Inn-By-The-Bye Stories - 6

By William Flewelling

In an endeavor to find a fresh way into the scriptural text upon which I would be preaching, I began to develop an imaginary world populated primarily by wee folk. I found the characters I developed and the way that they evolved in my mind and on the page served me well as a consideration of how I sensed things happening in the scriptural text at hand. I want to make these stories and the world they represent newly available, and so I bring them to book form fifty at a time.

The cover drawing was done by Anne Sullivan, the authors daughter. The drawing is the artists conception of the sunrise over the sea along the beach.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Apr 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9781524604103

William Flewelling

I am a retired minister from the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) living in central Illinois. Led by a request from Mildred Corwin of Manua OH when I arrived there in 1976, I long developed and led a series of bible studies there and in LaPorte IN and New Martinsville WV. These studies proved to be very feeding to me in my pastoral work and won a certain degree of following in my congregations. My first study was on 1 Peter, chosen because I knew almost nothing about the book. I now live quietly in retirement with my wife of 54 years, a pair of dogs and several cats.

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© 2016 William Flewelling. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 04/13/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5246-0411-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-0410-3 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Foreword

CCLI

CCLII

CCLIII

CCLIV

CCLV

CCLVI

CCLVII

CCLVIII

CCLIX

CCLX

CCLXI

CCLXII

CCLXIII

CCLXIV

CCLXV

CCLXVI

CCLXVII

CCLXVIII

CCLXIX

CCLXX

CCLXXI

CCLXXII

CCLXXIII

CCLXXIV

CCLXXV

CCLXXVI

CCLXXVII

CCLXXVIII

CCLXXIX

CCLXXX

CCLXXXI

CCLXXXII

CCLXXXIII

CCLXXXIV

CCLXXXV

CCLXXXVI

CCLXXXVII

CCLXXXVIII

CCLXXXIX

CCXC

CCXCI

CCXCII

CCXCIII

CCXCIV

CCXCV

CCXCVI

CCXCVII

CCXCVIII

CCXCIX

CCC

Appendix Texts For The Stories

About The Author

Also By This Author

Poetry

Time Grown Lively

From My Corner Seat

Enticing My Delight

The Arthur Poems

From Recurrent Yesterdays

In Silhouette

To Silent Disappearance

Teasing The Soul

Allowing The Heart To Contemplate

As Lace Along The Wood

To Trace Familiarity

The Matt Poems

Elaborating Life

The Buoyancy Of Unsuspected Joy

Devotional

Some Reflective Prayers

Reflective Prayers: A Second Collection

A Third Collection Of Reflective Prayers

For Your Quiet Meditation

Directions Of A Pastoral Lifetime

Part I: Pastoral Notes, Letters To Anna, Occasional Pamphlets

Part II: Psalm Meditations, Regula Vitae

Part III: Elders’ Studies

Part IV: Studies

Part V: The Song Of Songs: An Attraction

Inn-by-the-Bye Stories

vols. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Exegetical Works

From The Catholic Epistles: Bible Studies

Paul’s Letter To The Romans: A Bible Study

all published by AuthorHouse.com

Foreword

This sixth set of stories, essentially the sixth year of writing them, brings us to mid-July 1987. As I revisit them, I am struck at the way the stories grow, the way the characters become fuller. Some characters are new, like Eliza; others pick up names, like Wilbur, whose house begins to take on some character (though I admit that I recall how the house ended up being described and thus pre-fit the pieces into place … but the unfolding of the pieces remains tenable, I believe).

When I was in seventh grade, I had the assignment to write the tale of a journey to lots of places. I got the places all right, but discovered that I was totally naïve in terms of time. I suppose I had daydreamed too thoroughly through road trips for vacation with my folks over the years, paying no attention to the slow movement of time. I recall having trips of several hundred, even thousands of miles taking on the order of 45 minutes. That naiveté on time came about in terms of not paying attention. In these stories, I cover the distances between places with leaps of inattention, finding the focus where the story lies. As a result, the mental map has all sorts of odd distortions that fumble when I try to put them together too neatly. Thus I learned long ago not to try to put things together too neatly! As always, I invite my readers to indulge me on that naiveté.

With such simple caveats, I leave you to the dalliance with the characters and their evolving presence, their increasing fullness of characterization. And I hope you find yourself at home in the sundry huts and cabins and homes, the Inn-by-the-Bye above all.

William Flewelling

CCLI

An early morning laziness pervaded Hyperbia. Even Thyruid found it hard to rouse himself completely. The air was fresh and potentially inviting, but all the expected invitations of the morning seem to fall aside, sloughed aside by unaccustomed laziness; they simply moved slowly along, doing the usual things at a greatly slackened pace.

Within the yawning laziness of this particular morning, Thyruid worked at the usual chore of polishing his brassware trim. The major difference, immediately discernible by any listening ear, was the quiet; his polish rag did not snap as he rubbed he brassware clean. Thyruid was alone, however, and he was not listening. Marthuida in the kitchen kept her hands upon her slowly forming breakfast. The dough, for her, assembled in due time and order. The brassware, for him, assumed a dullish glint he found it hard to remove. He merely stood there, rubbing softly over and over again. But the brass clung to its own slighted gleam.

Such a lazy day brought lazy folk for breakfast. Apparently, many had decided to lumber over to the Inn-by-the-Bye and let someone else be busy for them, as a sort of surrogate labor, doing what they simply did not feel like doing today. Of course, Thyruid also would have liked a surrogate to do his polishing today. And Marthuida’s slow motion fingers would have enjoyed a substitute as well. But not everyone can be a substitute, nor surrogate, on any given day. By profession, Thyruid had to stand and act as host, to substitute for other people’s slowness this day. Somehow it did not matter if he wished to be or not, or if he wished to polish, or not.

Even so, as faces began to clutter his dining room unusually early – first Clyde, then John and Eliza, then Peder and Charles and Cy, then Vlad and Yev and their six comrades. Then Mary and Effie, Gilbert, Chert and Martha. The whole crowd, and more, climbed down into his dining room and sat while Thyruid slowly tried to polish the first brass piece of the morning. They sat quietly, looking at one another, rarely attempting to talk, or even thing. It was an extraordinary morning!

The people gathered, and they sat. Marthuida had no coffee, nor tea, nor anything else prepared. She wasn’t even aware of them, which preserved her fingers from behaving as too many thumbs. In fact, Marthuida had become engrossed within her own quite private world. She mused over an imagined landscape, free of kitchens or anything like that, and serene, receptive, immensely lazy. Her world of fantasy this morning was free of all demand, or hurry, or need; there was a relaxed laziness which she enjoyed quite readily. She found herself imagining herself there, not here. The others seemed to have fallen into that sleepy groove as well. For they were sitting unaware of inattention.

Into the dining room came also Guerric and Mahara. As was his custom, Guerric had slept in, for he is a man who hates to get up in the morning. Mahara had earlier asked to go out for breakfast, and so had awakened him without the odors of cooking gypsie-brew breakfast and steaming coffee, dark and rich the way he liked it best. So Guerric was his usual grumpy pre-coffee self. Mahara was bright and swirling and cheerful, the type of person in the type of mood who is guaranteed to grate against the habited fantasy world which seemed to have gripped most other souls. As they entered, they happened to be quiet, purely by accident, for she had chattered to him about the clear blue sky, the fresh air, scented by Summer and surprisingly cool, the light breeze, the glory of the day. He, half awake but otherwise alive, had grunted and grumbled in return. The thought of a big cup of coffee, hot and black, teased him onward. Their accidental quiet met the mammoth quiet of the assembled folk in the Inn-by-the-Bye: and they stopped to stand dumbfounded.

While Guerric and Mahara stood puzzled in the foyer, Geoffrey stepped a sprightly pace down the steps. He was dressed perfectly. The crease of his trousers knifed the air. His spats were spotless, his ascot supremely fluffed, his waistcoat adjusted with proper precision. Seeing his neighbors, he grinned; they smiled in return. ‘Good Morning’ he called with bright voice. The silence was shattered, but the place just hung there in a lazy silence. ‘Hi’ offered Mahara, timidly, caught between herself and Guerric and Geoffrey … and all the rest.

The noise of their greetings rippled through the dining room. Thyruid half-heard them and looked around to find the room quietly filled. He raised his eyebrows, opening his eyes wide and bright, brighter than they had been all day. His mouth opened and he began to count them all, then looked to the foyer, smiled and waved the last three into the room. With a wink, he turned and shuffled his stumbling feet toward the swinging door to Marthuida’s kitchen. Poling his head in, he saw her droll movements. He entered and spoke to her; she barely heard. ‘Come. Look at the dining room! We both act as though we were sleepwalking!’ he whispered in insistent tones. Dragging her arm, he made her follow. He stuck her face through the door; she peered within and saw many drowsy faces – and three with smiles, and waves. ‘Oh my’ she muttered under her breath. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ ‘I did: just now’. ‘I mean before, as they were coming’. ‘I didn’t notice them, either’. ‘Oh’.

The kitchen began a flurried activity, those lazy and delightful fantasies having been set aside for the sake of harsh realities. As Marthuida stirred herself about to fix a somewhat belated breakfast, Thyruid stepped into the dining room and smiled. Other than Geoffrey and Mahara and Guerric, no one paid any attention, nor even noticed. They sat in stupefied silence, waiting along the channels of their fantasies. Guerric and Mahara had joined Geoffrey at his corner table; the three chattered together. Thyruid assured them that the breakfast would be coming soon: ‘This has been a lazy morning, quite unusual. We are starting late, really’. They nodded and chatted: what else could they do? Thyruid began again to polish. Now the rag snapped as it usually did. Now the gleam began to jump from the buffed surfaces. Now Thyruid grinned with certain satisfaction. He even began to hum in a jovial, off-tune sort of way.

Mahara called to Thyruid, half way across the room: ‘Can’t you stay in tune?’ ‘No. I never could. Can you?’ ‘We can’. ‘Then sing, and I’ll try to follow with modest accuracy’. Her trio began a lively gypsie tune. They tapped their feet and Thyruid’s rag snapped faster yet. A few other patrons slowly roused. Clyde stomped upstairs, and returned with his shawm. He played; they sang, and more and more the timbers echoed with the sound. Marthuida emerged with pots of coffee and of tea. They took their choice and sipped quite noisily. Around the sips they sang, and sang, then laughed and laughed. Thyruid’s eyes danced brightly, too.

After the rush, as many ate and drank and talked together, Marthuida straightened her haggled hair and grinned. ‘This is a better scene than the other, more fantastic one’. To that Thyruid nodded sagely.

17 August 1986

CCLII

Dusk brought dimness to the dusty sky. Breezes died, leaving a still blanket of muggy, choking air lying over Apopar. No one moved quickly, but in sweat-logged weariness dragged their feet along the way. As weary as any, more so than most, the skinny and rumpled figure of Missus Carney moved along, too. The deepening shadows veiled the bone-aching tiredness which crept about her face. She felt gaunt, and was. She longed for the cot in her hut, on which she could sprawl, and even sleep. She urgently desired that rest as her legs shuffled their way along in mechanical agony. The day appeared to be ending like so many Summer days have ended in Apopar, or in the Borders: tired and weighted.

Missus Carney dragged herself along, her stature as erect as she could muster. The dust puffed up in little clouds at every step, both hers and those of any other traveler. As darkness cloaked the land, the dust hung invisibly; breathing noticed it, however. In the dark, she felt she could relax and let her weariness show; no one could see. So she felt her shoulders slump and her face melt, drooping to make known the deep longing for sleep and rest which may bring her body to freshness again – not the freshness of youth but the aged freshness of morning.

She passed an open doorway, slight light emerging from inside to splash across the path and grow fuzzy in the dust which hung uninvitingly close. She glanced to the door and saw a child gazing outward, timidly. By reflex she smiled and half waved to the child. ‘Hi’ spoke the child, clutching a ragged toy. She paused: ‘Hi’.

In stopping, all the pain of the day echoed up and down her bones. She quivered as that long assault mocked her and taunted her. Gathering herself, she drew her face up again and smile directly at the child. Not fooled, the child saw her eyes, deep set and pinched, darkened by the weight of the day now ending. She saw her body tremble in the heat and from the strains of all which had passed since last she slept. She saw the dryness of her mouth and the struggled grin she forced for her. She knew her mother had tea ready and, guessing one more weary soul would not over-strain the company, said: ‘Come, have some tea’.

Missus Carney had not thought of stopping. Even the pause surprised her homing instinct. She wanted to smile and just say no. But her muscles would not move that way. Her body had a mind of its own, one in rebellion against her own self-confidence. She paused again, this time to think. In her befuddlement, she could construe no reason to refuse. In fact, the notion of sitting and sipping tea with that pudgy little girl seemed to her quite pleasant, almost a whiff of paradise. With a warmer smile, no longer able to contain by pretext her tired ache which throbbed throughout her frame, Missus Carney nodded: ‘That sounds very good. Thank you’.

The thought that she had not checked with the child’s mother, and neither had the child, had not been considered. Instead, she felt the whole event with much the press of immediacy: nothing else pertained.

The open doorway cast a light which made a pathway in the dust, inviting her to come unto the shadow of the child with thoughts of sitting, then of tea. Her bones did move that way, though slowly and with effort, even complaint. Perhaps the vision of sitting eased their plod. So Missus Carney turned aside and came unto the door. She thought upon the way and straightened herself again. Erect, she drew her shoulders back and made her shuffles feel like strides into the dignified meeting. It was important, she always told herself, for the dignity of her hosts.

The child waited at the door for Missus Carney. She watched the old woman’s deliberate movements, though without appreciation, as a child has no reference for the weight of an adult. She watched the old woman’s face and saw the tiredness painted upon it. She looked at the lines carved more deeply as day had given way to night. She saw the arms hang limply in their ample sleeves, ending in gnarled hands, the fingers lumpy with age and worn with labor, curled slightly to her sides. Little puffs of dust billowed from each step. And, above it all, grey straggled hair reflected a sort of crown – or so the child conceived.

Missus Carney reached the door, the child leaning back to watch the face. There was in her sight a deep and agonized tiredness, the like of which she did not know. There was also in her sight a deep and vivid tranquility, attracting her studious eye. As the old woman paused before her, the child’s mother called from behind her. ‘What’s going on?’ Startled, the child responded in all innocence. ‘We have a guest for tea’. The mother hurried to her daughter, thinking to scold her for stray invitations given ill-advisedly. With emotional storm about to break, she looked to see Missus Carney. She really did not know the old woman, although she had heard of her, and could imagine no other possessor of such a mingled face. For she looked to see reflected the inner maps of many faces drawn together and etched in aged beauty. Her storm subsided quickly. And she stammered her greetings. ‘Tea will be a few minutes off. My daughter anticipates too well’. She patted her daughter’s shoulder more gently than she had at first intended. ‘Won’t you sit down … here … while I finish?’ ‘Thank you’.

Missus Carney sat as graciously as uncooperative limbs would allow, and sat with a sigh. Her burning eyes she closed until the burning forced them open once again. They were dry and the dust taunted them. She realized her lips were parched and her tongue felt fuzzy and large in her mouth. There was nothing to swallow, although she wished there were. The child watched her, uncertain of what to say to her very present guest. In response, Missus Carney asked if she wouldn’t sit down, too. The child blushed, then sat, holding her favored toy in a two-armed embrace. Sensing that her young hostess was suddenly uncomfortable, Missus Carney smiled at her with all the tender warmth her weary spirit would allow. ‘I’m glad you asked me in. This seat feels very good to me’. ‘I’m glad you like it. It’s the best we have’. ‘It’s kind of you to share it with me, even though you don’t know me’. ‘You look nice. And you were very tired’. ‘I am tired’. ‘Do you know what I noticed about you?’ ‘No’. ‘Do you want to know?’ ‘Sure’. ‘In the light outside you looked as if you had a crown in your hair’. ‘But I don’t have none now, do I?’ ‘No. But maybe yes. People tell me I see things like that, or imagine them, even though they are not true, nor real. But I think that some of those appearances are more real than other people think.’ ‘Well, I’m older, and I think you might be right’. ‘But you are … well, different than other older people. Maybe you have an imagination, too’. ‘Maybe. Just maybe I do’.

The child’s mother came with tea for the two of them. The little girl said ‘I don’t like tea yet; I’ll get some water’. And she did. The mother sat down. ‘Ah. That feels good’. ‘You have had a long day’. ‘Yes: long and hot and muggy’. ‘Your tea is very good. I thank you for it. Your daughter is a kind hostess to strange old women’. ‘It is unusual for her to act this way. But you are welcome here’. ‘Thank you. The seat feels good on my old bones’. ‘Haven’t I seen you somewhere?’ ‘Most likely: I get around Apopar’. ‘Weren’t you with the Guards?’ We argue over little things, like people and food and conditions and the like. They say we have it too good. I say they are more of a problem than a solution’. ‘Are you Missus Carney, by any chance?’ ‘Yes. I am’.

The mother nodded in misty silence. Together they sipped tea, refreshment for the end of a weary day.

24 August 1986

CCLIII

For a long time, it seemed, she had sweltered in the hot and muggy summertime. Her sod house is often cool, but the baking Sun and the very moist air, all still and wet in her secluded corner in the Hills, had made it almost unbearable. She had