Inn-By-The-Bye Stories - 16

By William Flewelling

In an endeavor to find a fresh way into the scriptural text upon which I would be preaching, I began to develop an imaginary world populated primarily by wee folk. I found they—the characters I developed and the way that they evolved in my mind and on the page—served me well as a consideration of how I sensed things happening in the scriptural text at hand. I want to make these stories and the world they represent newly available, and so I bring them to book form, fifty at a time.

The cover drawing is done by Eve Sullivan, the author’s granddaughter.

The drawing is the artist’s conception of the innkeeper, Thyruid.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Sep 14, 2018
• ISBN: 9781546260295

William Flewelling

I am a retired minister from the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) living in central Illinois. Led by a request from Mildred Corwin of Manua OH when I arrived there in 1976, I long developed and led a series of bible studies there and in LaPorte IN and New Martinsville WV. These studies proved to be very feeding to me in my pastoral work and won a certain degree of following in my congregations. My first study was on 1 Peter, chosen because I knew almost nothing about the book. I now live quietly in retirement with my wife of 54 years, a pair of dogs and several cats.

Book preview

Copyright © 2018 William Flewelling. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 09/13/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-6030-1 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-6029-5 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Also By This Author

Poetry

Time Grown Lively

From My Corner Seat

Enticing My Delight

The Arthur Poems

From Recurrent Yesterdays

In Silhouette

To Silent Disappearance

Teasing The Soul

Allowing The Heart To Contemplate

As Lace Along The Wood

To Trace Familiarity

The Matt Poems

Elaborating Life

The Buoyancy Of Unsuspected Joy

To Haunt The Clever Sheer Of Grace

The Christmas Poems

Life Is Employed

Adrift In Seas Of Strangeness

Composure In Constraint

An Elegance That Dawdles

Devotional

Some Reflective Prayers

Reflective Prayers: A Second Collection

A Third Collection Of Reflective Prayers

For Your Quiet Meditation

A Fourth Collection Of Reflective Prayers

Cantica Sacra

Directions Of A Pastoral Lifetime

Part I: Pastoral Notes, Letters To Anna, Occasional Pamphlets

Part II: Psalm Meditations, Regula Vitae

Part III: Elders’ Studies

Part IV: Studies

Part V: The Song Of Songs: An Attraction

Inn-by-the-Bye Stories

vols. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8,

9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15

Exegetical Works

From The Catholic Epistles: Bible Studies

Paul’s Letter To The Romans: A Bible Study

The Book Of Hebrews: A Bible Study

Letters Pauline And Pastoral: Bible Studies

The First Letter of Paul To The Corinthians: A Bible Study

The Gospel According To Luke 1:1 Through 9:50: A Bible Study

all published by AuthorHouse.com

Contents

FOREWORD

DCCLI

DCCLII

DCCLIII

DCCLIV

DCCLV

DXXLVII

DCCLVIII

DCCLIX

DCCLX

DDCLXI

DCCLXII

DCCLXIII

DCCLXIV

DCCLXV

DCCLXVI

DCCLXVII

DCCLXVIII

DCCLXIX

DCCLXX

DCCLXXI

DCCLXXII

DCCLXXIII

DCCLXXIV

DCCLXXV

DCCLXXVI

DCCLXXVII

DCCLXXVIII

DCCLXXIX

DCCLXXX

DCCLXXXI

DCCLXXXII

DCCLXXXIII

DCCXXXIV

DCCLXXXV

DCCLXXXVI

DCCLXXXVII

DCCLXXXVIII

DCCLXXXIX

DCCCXC

DCCXCI

DCCXCII

DCCXCIII

DCCXCIV

DCCXCV

DCCXCVI

DCCXCVII

DCCXCVIII

DCCXCIX

DCCC

APPENDIX: TEXTS FOR THE STORIES

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Foreword

By the time this sequence of stories began, I had been writing them for fifteen years. Over that spell, they had continued to be helpful exercises in attending to the texts that would lie behind sermons. And in the course of those years I kept a modest readership, locally and otherwise.

As I go through the process of taking these stories from the existing hard copy, editing them slightly while retyping and proof reading them, I find myself smirking at the efforts of my then secretary to master my pencil scratch and convert it into typescript. I sometimes have to reimagine what the actual line might have been in order to make proper sense. Of course, that is also a function of my prior proofreading as by this season the secretary was preparing a Works file that I proofed before printing. With time, I believe, I do a bit better than I did then!

I also find myself remembering some themes and developments that have yet to reappear for me. I get curious about when they will appear – though I am aware that I have more than three hundred stories to retype before finishing my re-visitation of Hyperbia. I am curious to find those wrinkles again – but I am waiting with you to discover them afresh.

I hope you enjoy your reading of these little episodes of illumination, expressions of my own involvement with the text and the faith and the life of faith among my people.

William Flewelling

DCCLI

Grey, with darkness clinging long into the morning, all a cover for a sharply penetrating chill, reminder of the overnight, lashing rains: within this discomforting morning, Mahara was setting out from the cabin she shared with Guerric. She figured he could be ready by now, and if her weren’t, then he could scramble next to catch up with her. She had, to be blunt, become irritated with Guerric this morning. Although he was well known as slow to start of a morning, today was slower than usual. And her patience was exhausted. The door closed behind her slashing steps with the sort of sudden rattle that served well as punctuation on her preceding words.

Skirts swished and swirled under her cape as she swung her hips so as to stretch each pace to its maximum possible reach. There was dash to her stride, the crisp skirt glistening, crinkling in the minimal light, and the long black hair bouncing, whipping with her exertion. Mahara always had an electric feel about her. she was charged, eyes black coals, all alive and darting, daring the world at each step; today was exceptional in that the snap in eyes and in the presence crackled and jumped.

As the narrow path she took led from her door towards the Commons, Mahara gracefully balanced between sharp rise on her left and the steep, sodded drop into the ravine on her right. The path itself was smooth and easy. Once, however, she reached the rise to the Commons, it was all grass, a little long for her taste, and wet. The ground was slick down in the sod so that her steps up to the Commons required some scrambling.

Determined, Mahara capped the rise and soon disappeared onto the Commons a land grass covered and wet, even with a spongy feel to the sod; she half expected to splash into hidden ponds of still-standing water … though she did not quickly find it that wet as she dropped from the ridge onto the Commons proper.

Guerric, in all this, had not emerged from the briskly closed front door. Mahara had decided by the time the cabin was out of sight that she was not about to worry much about Guerric. If he was going to be so sleepy – lazy – slow, she was not going to bother to waste much of any energy on him! He would have to come catch up with her if he were going to have anything to do with her today. And, unspoken, lay the defiant mood that he had best come, catch up with her. That was all there was to that!

Reaching the Inn-by-the-Bye after encountering some low spots, splashing (as she had feared) in the hidden puddles, discovering her feet soggy and her long skirts slapping-wet and cold, Mahara slowed. She had not decided for sure where she was going, just that she was going, so that now she did not have to change her mind in order to stop at the Inn, dry herself a while, and see if time did not make travel in Hyperbia friendlier to wee folk, like herself.

The door of the Inn-by-the-Bye yielded to her hand almost as naturally as the door at home. A slight moan in the hinges announced the movement as she followed the door inside. The subdued light that welcomed her was softer, but no dimmer, than the thorough overcast outside. And the floor boards were dry, except where her squishy shoes touched.

Closing the door on the piercing chill and damp outside, Mahara noticed the dancing flow of Thyruid’s low fire on the raised hearth. As always, Clyde sat beside the hearth, sprawled in his chair, his elbows on the chair arms, hands laid upon the swell of his belly … the very picture of contentment: warm, dry, at peace with himself and his world.

A shiver-shudder rattled up Mahara’s spine and back down again. Her shoes felt soggy. … And cold. Her feet rebelled. Her eyes studied the hearth and mentally displaced Clyde, taking that seat for herself. There, in her imagined reformulation of this scene, Mahara slipped off her shoes, casually dumped the excess water, set the shoes, the low socks, up by the fire to dry and to warm with her.

In truth, however, Mahara stood in the foyer yet, aware that she was quite cold, very chilled. Her feet almost hurt from the chill. In fact, she decided, there was no ‘almost’ about it; her feet hurt, tingling cold and aching raw. Mahara scowled until, at last, she began to move forward, scolding the harder at each step, each with a tingling sharpness stabbing first one foot, then the other, as she placed weight on each foot in turn. The water sloshed, strangely trapped in socks and shoes, not flowing out as it had flown in before.

Feeling awkward, her feet hurting, Mahara stepped down into the dining room of the Inn-by-the-Bye and involuntarily winced. She wondered if anyone else could hear her feet sloshing in her shoes. She wondered why the others did not turn to see her coming, like some strange act, of side show proportions, as she felt her coming. But they did not.

Maybe, she was not so odd, she thought; or, maybe, they really were as indifferent as she suspected. A smile crossed her face with the thought that all this would be easier if Guerric had not been so sleepy this morning … so sleepy-lazy-slow this morning. A little indignant rage … all so very private! … brought color up beneath the rich olive tones of her natural complexion.

After weaving around the tables and chairs with what others thought a deliberate and graceful approach – but which she considered a measured and miserable sludge) toward the hearth, where the dancing flames suggested a focus of physical warmth – Mahara came around the far end of the table by the hearth so as to stand by Clyde’s outstretched feet.

Mahara’s somber gaze left him entirely unruffled. She sat on the raised hearth; Clyde slid his feet over slightly, so as to give her room to be comfortable. He was politely generous. With a sigh bordering on a whimper, Mahara reached down to loosen and remove her shoes, almost as she had imagined it. She took them off, setting them, wet, on the hearth. Clyde watched, and silently nodded approval; he would do something like this if his shoes were so wet. Socks followed; Clyde approved. Mahara noticed the warmth of the near fire, and of the hearth stone itself. Thyruid brought her some tea: Mahara smiled a real smile, warm and appreciative.

Mahara was warmed through, her socks nearly dry and her shoes making real progress when the door opened abruptly. She did not even look, having become content with herself. The loping strides across the foyer, then the dining room, sounded familiar. She looked up; Guerric looked at her. ‘So, you found a warm spot to dry out’. ‘Yes’. "Good. What is more, I found you. Once I got going, I did alright’.

‘Coffee, Guerric?’ ‘Yes. That would be refreshing. Thanks.’

27 October 1996

DCCLII

The afternoon has lingered as warm, and with a growing overcast that dulled the day into a sort of grey. Margent found he had to light a lamp in his office earlier than his frugal habits normally required; he simply had too difficult a strain to see his work without the lamp alight. To be sure, Margent was careful to keep the lamp as trimmed as he could … and still see in adequate light. Efficient, he called himself, as a brown paper bag manager of this city he had governed since the demise of the showy Osburn.

Oh, Margent knew some thought him too frugal, in his small office on a side street, narrow and easily neglected, a place no one went by accident and a place that would not attract many tourists. Nonetheless, he was comfortable here, and what needed to get done got done.

Just as Margent was thinking the day may have run its course, and he ought to get away from the office for the night, afternoon having nearly un into Autumn’s brevity of evening, he heard the outside door open down the hall. His being the only office open, he sat back in his chair and awaited his visitor.

Footsteps coming down the corridor sounded multiple, piquing his interest. Margent found himself listening to the foot falls down the way, trying to sort out for himself how many were coming, but it was all so confused in the shuffling along that he simply could not tell. No voices sounded, as if the group were all preoccupied. (If the place were as grand as Osburn’s hall, he might have thought them awed; as it was, they might more plausibly have been perplexed as the corridor was long and narrow, leading to the open door of Margent’s city offices.)

After what seemed like a very long time, one face peeped around the jamb into his office. Margent sat at his desk, his hands playing with a pencil on his desk top. He had been watching for an appearance since first hearing footsteps along the hallway. Seeing the face, Margent smiled … a formally slight but clearly genuine smile. ‘Come in, please’ he said as pleasantly as one can do so near to the closing of the day … and that a grey, drab, fading day. ‘Thank you’ came the reply as the first entered the snug office. He was followed by a second, then a third, a forth … and eighth. Margent knew his office was small; now, in fact, it felt far smaller indeed! ‘May I help you?’ he asked.

‘Yes’ said the first face in the door, pausing slightly while Margent’s anxiety ratio increased. ‘My name is Vlad. With my friends, I have been living for some time in Uiston … in a root-framed house on the far edge of Uiston’s Cup’. Margent nodded; yet, of all the citizens of the City on the Plain, it seemed he had the least opportunity to travel … meaning he had never been to Uiston, at all.

Margent suspected Vlad and his companions had some request of him, perhaps … well, he really had no idea what it could be! This city had been peaceful. and he had managed their affairs modestly. He found himself thinking he had not provided for so large a gathering; Osburn’s hall, he recalled, had rooms to handle such a group, and even larger, with gracious ease. Margent discovered himself squirming in his seat, unexplainedly uncomfortable in anticipation of he knew not what.

Vlad had paused then, anxious himself and feeling the closeness of the room as he and his seven friends crowded amid the furniture that adorned the small, tidy room. Now, clearing his throat slightly, Vlad continued: ‘Only Father John lives in Uiston … in a hut near the center of the floor of Uiston’s Cup. He is rather crippled, really, leaning ever on his cane to provide enough support for himself. Even so, Father John is a cheerful, very positive force in Hyperbia (he has so many friends!).

Long before now, Margent had begun asking himself the question of what all this might mean.

Yev spoke up from a crunched corner location: ‘Vlad means to say we have come to visit you to learn what we might do in Uiston’. ‘Why me? … I mean, what does a brown paper bag administrator have to tell you? I have merely tried to keep things stable here’. ‘And free. We had heard how you had made so much freedom’. ‘Made freedom? No. I merely allow freedom to happen’.

‘We liked what we had heard of Margent’s City on the Plain. So, we came to see for ourselves’. ‘Oh …’ said Margent, not really attuned to any implications of Vlad’s appearing, or Yev’s, or any of the others.

‘No. Tell us what you did when … was the name Osburn? … left, how you changed things here’. ‘Oh my! I did not do much besides place this seat of government in a foot loose and fancy-free world’.

‘So, you did nothing but hem and haw? Fine: tell us about the reception when you opened the latched door and entered in. We remember the outside kids … their fireworks … the stories about the wild bunch, waiting for the role with the taking into Exile, the Entrance, the initial working-out of it all’.

‘Folks were unhappy some. Enough to take over down here, tell Osburn to stay up on the bluff … where, I understand, his view is tremendous, but that Osburn is lonely and bored and a bit unhappy’.

‘What about down here?’ they insisted. Margent simply shook his head and muttered: ‘We try to keep the mundane things going reasonably well’. ‘Is that all?’ ‘I think so’. ‘Then what are the rumors about how well the city runs, how smoothly, how pleasantly?’ ‘I don’t hear those rumors’. ‘Maybe you don’t listen to the right places’.

Alex interrupted the exchange between Yev and Margent: ‘We came her because we want to learn something about how to turn things around, to make Uiston a better place to live. You say you do not do anything. It strikes me you are not telling us the whole story’. Alex sounded irritated, a tone Margent did not miss.

‘I deal with details all the time. I deal with lots of little picky points daily. I get people to be independent and responsible for one another. I try to cultivate a civil, civic habit. That is all. Nothing is grand; everything is every day, in and out concerns’.

Dum mused: ‘You mean you simply …’ Margent broke in: ‘I think the change came when folk here got tired of Osburn’s grand … or, rather, grandiose presence. They … we wanted something else. Some of us thought the people ought to matter, and that our shared life was important to us and to our city. We tried to care for one another … a scheme in which there was no room for Osburn. That is all.