Cauliflower Corners-The Finale-Part 9

An Incident at The Ketchill Arms

Cauliflower Corners, 1911

Having successfully dispatched his brand new wife, Myrtle, and his father–in-law, Edward Carlson, in a well-crafted 1908 fire which left no traces of his involvement, the Most Reverend Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers took his time claiming the small fortune which was rightfully his as sole heir to the Carlson estate. He did not need the money right away. He still had lots from his previous crimes. Eventually, Gorgis sold off the Carlson farmland and liquidated the remainder of his ill-gotten inheritance. He then embarked upon a two year trip around the world.

In July, 1911, Gorgis decided to return to Cauliflower Corners to enjoy the fruits of his heinous criminality. Both his parents had passed away unmourned earlier in the spring of that year, thus granting him unfettered ownership of the Squeers family homestead. Life was good for Gorgis at age 25. All that was missing was a replacement wife to serve him.

It did not take him long to set his sights upon Gracie Birdsong, aged 19, the town’s new schoolteacher. But he was not her only budding suitor. Gracie’s childhood friend Hank Coulsome was also desirous of marrying the girl he had loved from the day he had met her, way back when, in Heart’s Content.

Hank Coulsome was a good man. By dint of his hard work, he had managed to save enough money by his eighteenth birthday, in 1911, to buy a small farm. It was the place next to his uncle and aunt, Gar Colter and Miss Beazy. Hank had taken Gracie to see the land before she moved to Cauliflower Corners in August of the same year. Gracie thought it would be perfect for Hank, all the while suspecting that she too would be living there one day.

For months, Gracie had been planning her school’s very first Christmas pageant and social. Every child in her care would be involved. It was certain the whole community would show up. The highlight of the social was to be a fundraiser called “The Secret Single Ladies and Single Gentlemen Silent Dance Auction”.  All the proceeds would go to the church and to the school. With their permission, every unattached male and female resident of Cauliflower corners over the age of 16 would be allotted a ballot box in which tickets could be placed. At 9pm, tickets would be drawn from each box and the winner would have the first dance with the owner of that box. The tickets were five cents each. You could buy as many as you wanted, as long as you were a single lady or single gentleman. You could put tickets into any or all the boxes you wanted. The boxes were curtained off so that no one but the depositor would know where a ticket had been placed. Needless to say, every aching heart in Cauliflower Corners wanted to play. And every one did.

On the day of the pageant and social, Cauliflower Corners was a veritable beehive of activity. The stage was prepared, chairs and tables were set up and food set out. By 6pm, the hall was packed, even though the festivities were not slated to start until 7. Not a resident was missing. As a matter of fact, there quite a few out-of-town guests who made the trip, including Hank Coulsome. It was on this night that he planned to ask Gracie Birdsong for her hand in marriage.

With but a few small hiccups, the pageant came to its conclusion. The musicians took their places on the stage and played while the revellers ate, kibitzed and laughed. The singles enthusiastically filled the ballot boxes with  small tokens of their secret desires. The Reverend Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers was there too, bedecked in the latest fashions from Toronto. He came prepared to be asked to say grace. Another less worthy curate had been chosen and Gorgis fumed inside when he found out about the snub. But saying grace was not his prime motive for attending. What he wanted, and what he promised himself he would get, even if he had to cheat, was the first dance with Gracie Birdsong, his intended future wife.

Gorgis bought $20 worth of tickets, four hundred tickets in all. He waited until 8:59 to make his deposits. He headed straight for the box labelled “Gracie Birdsong”. Before he put in his entries, he took a quick look around and ensured himself no one was watching. He took out all the tickets and hid them in his clothing. With the box thus emptied, he refilled it with what would surely be the winner.

At 9pm, the boxes were collected and brought to the stage. There were eighteen in all. One by one, a winning ticket was drawn from each box. It was now the time for the twelfth draw...to dance the first dance with Gracie Birdsong. Every eligible bachelor was crossing his fingers, Hank Coulsome foremost among them. Gorgis Squeers sneered inwardly at their misplaced optimism. He waited placidly for his number to be called. Pericles MacPherson, the school’s custodian and the evening’s Master of Ceremonies read out the winning number. No one came forward. He called it again. Once more, no response. On the third attempt, Gorgis made a great ceremony of producing the winning ticket.

“Well, goodness me” he oozed. “I believe the victorious ticket is one in my possession.”

Gracie felt more than a little nauseated. Hank took his temporary set back in stride. He would dance with Gracie later and then he would propose. The rest of the assembled throng did their best to hide their disgust. Gorgis had never been anyone’s favourite, a sentiment he lavishly deserved.

The draws were concluded and the Silent Dance Auction couples were called to the floor. Most were shy and awkward, many so nervous they could barely keep their legs from shaking. The most notable exception was Gorgis Squeers, 25, man of the world, Dance Master, widower and possessor of a vast fortune. He slimed his way to the place where Gracie sat next to Hank and, in his best voice, declared:

“Miss Birdsong, I believe I have the great fortune of the next dance. I will do the utmost not to tread upon your delicate toes.”

He took her hand and led her to the floor. The musicians commenced their waltz and Gorgis swept Gracie elegantly about the room. As he did so, he squeezed her hand  to indicate that this was to be no ordinary dance. The waltz went on a long time and, finally, Gracie was gallantly returned to her seat.

“Perhaps, I shall have the pleasure of another dance later” said Gorgis.

“Yes, perhaps” returned Gracie.

For the rest of the evening, Gracie barely left the dance floor. But her favourite dances were with Hank.  Around 11pm, Gorgis felt it was time to make his move. He looked around for Gracie. He did not see her anywhere in the hall. Eventually, his search took him outside where he spotted Hank and Gracie sitting close together on the bench which overlooked the river. As silently as the scum on a tailings pond, Gorgis slid his way to within earshot.

“Gracie, I have loved you since the first time I set eyes upon you, even though we were only children. But I knew then what I still know now. You have always been there in my heart as its desire, my love. I know am not worthy, but will you be my wife?”

“Yes, Hank Coulsome. I will be your wife.”

At first Gorgis denied what he had heard. When he had finally exhausted every alternative explanation, his disbelief turned to fury. “I shall have her for my own” he gritted through his teeth. “She shall be mine or no one else’s.”

That evening, Hank helped Gracie and the others clean up. Around 1am, he walked her home to her rooms at the Ketchill Arms. At the front door, he hugged her and kissed her until she finally said “Hank Coulsome, I love you. Now head on straight home. And don’t propose to anyone else on the way.”

Hank left the Ketcill Arms, a man besotted with happiness. He could barely remember making his way to the Madges’, the family friends with whom he was staying in Cauliflower Corners. He went to bed. He never closed his eyes all night.

Meanwhile, The Most Reverend Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers had left the social in a rage. He knew that Gracie would never be his. Once he got home, he poured himself a generous brandy and cursed his luck. “I always get what I want” he thought. “But what I can’t have, no one else will have.”

Slightly inebriated, and with his plan firmly set, Gorgis collected what he needed from his tool shed and crept, under the cover of darkness, to Mrs. Ketchill’s boarding house where Gracie Birdsong lay sleeping. He drew upon every ounce of the sociopathy that coursed so easily through his veins. A strange calm came over him as he doused the perimeter of the house with kerosene. Gorgis hesitated a moment before he struck the match. Some minute trace of guilt had squeezed its way into the vacuum of his conscience. He fended off the intrusion with an unchristian grimace and set the Ketchill Arms ablaze.

Gorgis stepped back from the fire to admire the terrible beauty of his secret craft. He did not notice the small leak from the kerosene can as it dripped silently onto his shoe. As he turned to go, a tiny spark, no larger than the head of pin, freed itself from Gracie’s nightgown as she and Mrs. Ketchill fled desperately from the roaring conflagration. The spark floated with purpose through the cold night air. In an act of Cosmic Justice, it landed delicately upon his toe. The ignition was instant. All they found in the morning were the brass buttons of a once magnificent raccoon coat and the charred remains of a well-used metal matchbox, inscribed with words “To Lil’ Gorgeous, The Light of My Life. All My Love Forever, Mother.” 

Cauliflower Corners-Part 8

A Sociopath Spreads His Wings

Hanover, 1905

After the unfortunate fire which had destroyed Gorgis Squeers’ first business venture, Kan-O-Korn Collegiate and School of Aristotelian Excellence, our feckless moral entrepreneur took his sweet time recovering at the home of Doctor Carlson and his wife. Most of his protracted convalescence was given over to the joyous recounting in his mind of all the money he had been able to separate from the grasp of the good citizens of Hanover. He knew it would not be prudent to keep all the embezzled funds. So, in a moment of rare magnanimity and calculated self-interest, Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers, Doctor of Divinity, decided he would return ten cents on the dollar to all his fleeced investors and tuition payers.

Gorgis announced that he was returning to the luckless Hanoverians all that he could under very trying circumstances. He also claimed that he would love to do more but was barred from doing so because he had already spent most of the collected funds on furnishings, expensive pedagogical materials, subscriptions, accreditations and other outlays, the great majority of which were destroyed in the conflagration he had so meticulously engineered. In reality, the lying mediocrity still held over $2300 in a Toronto branch of the First Regal Bank of The Dominion. And this sum was net of his extremely generous refunding.

Although quite saddened by their losses and the destruction of the Collegiate, those who got back a small portion of their investments and tuitions were grateful and mightily impressed for two reasons. Firstly, the junior Most Reverend Squeers, worthy scion of the Most Reverend Cornelius Augustus Ramses Squeers of Cauliflower Corners, was under no legal obligation to return anything. Secondly, and more importantly, Gorgis was (or so he humbly claimed) “digging deep into my own meagre savings so that the good citizens of this exemplary town are not totally inconvenienced by a mysterious Act of God”.

After four months of milking Dr. Carlson and his family, Gorgis felt it was time to resume his path to financial, educational and ecclesiastical glory. With Hanover pretty well tapped out of its excess cash, another unsuspecting town needed to be targeted. Using glowing letters of introduction from the same folks he had so expertly cheated, Gorgis made the rounds of promising settlements just outside of Hanover County where he knew there would be no possibility of suspicion and where his letters of introduction would have maximum effect.

Following a thorough study of its potential for monetary gain and gullibility, Gorgis settled upon Peason Mills as his next conquest. Peason Mills had a population of 725 and was located a day’s train ride from Hanover. It was also the home to Doctor Carlson’s widowed brother, Edward Carlson, the local Reeve who, during the day, sold insurance and mortgages from his home office on Main Street.  Edward lived with his daughter, Myrtle, in the three storey Victorian home he had built for his late wife, just months before her passing.

When her mother died in 1902, Myrtle, aged 19, became mistress of the house. It was her father’s fervent hope that Myrtle would marry soon thereafter, before the less kind town folk started to refer to her as The Spinster Carlson. There had been suitors, but none had met with the approval of Edward. It was not that his standards were impossible to meet. It was simply that Peason Mills had a dearth of eligible bachelors under the age of 60. Some blamed it on the water. Others, more astute, blamed it on a virulent form of warped religionism which assured that any young man worth his salt would vamoose at the earliest possibility opportunity.

Within days of his arrival, The Most Reverend Gorgis Squeers had thought out his three year game plan, which would culminate in his becoming the sole male heir to the handsome estate of Mr. Edward Carlson. Gorgis began by purchasing, for the unheard sum of $435, all of the farmlands of Grayson Campbell Sharfield, an heirless bachelor of 82 who had had the recent misfortune of finding himself crushed under the weight of his favourite mare.

Gorgis Squeers, who had turned eighteen only eight months previous, quickly established himself as the town’s most popular gentleman squire. With his small fortune and plans for purloining more, he had no need to abase himself by performing any kind of manual labour. He could coast easily on his comfortable income and on the fumes of his ill-deserved reputation as a man of honour and worth. He joined the library board and was elected Vice-Chair. He joined the Cattlemen’s Association and became its Treasurer. He established the Little Heathens of West Africa Benevolent Fund and campaigned tirelessly for the salvation of his non-existent charges. He attended every social function, religious gathering, and business meeting, all the while dispensing invaluable oral trinkets from the vastness of his intellectual stores. Gorgis was the most quoted man within miles. He would spin words and phrases like “integrity, transparency, accountability, faith, charity, respect, fiscal future focussing, pedagogy, eleemosynary sustainability” and other jabberwocky into any cloth and to any purpose.  He didn’t spout to clarify. He did it to confuse. And confuse he did: so much so that no one dared question him on anything for fear of seeming uneducated.

For three painstaking years, the Most Reverend Squeers set his trap. He made certain every unmarried woman in Peason Mills somehow believed, without a commitment ever having been made explicitly, that she would someday be his chosen bride. When the time was right, he pounced upon his grateful prey, Myrtle and Edward Carlson. By this time, Myrtle was almost unmarriageable, having reached the desperate age of twenty four. After a brief courtship, it was announced that Miss Myrtle Alice Carlson would be wed to Peason Mills’ most eligible bachelor on December 22nd, 1907. In gratitude, Edward Carlson changed his will on December 23, 1907, leaving the whole of his estate to his new son-in-law. Never in the history of the world were three people more happy.

In January 1908, Edward Carlson moved into the home of The Most Reverend Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers and his new wife. Edward sold his house in town but continued to travel the two short miles to his new offices every day to attend to his thriving business affairs. By February, Gorgis was already tiring of his wife’s unbearable affection. “What audacity she has” thought Gorgis as she persisted in asking him what he would like for supper or what clothes he needed to have mended. “Why did I choose one so annoying?” he complained to himself. Yet he remembered that his discomfort would not be for long and he soon regained his composure.

The newly-wedded Squeers’ land abutted that of Hieronymous Glenns, who farmed cattle, corn and wheat. A thick forest of tall cedars ran from Mr. Glenns’ main barn to the small creek on the east side of the old Sharfield place, now owned by Gorgis and Myrtle. Gorgis and Myrtle’s home was nestled snugly within that forest, protected from winter storms.

On a hot, windy night in August, 1908, Gorgis excused himself and notified his father-in-law and his wife that he was heading over to Mr. Glenns’ farm next door to discuss some fencing issues. He skulked his way to his own barn where he grabbed the cans he had filled earlier in the day. Silently, he made his way to his neighbour’s barn where he doused the structure liberally in kerosene. With the wind blowing strongly from the west, it would take but a few minutes for the fire to spread through the dry cedars to his own home. Gorgis waited until 7pm and set down a trail of volatile gas from the Glenns’ barn to a small starter fire. He calculated the little fire would reach the Glenns’ barn in less than ten minutes. From there, it would gallop through the dry forest to its intended target. With the starter fire lit, the Most Reverend Squeers worked his way unseen to Hieronymous Glenns’ front door and calmly knocked. Before he had time to explain the purpose of his visit, the sky had burst into flame.

There was nothing anyone could have done. The Squeers’ place and its unsuspecting occupants were incinerated beyond recognition. Myrtle had tried to pull her father from the raging conflagration but both succumbed to the heat and smoke before they could make it to safety. A funeral was held the following week. Gorgis Squeers was publicly inconsolable. His tears were voluminous. His cries were heart-rending. Meanwhile, his fortune blossomed. 

Cauliflower Corners-Part 7-Gorgis Squeers Sets Up His First Venture

Hanover, 1904

On April 1, 1904, Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers, Doctor of Divinity (purchased for less than $2.00), celebrated his eighteenth birthday in the company of all his friends. In other words, he celebrated alone. Yet, that was okay by him. Because now, he was a man of some means. Here is how he got his real financial start.

Lil Gorgeous, as his mother always called him, much to his annoyance, had inherited a little too much of his father’s psychological DNA. That pompous and oily Most Reverend Cornelius Augustus Ramses Squeers, DD, was a natural born liar, cheater and overall mediocrity. There was no devious scheme for separating good folk from their money that Cornelius was below attempting. There was no honour, however insignificant or dubious, he did not wish to devour or purchase.

The Reverend Cornelius covered up his inadequacies by the skillful invention of a false persona which he acted out with all the art and deception of a well practiced sociopath. Lil Gorgeous, by the age of twelve, had learned to out-Squeers the senior Squeers, whose love and attention for his only son were meted out in quantities so small, they could not have been discovered with the best of microscopes.

Lil Gorgeous applied himself to sociopathy with all the zeal of a true believer. As soon as he could walk, he would deliberately knock over his mother’s prized vases. At age four, he was already stealing coins from her purse. He secretly urinated in his father’s morning apple juice once a week. By age eight, he was supplementing his meagre allowance with tribute from his frightened peers. There was nothing he could not take down by burning it, whether it be a stray dog or a perfectly good woodshed. It pained him to say anything which remotely resembled the truth. He thrived on a diet of lies and malice. He was unwelcome in every home in Cauliflower Corners, even though he had never been caught red handed in anything he perpetrated.

  At the age of nineteen, Gorgis could see clearly that he had no future in his hometown. Armed with a Doctor of Divinity bought from the same mail order degree mill as the one his father had used to acquire his own bogus credentials, Gorgis set his sights on the bigger game to be fleeced in Hanover, the County Seat located thirty two miles to the south. Hanover was just far enough away from Cauliflower Corners that the stench of his homegrown reputation had not yet travelled that far.

After installing himself in a boarding house whose guests’ belongings looked promising, Gorgis set about scouring the town for further opportunity. By ingratiating himself with the right people, he found out soon that what was lacking in Hanover was a finishing school for young men and women of ambition and breeding who were not quite ready to conquer the wider world. The University of Toronto lay beckoning a few hundred miles away, but parents were reluctant to send their children off to the great metropolis without a little worldly preparation. Enter Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers and his fantasy resume: Dance Master, Rhetorician and Logician, Philosopher, Expert in Manners and Elocution, Doctor of Divinity, Pro Tem Lecturer in Metaphysics at the University of Toronto.

Gorgis knew that the greater the exaggeration, the less likely the questioning to follow. No one in Hanover thought to investigate his claims to excellence in so many fields of human endeavour. “We have a prodigy here” the town folk surmised.  “He’s practically one us.” "Hometown boy making good.” “How fortunate we are to have such genius in our presence”. All these tropes were happily repeated by the members of the Exalted Daughters of the Grand Empire at every opportunity. The stamps of approval from every local club and organization competed with each other to be the next imprimatur to grace Dr. Gorgis Squeers’ perfection. The path to fortune was now being paved. Gorgis, in his magnanimity, decided that his boarding house roommates would not be overly unburdened of their belongings, given his newfound road to potential riches.

Our self-contented sociopath lost no time in signing up the lambs whose places in his new school could only be guaranteed with a deposit, in cash, of the full tuition for the year: a princely sum of $100, non-refundable. In the first week of inscription, thirteen of Hanover’s finest youths were enrolled. Two large spaces above the Imperial Bank were rented out for a year to serve as classrooms, with the rent payable on the last day of the lease.

On August 7, 1904, Kan-O-Korn Collegiate and School of Aristotelian Excellence was incorporated. Its mission, vision, core values and a strategic plan, consisting mostly of fluff and, to a lesser degree, puff, were printed on beautiful glossy paper and handed out personally to the easily deceived. The document was used for three purposes. The first purpose was to attract a “teacher” possessing the slightest hint of a passing acquaintance with any knowledge, however distantly related, pertaining to the school’s published curriculum. The second was to attract “financial partners” looking to invest in a promising venture whose returns would be guaranteed in writing, subject only to Acts of God. The third purpose was to assuage any fears the subscribing parents might harbour about the legitimacy of, in Gorgis’ words, “this most superb educational undertaking”.

Within weeks, investors had forwarded to Dr. Squeers account over $1500 in start up funds.  A “teacher” whose credentials were never verified simply because they did not matter, was hired at $11 per week, less a commission to be determined at a future date. The net weekly teaching stipend would be held in trust by the school until such time as the “teacher” had proven his abilities in a classroom setting. In the interim, the “teacher” would be allowed a monthly living allowance of $15.26.

The doors of Kan-O-Korn Collegiate and School of Aristotelian Excellence were open for business on September 10, 1904, to much pomp and circumstance. Doctor Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers lavished praise upon everyone he was fleecing. His students were “beacons of promising erudition and untold future glory”. Their parents were “wise and forward-looking”. According to a specially created hand flyer, “the good Doctor Squeers would be sharing with the school’s hired teacher, Master Galicio Ornest, a paragon of plu-perfected pedagogy, the delivery of a curriculum  richly decorated with effusive accolades from every quarter of the learned world”. In short, the BS was so thick, no one noticed it. All concerned Hanoverians were so busy congratulating themselves on the superiority of their good fortune in having such august leaders among them that they failed to see that Gorgis’ shears were already half-way through their coats.

The first school year, which ended abruptly on December 25, 1904, was a fabulous success: well, a fabulous success from Gorgis’ point of view at least. For the whole first semester, he kept his students off-balance by foisting upon them a potion of gobbledygook so opaque that they were too embarrassed to admit their inability to grasp the ungraspable. He coupled this ruse with high marks, designed to appeal to their vanity and to the vanity of their parents, who were regularly kept abreast of their progeny’s stellar progress and inevitable admission to the University of Toronto. He kept Master Galicio Ornest happy by raising his monthly allowance to $15.85 and promising to lower the commission on his salary to “something below the norm sometime early in the new year”.  He kept his investors happy by declaring a quarterly dividend of 4% on each investment, payable monthly, commencing January 1, 1905.

What sealed Doctor Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers’ joy was the success of the terrible fire which took down the Imperial Bank along with Kan-O-Korn Collegiate and School of Aristotelian Excellence in one fell swoop. With a perfectly calculated amount of kerosene, a slightly open window and a candle lit to allow for a close Christmas Day reading of the Bible in the comfort of his quiet classroom, Gorgis was able to set the base for his early retirement. After he had ensured that his escape route was clear, he knocked over the candle which landed like a well aimed missile into a small pool of the volatile gas. He yelled “Fire. Help Fire” over and over as he clamoured down the stairs to the front entrance. As soon as he saw the first head appear from one of the houses across the street, he tumbled into a heap in the middle of the street, his fall cushioned by his new raccoon coat. There he lay, pretending to have passed out, as the fire raged behind him. Gorgis was pulled to safety. The town folk did all they could to contain the blaze. They managed to stop the flames from spreading to the next building, but the bank and the school were beyond saving.

Gorgis recovered slowly under the care of Dr. Carlson and his wife. They had moved all his belongings from the boarding house and had set up, in their own home, a guest room in which the unfortunate schoolmaster could convalesce. Gorgis was in no hurry to go anywhere. All the tuition fees were non-refundable. His lease for the school was null and void as of September 10, 1904, because of the fire. Therefore, no money needed ever to be paid on that account. Due to a well-placed clause in the contract of employment with Galicio Ornest, he owed him nothing further. The investors would get back none of their initial outlays because they had agreed to forfeit their funds in the case where an Act of God should cause the school to close for more than two consecutive months.  It would take at least three months for Gorgis to even think of getting out of bed to fondle all the monies he had so meticulously extracted from gullible Hanoverians and, with great foresight, prudently deposited into the care of a Toronto branch of the First Regal Bank of The Dominion.

Cauliflower Corners-The Drawing Class

1911-Cauliflower Corners

Earlier in our story, we learned that Miss Gracie Birdsong, all of seventeen years old, became, in September 1911, the very first teacher at Cauliflower Corners’ brand new public school. Her arrival was the most talked about events for weeks thereafter. She was responsible for the education of seventy-six pupils, ranging in age from five to thirteen. What a Herculean task it was. Grades one through eight. There were children from poor families. Children from better off families. Eager children. Children who would have preferred being elsewhere. Children with fertile minds. Children whose curiosity had been beaten out of them. Coddled children. Neglected children. Yet, they all had something in common: they adored Miss Birdsong.

By the end of her first week, Gracie knew every child’s name and some useful information about her charges’ family lives. And, every evening, she returned to her rooms at The Ketchill Arms, tired and elated. She would have a light dinner with Mrs. Ketchill and then retire to her parlour to prepare for the next day. Gracie never felt so alive.

At recesses, Gracie would stroll about the church and school grounds, in the gregarious company of every student of the female persuasion. The girls took turns holding hands with their teacher and vying for her warm attention. They loved the way Miss Birdsong’s dresses would billow softly in the breeze. They were intoxicated by the sweet smell of her lavender eau-de-toilette. They loved Miss Birdsong because Miss Birdsong loved them.

Of course, things were different with the boys. Or where they? All the young gentlemen proclaimed they would have preferred a more masculine leader, along the lines of Daniel Boone or Sitting Bull. Yet, they could not get enough of Miss Birdsong’s attention, something for which each of them longed but could not openly admit to, for fear of the inevitable shame that such an admission would surely entail.

The boys resorted to other means of getting noticed. Near the end of September, Magnus and Alistair McMurdo, cousins and fellow pranksters, aged ten and eleven respectively, hatched their own devious plan for discombobulating their undeclared crush. One Wednesday, after school, they made their way down to the village wharf to collect an appropriate specimen of the local fauna. At recess, the next morning, they released, with great stealth, their startled prisoner into the top left hand drawer of Miss Birdsong’s desk. Then they waited nonchalantly by the school door. Recess ended and the noisy throng of budding scholars elbowed, punched, needled and jostled their way back into the classroom. The McMurdos were the first in, ensuring no would take their front row seats.

After morning recess, it was always time for the Drawing Class. In the top left hand corner of her desk, Gracie kept the coloured chalk she would inevitably use for her demonstrations. When the class finally quieted down, she began:

“Children, today we will create posters for the Annual Thanksgiving Harvest Festival. We will put up the posters all over the village. Let your imaginations soar. Please share your colouring pencils. You may use the butcher paper given to us by Mr. Carmine. Eleanor, would please distribute the paper to those who want it? But, before we start, let me draw for you, on the blackboard, the poster I dreamed up last night.”

The McMurdos could barely keep still. It took all their strength to contain the itchy glee coursing through their veins. “Open the drawer, open the drawer” they pleaded inwardly. Miss Birdsong reached for the top drawer and pulled it open. She glanced down and her eyes fell upon a stunned dock spider of momentous proportions. In the slowest motion possible, she closed the drawer as she surveyed the room with slightly arched brows. You can guess whose four eyes were the only ones to avert Miss Birdsong’s perceptive gaze.

“Before we let our creative juices flow, announced the teacher in her most dulcet tone, “I would like to tell you something interesting I learned as a little girl growing up in Lansing’s Ford.”

“Daddler’s Creek ran through our farm. I used to fish there with my father from the tiny wooden launch he had built years before. One day, a spider the size of our woodshed popped up between the planks and started to crawl up my father’s pant leg. I was dumbstruck. I could not utter even the simplest word of warning. My father, spotting his visitor, calmly grasped him by the thorax and showed him to me.”

“Gracie, look at our guest. Isn’t he a beautiful monster?”

“Yes, Papa” I replied with all the courage I could muster.”

He is a common dock spider. His bite can cause quite a sting if he is surprised. But if you are gentle and touch him by the thorax only, he is rendered harmless.”

Gracie Birdsong paused for a moment as she relived her vivid memory. Then she continued.

“Now children, the spider story has somehow caused me to change my mind about how we will proceed with our drawing. Let’s see. Magnus McMurdo, you are one of the best artists in the entire school. I would like you and Alistair, another fine artist, to inspire us by starting your poster creation on the blackboard.”

Magnus and Alistair felt very uneasy. This was the first time Miss Birdsong had asked either of them to step forward. Sheepishly, they dragged themselves to the side of her desk.

“When I am drawing” volunteered Miss Birdsong, “the most difficult decision I ever have to make is choosing my first colour.  Once I’ve decided that, it is almost as if the pictures draw themselves. So what do I do? I close my eyes and choose a coloured pencil or a piece of chalk at random.”

Magnus and Alistair stood stock still.

“Magnus, let’s try an experiment. Without sneaking a peek, turn your head, reach into the drawer and pull out the sixth piece of chalk you feel.”

Magnus’ eyes could not have grown any larger. What should he do? If he reached in and fumbled for chalk, surely he would be stung. To refuse would be tantamount to admitting to his prank gone awry.

“Alistair is the better drawer” gurgled Magnus. “I think he should pick out the chalk.”

“Not me” pleaded the mortified Alistair. “I’m...I’m...I’m allergic to chalk.”

“Are not!”

“Am so!”

“Are not!”

“Am so!”

Gracie let the boys squabble a little longer and then mercifully directed them back to their desks, apologizing for having been the unexpected cause of such a disagreement between cousins. Once seated, Magnus and Alistair lifted their eyes to Miss Birdsong as far as they dared, knowing that they had been decisively, yet           secretly, admonished for their youthful transgression. Miss Birdsong smiled forgivingly at both of them, two more hearts won over by the power of wisdom and kindness.

Cauliflower Corners-Part 4

Hank

1894-Lansing’s Ford

Hank Coulsome came into the world prematurely on January 1, 1894. Dr. James Perkins did not expect either mother or son to survive the ordeal. Hank weighed under 4 pounds and his little heart was very weak.  His mother, Agnes, had lost much too much blood, and were it not for Dr. Perkins’ timely arrival and excellent care, she would have died soon after childbirth. As it was, Agnes was bedridden until April of that year, gathering a little more strength as each day passed.

On January 3, Mrs. Beatrice Colter, or Miss Beazy as she had been called all her life, was taken to the Coulsome home by her husband Gar. Gar stayed on for 2 weeks to ensure that more than sufficient water, food, and wood were stockpiled to get everyone to spring. Miss Beazy was Agnes’ sister in law and younger sister of Hank’s father, Thomas.

Thomas Coulsome was not present at his only child’s birth, having passed away accidentally a week earlier. Even though Thomas had worked the lumber camps of the Ottawa Valley for more than eighteen years, as a teamster, lumberjack and cook, his intelligent hands and agile mind did not render him immune to fickle, inscrutable nature. On Christmas Day, 1893, while driving a wedge into the base of a majestic white pine, the tree uncharacteristically split along an invisible vertical fault. The outer strand of the fault gave off a thunderous scream as it tore away from the trunk and was catapulted through Thomas’ torso before he could even think of diving to safety. Death was instantaneous. His body was packed in ice to be brought back to Lansing’s Ford at spring breakup for a proper burial. The terrible news was dispatched to Agnes on Boxing Day and reached her two days later. Most folks believe it was her shock that precipitated Hank’s premature birth.

Thomas was buried next to his parents in the tiny cemetery on the western edge of Lansing’s Ford. As was customary in all small communities of the time, anyone who was able to do so came to pay their respects. A wake was held and fond memories of Thomas Coulsome were recounted in quiet voices.

Lansing’s Ford did not have a large population but most of its residents were generous, as rural folk almost always are. A small sum was raised to ensure the surviving Coulsomes were taken care of. Dr. Perkins was appointed to administer the trust and he did so with a great sense of duty.

Hank Coulsome spent his childhood in Lansing’s Ford. He was a good son who doted upon his mother as best a young boy could. Hank would often help her with wool spinning and the seamstress work with which she supplemented their modest trust. When he wasn’t in school, Hank would hire himself out to local farmers who could use a dependable though inexperienced hand. By the time he was seven years old, Hank knew that some day he would have a farm of his own.

Hank especially loved going to visit his uncle Gar and Miss Beazy at Heart’s Content. From age five onwards, he would travel with his mother to the Colters place to help with the apple harvest. Uncle Gar was the most important man in his life. Nothing made Hank happier than to be in the presence of this gentle, caring man. Gar did his best to cram into those two short weeks of orchard picking as much of an education as he could provide his young nephew, a boy he loved as much as he would have loved his own. Miss Beazy and Gar were not able to have children. Hank was their blessing.

It should be pointed out that Hank, though a good boy, was no angel. He seemed to have picked up a little of his uncle’s benign mischievousness in the hours he spent shadowing him. Like all boys his age, Hank had more than once tied an old tin can to a stray’s tail for the sheer delight of it. His mischievousness reached its acme in the summer of his eighth year. That year, there was an incident whose details continue to be embellished to this day in the mutating folklore of Lansing’s Ford.

For his eighth birthday, Uncle Gar bought Hank his very first rifle: a Daisy Red Eagle, single pump, repeating B.B. gun with a stock of polished ash. Gar and Miss Beazy delivered it personally.

“Someday soon, Hank, you are going to need to learn how to use a real rifle. But first, you’ll need to master this one.”

“Oh, Uncle Gar and Miss Beazy, it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Can you teach me right now, Uncle Gar? Can you?”

With that, two smiling boys, one eight and the other forty five, scrambled outside to find as many tin cans as they could. Having collected four sorry-looking containers, they lined them up on fence posts in the back yard. For three hours, they practiced their marksmanship. Hank was a quick learner. The next day, before the Colters embarked upon their trip home, Hank and Uncle Gar were back outside, turning the tin cans into pulverized metal. Gar had no doubt his nephew would be ready for the real thing by summer’s end.

Now Lansing’s Ford had a tradition that dated back to its founding. Every first Saturday in July, the chapel would be reconfigured into a makeshift bingo hall. The bingo was for adults only. For three hours, the grownups would howl and squeal as numbers were tumbled from the bingo cage. There were no money prizes, but baked goods, donated by the members of the Women’s League, could be won with just the right amount of luck and timing. The monies raised were used to keep the chapel in a good state of repair.

The chapel had been built on a piece of property bequeathed by Seth Armstrong. The Armstrongs were cattle ranchers and from time immemorial had been farming the acreage surrounding the chapel. On this particular Saturday, the Armstrong’s only bull had been tethered to the back wall of the chapel. The bull, known to all as Serene Dean, was anything but. Serene Dean had not one chromosome that wasn’t tainted with anger and orneriness. If let loose, he would have stomped everything within his poor eyesight into a fine powder. This day, Serene Dean was unusually quiet. He stood impassive behind the chapel, slowly digesting his lunch. Inside the chapel, the unpracticed gamblers roared and taunted and teased, as they waited happily to strike off their cards the next number to escape the bingo cage.

As it so happened, Hank was on his way to the river with his Daisy Red Eagle, single pump repeater. Upon hearing the commotion coming from the chapel, he turned his gaze to his left and spotted Serene Dean lazily munching away. Serene Dean and Hank were not on the best of terms. Not since the bull had surprised him as he took a shortcut through the Armstrong’s back forty. Never had a boy’s underwear been so soiled on such a desperate run to safety.

No one really knows where young boys get their ideas. Most people wouldn’t even call them ideas…more like half-formed, irresistible notions. Well, a notion came to Hank as he unmindfully caressed his Daisy Red Eagle. He moved stealthily to the east side of the chapel, making sure to keep the fence between him and his nemesis. Without thinking further, he took aim and pulled the trigger. A B.B. spun through the barrel and violently launched itself upon the seat of Serene Dean’s sovereignty. In a nano-second, the leviathan sprang six feet straight up into the air. He seemed to levitate forever as his short tether yanked forcefully at the back wall of the chapel. Hank looked on, frozen, as the whole wall was separated from the rest of the ecclesiastical structure. Serene Dean returned to earth with a gigantic thud and visions of bullish revenge.

Milus Armstrong, acting as bingo caller, was the first to look beyond the vanished wall. He could see all the way up Serene Dean’s nostrils right into the malicious bovine intent that flooded his tiny brain.

“Run everybody, run!” Milus bellowed.

Out of the chapel the bingo players spilled, tripping over pews and knocking down the baptismal font. As the last of the gambling enthusiasts squeezed himself out of the pandemonium, Milus slammed the big iron bar across the massive oak doors and then collapsed in a puddle of shocked perspiration. Hank, finally exiting his daze, flung himself to the ground and lay hidden until nightfall. He would tell no one of his misdeed until he was much, much older.

Note: This will be the last of the Cauliflower Corners installments until September, at which time the story will resume. Will Gracie Birdsong get married? Will Hank Coulsome be the one? Will Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers weasel his way into her heart? Will the shady dealings of the Reverend Cornelius Augustus Ramses Squeers, Doctor of Divinity, catch up to him or will he continue to prosper? Find out soon.

Cauliflower Corners-Part 3- Gracie

Miss Gracie Birdsong was born in Lansing’s Ford on September 11, 1894, in the warmth of her parents’ small farmhouse. It had been an easy birth according to Mrs. Grant, the local mid-wife. A healthy 7lbs. and 14 ounces, composed mostly, it seemed, of inexhaustible lungs. Feisty from inception. Destined for great things.

On her first birthday, Gracie was christened in the tiny chapel which served as Lansing’s Ford’s place of worship and community centre. Anyone who had the pleasure of knowing the Birdsongs had congregated to be present at the baptism. The proudest of all were Gracie’s god-parents, Gar Colter and his wife, Miss Beazy. The day before, they had made the twenty nine mile trip from Heart’s Content, pulled happily in a two-seat buggy by their sturdy Percherons, Max and Red. Gracie was their first god-child, and, unable to have children themselves, Gar and Miss Beazy were determined to lavish her with all the love they could.  Gracie could not have chosen better.

Gracie grew up strong with a will of iron. She could run as fast as any boy, climb any tree, mend any halter or harness. Early on, she knew she would be a teacher. Whenever she got the chance, she played school, sometimes with her friends but even more often, out of necessity, with her dolls. Gracie loved to pretend she was Miss Lowe, her teacher for all of the 11 years she attended Public School 43 in Hanover County. To her, Miss Lowe was beautiful, graceful and the smartest person in the whole world. If she could have become anyone, Gracie would have chosen to be Miss Lowe.

In September of the year she turned 16, Gracie went off to Normal School at the University of Toronto. It was arranged that she would board with Miss Beazy’s great aunt Violet in Cabbagetown, a short walk away from her classes. At first, the big city scared her more than just a little. It was nothing like Lansing’s Ford or Hanover. If you didn’t pay attention, you could be killed just crossing the street. Yet, day by day, the city took on a comfortable familiarity and she learned to enjoy the clamour and noise and frenetic industry which surrounded her. Eight months later, Gracie passed her provincial exams and was conferred the title of teacher. It was the most rewarding accomplishment of her life. She could hardly wait to be in charge of her own classroom.

Almost exactly at the moment Gracie became a teacher, Cauliflower Corners, a village 32 miles from Hanover and only 16 miles from Lansing’s Ford, was elevated to the status of Auxiliary County Seat. As such, Cauliflower Corners would be entitled to its own school and to its own school teacher. Gracie sent a letter to the Hanover authorities requesting an interview for the newly opened position. This she was granted by return correspondence. On June 21, 1911, Miss Gracie Birdsong was offered the position of “Schoolmistress, Public School 46, Hanover County. Annual Salary: $654.34”. The acceptance was whisked back before the glue was dry on the envelope.

All summer, great preparations were made. Material for dresses was purchased in Hanover. Accommodations were secured with Mrs. Sam Ketchill, a widow with a spacious room and adjoining parlour for rent in Cauliflower Corners. “Ketchill Arms: No gentleman visitors after 7 pm.”

School supplies were ordered from Toronto, including a six foot by four foot map of the world, boxes of coloured chalk, a hand bell, ten pairs of scissors, construction paper galore, a three foot ruler and a large box of stick-on stars. Four months of lesson plans were prepared for grades 1 through 8. Outings were planned and holiday decorations fashioned with imagination and care.

On September 1, 1911, Gracie, helped by her father and her mother, packed up the farm wagon for the long trek to Cauliflower Corners. It was a beautiful late summer day with a sun that still held a lot of warmth. Just before sundown, the Birdsongs pulled up to the Ketchill Arms. Introductions were made and Gracie’s householdings were moved into her new rooms. Mrs. Ketchill had prepared a welcome dinner for her new boarder and her parents, who would be staying that night as honoured guests. Stories and histories were exchanged long into the evening. The bonds of friendship were not long in taking root.

The following morning, the Birdsongs made their way to the school where they were met by Pericles MacPherson, a short powerful man with directionally-challenged hair of such redness that it looked as if his head were on fire. The Periclean handshake was of such vigour that it caused Mr. Birdsong to check for broken bones when he was finally able to extricate his swollen digits from the human vise which had grasped it with unmitigated enthusiasm. With the ladies, Pericles was the picture of gallantry, holding Mrs. Birdsong’s small hand gently in his and bowing ceremoniously in Gracie’s direction.

“It is indeed a pleasure and an honour to meet such a fine family. We have the highest hopes for and greatest confidence in our new schoolmiss. You must be so proud of your daughter, Mrs. and Mr. Birdsong”.

“Why, thank you indeed, Mr. MacPherson. We are sure Gracie will be a credit to your new school.”

“Well, Miss Gracie, let’s get you settled.”

Soon the wagon was emptied.

“Would you like us to stay to help you, dear?”

“Thank you, Mama, but you need to be getting on so that you can get home before dark. I promise to write every day.”

“Good luck, darling.”

“Thank you, Papa.”

“Write to us.”

“I will, Mama.”

“We will miss you.”

“I miss you already.”

“Goodbye.”

“Goodbye.”

At this, Gracie turned to the classroom which would change her life.

Cauliflower Corners-Part 1

From Hamlet To Village

In 1911, Cauliflower Corners was on the verge of greatness. It had recently fully molted from hamlet to village. Two hundred and fifty six citizens in total, with two more expected in the spring. Like all small settlements, it had its eccentrics, geniuses, harmless lay-abouts, scads of decent folk and a budding sociopath, destined to destroy more than one august local institution with his ruthless ambition, vile arrogance and a brain three sizes too small for his already small cranium.

We mention the verge of greatness not without justification. With the County capital 32 miles away in the larger settlement of Hanover (population: 645), Cauliflower Corners had recently been appointed the auxiliary county seat, an honour it had been seeking for over a decade. Being the auxiliary meant that a circuit court judge would come by for Assizes four times a year. More importantly, the village would get its very own schoolteacher, the first of which was to be Miss Gracie Birdsong, all of seventeen years old.

It was a mystery why Miss Birdsong was not yet married. Not that suitors had not been plentiful. On at least five occasions, she had to summon all her tact to let down softly her ardent swains without bruising their fragile egos. Miss Birdsong had always known what she wanted and would not settle for less. Better single and little wishful rather than married and a lot regretful was her philosophy. This outlook had saved her from certain disappointment on several occasions.

Of course, Miss Birdsong’s arrival in Cauliflower Corners was anticipated with more than just a passing interest. The village fathers were pleased with the prestige a full time educator would bring them. Parents would no longer have to spend their exhausted day’s end, struggling to give their children what modest book learning they could. The eligible bachelors, sensing the opportunity of a lifetime, began bathing more frequently, cussing less and spitting their tobacco juice with much more ceremony and renewed accuracy.

Within days of the announcement of the new schoolteacher’s appointment, the whole village turned out to transform the underused church basement into a passable classroom. Desks were built, a blackboard imported from Hanover and the pot bellied stove replaced with one that actually functioned. Walls were scrubbed spotless.

With great solemnity, the children were taught the brand new official welcoming song crafted by Mrs. Gustavia Squeers, church organist, choir leader, and neglected wife of the presiding minister of the Glorious Church of Golgotha, The Most Reverend Cornelius Augustus Ramses Squeers, Doctor of Divinity. The Most Reverend Squeers had, hitherto, been doubling his meager clerical stipend with an annual salary from the County for acting as the local judge, jury and executioner. This annual salary was, of course, augmented by the fifty percent of all fines he greedily meted out and collected, one way or another: usually another.

Cornelius Augustus Ramses Squeers: it was a rather long and imposing name for a man who stood no more than five feet tall in best Sunday shoes. The Reverend believed himself to be a just man, a merciful man even. Under his munificent legal rule, no one was ever flogged more than once a month unless he deserved it. And there was always the option to substitute any flogging or incarceration with the immediate payment, in cash or in kind, of a monetary penalty commensurate with the seriousness of the offence. Reverend Squeers was the richest man in Cauliflower Corners in 1911.

The Reverend and Mrs. Squeers (nee Burden) had met as quietly desperate Hanoverians. He was 38 at the time and Gustavia was in the last month of her twenty third year. The courtship was short and their marriage was propelled more out of resignation than love. Cornelius’s mother had passed away the year previous and he needed someone to starch his collars and prepare his meals. Gustavia had been flirting with spinsterhood and was willing to bargain away her limited autonomy for what she considered “respectability”. She thought of her husband as a somewhat less than adequate catch, despite Cornelius’s recent inexpensive acquisition of a Doctor of Divinity degree from an obscure diploma mill somewhere in Michigan; or maybe it was Utah or Central Africa. Gustavia summoned all her will and decided she would make do with a less than optimal situation.

Within the year, they were blessed with a son. He was christened in a converted wash basin near the altar of the Glorious Church of Golgotha, an institution hastily established by The Most Reverend Squeers only months before his betrothal to Gustavia. Difficult negotiations had preceded the christening and the newborn child was finally labeled, after much compromising and tears. Gorgis Cornelius Gustavius Burden Squeers was adored by his mother and grudgingly tolerated by his father, who, given his druthers, would have been content with a barren yet quieter childlessness. Crying babies interfered with his digestion and customary afternoon naps. Plus, there would have been more money for his secret habits.

Fortunately for Gorgis, his mother loved him to the point of spoliation. The sun rose and set upon Lil Gorgeous (or just plain “Gorgeous”, as she often called him).  It would be her life’s mission to mould him into something special. And special he turned out, as we shall soon see.