood in front of her, and while she did so, he relaxed, leaning lightly against his truck. He had thick auburn hair and light hazel eyes that crinkled in the corners, giving him a good natured look. His mouth widened into a broad smile and his eyes twinkled intelligently as he watched her look him over. She admired the restraint he held over the curiosity he must have felt.

“Well. At least it’s understandable,” the witch finally said.

“What is?”

“This attraction you seem to hold for half the village wives.”

He relaxed a little more. Then she began explaining why she’d wanted him to come.

Two days later, the witch, bearing a napkin-covered tray before her like jewels of state, entered Ike’s Fish Market at the exact moment that the lunchtime crowd was at its peak. She sailed across the damp floor and, as she presented him with the dish, she lifted the napkin away with a flourish. Revealed was a wide bowl filled with the stew that contains several varieties of fish and shellfish, plus chicken, sausage, spices, and a sauce on rice. A paella. And such a paella that it filled the already odiferous air with a rich, mouthwatering aroma.

Ike, bursting with self-importance at this unheard-of attention paid him by the Witch of Wyndham, was beside himself with pleasure. He called me to come see.

Of course I came running. Mrs. Risk explained to the onlookers that it was a gift to show her appreciation for all his kindnesses to Jezebel. I added my polite thanks to his effusive ones. I was extremely relieved when Mrs. Risk insisted that this dish was only for Ike, that no one else was to have so much as a taste. Ike’s chest swelled at this added honor. I stepped away, happy to let him be the center of the commotion. His voice vibrated with pride.

At the witch’s urging, he picked up one of his own serving spoons and shoveled a great mound of paella into his mouth, swearing with a full mouth that it was his favorite dish.

Ike then demanded that everyone join him on the house with drinks from the small market as Ike plowed his way through the bowl of paella to please Mrs. Risk.

When he’d nearly disposed of it all, he wondered out loud where she’d gotten all the fish and shellfish it contained. He didn’t remember selling her any yesterday, or even the day before that, he said. He stoked his mouth with the last spoonful.

She murmured in reply that he had himself to thank for it, after all.

When he raised puzzled eyebrows at that—his mouth being too loaded to open—she explained she had ‘borrowed’ a few of Mrs. Elias’ lunches he had himself prepared to provide some of the ingredients of the paella. After all, he always fixed his wife such an overwhelming amount each day, far too much for one person.

Ike froze. His massive jaws ceased to chew and remained poised in place like a great masticating machine from which someone had pulled the plug. The color fled his perspiring, normally ruddy face. He stood frozen in the center of his shop, holding the dish close under his chin in a shock his friends couldn’t understand, because the paella was no doubt as delicious as he’d said. Suddenly, his eyes the size of golf balls, he swiveled sideways, still not chewing or swallowing, to stare at me. My expression must have reflected the surprise he himself felt. But at the same moment his eyes found me in the back of the crowd, the milkman, Charlie, seized me firmly in his arms. Bending me slightly backward, he planted on my unsuspecting lips an incredible, enormous, (amazingly gentle) kiss that would’ve brought cheers in the late-night movies.

Ike promptly spewed the contents of his full mouth. His customers fell back, disgusted. He turned purple in the face, clenched his teeth, then reeled and hit the floor like a felled oak.

Days of hysteria, questions, and long testimonies fraught with suspicions and accusations later, I attended Ike’s funeral.

You might wonder if Ike died at my hand, but I assure you, this all happened before my plants were ready for harvest. A few locals with their own ideas of Mrs. Risk’s character thought she had killed Ike.

An inquest was called, of course, but the death was declared to be stroke resulting from neglected high blood pressure. Natural causes. A pity at his age, the judge said when it was over.

A visit to our local banker assured me that the fishmarket’s mortgage, which Ike had early put into our joint names, could easily be transferred to my name alone. He executed the necessary paperwork and gave my hand a predatory shake. I could call it mine—unless I missed a mortgage payment. After what I hoped was a respectful wait of twenty-four hours, I installed an air-conditioner in the upstairs rooms, where I then sat and doodled designs for a new sign: ‘Rachel’s Flower Shop.’

I also used my time to think. There was a lot I wanted to understand, having now taken a few giant steps towards that long delayed awakening. Eventually I decided that Mrs. Risk was the one to ask. See, I also thought she’d killed him.

My car, for which I’d traded Ike’s van, (I’d done more than just doodle over those few days) was a battered ’69 Stingray convertible. In my new car, as in my new life, I wanted no room for another person. The passenger seat I swear I kept only because it was handy to put things in.

As I bounced up Mrs. Risk’s rutted lane, I feared for my ‘new’ car’s low undercarriage. Drooping tree branches lining the narrow trail gouged my car’s tomato red paint and smacked my windscreen, making me flinch. I’d been instructed by a villager to follow the ‘driveway’ until I reached a clearing, but this overgrowth made me wonder if ‘clearing’ would be an exaggeration like calling this path a driveway. Then suddenly the path disgorged me onto an emerald curve of lawn embraced on both sides by wooded hills. My car coughed to a stop. At the other end of this glade, the Sound murmured and sparkled. I had arrived at the very spot where Charlie had stood leaning against his truck, agreeing to Mrs. Risk’s scheme, but I didn’t know it then.

The air was fragrant and fresh, cooled by an elevated ceiling of interlaced branches of tall old oaks standing guard over what I presumed was her cottage. I inhaled with pleasure.

The age-darkened log cottage was roughly built, a compact rectangle, one story in front, two in back, with a low shingled roof and no porch. A tall person would have to duck to enter its small screened door. The surrounding vegetation grew with such abandon that the place would’ve looked deserted, if it hadn’t been for the windows. Dozens of clear mullioned panes, thick and distorted with age, glittered pristinely under the overhanging eaves, suggesting a cozy cleanliness inside.

She came out to greet me. She’d been waiting, she said, expecting both me and my questions. Well, she was a witch wasn’t she?