Chapter Six: Giggleswick
The next morning, the Bisbys were just having another look around the house in their pajamas when there came a polite knock upon the front door. Not one of them felt presentable enough to be answering front doors at this hour of the morning, but after they had all straightened their pajamas and patted down their hair, they decided Mr. Bisby was clearly the tidiest, and so he was sent shuffling down the hallway in his cast to see who it was while Mrs. Bisby and Elliot hid in the kitchen peering round the corner.
“Helloooo,” sang a voice they didn’t recognize, and Mr. Bisby swung the door open to find the entire Noodle family on the doorstep. A woman he expected was Lilly Noodle was beaming up at him with a smile full of teeth and dimples, and she was holding a plate of pancakes stacked as high as her chin. She had strawberry-blonde hair pulled into an elegant low bun, and a string of pearls hung round her neck overtop a very classic red pencil dress, which Mrs. Bisby was busy admiring from her hiding place in the kitchen. Wally stood beside his wife wearing a bow-tie to match her dress, as they were seldom seen in conflicting colors, and his hands were resting on the shoulders of a freckly girl with wispy brown hair that flicked in every direction. Clutched in the girl’s hand was a leash with a particularly droopy-looking basset hound at the other end.
“How d’you do?” said Lilly Noodle, still smiling so that all her teeth should have a view. “We thought you might be needing breakfast,” she said, holding the plate of pancakes out for Mr. Bisby to take. Her voice was low and bookish, but on the contrary, she seemed anything but dull.
“That’s very thoughtful,” said Mr. Bisby, nearly buckling under the weight of the pancakes. “Won’t you come in?” he said, and the Noodles happily accepted the invitation.
Mrs. Bisby and Elliot gave one last tug on their pajamas and then left the dignity of their hiding places to greet their new neighbors. All the proper introductions were made, including Bert the basset hound, who barked in recognition at the sound of his name and then trotted off in search of a comfy place to lay down. Mrs. Bisby said how much she liked Lilly Noodle’s dress, and then Mrs. Noodle made a very polite but ill-fated attempt to compliment Mrs. Bisby’s plaid pajamas. This caused them both to giggle, and they were soon chattering away like old school friends while Mrs. Bisby dug through the suitcases to find dishes and silverware for their pancakes.
Wally had already begun telling Elliot’s father about the exciting day at work he had planned for them, and this left Elliot and Eliza to stare awkwardly at one another. Eliza began to hum absentmindedly, and Elliot decided it was much less awkward staring at his toes instead, and they both went on like this for quite some time until suddenly Eliza spotted Elliot’s worn copy of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe poking out of the suitcase his mother’d just been rifling through.
He was quite sure he saw her eyes light up at the sight of it, but just when it looked as though she were about to say something, she pressed her lips back together and began to hum once more.
Elliot couldn’t help finding Eliza’s reaction rather curious. He doubted very much that C.S. Lewis’s books had made it all the way to Giggleswick, but then again, perhaps Wally had been particularly thorough in his travels. He swallowed uncomfortably, and though he wasn’t altogether sure he wanted to say anything either, Elliot finally cleared his throat and pointed to the book. “Do you –– er, know it?” he asked.
“Know it?” Eliza replied, now quite animatedly. “I love it! I’ve read it ‘bout a hundred times!” she professed. “I sometimes wish I could crawl through my mother’s wardrobe ... you know –– to another world, and then save it from the grips of a terrible Queen. And then––” But Eliza must have sensed the look of surprise on Elliot’s face, because she suddenly grew very bashful, and she stared back down at the floor.
“Oh ... um, yeah,” said Elliot kindly, “I know what you mean. It’s –– great.”
It was a stupid word to describe his favorite book, Elliot told himself now that he’d said it. But he wasn’t used to talking to kids his own age. More still, he wasn’t used to anyone wanting to talk to him.
He and Eliza smiled feebly at one another, but the awkwardness quickly returned when he couldn’t think of anything more to say. Was it any wonder he hadn’t any friends? he thought. He’d just begun to dwell on this when the sound of Eliza stomping her foot yanked him back into the moment.
“Oh, this is silly,” she said rather dramatically. “Look, do you want to be friends or don’t you?”
This level of directness took Elliot by surprise, and once the question had sunk in, he was only ever able to nod his head and smile shyly back at her.
“Good!” she exclaimed happily. “That’s settled, then.”
And in another surprise gesture, she flung her arms around him, giving him a tight squeeze, and just like that, Elliot had his first ever friend.
“Have you gotten your school list yet?” said Eliza quite comfortably now.
“No,” said Elliot. “Should I have?”
“Dunno,” she shrugged. “I bet we’ll have loads of classes together though!” And they sat down next to each other on the floor to pet Bert, who groaned appreciatively as they scratched his ears and then rolled over so they shouldn’t forget his belly would need scratching too.
“Were you born in Giggleswick?” asked Elliot, feeling much less awkward now that he and Eliza were sworn best friends.
“Oh yes,” she said proudly. “So were my mom and my dad. Though one of my grandfathers came over from England, I think, but I can’t remember which.”
“Doesn’t he have an accent?” asked Elliot, thinking that would be the logical way to tell.
“I don’t think so ... dead, you know,” she said quite matter-of-factly.
“Oh,” said Elliot, and just then his mother called them over for pancakes, forcing Elliot and Eliza to postpone solving the mystery of the mysteriously English grandfather till a rainy day.
Seeing as they hadn’t any furniture, the Bisbys and the Noodles seated themselves in a circle on the floor, which Bert saw as an open invitation, and there were so many pancakes that they each had several stacked on their plates. The Bisbys were about to eat theirs plain when Wally whipped out a bottle of some greenish looking syrup and offered it to everyone. Eliza accepted immediately, pouring globs of it onto her pancakes before devouring forkful after forkful. The Bisbys did not think it looked very appetizing given its uncanny resemblance to swamp water, but Eliza did seem to be enjoying it quite heartily, and they didn’t want to be rude, so they each took their turn pouring teensy amounts onto their plates.
“You’ll want more than that,” said Wally, egging them on, and Mrs. Bisby, who was currently holding the bottle, smiled sheepishly and poured a bit more.
“What is this stuff?” Elliot dared to ask once he’d had his turn with the bottle.
“Foosap, of course!” said Eliza through a mouthful of pancake, and her mother glared at her reproachfully.
“It’s made from the sap of foogerton trees,” Wally explained. “They’re a species of maple tree indigenous to Giggleswick.”
“So it’s like maple syrup, right?” asked Elliot, feeling a little less apprehensive.
“Wouldn’t know,” said Wally.
Elliot told himself it was like maple syrup so that he would feel better, and he took a modest bite. At first he was surprised to find that it didn’t taste green, but when he took another much bigger bite, he realized it was really quite wonderful. Sometimes it tasted like maple syrup, and other times it didn’t, which is a confusing description, but it really was the best way to describe it.
Mr. and Mrs. Bisby had taken a liking to the foosap as well, and soon everyone was finishing up, all except for Eliza who was on her third helping. Elliot thought she looked much too small to fit all those pancakes inside of her, but it seemed the laws of physics disagreed with him, and in all fairness, she did have Bert’s help in finishing what was left on her plate.
“Bert! You’ll get your ears all syrupy!” scolded Mrs. Noodle, looking embarrassed, but Bert was paying her no attention, and she soon gave up since no one else seemed to mind.
“Lilly,” said Mrs. Bisby as they began to clean up, “this was so kind of you –– and the beds! How can we ever thank you?”
“By spending the day with us, of course!” Mrs. Noodle replied immediately. “Eliza and I are dying to show you around Giggleswick, and Wally wants to take Todd to work, so you and Elliot will need something to do!”
“Are you sure it wouldn’t be any trouble?” asked Mrs. Bisby.
“Heaven’s no,” replied Mrs. Noodle, “long as you haven’t tired of us yet!” she said with the wobbly giggle that seemed to be her trademark.
Mrs. Bisby looked in awe. “We should be sorely punished if we ever tire of you,” she said quite seriously.
Elliot couldn’t imagine tiring of neighbors like the Noodles –– the Lewis’s, yes, but not the Noodles. He and Eliza washed the foosap out of Bert’s ears, which the dog happily mistook for attention, and then after the Bisbys had changed, the whole clan made their way out of the house and into the street to start the day. Wally and Mr. Bisby went in one direction after many waves, hugs and kisses, and their counterparts went in the other direction toward town with Bert flapping at their heels.
Eliza was pelting Elliot with a hundred questions about America, but meanwhile, Elliot couldn’t take his eyes off Giggleswick. The homes along the street were elegantly chiseled into many gingerbread encrusted gables and sweeping porches. Every tree was appropriately placed, and every hill looked as if it had been sculpted with absolute precision. Even the dirt mounds and ant hills seemed to have a decorative flair.
As they neared the center of town, everything from lawns to store fronts, to well dressed people and litter-free streets testified to the deep affection every citizen held for Giggleswick. Everything seemed perfectly and lovingly executed, all the while giving the impression of effortless creativity.
“You’ll be needing furniture, I expect,” said Mrs. Noodle as they came to a pause in front of a wide shop with the words Finster Furniture, since 1811 sprawled in gold paint across the front window.
At first Mrs. Bisby looked very eagerly in through the glass at the chintz armchair and dark wood coffee table on display, but then she quickly backed away from the window looking a little glum. “I’m afraid we haven’t any American money to convert to pay for these things,” she said. “We’ll make do for now.”
Mrs. Noodle looked repelled at the words “make do”. “American money is of little use to us,” she said. “That’s why we have a fund for new arrivals to help them get off on the right foot. You didn’t think we’d expect you to hop over here and start your new life without any money to make the transition, did you?!” But Mrs. Noodle didn’t wait for an answer and instead steered Elliot’s mother directly through the shop entrance.
They were quickly greeted by a short, slightly humped man wearing a cardigan sweater and large boxy glasses.
“Nora, this is Algernon Finster,” said Mrs. Noodle. “Algie, this is Nora Bisby and her son, Elliot. They’re our new arrivals.”
The man grinned at them with a conspicuous pair of dentures that looked several sizes too large for his mouth. “A pleasure, indeed,” he said sloppily, his teeth slipping. “May I interest you in my collection of skunk-skinned footstools?”
Elliot and Mrs. Bisby exchanged puzzled looks, thinking it sounded like a rather nasty piece of furniture.
“No thank you, Algie, we won’t be needing any of those,” said Mrs. Noodle politely. “We’ll just have a look round.” And she strolled past him toward the armchair Mrs. Bisby had admired from the window. “Nora, dear, I could see it in your eyes –– this is the chair for you!” “Yes, well ... I suppose ... I do love it,” said Mrs. Bisby, looking hesitant at such a sudden purchase. Mr. Finster, however, did not delay in noting her selection.
“And how about this couch? The color will go quite nicely with the chair,” suggested Mrs. Noodle now halfway across the room.
“Oh it’s lovely! But we don’t––”
“We’ll take one of these, Algie,” Mrs. Noodle called across the store. “And what about this nice lamp?” she said, turning Mrs. Bisby’s attention toward the shelves of accessories that lined the back wall.
“Well, it is nice, but we really––”
“One of these too, Algie, I should think,” she called again, pointing to the lamp. Mr. Finster was now by the cash-register jotting the items down on a list, which he was subsequently drooling over.
Mrs. Noodle went throughout the whole store like this until she and a shell-shocked Mrs. Bisby had selected enough chairs, couches, tables and lamps to very nearly furnish the entire Bisby home.
“I think that will be all, Algie,” said Mrs. Noodle, and Mrs. Bisby nodded very firmly in agreement.
“I’ll just ring you up,” he slurred, hunching over the old-fashioned cash register, looking very pleased with Mrs. Noodle’s excellent salesmanship. “Hmm,” he said as he punched the keys to compute the last few figures.
“Comes to eleven-hundred chuckles and fifty-three sniggs.”
Elliot thought he’d misheard, and as he was asking Eliza if they really called their money chuckles and sniggs, Mrs. Noodle removed an envelope from her purse and began counting the most colorful money Elliot had ever seen. Each bill was a different color of the rainbow according to its denomination.
Although Mrs. Bisby was also momentarily entranced by the colorful money, she was apparently much more preoccupied with the amount. “Are you sure we haven’t gone over budget?” she asked nervously.
“Surely not!” said Mrs. Noodle jovially. “Haven’t so much as pinched it!”
Mrs. Bisby looked only slightly relieved. No matter how much money was in the new-arrival fund, they had just purchased a lot more furniture than she had ever deemed necessary in the past. However, as she took another glance at the armchair on display in the window, she smiled helplessly, likely imagining where she might put it in their new house.
Mr. Finster assured them that the furniture would be delivered later that day and then waved awkwardly at them as they left the shop. Mrs. Noodle explained that Algie was one of seven Finster brothers, all of whom lived above the store with their mother, the elderly Mrs. Penelope Finster, whom the brothers frequently mentioned, but Giggleswick had seldom seen.
“She stays fairly confined to her room above the store, but she’s quite the knitter –– knits blankets for all the newborns, and I always think her sons have the warmest looking socks,” said Mrs. Noodle. “I know they’re a bit peculiar, but I’ll say one thing for the Finster brothers –– they all have hearts of gold.”
Elliot did not doubt this, though he had personally felt rather uncomfortable around Mr. Finster. Perhaps it had been the gnawing fear that the man’s teeth might suddenly fling out at them as he spoke, or that he might have a room full of dead skunks hanging from the rafters somewhere. Peculiar did seem the right word.
Back outside along the shop-lined street, Bert was wagging his entire tail-end at the sight of them, and Eliza untied his leash from the lamppost she’d secured him to while they had been in the store. Many people with arms full of shopping bags bustled past, each of them saying “hello” more cheerfully than the next, and occasionally someone would stop to pet Bert or to introduce themselves to Mrs. Bisby and Elliot, having spotted their new faces.
As they wandered past shops like Luciano Lombardi’s Ladies Apparel, Tilda Sprinkle’s Ice-Cream Parlor, Dirk’s Dentistry (which had likely supplied Mr. Finster with the ill-fitting dentures), and Pauline La Russo’s Hair & Nail Salon, they soon came across a store front with a hanging sign that read Caractacus Knicklebean’s, Candymaker carved majestically into the wood. Through the window, Elliot and Eliza spied the most succulent looking candies and sweets displayed temptingly just on the other side of the glass.
“Oh!” said Elliot, suddenly remembering the candy Mrs. Noodle had left on his bed the day before. “Those ‘nicklebeans were wonderful!” he said, pronouncing it as you would the word knob or knife.
Elliot expected Eliza to agree with him, but instead she giggled, and just when he had had enough of being laughed at, she said, “The k’s not silent. It’s K-nicklebean.”
“Oh,” said Elliot again, turning red. “Well, anyway ... they were good.”
Elliot and Eliza did not have to ask permission to enter the store, for Mrs. Noodle and Mrs. Bisby seemed just as eager. As they pressed the door open, a bell tinkled above them to signal their presence, and the smell of warm sugar and chocolate filled their nostrils causing their eyes to roll over in pleasure. There were shelves of toffees and creams and treacle tarts and row after row of gummy this and chewy that. One whole corner was dedicated to the candymaker’s specialty, Knicklebeans. Some bags were filled with the original chocolate beans that Elliot had very much enjoyed, but other bags featured beans that gushed cherry, blueberry, or caramel when the shell was crushed in your mouth.
Elliot salivated at the sight of so much sugar, wanting to try a bit of everything he saw. He was particularly interested in some round tablets called Fogze, which supposedly filled your mouth with fizz and then sizzled all the way down to your stomach where it would continue to tingle for up to an hour. There were several other fog-themed candies throughout the store, including big poofs of gray-colored cotton candy, marshmallow cream pies, and tiny pellets that billowed into thick creamy clouds when dropped into a glass of water. He then spotted what looked like PEZ dispensers in the shape of a woman dressed in nautical clothing, and when you popped her head back, she wailed shrilly and produced a compass-shaped candy out through her teeth. This was obviously meant to portray Wailing Wanda in her final moments, which Elliot thought was quite clever, though he didn’t imagine Lefty Scrum would find it so amusing.
The hundreds of colors and smells that currently overloaded Elliot’s senses were interrupted only by a booming voice that called “Hello there!” to them from behind a counter at the front of the store. When Elliot turned to see who had spoken, he saw an elderly man with a shock of wintery-white hair resting his elbows on the glass countertop and smiling sweetly at him, as if his every tooth were a sweet tooth.
“Hello, Mr. Knicklebean!” called Eliza excitedly from a display of parrot-shaped gummies she was eyeing.
The man regarded Eliza with a look typically reserved for grandchildren or very special family relations. “You have as many of those as you like, my dear,” he said with a hint of a British accent, and then he turned back to Elliot wearing the same friendly expression. “And who might you be, young man?”
Elliot felt his voice catch in his throat. “E-Elliot Bisby, sir,” he said, sitting the bag of Knicklebeans he’d had in his hands timidly back on the shelf.
Mrs. Bisby, who’d found her way over to Elliot’s side, placed her hands on his shoulders and said, “We’re new to Giggleswick, Mr. Knicklebean. I’m Elliot’s mother, Nora Bisby.”
The man’s eyes sparkled with an intensity matched only by his candy store. “Well I’ll be! It’s sure a pleasure, Mrs. Bisby, and the same goes for you, Elliot. You make sure to take a bag of those Knicklebeans,” he added. “It’s on me!”
Elliot hesitated, not wanting to appear too hasty in accepting the man’s generosity, but Mr. Knicklebean motioned insistently toward the bags of beans. At this time, a much younger man appeared from a doorway behind the counter carrying a tray of chocolate covered pretzels that looked to have been freshly dipped.
“Ah, Calvin!” Mr. Knicklebean said upon spotting the younger man. “Meet Nora Bisby and her son, Elliot. They’ve just arrived.”
The man named Calvin nodded courteously to them but did not stop to chat and instead began unloading the pretzels into an empty display case. He was wearing a chocolate smeared apron atop a crisp shirt and tie and red suspenders and a dour expression upon his face that Mr. Knicklebean ignored.
“My son, Calvin,” the elderly Mr. Knicklebean said dryly. He then directed their attention to the fudge display he’d been resting on. “Mrs. Bisby, I have a sneaking suspicion that you’re a fudge lover,” he said with a sly grin.
Mrs. Bisby blushed. “It does look wonderful,” she said, and she eyed the many different flavored blocks of fudge, which were nearly the size of bricks.
“Pick your pleasure,” the candymaker bellowed. He then caught sight of Mrs. Noodle who was taking a whiff from a tin of peppermint flavored tea leaves. “Lilly, dear,” he called to her, “looking lovely as always. How about some fudge for you as well?” It was more of an offer than a question.
“Oh Caractacus, you spoil us so,” Mrs. Noodle cooed, and trailed up to the fudge counter to peruse. “I’d love some of the creamsicle,” she said after a short deliberation.
“And for you, Mrs. Bisby?” the candymaker asked, giving her a mischievous wink. “On the house, of course,” he added.
Elliot thought he saw Calvin grunt and roll his eyes before making a pronounced exit with the empty pretzel tray, but Mr. Knicklebean payed him no attention and began wrapping Mrs. Bisby’s selection of white chocolate fudge in tissue paper.
“We call him the ‘Grandfather of Giggleswick’,” Mrs. Noodle explained with a tilt of her head in Mr. Knicklebean’s direction. She had already bitten off a hunk of her fudge block. “Gives away more than he sells,” she said affectionately, using a napkin to dab at the ring of creamsicle now around her lips.
Before Mr. Knicklebean could commence with what was sure to be a humble reaction, his son swirled back into the room with another tray of freshly dipped pretzels.
“Goodness gracious, my boy –– do take a lunch break or something,” the senior Mr. Knicklebean said exasperatedly. He leaned over the counter toward Mrs. Noodle and Mrs. Bisby. “Poor boy never sits still,” he whispered.
Calvin disregarded his father’s suggestion as if it were merely senseless drivel spoken by a daft old man and began unloading the batch of pretzels neatly into the display case with marked efficiency.
Mr. Knicklebean was about to ring up Mrs. Noodle’s tin of peppermint tea when suddenly a loud bang erupted from somewhere in the kitchen, and they all jumped several inches off the floor, including Calvin, who consequently toppled into his display of perfectly stacked pretzels.
“Good Lord, I completely forgot!” Mr. Knicklebean bellowed. “I was experimenting with something new, and it––”
BAM!
“Whoops, really must run!” he said, making a mad dash for the kitchen as quickly as his elderly feet could take him. “Calvin –– ring up the tea for Mrs. Noodle, would you,” he called over his shoulder, and he turned around just long enough to smile warmly at them one last time before slipping out the back.
After grumbling at the destruction of his pretzel display, Calvin picked himself up off the floor and stepped behind the cash-register. “The tea comes to five chuckles and twenty-seven sniggs,” he said. “Will that be all?” His eyes grazed over the other confectionary they were holding in their hands, and Mrs. Bisby suddenly looked very self-conscious as she swallowed a hunk of fudge she’d been nibbling.
“Yes,” said Mrs. Noodle flatly. “Mr. Knicklebean was quite kind to us.”
Calvin held his stare for several seconds. “Yes, well ... Father’s generosity knows no limits,” he said with a stiff smile.
Back outside the shop, Mrs. Bisby and Elliot wondered if they might have said or done something to upset the younger Mr. Knicklebean, but when they mentioned this to Mrs. Noodle, she waved it off.
“Some people think Calvin’s worried his father’s generosity will spoil the family fortune,” she told them, “but personally, I think he’s just persnickety.” And she led them down the street past several more shops with Bert again at their heels. He was looking ever so hopeful that one of them might accidentally drop a piece of fudge or a handful of Knicklebeans.
A short way off in the distance, Elliot heard the faint trickling of water, and in rounding the corner of a shoe store, they came upon a central looking area of town with a huge fountain in the middle of a cobblestone circle. Water spiraled in many high arcs toward the center of the fountain where there stood the statue of a man in colonial period attire peering through a telescope held in his outstretched hand.
Chiseled in the stone at his feet was the name Godfrey Gallagher-Garrington de Gadsberry Giggleswick, followed by the dates 1685 - 1750. Elliot noticed that there were words scrolled along the outer rim of the fountain, and he walked around it slowly to find that they formed a quotation which read:
“We cannot make everyone in this world peaceful, we cannot make everyone want peace, but we can ensure that this great land of ours remains governed by peace.”
“Who was he?” Elliot asked Eliza, not even attempting to speak the name.
“The first constable of Giggleswick,” she said. “He’s really fascinating –– the only person to ever make it through the fog alive! It was probably an accident really, but after making it through safely, he founded Giggleswick and lived the rest of his life here with his crew.”
Elliot’s mother called to him from the entrance of a nearby shop that had sausages hanging in the window. “Elliot dear, Mrs. Noodle and I are going to pop into the market quickly.”
“Stay close, Eliza,” Mrs. Noodle added, and the two mothers disappeared into the shop.
Elliot and Eliza sat down on the edge of the fountain and scratched Bert’s ears as he panted at their feet. “People say Godfrey carried that telescope with him everywhere he went,” Eliza said casually as they gazed up into the statue’s majestic features. “My dad reckons he kept diamonds in it or something and didn’t want to let it out of his sight, but I think it was something much more special, like a wedding ring or love letter, or––”
Elliot had zoned out and was wondering what had become of the telescope when a thought suddenly occurred to him. At the first hint of a pause in Eliza’s rambling, he asked, “How did Godfrey Gallagher-Garr–– oh you know who I mean –– how did he survive here without any food or supplies?”
“Well you see, Godfrey had a photographic memory, and he could recall all the nautical calculations he’d used before stumbling upon Giggleswick,” she explained. “So he and his crew travelled back and forth from Giggleswick to England to retrieve their wives and any other necessities. My history teacher says Godfrey made loads of trips and was responsible for bringing over more than a hundred people in his lifetime.”
“What did they do when he died? Had he drawn a map or something?” asked Elliot. He hadn’t forgotten her father’s reaction to the same question.
“No,” said Eliza quickly. “Godfrey was afraid that his calculations would fall into the wrong hands if they existed on paper. That’s why there weren’t any new people brought to Giggleswick for over a century after he died. Lefty’s father, Poppy Scrum, was the first person since Godfrey to attempt the voyage. Of course, he had the help of his trained parrot, Evol.”
“You mean, the same bird that––”
“Yes,” said Eliza. “Parrots sometimes live longer than humans, you know.”
Elliot wondered how old this would make Evol. “No, I didn’t,” he mumbled.
By this time, their mothers had reappeared carrying a few grocery bags, and Mrs. Noodle was suggesting they all get some lunch at the Sappy Maple, which made Eliza very happy, for she had finished all of her parrot-shaped gummies and was still hungry.
The Sappy Maple had a charming but well-used look about it, and when they opened its doors, their ears were filled by many roars of laughter and the distinctive chink of glass as people made toasts. A portly barman wearing a grease stained apron folded around his waist called to them thunderously from behind the bar –– “Hello, Noodles!”
“Hello Jasper!” Mrs. Noodle and Eliza called back to him simultaneously.
“That’s Jasper Stubbs, the bar owner,” Mrs. Noodle told Mrs. Bisby and Elliot as they weaved through mounds of people over to an empty table in front of a great stone hearth. The battered chairs creaked as they sat down, and there were many rings atop the table where years and years of frosty mugs had rested in-between hearty swigs, but Elliot and his mother found the atmosphere quite cozy.
They were soon handed menus by a bubbly young waitress named Lolly, who Mrs. Noodle later told them was Jasper’s niece, Lolly Perkins, currently enrolled at the Willy B. Foogerton Institute for the Culinary Arts working toward her chef’s certificate. Mrs. Noodle gave her their drink orders in private, wanting to surprise Mrs. Bisby and Elliot with a Giggleswick specialty, and meanwhile, Elliot flipped through the menu and noticed that they served many of the same foods found in America, with a few curious exceptions such as gizzard pot pie, turtle brisket, and tripe kebabs, none of which he dared inquire about.
Several minutes later, Lolly returned with a tray of mugs filled to the brim with a greenish liquid that fizzed furiously.
“It’s fogg-fizz!” said Mrs. Noodle as if unveiling the surprise.
Mrs. Bisby and Elliot stared down into the misty depths of their mugs. Elliot thought it looked similar enough to soda, but he doubted very much that the taste would bear any likeness, and after Mrs. Noodle had made a very kind toast to their new friendship, he held the fizzing drink up to his lips and took a large sip.
It was the most extraordinary sensation –– as if he’d consumed a waterfall of cool, bubbly spring water. It surged pleasantly down his throat, leaving a lingering sweetness the likes of which no soda had ever produced. He grinned feverishly at his mother, who grinned back with the same expression of enjoyment.
Mrs. Noodle and Eliza looked pleased to see that Elliot and his mother were so fond of the fogg-fizz, and it was only moments later that Eliza drained her mug and they were ordering another round to go with the club sandwiches they’d all decided upon.
An hour later, they were rubbing their bellies and finding their way back through the mounds of boisterous people toward the door. Before they could leave, Jasper Stubbs yelled for them, waving a small paper bag in the air. “Doggy bag for Bert!” he said, and when Mrs. Noodle had thanked him and introduced Mrs. Bisby and Elliot, he wiped his hand down the side of his apron and gave them both a robust shake.
Outside, they found Bert receiving pats from two little girls who were giggling as they tried to tie his ears in a bow. Just then, someone in the distance called, “Dawn ... Dora ... come along!” and they each gave Bert a hug and a kiss before skipping off, but Bert no longer seemed interested, for he had caught the scent of his doggy bag and was busy sniffing the air. Eliza opened the bag and handed him the pieces of bacon that were inside, and he happily gobbled them up as she untied him from the lamppost.
The walk home proved fairly uneventful at first. Elliot noticed he hadn’t seen any cars on the street, and Mrs. Noodle explained that there was no need for them given Giggleswick’s small size.
“Edgar Fenderbang claims to be building a petrol-free motorcar,” she said indifferently. “He’s sort of our local inventor, though a bit of a kook.” There was an air of admiration in her voice, yet Elliot could tell that she put little faith in Mr. Fenderbang’s ever materializing such a car.
The homes along Amity Drive appeared even prettier upon second glance. The rooftops gleamed in the sunlight, and due to the autumn-like chill amid the air, faint puffs of smoke rose from several chimney stacks, except for one which––
Elliot could not believe his eyes. He blinked furiously to check that he was seeing correctly, but the scene did not change. Atop a powder blue house with a steeply peaked roof was a twiggy woman in red pumps wearing a rather tight skirt and a flower print top. Her head was stuck down the chimney stack, which she seemed to be clinging to with her brightly painted nails.
“TRIXIE!” Mrs. Noodle yelled in horror, though in hindsight, this was probably an unwise thing to do to a lady on a roof in high-heels.
The woman was obviously startled, and she slid downwards, scraping her heels into the shingles and digging her nails against the brick as her head popped out of the chimney to reveal big poofs of wavy blonde hair that had been slightly blackened with soot. She had only just managed to regain her balance and climb back to the top for a better grasp on the chimney.
“Well, gee ... Hi there,” the woman called down to them, trying to appear leisurely. She had a very nasally voice and a detectable New York accent, and now that she had caught her breath, Elliot could see that she was chomping on a piece of bubble-gum.
“Trixie, are you alright up there?” asked Mrs. Noodle very worriedly. “Can we help you with anything?”
“Nooo,” Trixie trilled. “Just um ... just doing some c-calisthenics,” she said awkwardly. “Yes, that’s right, calisthenics.” And she mimicked doing a few reps of bicep curls and leg lifts, but this caused her to lose her grip once again, and her legs flailed out into a spread eagle, hiking her skirt up to heights well above a normal level of decency.
Mrs. Bisby clapped a hand over Elliot’s eyes.
“Trixie! This is really quite dangerous,” Mrs. Noodle yelled sternly once the woman had safely secured herself again and yanked her skirt back into position. She had apparently choked on her gum, for she hiccuped loudly, and a wad of pink goo flung over the side of the roof.
“Alright,” Trixie said absentmindedly, “yes, I guess this isn’t the best place for my exercises.” But she remained perched over the edge of the chimney stack and was twirling her hair, which looked to have been heavily plastered with hairspray. She did not look at them and seemed hopeful they might just leave on their own accord.
The four of them stared up at her incredulously. “Trixie! Do get down!” Mrs. Noodle shouted more severely this time.
“What?” Trixie said blankly. “Oh, yes. Uhh ... well, propriety dictates a lady dismount a roof in private, I always say,” she said decidedly, though the look on Mrs. Noodle’s face made it clear that she had never heard Trixie say such a thing before.
For the remainder of the encounter, Trixie merely stared motionlessly down at them with a goofy look about her face until Mrs. Noodle finally saw no solution to the woman’s odd behavior and ushered Mrs. Bisby, Elliot and Eliza away from the scene, huffing in disbelief.
When Elliot glanced over his shoulder a few moments later, all that could be seen of Trixie was her bulbous rear-end and bright red heels poking out the top of the chimney. The rest of her was once again wedged deep within the stack, and it looked distinctly as if she were searching for something.