The Haunting of the Holy Mackerel
(August 15, 2016)
24: Loose Ends
Though they both got to bed late on Sunday night, Dipper and Wendy did their morning run that Monday. True, they started an hour later than usual, since the Shack was closed Mondays, but even so, by the time they returned laughing and gleaming from the exercise, Mabel had not yet crept out of bed.
The Ramirezes were up, though, and Abuelita had come through with one of her Mexican breakfast specialties: egg-and-cheese molletes, with slices of ripe avocado and broiled tomato on the side, followed by pan dulce, sweet buns glazed and sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.
Wendy and Dipper dug in, and before they had finished, Mabel showed up, rubbing her eyes. Tripper trotted right beside her, as though he'd decided he was her official palace guard from here on out.
They were on their second cups of coffee when Ford and Lorena and Stan and Sheila came in. Abuelita took the little ones to their play room, and with Soos's permission, Ford said, "We've still got some work ahead of us. Melody, I don't want to upset you—Soos was never in danger, but he might have been, so he acted bravely. In addition, he was an immense help, and he deserves to be in on the tidying-up, if he wishes."
"Dr. Pines, dawg!" he said. "Sure, I want to be in on it! I'm sort of immense!"
"All right," Ford said with a smile as he poured himself a cup of coffee. "Let me bring you up to speed."
Early that morning (Ford said) the Agency's top forensic pathologist had examined the remains found at the service station. Though the clothing had hair and skin flakes and provided a good DNA sample—it had not yet been typed, of course—the gelid mass seemed to be homogenized and unidentifiable proteins. "We really don't have a body for Mr. Vetch," Ford said. He sighed. "So Blubs is going to put it on the books as a "voluntary disappearance." He thinks Vetch is a drifter—despite the fact that he spent his life in Gravity Falls—who just wandered off looking for a better job. At least Vetch has no family to be worried about him, poor man."
As to the other victim, Dwight "Honker" Dillinberg, who lived south of Bend, his crew of bikers thought he'd probably shoved off ahead of some bill collectors or the I.R.S. He'd been in financial straits recently, they knew. Dillinberg's landlady hadn't seen him since the previous Thursday and thought he was probably off drunk somewhere, because he was worthless. His employers were ready to fire him for unreliability.
"Nobody's gonna miss him, case closed," Stan said dryly. He followed Ford's lead and got himself a steaming mug of coffee.
Mabel looked up, her eyes red. Quietly, she said, "That's not fair to them. What happened to them wasn't their fault. Grunkle Ford, are they—you know, really gone?"
"Yes," Ford said heavily. "I'm afraid they are."
Mabel drooped. "It's just not right. Couldn't we—I don't know—at least have a memorial service?"
"I think that would be nice," Melody said, reaching across the table to take Mabel's hand.
"We can do something private," Wendy volunteered. "Just us, the ones who know about what happened."
"Yeah, I'm sure Dr. Gaspell would accommodate," Stan said. "Sort of non-denominational, but spiritual, that the idea?"
They said it was, and Stan made a phone call. The genial minister who had performed the wedding ceremonies for Stan and Sheila and Ford and Lorena listened and agreed at once. "When?" he asked.
"As soon as possible," Stan said.
A pause. "If you really mean that, I'm free this evening."
So they set it for seven p.m., in the Shack. Stan grinned at Mabel. "Pumpkin," he said, shaking his head fondly, "you got a big heart. Thank you for keepin' us human."
On Ford's advice, they agreed to have the disabled pink motorcycle crushed at a junkyard outside the Valley. Honker wouldn't need it any longer, and though they'd broken the ghost's possession of the machine, there was no sense in taking chances. Ford mentioned James Dean and his fatally haunted automobile, and they cast their votes for the crushinator.
"Now," Ford said, "this next part concerns Mason. Feel free to refuse this, nephew. You know someone who can look into the Mindscape and tell us if Pica has really, um—"
"Gone on to his, like, reward," Soos said helpfully.
Ford nodded. "Yes, exactly."
"I'll do it this evening," Dipper said. "That seems to be the best time."
Later that morning, the Gnomes performed their funeral march and spoke their eulogies. It was an enormous meeting—the new Gnome, the one good at arithmetic, Winziger, told Jeff the crowd easily numbered over two thousand "in real figures, not Gnome thousands."
First, of course, the assembly said farewell to their Queen, the late badger. She had been a good Queen, though admittedly she had come to power by eating their former Queen. Still, her advice had been sound, and despite the malcontents who suspected that Jeff was actually doing the thinking and not just interpreting her will, the Gnomes' lives had improved over the past few years under her reign. They wept at her passing, and they ate jam in her memory.
Then Jeff , speaking in the great clearing, said, "We lost another of our own, and we must remember and honor him. His name was Wembley, son of Mr. and Mrs. Grizzle there."
Some of the crowd began to murmur. Jeff said loudly, "Yes! Yes, he left us and went feral four seasons ago! But he was young. He didn't really know what going feral would mean. And if we had been better Gnomes and had offered him a little help and understanding, he might have stayed with us! But feral or civilized, he was one of us! He was our brother! And now his spirit has flown beyond the sunrise, and I say we honor him and speed him on this last journey."
Shmebulock, somewhere in the middle of the crowd, said, "Shmebulock!"
"Young Shmebulock is right," added a cracked old-woman voice. "And so is Jeff."
The crowd parted, gasping. Leaning on her staff, her seeing-eye squirrel walking slightly ahead of her, Granny Gypsum came forward. For most of them, it was their first glimpse of the legendary old sorceress, and many held their children up so they could see her, too. Jeff helped her up onto the hillock that was the speaker's place. "He's right," she said again, settling into a hunched-over stance, gripping her staff. Everyone noticed that her squirrel sat upright before her and that its head turned at the same time and in the same direction of hers as she spoke. And it stared at them. Though it sounded old, her voice rang clear and loud: "You all know me. You're afraid of me, but you know me! And I say you'd best listen to me. I tell you again, young Jeff speaks true."
Jeff noticed that even those who had looked indecisive started to nod when she said that. It's her magic, he thought.
The old woman nodded, too. "Listen to Granny, you diggers and you tree-dwellers. I tell you, blood knows blood! You all have the blood of the Gnomes in you! This foolish fighting, civilized, ferals, surface dwellers, tunnel dwellers, all this has to end. It will end, too. It can end with us being one people and thriving—or it can end with us being stubborn and fighting each other and dying out, like the sad last leaves of autumn. I tell you, the time for Queens is over."
Even with her saying it, the words hit hard. People looked shocked, blinked, wept again. "No!" someone shouted.
"Yes, Emmett Whetstone!" Granny shot back. "This is only a suggestion, mind, but let Jeff remain the Prime Minister. He's done a good job for the surface Gnomes! Look at how prosperous you've become! How respectable! Even the Big'uns greet you and welcome you!"
Murmurs of "Yes," "That's true," and "I ate a rat last night"—that last from one of the diggers, who'd roused perhaps the sole surviving rat in the depths below the Skull Fracture and who'd dined well.
Granny held up her hand for attention. "I say this: Give Jeff a council of advisors to help him. Young Winziger knows numbers and business. He can be the Finance Minister. Elada Gneiss, where are you? There you are. How many children have you and your Mister raised? Seventeen! There, Elada can advise on matters of family and marriage and such. Old Gnarl, where are you? There in the back, you old rascal!" Granny cackled. "You're nigh as old as me, and you know all the Lore, top to bottom, don't you? You will be the Lore Minister and remind Jeff of our traditions!"
Jeff watched in disbelief. In five minutes, Granny Gypsum launched, pursued, and won victory in a political revolution. She appointed seven advisors—with him as Prime Minister. "Why seven?" he whispered to her.
"Because that way, you don't get any ties," she whispered back. "Worst it'll be is four to three, one way or t'other. You get to pose the question, but you can't vote. You can offer arguments for or against. But they get to vote. Make it that they has to vote, no abstaining. Then, like it or not, you carry out their decision. 'Cause we can trust you!"
After a moment, Jeff raised his hands and the crowd grew quiet and expectant. "Thank you, Granny," he said. "If we're really doing this, though, let's do it right. Who doesn't want me to continue as Prime Minister?"
Muttering rose among the digging Gnomes, but surprisingly, young Shale yelled out, "We're behind you, Jeff!"
"Thank you, Shale," Jeff said. "I want you to be the—" he leaned down and whispered to Winziger, "What's a nicer word than go-between?" Winziger replied, and Jeff continued: "—the Liaison-in-Chief between the—we can't call you ferals anymore. How about the Traditional Gnomes?"
Some little discussion and they agreed.
"Between the Traditional Gnomes and the, uh, the—what are we?"
"The Sunlighters!" somebody yelled.
"That OK with everybody? All right! So Shale will be the liaison, the diplomat, between our two branches, the Sunlighters and the Traditionals. But from now on, we're two halves of the same whole. One Gnome is all Gnomes, and all Gnomes are one!" Jeff wasn't sure that made sense, but it sounded good at the moment. He hurried on: "If that's settled, then who does want me to continue as Prime Minister?"
In Gnome Lore, that went down as the rarest day ever: The Day We All Agreed.
Jeff, all on his own, and without the Queen's input, then proposed, "I accept, but look, if this doesn't work out, we're free to go back and choose a Queen again, OK? And we'll do it anytime most of you want that. If I make the majority of you mad, you can throw me out and choose somebody else for this job—"
"Jeff forever!" someone yelled.
Jeff grimaced. "Thanks, Mom. We'll think it over. Maybe we want to choose a new Council every so often, and a new Prime Minister. We may want to reconsider using owls as our judges. They always want to eat the defendant, and I'm not sure that's fair. We'll meet and take advice from everybody and work things out. Anyway, I thank you all. And as we go through this—this great change, let's not forget those whom we honor today. Queen Badger. Wembley, son of the Grizzles. May their spirits fly free and far, and one day may we meet them again!"
At about the same time, Manly Dan Corduroy wasn't exactly sure about all that business the previous night, but that Monday morning he went in to his lumber mill and personally chose some hickory for new flooring. It was good seasoned hardwood, it would last, it would be sturdy, and—he thought—it would brighten up the joint a little. Make it a tad more airy than the dark-gray splintered, brittle, warped stuff that he and Soos had crowbarred up.
He grabbed a pad and pencil and did the figuring without a calculator—he was a master at estimating and could lay a floor and have no more than a plank and a half overage—and then worked out the cost, thought for a bit, and last of all he marked it up by only fifteen per cent. He called Tats, not Digges, and made the proposal. "Labor'll be extra," Dan rumbled, "but I'll put four good men on it and I'll supervise the job myself. It'll take two days, tops. It's a good price, best Digges could get anywhere, and I guarantee the result."
"I'll talk Digges into it," Tats said. "'Bout time we got rid of them rats and replaced that shanky old floor, anyways. Draw us up the contract. Hey, brother, you comin' back into the lodge? We sure do miss you."
"Aw," Dan said. "I dunno. I'm real busy and all, but—well, yeah, I guess maybe so."
"Welcome back, fellow Mackerel," Tats said with a chuckle.
"Feels good to be back," Dan admitted. He hung up, told his clerk to draw up the contract with the specs, and wondered just what the hell all that last night had been about.
"You really mean it, Mr. Pines?" Soos asked, his voice hushed with awe. The two stood outside the Shack, in the shade of one of the redwoods, and Soos's eyes grew huge and shiny, like those of a kid on Christmas morning.
"Yeah, 'cause you really oughta earn that fez," Stan said with a nod at Soos's headgear. "Look, I talked to the membership chairman, and if you really wanna be a Mackerel, you're in. And call me Stan!"
"Thanks, Mister, I mean Stan! You'll never regret it! I already know the secret handshake and all from watching you, so I'll hit the ground running, or, like, the water swimming, or whatever, dawg, sir."
"Yeah," Stan—who, by the way, happened to be the membership chairman and committee all in one— said. "Right, I'll never regret it. Just gotta keep reminding myself."
That evening their brief memorial service moved Mabel to tears—again. No one really knew much about Mr. Vetch or Mr. Dillinberg, but Dr. Gaspell read from John Donne—"No man is an island"—and from Job, and they bowed their heads as he prayed that it would be well with their souls.
"I feel better," Ford admitted later. "It wasn't much—but the two men were part of our community, a resident and a visitor, anyway, and saying farewell and having good will for them both leaves me with a good feeling. Hmm—this is an area I'll have to study more."
"You do that," Stan said, rolling his eyes.
Wendy and Dipper walked Dr. Gaspell back to his car. "Wendy," the minister said in his warm, soft voice, "haul your dad and brothers into church a little more often. It can't do them any harm, and it might do you a little good, too."
"I'll do what I can," she said, smiling.
He paused at his car and smiled back at the two young people. "And speaking of that, is there anything you might want me to do for you?" he asked.
Dipper squirmed a little. Oh, his dad wouldn't insist on a Jewish ceremony, and his mom would be happy with any church wedding, but—
"Maybe in about a year," Wendy said, comfortably linking her arm through Dipper's.
"Mm, well. You two behave yourselves until then," Dr. Gaspell said, with a twinkle in his eye.
After he drove off, Wendy and Dipper continued their walk—inevitably to the bonfire clearing. "You ready to do it?" Wendy asked.
"Yeah," Dipper said. "It always scares me a little, though."
She caressed his neck. "Hey, remember I'm right here with you. All the way, Dip."
"Thanks, Lumberjack Girl," he said.
They kissed. Then he settled onto the log, closed his eyes, and in the Mindscape got ready to ask Bill Cipher if they really and truly were safe from the terrible thing responsible for the haunting of the Holy Mackerel Lodge Hall.
The End