Free A Thousand Never Evers by Shana Burg Page A

gasps. She throws her hands over her mouth like she just won the Fourth of July cake-decorating contest.
    The mayor stands. “Why, a fall-season garden is an excellent idea! We’re Kuckachoo, after all, not Bramble or Weaver. We’re not afraid to be on the leading edge.”
    But Mr. Mudge wants his advice followed and I can see why. That man has what you call farming experience. “If you’re going to insist on a garden, then might I propose an altogether different sort,” he says. “It’s impossible to be an expert in everything now. Better to pick one crop and do it right, like Henry Ford did with the Model T. In my personal opinion, due to their nutrition value and all-around robust flavor, turnip greens is the only wise choice.”
    “Or garlic,” Mrs. Worth says. “We could plant all garlic.”
    “Or butter beans!” Mrs. Tate says.
    I can see by the way Mrs. Tate opens her blue eyes real wide, she’s proud of her idea. “I read in the magazines that movie stars like Audrey Hepburn and all the ladies in New York City eat a steady diet of butter beans,” she says. “They make butter bean soup, butter bean sauce, and even butter bean pie!”
    Mr. Mudge chuckles. “With all due respect, Mrs. Tate, you can’t believe everything you read,” he says. “Besides, Mr. Adams didn’t leave any butter bean seeds in his shed. None at all.”
    That’s when Miss Springer pushes her horn-rimmed glasses up farther on her nose. “Well, Mr. Mudge, since you’ve already taken stock of what seeds Mr. Adams left in his garden cabin, perhaps you might be so kind as to make a quick list of the inventory.” With that, Miss Springer tears out the crossword-puzzle page from the
Delta Daily
and hands it to Mr. Mudge, along with the pencil that was resting behind her ear.
    Mr. Mudge leans over the coffee table and scrawls the list of seeds onto the torn sheet of newspaper. When he’s finished, he slams Miss Springer’s pencil on top of it, folds his arms across his chest, and stares out the window.
    Miss Springer examines the list written on the crossword-puzzle page. Then she says, “Mr. Mudge, Mr. Mayor, we ladies have a plan. According to this list, Mr. Adams left a wide variety of seed in his garden cabin. We can’t plant tomatoes, though. Too tender in the August heat. And no watermelon. Wouldn’t be ready before the frost.” Miss Springer turns to Mrs. Worth and Mrs. Tate. “Sorry to say, girls, there aren’t any garlic or butter bean seeds in his garden cabin either,” she says.
    And I reckon this is the start of a real hullabaloo.
    “Regarding the rows,” Miss Springer says, “there’s only one way to figure it. We’ll plant sixty-eight purple hull peas, nineteen string beans, twenty-three cabbage, forty-five crowder peas, fifty-three mustard greens, thirty-two crooked-neck squash, forty-nine collards, thirty-six kale, forty-seven black-eyed peas, forty-one button squash, and well, I reckon four turnip greens wouldn’t hurt.”
    “And there you have it,” Mrs. Worth says, as if she knew it all along.
    Mrs. Tate nods.
    One thing’s clear: both Mrs. Worth and Mrs. Tate will gladly give up rows of garlic and butter beans to have a garden planned by a lady. And it seems Mr. Mudge and the mayor don’t have the nerve to disagree.
    I want to stand and cheer for Miss Springer, she’s got so much grit. But now Ralphie throws his stuffed doggie onto the floor, and it’s near supper time, so I set the water to boil and drop some noodles in the pot.
    “Well, of course I’d be more than happy to donate the labor to plant the garden,” Mr. Mudge says, “but surely that’s not enough to keep a garden growing. Who’s going to pick the weeds? Who’s going to fertilize? Water? Take it from me, you can’t grow a garden without hiring field hands to tend it for months after the planting.”
    “Can’t, couldn’t, shouldn’t! That’s all we hear from you, Mr. Mudge!” Miss Springer shakes her head. “We are