tale #43

Ace Hardware sat on the main road just before the bridge crossing out of Kolonia.  There was a dirt road on either side of it.  If you turned down the road before Ace Hardware, you got to Old Bill’s house.  If you turned down the road after, it led you to Disco Dannenberg’s house.  Hers was the third house back.  I almost missed it.  The short, squat, cinderblock building was hidden behind a tangle of hibiscus and bougainvillea.  I parked near an overgrown azalea  and sat in the car for a moment, as was polite, to give Mrs. Dannenberg time to see me and prepare for a visitor.  I hadn’t called in advance, in case she told me not to come.

Through the car windshield, I could see a small wooden stoop that led up to the front door.  On it sat a lonely looking single chair and a small table.  I reached over to the passenger seat and scooped up the Styrofoam cooler that Bernard had lent me.  Inside was the white vase with the green dragon pattern I had purchased in Guam.  I took a deep breath and opened the car door.  The walk between the car and the stoop was only a little muddy.

Mrs. Dannenberg answered on the first knock.  She was almost exactly as I had pictured her but shorter.  Much shorter.  I towered over her.  She matched her house, short, squat and covered in a house frock with a tangle of tropical flowers.  Her hair was steel gray and pulled into a tight bun at the back of her head.  She looked up at me appraisingly and I felt sure she knew who I was.  “Yes?” she said.

I smiled.  “Mrs. Dannenberg?  I’m Austen Clark.  I work for the attorney general.  I was hoping to speak with you about your son-in-law.”  She looked at me blankly and waited.  “Norman Norman” I added.  She continued to watch me.  I stopped smiling.  “He’s married to your daughter.”  The woman didn’t move.  “He works for the national government.”

Mrs. Dannenberg tilted her head to one side considering me.  She gave a long sigh and then stepped back, opening the door wide.  “Come in,” she said.

I slipped my shoes off.  “Thank you.”  I followed her inside.  The linoleum was very clean and felt cool under my feet.  The house was the same layout as the one I had rented from Old Bill.  Her little kitchen was tidy and the living room had a few pieces of wooden furniture with faded cushions.  It did not look as if she had company very often.  I looked from the straight backed woman in front of me, to her cheerful floral dress, to the drab furnishings of her small house.  Something was not matching up.  Why was she living in a Menwei style house, by herself?  Old Bill had cinderblock houses on his property, but he lived at the front, in a traditional style house, with a rotating cast of relatives.

“You have a lovely home,” I said as I sat in an armchair, near the kitchen pass through.  I set the cooler I was carrying by my feet.

Mrs. Dannenberg sat on a loveseat across the room.  She looked around, as if trying to see something lovely about the room.  Finally, she shrugged.  “It’s where I live now.”

She looked at me again.  We were both silent.  “Well.  Hmmm,” I said, trying to figure out how to begin.  Mrs. Dannenberg didn’t say anything, an intent expression on her wide face.  “Awhile ago, your son-in-law, Norman Norman, gave you a vase,” I said.

She gave a single nod of her head.  “Yes.”

“That vase was not his to give.  It belongs to our President.”

She snorted.  “That man is from Kosrae.  Presidents are from Pohnpei, or Chuuk.  But that man is from Kosrae.”  Her disdain for the national leader was evident.

“Yes, ” I forged ahead, “but it is still his vase.  He would like it back.”  I gestured to the cooler at my feet.  ” I have another vase for you.  You should not be without a vase, since you didn’t know it belonged to the President when you accepted it.”  My speech sounded stilted, even to me.

“What if I did know?” she asked, leaning forward.  Her face took on a sly appearance.

I sat back, surprised by the question.  “Well,” I thought for a moment.  “Then, I would have to arrest you for receiving stolen property.”  I couldn’t actually arrest anybody, but maybe she wouldn’t know that.

“You would arrest a frail old woman?” she asked in a shocked tone.

I looked at her neat hair and straight back.  “You’re not that frail,” I said.

She stared at me.  Then she stared at the cooler.  Finally, she held her hand out towards me, palm up, and wiggled her fingers.  “Let’s see it.”

I took the lid off and pulled out the vase.  I held it in both hands and turned it around slowly, like a human display rack.

The look of disdain returned to her face.  “I was told you were bringing me a better one.”

Uh oh, she didn’t like it.  “You don’t like this one?”  I had spent quite a bit of my limited time on Guam selecting it.  “What’s wrong with it?”

“I was told the President was a man with fancy taste.”  She stood up.  “And the vase was very special.  ‘One of a kind’ the police said when they came here.”  She waved at the vase I was holding.  “That one don’t look so special to me.”  She walked out of the room.  I could hear her shuffling around in one of the bedrooms.  A minute later, she walked back into the living room holding a vase in her hands.  It was white with a green dragon pattern.  I looked at it.  I looked down at mine.  I looked back at the one she was holding.  The vase in Mrs. Dannenberg’s hands was an identical twin to the one I was holding.

“I guess the President’s taste isn’t so fancy after all,” she said.  She placed her vase on the counter of the kitchen pass through.  She sat on the ottoman near my chair, leaning towards me.  In a low voice, she said, “You can tell me, where did you get it?”  Her eyes gleamed a little.

“K-Mart,” I said sheepishly.

She nodded and took the vase out of my hands.  She stood up and set it on the counter of the kitchen pass through, next to the President’s vase.  We looked at them, side by side.  Mrs. Dannenberg moved back to the love seat and sat down.  She shook her head and said, almost to herself, “All this mess over a cheap vase I didn’t even want.”

Really?  I couldn’t rent a car in Chuuk, or go to certain shops, or take a taxi, over something she didn’t even want?  Really?  I looked over at her.  She looked so dejected, like a small, disappointed child.  I sighed internally.  “Norman Norman must have thought you would like this vase.  He risked a lot to give it to you.”

She snorted again.  “Norman Norman is an idiot.  I told my daughter that before she married him.  I like his brother alright.  If my daughter had been faster, Bernard Norman could have been my son-in-law.  But her cousin got there first.”

“What do you want?” I asked.

“What?”

“You said you don’t want a vase.  What do you want?”

Her old face lit up.  She held her two hands up to me, palms facing inward.  They were bent and wrinkled, like my old leather slippers, just before they had to be thrown out.  “My hands don’t work so good anymore,” she said.  “They have a machine that opens cans for you.  You just put the can near it, and it opens them.  You don’t have to do anything.”  She inspected her hands.  “What do they call those?”

“An electric can opener?”

“Yeah, that’s it.  One of those would be nice.”

“An electric can opener.  Your son-in-law steals from the President, you turn the police away at your door, and what you really want is an electric can opener?”

She nodded in affirmation.

Oh for goodness sakes.  “A little communication can go a long way,” I said, exasperated.

“I tried to tell him,” she said sadly.  “That Norman Norman, he don’t listen so good.”

“Well why didn’t you just give the vase back?” I asked.

Mrs. Dannenberg looked appalled.  “That would be rude.  Norman Norman went to a lot of trouble to get it for me.”  She looked at me sternly.  “Maybe you don’t have such good manners.”

We sat quietly for a bit.  “What now?” I asked.

She stood up and walked over to the two vases.  “Close your eyes,” she said.

“Why?” I asked automatically.

She gave me another stern look.  “Close your eyes.”

This time, I sighed out loud.  I shut my eyes, though not tightly.  I could hear the vases scrapping on the counter.

“Okay,” Mrs. Dannenberg said.  “Open.”

I opened my eyes and the two vases were still side by side on the counter.

“Pick one and take it to the President,” she said.

I stood up and went over to the counter.  I examined both vases carefully.  They really were indistinguishable.  I picked up the one on the left.

Mrs. Dannenberg nodded and handed me the cooler.  I placed the vase inside and headed to the door, where I turned to my hostess.  “Thank you.  It’s been…”  I hesitated, “interesting.”

Mrs. Dannenberg looked up at me.  “I like you.  You’re not so nice.  Maybe you’ll come visit again?”

Maybe not.  I shrugged.  “Maybe.”

She opened the door for me.  “Good,” she said as if I had agreed.  “Next time, don’t park so close to the azalea.”

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