Just a Kiss Away (34 page)

She hurried through the doorway just as Sam heaved wood into the fire bins. He bent over one, held a match to it, and asked, “You have cooked before, right?”

“Not really.” She couldn’t look him in the eye.

“Not really? Why do I feel you’re not telling me everything?”

“Oh, I boiled some water for tea once.” She waved her hand as if it was nothing.

“And?”

He wasn’t fooled.

“This little fire started.”

“And?”

“I burned down one wall of the kitchen. But I know I can do this. Besides, you promised.”

“Something I’m sure I’ll regret,” he muttered, then straightened, moved to the next stove, and lit it, too. “How do you want to cook those birds,” he asked, “baked or fried?”

She couldn’t really decide. “Both.”

“Okay. Remove the feathers, cut up the frying chickens, dip the pieces in flour, and fry them in hot lard. Got it?”

She nodded, mentally repeating: remove the feathers, cut the frying chickens, dip in flour and fry in hot lard. That didn’t sound too difficult.

“The baked ones go in roasting pans; season them, and cook them in these ovens.” He pointed to the large black doors on the front of the ranges. “Do you know anything about stoves?”

“No, but I’m sure I can learn.”

He lit the second stove then slammed the oven door closed. “Come here.”

She crossed the few feet between them, and he turned, pointing to a black handle. “This is the damper. Push it down to open it if you want to cook on the range top. Push it up to close it for oven cooking.” He looked at her.

“Down is open for cooking on top. Up is closed for cooking in the oven.” She repeated proudly.

“Right.”

He squatted down beside a stove. “See this grate?” She leaned over his wide shoulder and nodded. “Uhhuh.”

“It’s the draft. This probably caused your fire at Hick House.”

“Hickory House.”

“All right, Hickory House. Now pay attention.”

“I was. If
you’d
paid attention you wouldn’t keep calling it Hick House.”

“Do you want to learn this or not?”

“Yes, but that’s not fair. If I have to pay attention then you should have paid attention to me when I told you where I live.”

“I don’t want fairness, I want quiet.” He stood up, glaring down at her.

“Well, I just think that you ought to be able to remember—”

“Do me a favor. Don’t think, just listen.”

She sighed, counted to five, then said, “All right. I’m listening.”

“As I said, this is the grate. You turn it so the holes are exposed. The more holes you expose, the hotter the fire. Now, this handle up here”—he stood and pointed to a black handle on the stovepipe—”is the check draft. It lets cool air in so that the oven won’t explode. It is very important that you keep this open. Understand?”

“Draft open.”

“Check
draft open.”

“Check draft open,” she repeated.

He watched her for an unsure minute.

“Sam, please, I want to do this. I know I can do this, really. Just give me a chance.”

“Anything to keep you out of the line of fire,” he muttered, moving over to the next range and lighting it. He pointed to the black handle. “What’s this?”

“The damper,” she said proudly.

He looked surprised. “That’s right. He pointed to the handle on the stovepipe and gave her a smug look. “What’s this?”

“The
check
draft.” She smiled. “You thought you’d trick me by switching the order, didn’t you?”

“Just making sure you understand.” He leaned over to the side grate and opened his mouth to speak.

“You’re testing me, aren’t you?”

He took a long breath.

“That’s the damper,” she said, determined to prove to him that she could do this. “Push it down to open so you can cook on the top. Push it up to close it and use the oven. See, I pay attention.” She smiled, suddenly feeling as if she’d finally held her own against him.

He shrugged and lit the other two stoves. “They’re all yours.” He turned to leave, but stopped as if he’d forgotten something. “Don’t come and get me. Bang on a pan when the meal is ready and we’ll come eat it.”

She nodded, watching him until he shut the door. She looked around the hut, a little of her bravado fading now that she was all alone.

Well, she thought, time’s a-wasting, and she picked up one of the dead birds. Holding it up by its webbed feet she stared at it for a moment. He’d said to remove the feathers. Or was it cut the feathers? She held the bird a bit closer and examined it, mentally reciting his instructions: remove the feathers, cut the fryers. Okay, he’d said “remove.”

Now, how did one remove the feathers? She looked around the kitchen for something to use and spotted some shears hanging on the wall. She marched over and took them back to the table.
Cut the feathers.
Holding the chicken’s wing between her finger and thumb, she lifted it and cut off the feathers.

An hour or so later, she hummed “Dixie” as she snipped off the last bit of fluff from the twentieth chicken. She plopped the bird onto the pile of others and swiped the floating feathers out of her face. The birds looked a little like porcupines. Those little spiky things must turn into that crispy stuff on the outside, she reasoned.

Now what had Sam said? “Oh, that’s right,” she said. “The baked ones go into roasting pans in the ovens.” Roasting pans . . . hmm. She eyed the wall where all the black cookware hung. Some of the pans were square and big enough for several chickens. Those must be roasting pans, she thought, marching over to pull two of them off the nails that held them on the wall.

She dropped both pans on the range top and gathered the whole chickens. They sure were prickly. They ought to be good and crispy. She stuffed five in one pan until they were tight as could be; then she filled the next pan. She opened the oven door, lugged the pan off the top, rammed it into the oven, and closed the door. She did the same with the other pan.

There! she thought, wiping her hands together. All done!

She turned back to the others, which still had to be cut up. She grabbed a knife from a nearby barrel and began sawing back and forth, trying to cut the bird, but the knife was too dull. She eyed a thick-bladed rectangular knife with a big handle and decided that was what she needed. She plucked it off the barrel, then spread the chicken out as flat as she could on the table. She raised the cleaver as high as she could, and with all the force she could muster she hacked through the bird with a loud smack-crunch!

Over and over she hacked at the bird until she had a whole mess of chicken pieces, none of which were recognizable except the neck and feet. She shrugged. Nothing she ate ever looked like the real thing anyway, she reasoned, continuing on with her massacre until half the birds were lacerated into bony, spiky chunks.

With a zip in her step she crossed to the flour barrel, scooped up a bowl of flour, and carried it back over to her table. She set it down and tossed the pieces in the flour, like Sam had said. She repeated the motion until she really got into the spirit of it, tossing the prickly little chicken pieces in the flour. A white cloud billowed upward as she hummed. She placed the last piece on the table and decided cooking was right fun. Then she sneezed, sending a shower of flour and feathers all around her.

She should have gotten rid of the feathers after she’d cut them off. She fanned them away and looked down at her clothes. They were caked white. She tried to brush them off but succeeded only in smearing flour deeper into the cloth and sending the feathers flying through the air like dandelions in March. She gave up and went over to the monstrous stoves.

She took the huge black iron pans, all six of them, off the wall and plunked them down on the stove tops. There was room for two pans on each stove, so she’d have to use three of the four stoves. She retrieved the lard canister and scooped out a spoonful of lard and tried to drop it into the first pan. It stuck to the spoon. She shook it a minute until it loosened and plopped with a sizzle into the pan.

Confidence recharged, she thwacked the lard-filled spoon against the rim of each pan and watched with satisfaction as it sizzled into liquid fat. This was great fun, and not too hard, either. She crossed to the table, scooped up an armful of floured, prickly chicken, then returned to the stoves, and dropped the pieces into the pans. A few minutes later she had all the chicken sizzling on the stoves.

Now what to serve with them? She rummaged through the sacks and barrels until she spotted some rice. That was perfect. She looked back at the chicken, sizzling away, and wiped some sweat from her forehead. This wasn’t easy, and the hut was getting really hot.

She filled a bowl with rice and walked over to the stove. She realized she’d have to boil the rice. She pulled a couple of big pots off the wall and placed them on the fourth stove. Then she walked over to the water barrel, ladled water into a bowl, and carried it back to the pot.

Over and over she repeated the motion until sweat poured from her damp head. But the pots were filled. She dumped in the rice, a couple of big bowls full in each pot. By the time she’d finished, the pots were filled almost to the top with rice. She placed the lids on the pots and checked the frying chicken.

Spoon in hand, she went to the first pan and stuck the spoon in to turn the meat. It wouldn’t budge. The grease splattered and sputtered, and she dodged it, still trying to jam the spoon under the chicken. Smoke started drifting upward. A distinct burning smell permeated the room.

A quick glance at the other pans told her the ranges were too hot. She moved like lightning between the stoves, trying to pry the burning chicken off the pans. Grease splattered on her arms and shirtfront as she worked.

The sudden hiss of water sizzled from the far stoves. Lollie turned just as the rice bubbled over in a pasty avalanche. The lid crashed to the floor along with a bubbling mass of gooey, watery rice. It spilled onto the stove, sending a cloud of steam upward to mix with the smoking chicken.

She panicked, running back and forth as rice glopped down the front of the hot ovens. Streaks of pasty, lumpy rice began to bake on the oven doors. The ranges were just too hot. She needed to hit the damper to lessen the heat.

Or was it the draft she needed to close?

Oh, rats! She’d forgotten which was which. Calm down, she told herself, trying to ignore the sound of erupting rice. She waved the smoke away and concentrated.

A damper is something that dampens. A draft is air. Smoke billowed out, turning blacker and blacker. Rice sizzled, then plopped and plopped. A drastic situation called for drastic measures. She grabbed a handle in each hand and closed them both.

The blast turned the head
of every soldier on the artillery field, including Sam. His first instinct was that they were being attacked, until the half-burned, half-raw prickly chicken landed next to his foot.

“Aw, crap!” He dropped the shell canister he’d been holding and ran toward the cooking hut, rounding the corner seconds after the blast.

Black smoke billowed up from where the thatched roof used to be, and chicken feathers rained down like snowflakes. The front door hung on a single hinge, and as Sam stepped forward, he tripped on the back door. Barrels had splintered, tin canisters rolled, and one entire side of the building was white with what looked like flour.