Old Mrs. Trimble was found sprawled in the town cemetery with her head bashed in. Her son Wayne was the town’s chief (and only) pharmacist, and no one, including Officer Hupp, seemed to notice the inconspicuous absence of something in the drugstore’s window display...
It had been so easy. So easy he wondered why he hadn’t done it years before. Wayne Trimble chuckled to himself as he rounded the comer of Elm and Main on his first day back to work after the funeral.
Everyone in town knew of Mrs. Trimble’s habit of walking her nasty yippish little dog through the cemetery at dusk. Everyone, including Officer Hupp, had warned her that it was not the safest thing in the world to do. Not in these days when there were dope addicts and wild kids everywhere, even in a place like Minchville — Main Street with five cross streets named after trees and a surrounding sprawl of immobilized mobile homes. But nothing would deter Mrs. Trimble from her nightly ramble with Precious Lotus trailing at her heels.
Old Ansel, the cemetery caretaker, had grumbled at her through the years for allowing the pop-eyed waddling Peke to lift his leg against the chiefest monuments of Minchville’s dear departed. On those occasions the solemn cemetery silence would be rent with shrill altercation.
“Now, Miz Trimble,” Ansel would rumble in his age-and tobacco-thickened voice, “it just ain’t respectful for you to let that mutt scamper over them graves and do what he likes just anywheres. Even on the Judge.” And he would threaten to lock the gates and put up a No Dogs Allowed sign.
Mrs. Trimble’s nasal voice would rise and split the air, float among the tombstones and down the hill, until the whole town could hear her declaiming, “I had little respect for the Judge in life, so why should I waste it on him now, Ansel Coombs? Tell me that. And while you’re at it, tell me on whose authority you will lock those gates and keep me out. My plot is bought and paid for, and so is one for Precious Lotus, and if we wish to spend twenty-four hours a day visiting our final resting place, no amount of signs or locks will keep us out.”
There had been some objection in the town to Mildred Trimble’s desire to spend eternity with Precious Lotus by her side. Some folks even thought it was against the law to bury animals in a human cemetery. But Mrs. Trimble raised her voice and, aided by her status as the Judge’s widow, prevailed. Some folks wouldn’t speak to her or have her to tea after that, but they mostly considered it a small loss since speaking to Mrs. Trimble consisted mainly of listening to her whine and rail against the town council, the postal service, the price of eggs, and her son, Wayne.
Wayne Trimble, happily full of sweet pastry and several cups of coffee, forbidden during his mother’s long reign in favor of economical breakfasts of nourishing but tasteless mush, listened to the tip-tapping of his small feet on the sidewalks of Main Street this fine October morning and his head buzzed with a little rhyme to keep time with his steps.
Tippity-tap,
Out of the trap.
Bippity-bop,
Bang on her top.
To outward appearances Wayne Trimble was the very model of the bereaved son. This past week had been a trying one for him. From the moment that Mildred Trimble had been discovered sprawled in the cemetery with her head bashed in and Precious Lotus snuffling and shaking at her side until the final ceremonies yesterday afternoon, Wayne had conducted himself with a solemn decorum that satisfied the town at large and Officer Hupp in particular. Everyone knew how devoted Wayne had been to his mother. He had to be to put up with her constant nagging and complaining delivered in tones of shrewish self-pity for forty-odd years. Everyone also knew that for years Wayne had been “visiting” with Verna Hicks who lived in the trailer park on the south side of town and worked as a finisher in the town’s one industry, the shoe factory out on Route 2.
Mrs. Trimble had loudly refused to countenance Verna as a daughter-in-law. She was low class, a factory girl. Wayne, in a feeble gesture of independence, had continued to see Verna, spending many of his evenings in her trailer watching television and playing cards and eating butter-pecan ice cream. Verna considered herself engaged to Wayne, and didn’t seem to mind either the interminable length of the engagement or her second-class status in Mrs. Trimble’s eyes.
“Peace, ho-ho!” sang the little voice inside Wayne Trimble’s head as he returned subdued “Good mornings” to the few townsfolk he met on his way down early-morning Main Street. “Quiet, ha-ha!” Arriving at Vogelsang’s Drug Store he paused to admire the window display: two large apothecary jars filled with colored liquid surrounded by a wealth of trusses and bedpans, heating pads and crutches, and occupying the foreground an artistic pyramid of patent cold remedies.
It was a dizzying display of all that was dear to the heart of Wayne Trimble. Only last week, in fact, the day before the tragic demise of Mrs. Trimble, Wayne had removed the summertime pyramid of insect repellent and sunburn lotion and replaced it with the more seasonal pile now reposing colorfully in the foreground. The background never changed. Wayne had dusted the jars and prosthetic appliances lovingly, but they were the same jars and appliances that had reminded Minchville’s populace of their infirmities for over 20 years. Between the two large jars, one red, one amber, there squatted a solid bronze mortar, symbol of the pill-pounder’s ancient craft.
Wayne smiled as he unlocked the door and prepared to resume his position as Minchville’s chief (and only) pharmacist, splinter remover, and sympathizer to the town’s lumbagoes and sciaticas, rheumatisms and unspecified aches and pains. But before exchanging his sober gray suit coat, the black band still fastened around its sleeve, for his starched white pharmacist’s jacket, he removed a long, heavy, knobbed object from his pocket.
Alone in the shop, for his assistant had covered for him during his week of tribulation and loss and now would have the day off, and the soda fountain did not open until mid-morning, Wayne weighed the object in his hand and examined it carefully under the fluorescent light. It looked just fine. Next, he peered out of the shop door, and satisfied that no person abroad on Main Street would approach the drug store within the next few moments, he nipped over to the back of the window, opened the wooden hatch giving access to the display, and swiftly replaced the long, heavy, knobbed object in its accustomed place.
“For what is a mortar without a pestle,” he chirruped to himself, “what is a train without a trestle, what is a Wayne without his mother?” Ending on a high note, Wayne Trimble allowed himself a euphoria of chuckles and a modified tap dance on the resounding marble floor of the drug store before buttoning himself into his professional manner. He then set himself to the chore of taking stock of his pharmaceutical supplies to see what might have run short during his week-long absence.
Wayne Trimble had a busy day. It seemed as though everyone in Minchville and its environs had developed an alarming series of minor ailments. Sore throats came in for lozenges and to extend sympathy. Migraine sufferers had run out of aspirin and asked how he was doing. Even Officer Hupp came in for a package of com plasters, bringing with him a plate of brownies baked by Mrs. Hupp for “that poor Trimble boy,” and the news that a farmer several miles out on the River Road had found and turned in a waterlogged ladies’ billfold containing Mrs. Trimble’s driver’s license and identification cards. There was no money in the billfold. Everyone in town knew of Mrs. Trimble’s habit of carrying several bills of large denomination. She had delighted in buying a newspaper or a ten-cent postage stamp with a $20 bill.
No, Wayne had no idea how much money had been in the billfold on the fateful night. And yes, he’d be happy to stop by the station on his lunch hour to identify it for sure. In the meantime don’t those brownies look yummy, and wouldn’t Officer Hupp like to have one along with a cup of coffee at the soda fountain? Wayne poured the coffee himself into thick tan mugs, and side by side at the counter they munched brownies and discussed “the case.”
Officer Hupp considered that the finding of the billfold out on the River Road bore out his theory of a gang of young thugs, probably on motorcycles, who had swept through Minchville pausing only long enough to bean Mrs. Trimble, steal her billfold, then race away down the River Road. They were probably in the next state by now.
To Officer Hupp’s credit it should be noted that before embracing his motorcycle-gang theory, he had looked into the whereabouts of both Wayne Trimble and Ansel Coombs that night. He considered it far more likely that old Ansel should rise up in wrath against the continued desecration of his graveyard and strike down old lady Trimble with a spade than that the wormish Wayne should turn on his mother after a lifetime of submission to her ear-splitting demands.
However, Ansel Coombs had been safely tucked into a back booth at The Happy Hour Roadhouse absorbing beer with his cronies, and it was the occasion of his homecoming that gave the alarm and caused the battered body of Mrs. Trimble to be found. As he returned to his vine-covered cottage just outside the cemetery gate at about 10:30, supported by his chums, Jackson Spiker and Luke Leep, the three were startled by a high mournful keening emanating from the confines of the graveyard.
With a cry of “Ghosts!” Spiker and Leap had dropped the sodden Ansel on the path and lit out down the hill as fast as their arthritic legs could carry them. Ansel Coombs, more cantankerous than ever with a snootful, had growled, “Ghosts, my great Aunt Fanny!” and armed with flashlight and pickax had set out to investigate the goings-on in. his cemetery. He followed the piteous howl, and after much stumbling and a few false turns among the stone angels, came upon the pop-eyed dog guarding his mistress’ mortal remains.
As he later told Officer Hupp and whoever else would listen to him, Ansel Coombs was only sorry that he wasn’t there to hear what Mildred Trimble said to her murderer before he lowered the boom on her. It must have been a doozie and worth using as her epitaph.
As for Wayne Trimble, why, Wayne had spent the entire evening with Verna Hicks in her trailer. He’d gone there directly from work, had supper (meat loaf and mashed potatoes) and the two of them had got involved in a lengthy game of Monopoly that lasted all evening. They were still negotiating for possession of Park Place when Officer Hupp arrived with the news of Mrs. Trimble’s misadventure. Verna Hicks, questioned separately, had corroborated Wayne’s statement and added some further details which reddened Officer Hupp’s ears and were omitted from his report.
Officer Hupp polished off two brownies and left, promising to let Wayne know if there were further developments. Wayne, clearing off the coffee cups, reflected that it had been sheer genius that had inspired him to lift his mother’s billfold, remove the money, and toss the billfold into the rainbarrel behind the house. When it had become necessary for him to drive to the lawyer’s office at the county seat 20 miles away for the reading of the will, he had simply fished the billfold out of the rainbarrel and somewhere along the River Road, he couldn’t remember exactly where, he’d flung it from the car window in the general direction of the river. He was sure no one had seen him. He was sure it would make no difference now that it was found.
The long afternoon passed quickly enough enlivened by neuralgias and charley horses and further donations of edibles which the donors felt entitled them to all the gory details. Wayne told his simple story over and over again, and yearned for closing time and the peace and quiet now to be his forever in the little white frame house on Elm Street. Verna had kindly offered to take charge of Precious Lotus until a home could be found for him. There was nothing now to interfere with his quiet enjoyment of the things he found good in life.
Wayne could now build his model ships on the dining-room table and no one would nag at him to clean up the mess. He could read his favorite magazines with his feet on the couch and no one would tear out the centerfolds or disturb his repose. He might even take up pipe smoking or even, Wayne chuckled, keep a bottle of whiskey in the house. There was no end to the things he could do now. And there would be no fretful whine to say him nay. It had all been so easy.
Just before closing time, after Wayne had amassed enough dainty food to supply a wedding party and felt that if he had to tell the story one more time he might well astound everyone and confess the deed himself, in came Miss Emily Orr for her weekly bottle of Lydia Pinkham’s. Miss Emily tottered down the length of the store, hollering as she came.
“Wayne Trimble, Wayne Trimble! What you gonna do now, Wayne-Boy?”
“Why, Miss Emily, what brings you out this afternoon?” It was always best to humor Miss Emily who was 80 if she was a day, and never minded what she said.
“Curiosity, son. Same as every other busybody in town.” She bore down on him, safe behind a counter stacked high with notions.
“But I need my Lydia P., too,” she confided in an undertone.
Wayne reached to the shelf behind him for the bottle. He nearly dropped it as Miss Emily cackled and bellowed her next question. Heads at the soda fountain turned to listen.
“You gonna get married now, Wayne-Boy?”
“Why, no, Miss Emily. Whatever gave you that idea? At least, not right away. It wouldn’t be respectful.” Wayne busied himself slipping Miss Emily’s tonic into a crinkly white paper sack and writing the amount of her purchase on her account card.
“Be a fool if you don’t. Nothin’ to stop you now, is there?” Miss Emily snatched up her Lydia Pinkham’s in a withered brown claw and headed for the door, yelling as she went. “It’s past time you made an honest woman of that Hicks girl. Everybody knows. Don’t you think they don’t, Wayne Trimble. Stop by for tea and jam cakes some time, y’hear.”
The door slammed behind her and its little bell tinkled into a thick silence. The remaining soda-fountain customers smirked at each other, paid their bills, and left. Andy, the fountain clerk, cleared the counter and removed his apron and jacket.
“Don’t pay her no mind, Mr. Trimble,” he said as he prepared to leave for the day. “She’s just an old hen. Cackle, cackle, cackle all the time.”
“Oh, I won’t, Andy. Thanks. It’s been quite a day.” Wayne started turning out the lights in the front of the store.
“See you tomorrow, Mr. Trimble.” And Andy was gone.
Alone in the store, Wayne Trimble thoughtfully gathered together all the covered dishes, cookies, and pies that had showered upon him during the day. He managed to get them into one large bag, all the while thinking of Miss Emily’s question, “You gonna get married now, Wayne-Boy?” For truth to tell, it had never entered his mind. His arrangement with Verna was of such long standing, it had achieved a kind of permanence in his mind.
True, at one time he had ached to make Verna his bride, and she had been willing if not exactly eager, but that was years ago and his mother’s loud objections and lurid recounting of Verna’s faults of birth and breeding had forced their relationship into a pattern of pretense, Verna pretending that marriage was imminent, Wayne pretending that the situation didn’t exist, and Mrs. Trimble pretending that she didn’t know anything about anything.
No, Wayne had not considered marriage at all. He’d scarcely had time to enjoy the fruits of his mighty blow for freedom. For the first time in his life he meant to live alone, peacefully, quietly, without his mother’s voice constantly and irritatingly telling him what was good for him, what to eat, what to think, what to do, and even when to go to bed. No, he was not quite ready to give up his newly won state of single blessedness.
But come to think of it, Verna was pretty much attached to her independence, too. Maybe she wouldn’t be so eager to marry now, to move out of her cozy trailer and into the white frame house so filled with memories of Wayne’s mother. He had been unnerved by Miss Emily’s suggestion that the whole town was breathlessly waiting to march him from funeral wreath to wedding bells. But maybe he really had nothing to worry about. Verna would undoubtedly be willing to carry on as before. Everything would continue to be peaceful and quiet and easy.
Much relieved, Wayne Trimble locked up the drug store for the night and with his heavy bag of goodies tip-tapped his way up Main Street bidding a pleasant “Good evening” to such townsfolk as he passed along his way. Up Main Street to Elm, turn right, two blocks along Elm, through the wrought-iron gate, up the path to the front door. Wayne Trimble luxuriated in using his own front door. For forty years Mrs. Trimble had insisted that Wayne use only the back door so as not to track dirt into her sacred front parlor. Now Wayne used only the front door and he didn’t even bother to wipe his feet.
Looking forward to a quiet supper of Nellie Starling’s chicken fricassee sending forth a mouth-watering aroma from the bottom of the bag in his arms and the company of a new mystery thriller from the library, Wayne Trimble opened his front door. The door had been unlocked. That was funny. Wayne couldn’t remember whether or not he’d locked it that morning. People in Minchville didn’t bother to lock their doors very much. It wasn’t neighborly. Oh, well, it didn’t matter. Wayne Trimble opened his front door and stepped into his parlor.
“Is that you, Way-yun?” The voice came shrieking at him from the back of the house. Startled, he dropped the bag of food and stood riveted to the spot. “How come you’re using the front door, Way-yun?” Sharp, purposeful footsteps approached, and a scrabbling of tiny paws and an awful high-pitched yipping accompanied them.
Had he dreamed the whole thing? Were all the events of the past week nothing but a brainstorm, the results of an overheated imagination? No, of course not. There on the floor lay proof that Mildred Trimble and her nagging voice were well and truly laid to rest. All that lovely chicken mingled pinkly with a shattered rhubarb pie, and molasses cookies crumbling wetly into pools of chicken gravy. Oh, my. Wayne gazed sadly at the destruction of his quiet supper. But that voice. That irritating nasal voice. So like, so very like. Who?
“Oh, Way-yun! Look at that mess. Will you just look at that mess. All over the nice clean floor. Well, you’ll just have to clean it up. No, no, Precious Lotus, you keep away from that. You’ll get a nasty old chicken bone in your little throatie, and you wouldn’t like that.”
Wayne raised suddenly tear-filled eyes.
“Hello, Verna,” he said. “What are you doing here?”
“Why, you old silly,” she screeched. “Why on earth shouldn’t I come over and cook for you? After all, we are engaged. Now you clean that up while I get dinner on the table. I don’t know what gets into a man when he lives alone, but I had to clear a whole heap of scrap wood off the dining room table before I could set a plate.”
She bustled off to the kitchen, followed by Precious Lotus, who leered back over his shoulder at Wayne.
“Verna,” Wayne called after her. “What did you do with that scrap wood?”
“Threw it away, of course.”
Wayne ate silently, swallowing his food mechanically without tasting it. Verna, sitting in his mother’s chair, seemed not to notice his brooding silence, for she chattered shrilly throughout the meal. It was not until dessert that he could bring himself to speak.
“Verna,” he began.
“Now stop fiddling with your rice pudding,” she interrupted. “Eat it. It’s good for you.”
“Verna,” he tried again.
“Way-yun, I think we have something important to discuss.” Wayne shuddered as she simpered at him across the table. How was it, he thought, that he’d never noticed the likeness. Her voice, the things she said. She’d never been like that in the trailer. Or had she, and he’d never noticed?
“Way-yun dear. Do you think it’s too soon to set the date? I don’t think we need to wait too long, do you? After all, we have been engaged for eight years. Nobody would think it was disrespectful if we got married right away. Everybody knows you need someone to look after you.”
“Now, wait a minute, Verna.” Wayne had no intention of letting himself be stampeded into another 40 years with a nagging, whining voice controlling his destiny. “I can take care of myself, and—”
“Oh, by the way, Way-yun. There’s something else I forgot to mention. Or rather, I forgot to mention it to Officer Hupp. Remember that night, that awful night when your mother was— Well, when Officer Hupp came to the trailer that night, I was so upset I plumb forgot to tell him about your forgetting to bring the butter pecan.”
“Verna, what are you talking about?” Wayne’s eyes narrowed, but his heart sank.
“Oh, you remember, Way-yun. You forgot to bring the ice cream, and after supper you went back to the drug store to get some from the freezer chest while I washed the dishes. I thought you were a pretty long time getting it, and it was all melty and mushy when we ate it. And I forgot all about it in all the hullabaloo and only just remembered it today.”
“I see,” said Wayne Trimble.
“Do you think I should remember it to Officer Hupp?”
“No, Verna. I don’t think you should do that.”
“Well, then, how about next Saturday afternoon?”
“Saturday afternoon?”
“For the wedding, Way-yun.”
“Why, yes, Verna. Next Saturday afternoon will be just fine.”
Verna bustled around the table and planted a wifely peck on Wayne’s cheek.
“Now that that’s all settled,” she announced, “I think I’ll take Precious Lotus for a little walk. You can do the dishes while I’m gone, Way-yun.”
A cloud of gloom settled over Wayne Trimble as he wielded the dishrag in a pan of greasy water. He tried to turn his thoughts into pleasanter channels, to think of the drug store, the center of his life, of his jars of many-colored pills and capsules, his bottles of syrups and elixirs, but all of these happy visions ended with the inevitable one of coming home to Verna every day.
He thought of all the catalogues and brochures sent out by the drug companies advertising new cures for old complaints. Wayne dearly loved poring over these catalogues when business was slack. All the new pills, new potions to add to his teeming shelves. So many new things. New.
It occurred to Wayne that his window display was hardly in keeping with the newness of developments in the drug business. Maybe he should completely redecorate the window — get rid of those old jars, they were only full of colored water anyway, make a clean sweep of all the trusses and bedpans, and fill the window with new things. Newfangled humidifiers, elaborate equipment for the care and feeding of babies, maybe even a pry amid of expensive cosmetics to beautify the craggy-faced farm wives who were his customers.
And the old mortar and pestle — well, that was an antique and probably valuable. He would bring that home. Yes, indeed, that would be a real nice thing to have around the house, particularly the pestle.
Plus ca change, plus c’est la même chose.
The more things change, the more they are the same.