“Beware the pogonip,” says one of the dogs. Mr. Henderson looks around the circle. Usually, the dogs are absolutely speechless.
“It is not because they don’t have anything to say,” realizes Mr. Henderson. “It is because they don’t have teeth.”
[:]
Mrs. Borage stands outside the front door.
“Petition and Notice of Foreclosure,” reads Mrs. Borage. The sun is six degrees below the horizon. Mrs. Borage will not read a Petition and Notice of Foreclosure after civil dusk. It is a matter of principle. She examines the shingle.
“Harpsichords Restored Here,” reads Mrs. Borage. We have been using the harpsichord as a dining room table. Mrs. Borage clears off the magazines. A postcard flutters to the ground. Mrs. Borage recognizes the Three Chilly Saints.
“St. Marmetus, St. Pancras, St. Gervais,” says Mrs. Borage. “How many times have we circled the maypole together!” She turns the postcard over.
Fustic from the smoke-tree
Yellow — Ladies’ bedstraw
Broomsedge — a nice brass
Blue logwood
Kermes
Red madder
“A recipe for a midnight rainbow?” says Mrs. Borage. “Dear Gervais! Dear Agnes!”
[:]
Mrs. Borage rolls her harpsichord to the front door. She’ll have to take it apart to get it outside.
“How did I get it inside?” wonders Mrs. Borage. Of course! She didn’t! Mrs. Borage remembers, before she built the house, the marvelous tea parties, harpsichord and sofa and wingback chairs under the open sky. She remembers the taste of rain in lemon zinger.
“It was a gorgeous, impractical lifestyle,” thinks Mrs. Borage. When she remembers it, it does seem worth missing.
She pries apart the harpsichord case. She carries the keyboard into the yard, the pinblock, the soundboard. Back and forth, back and forth, with great pieces of lacquered oak, goes Mrs. Borage. She hammers and hammers. Suddenly, Mrs. Borage drops her router. She realizes she has been building a Viking funerary craft.
“That won’t fit back through the door,” thinks Mrs. Borage.
Anyway, it’s time for that candy bar. Mrs. Borage climbs into the Viking funerary craft. She sits in the stern, on the shiny black bench. She doesn’t feel foolish, sitting in a boat on dry land. Viking ships are amphibious. Hence, the tactical advantage of the Vikings as a land-sea invasion force. Mrs. Borage feels the warm wind stir the lace at her throat.
[:]
Mr. Henderson can’t bear to go near his garage. He has lost the ability to pot. Even the clay on his clothing has grown white and dry and it falls away from him. There is a white trail of potter’s snow all through the house.
“Some men endeavor,” thinks Mr. Henderson. “Some men mold their worlds or even the physical universe. Other men are better suited to stand mildly by, to receive the affections of animals and flowers.” Mr. Henderson decides to give all his muesli to the birds. He goes out onto his porch. It is growing dark, but he sees Mrs. Borage. She is sitting in a Viking ship. The compost heaps tower around her.
Mr. Henderson is reminded of the fecund archipelagos vis ited by the HMS Beagle, maybe because of the colorful birds on the tops of the compost heaps, the pink and green cockatoos. How tame they seem! Were there Vikings in the fecund archipelagos?
Mr. Henderson has only foggy notions of geography. This is the case with many people in the United States of America. Ozark attributes it to the doctrine of American exceptionalism and, of course, to logocentrism, and to the education system, and also to geo-political restructuring as managed by Capital. How many borders have changed in Mrs. Borage’s lifetime?
“The border between life and death certainly,” says Mrs. Borage. “All the borders of Moldova. And Limbo, entirely annexed. It goes on and on.”
Mr. Henderson checks his wall calendar. As he suspected, it is Leif Erikson Day. He takes the small bag of prunes and the smaller bag of hazelnuts from the cupboard. Not for the birds. They might choke. Prunes and hazelnuts — it is the muesli of Vikings.
Mrs. Borage’s eyes are closed. She is singing a Viking song. It tells the old tale of Gudrid the Wanderer: the white sun, the sea of worms.
The adult nieces of Mrs. Borage have come outside to dance. They are singing a Viking song, also. It is not nearly as doleful. The adult nieces of Mrs. Borage sing:
Can’t you hear my love buzz?
Can’t you hear my love buzz?
Can’t you hear my love buzz?
Mr. Henderson gives the muesli to the niece in the leather chaps and Trafalgar jacket. She doffs her three-cornered hat. Strange that Leif Erikson Day should fall just a few days before Mrs. Borage’s birthday! Leif Erikson Day comes earlier each year.
Mr. Henderson feels something squish beneath his shoe. He has just stepped on a marzipan egg. The marzipan eggs are not holding up well in the warmer weather.
“I can make egg cups,” thinks Mr. Henderson. He should be able to do that much at least. Mr. Henderson tries to open the door to his garage. He pushes harder and harder. He sees a tuft of bear fur. Has a bear taken up residence in the garage? Mr. Henderson imagines himself making egg cups, each as fragile as an egg shell, encircled by bears. He knocks gently on the door.
“Mr. Bear,” says Mr. Henderson.
“Ms. Kidney,” says Ms. Kidney. She climbs out from her parka and rubs the sleep from her eyes. In her dream, executives from FAO Schwartz were attempting to steal her sled for their Christmas display.
“We will stop at nothing,” threatened the top executive, as more and more executives poured out from beneath her enormous skirt. Ms. Kidney looks at Mr. Henderson. He looks nothing like the tiny executives, but neither is he Mr. Bear!
“Mr. Buzzard,” says Ms. Kidney. Mr. Henderson feels very nervous. He sidles into his garage and sits on his stool. Ms. Kidney sits back down on her parka. They look at each other.
“I am drinking your port,” confesses Ms. Kidney.
“I don’t have any port,” says Mr. Henderson.
“Tawny port,” says Ms. Kidney.
“I don’t thinks so,” says Mr. Henderson.
“Ruby port,” says Ms. Kidney. Mr. Henderson blinks helplessly.
“You’re a gillyflower, aren’t you?” sighs Ms. Kidney. “Well, your port is the excelsior.”
“I’m glad you like it,” says Mr. Henderson, at last.
“And damn the Bishop of Norwich!” says Ms. Kidney. “Are you with me? Eh, demijohn?”
Mr. Henderson nods at Ms. Kidney.
“I am with you,” he says. “But if you don’t mind…” He faces his wheel. He pumps a few times with his foot.
“It’s not Basil Fool-for-Christmas, is it?” says Ms. Kidney. Mr. Henderson turns back around.
“Skulldugging dream I was having,” says Ms. Kidney. “Little men in penguin suits.”
“No,” says Mr. Henderson. “It is Leif Erikson Day.”
“So it is,” says Ms. Kidney. “Do you have a stronger drop?”
“A stronger drop?” says Mr. Henderson.
“Stronger than the port,” says Ms. Kidney. “A nip for old Lucky?”
“I don’t have any port,” says Mr. Henderson.
“Yes, we’ve drunk it,” sighs Ms. Kidney. “Do you know any knot tricks?” Ms. Kidney ties a magnus hitch.
“Would you care for some soup?” asks Mr. Henderson.
X
Agnes’s research is not going well. Why can’t she focus on the extraterrestrial origins of whale lice, their marvelous voyage, how they came to settle in the ventral pleats and lesions and eyefolds of the old right whale whose wax burns even now in the lantern?