Salem's Daughters by Stephen Tremp Page B

obey.
    Bob passed more farmhouses, some with pristine manicured lawns and postcard red barns and others with rusted farm equipment in the yard.
    “Over there. That was where the house I was raised in stood.” Erma pointed down a long overgrown two-tire lane path.
    “It’s gone now. A tornado destroyed it a few years after my siblings and I left home and my parents moved to Lansing. I remember there were mean dogs that roamed the area. Daddy would have to walk all the way to the road with a club to get the mail in case that pack of wild mongrels attacked him.”
    “That’s quite a story, Grandma,” Debbie said. “Wild dogs roaming the roads? Things were sure different then.”
    Erma sighed deep. “That’s not all. It was those dogs that kept your grandfather and I separated as kids. You see, he lived on the other side of that row of trees over there against the horizon. We rarely left our property on foot for fear of those damned varmints.”
    Erma grabbed Ross’s hand and kissed him. “I only met your grandfather in high school, because my parents home schooled us in the morning, and then we worked our small farm in the afternoon and evening. And to think as young kids we lived a few short miles apart. All those wasted years because of those confounded mutts.”
    Erma looked at Debbie. “When we graduated we were married and moved to Lyon Lake just outside Marshall. Your Grandfather was hired by a lumber baron. Ross, he was already an artisan.
    “This man, I can tell you he could build anything out of wood. It wasn’t long before he opened up a furniture building business. Dempsey Furniture was born and has been around for over fifty years and still going strong.”
    Bob passed a row of one hundred foot tall elm trees that formed the eastern border of the Turner place. Up ahead, the dilapidated hulk came into view. He slowed to a stop.
    “Bob. What are we stopping here for?” Erma snapped.
    “We’re ah … we’re here,” Bob nearly stammered the words out.
    There was silence for almost a minute as the Dempseys and the Collins stared, stunned at the burned down rubble. Bob tried to think of something, anything, to say.
    Debbie broke the silence. “Okay, put your jaws back into your mouths. Let’s go.”
    Bob exited the Explorer and opened the drivers’ side back door, helping Erma out.
    “Well,” Debbie said, flashing a smile and with a pose similar to a model on a daytime television game show. “This is it. What do you think? Wait. Don’t say anything. Let me give you the grand tour.”
    “And don’t forget to bring your imaginations,” Bob said.
    He laughed out loud, observing for the first time since he’d met her, Erma was dumbfounded into silence and bereft of any snide comebacks to throw at him.

Chapter 11              Cornwell’s Turkeyville
     
    The sun was passing toward the western horizon. It was almost four o’clock. Bob pulled into the parking lot of Cornwell’s Turkeyville, just north of Marshall.
    He knew how much Debbie and her family loved the restaurant. All the countless times they took him there when dating Debbie, from high school and college, and his career with Thorbough and Tomlinson, he feigned interest to get in their good graces because he loved Debbie and wanted to fit into her family.
    But now he was appreciative of the journey back in time. The place was built on four hundred acres and boasted an ice cream parlor, gift shop, general store, dinner theatre, Civil War re-enactments, summer kids camps, to a heated pool for RV parking. The place was huge, and situated at the intersection of two interstate highways, he understood why the lines to get in were always so long.
    Today was no exception. Since this was the last holiday weekend of the summer, Cornwell’s was packed with hundreds of families. By the time they found a parking spot and entered the line, Bob surmised it would be at least a thirty minute wait to order their food. Finding an open