The tin can and the canoe: Part I
For the season, I offer a two-part ghost story that starts with good intentions and ends with unintended consequences, bearing with it a moral-honor your ancestors but when loved ones pass on, keep them close.
My uncle lives on a rambling estate overlooking the Hudson. The house itself is a Tudor abbey, brought over from England, stone by numbered stone, at the end of the nineteenth century by the grandparents of my uncle’s law partner, Jerry lets-call-him Stone. The land is an old Revolutionary War battlefield returned, by the centuries, to woods, brooks and rambles.
When Jerry married a city girl, he offered my uncle a house swap, a Manhattan brownstone for a place in the country. Some thought Uncle Phil pulled the short straw. The place had been lightly lived in for decades, ever since the day the Stone boys packed off to war and one never returned. Some said Mary Stone wasted away from heartache and, to see the house as it stood in the sixties, it seemed the house, too, had fallen into deep sorrow.
When my aunt and uncle moved in with three lively children and a passion for history, the house gradually revived. Every family weekend was devoted to exploration and upkeep. Soon, gardens emerged from the weeds and, with careful pruning, a hundred rose bushes burst into glorious bloom.
One day, a mining company client gave my uncle a curious thank-you gift-a Geiger counter. It was for finding old cannonballs. Thrilled, my uncle called his two young sons to his side and began prowling the rose garden, hunched over, intent. Whenever the stick beeped, the boys dug. The first beeps unearthed a few old nails and a coin or two, nothing truly antique or of value. Soon, the boys tired of the game and resorted to rough-and-tumble tag. Then, the stick went mad. Beeeeeep-beep-beep-beep-beep, it was insistent that something big was under there. Putting their shoulders to the task and clawing at roots that blocked a path to their treasure, the boys soon struck pay-dirt: a rusty yellow can, labeled “Maxwell House good to the very last drop.”
They pulled it out and shook it. Something shuffled around inside and the can was heavy. Johnny started to pry it open.
“Wait!” my uncle commanded, a “bad feeling” rising, “Let me do it.”
He turned his shoulder to the boys and held the can close. Inside were mounds of gray ash with chips of white and a note scrawled on scrap paper saying, “Here rest the remains of Mary Barrett Stone.”
Tenderly, he carried the can into the house and picked up the phone. Here’s what he says transpired next:
“Jerry, I’ve got your mother in my den.” Silence.
“She’s in a tin can. I found her in the garden.”
“Put her back!” Jerry snapped, horror in his voice.
“I can’t do that. I’m an officer of the court. You’ll have to come get her.” More silence.
In the end, Jerry drove up and, saying nothing to anyone, took away the can.
Where Jerry’s mother traveled from there, we don’t know for sure, but his father’s final resting place is more uncertain. But, that’s a tale for another day.
Gran’s Fruitcake
Another uncle died this summer and, under the bed, my cousin found an age-yellowed envelope that she sent to me, saying only, “I think this should be yours.” The handwriting was jagged with almost Oriental points on the M’s that I instantly recognized though I hadn’t seen it in 30 years. Penciled in my grandmother’s spidery scrawl, were a dozen recipe cards all splotched with grease and batter and annotated with comments like “Glady’s favorite” or “no nuts for Uncle Bob.” Messy or not, these cards are an enduring testament to a life lived well with friends. Gran had a sweet-tooth and she always kept a freshly baked cake on the counter to share over coffee and kitchen conversation. As the cake bakes today, the aroma is a time-machine back to a slower decade when family and friends were everything.
1 tsp. baking powder
2 1/ 4 cups flour
1/2 pound butter
1 1/ 4 cups sugar
5 eggs
1/ 4 lb. dried cherries
1/ 4 lb. dried pineapple
1/ 2 lb. raisins
1/ 4 lb. chopped pecans
2 T. milk
1 t. vanilla
1 t. almond extract
zest of one lemon, minced
Preheat oven to 325.
Mix dry ingredients with a pinch of salt. Set aside.
Cream butter and sugar. Beat in one egg at a time. Add fruit and nuts. Add dry mixture alternately with milk until batter is thick but still drops from a spoon. Add more milk, if necessary.
Butter a spring-form pan and dust with flour. Pour in batter.
Bake one hour and test. Do not over-bake; it will dry out.
Sprinkle with powdered sugar. Serve it straight or Gran’s way, with great gobs of freshly whipped cream. It’s perfect for a coffee social.