This morning, Elner Shimfissle was wandering around her backyard in her pink floral cotton housedress, carrying a blue and white speckled pan full of Purina chicken feed, throwing it out to her chickens and singing, “Ooohhh, in your beautiful Alice Blue gown, you’re the prettiest gal in the town…”
Elner always sang to her chickens. She believed it made them lay bigger eggs. And besides, she liked to sing. Unfortunately, she sometimes didn’t know the words and was always just a hair off-key, but the chickens didn’t seem to mind.
A few minutes later, Elner spied her husband, Will, way out in the back field on his tractor. She waved and called out to him. “Whoo! Whoo!” He saw her and waved back.
After she finished feeding the chickens, Elner walked over and hung her pan up on a nail on the side of the house, and then she heard a car drive up to the front of the house. She thought that maybe it was Ida or her friend Beatrice who had come to visit.
She quickly wiped her hands on her blue-checked apron and walked around to see who it was. It was a man she had never seen before, sitting in a big black dusty car, and he was looking at a map.
“Hey, there,” she said. “Can I help you?”
The man looked up, startled to see her standing there. “Oh, hello. We seem to be lost. Is this the way to Joplin?”
She laughed. “Oh lands, no, honey.” She went over and put her foot up on the running board and leaned in and pointed down the road. “You need to turn around and head back the other way, then turn right on the highway, at your first crossroad.”
“Oh, I see,” said the man.
Elner then noticed the girl sitting in the front seat beside him. She was wearing a cute little tam. By the look of them, Elner figured them for newlyweds and said, “I’m sorry you’re lost, but now that you’re here, come on in. Let me fix you a nice glass of iced tea or a cup of coffee before you head out again.”
The couple looked at each other quizzically, then the girl shrugged. The young man said, “That sounds awful good. We’ve been driving for quite a while, so…if it’s not too much trouble….”
“Oh lands, no. Glad to have the company. We don’t get many visitors this far out.” She walked up and opened the front door and said, “Come on in. Hope you don’t mind cats. I’m Elner Shimfissle. My husband, Will, is out in the back field plowing, and he’s gonna be sorry he missed meeting you. What’s your name?”
“Clyde. This here’s Bonnie.”
“Nice to meet you.”
As they went through the house and back to a big kitchen that smelled of bacon, about six cats scattered everywhere. Elner pointed to a white enamel table with four wooden chairs. “Have a seat. Hey, I’ll bet you kids are hungry. Have you had your breakfast, yet?”
“Well, no,” said the man, “not yet. We were thinking to have it in Joplin.”
Elner looked over at the girl. “You’re just a teeny little thing. You need to eat something or you’re liable to fall out in a faint, and I’m not going to let you leave until you do. I’ll call you when it’s ready. In the meanwhile, you two just make yourselves to home.” She looked at the girl. “I know you probably have to use the bathroom, so just help yourself, honey. I’ve even got a bar of store-bought soap in there. I used to make my own, but I got too lazy.”
—
ABOUT TEN MINUTES LATER, the couple sat down to a huge plate of bacon and eggs, freshly made hot-buttered buttermilk biscuits, and homemade preserves. “Be sure to eat them while they’re hot,” Elner said. Just as the couple sat down, a big, fat raccoon, obviously a pet, slowly waddled into the kitchen and toward the screen door and without saying a word, Elner got up from the table and held the door open while it waddled out. “See you later, Richard,” she said, then sat back down. “So you folks are headed to Joplin? I know it’s not too far, but you know, I’ve never been to Joplin. My daddy was a pig farmer, so I’m kinda scared of big cities. My sister Ida’s been there and said it was real nice.”
Between bites of the delicious biscuits and bacon, the young man became rather talkative. At first, the girl said very little, but pretty soon, she joined in the conversation. She told Elner that she had once worked as a hairdresser back home in Texas. Elner was impressed. “Oh, you don’t say? Well, that takes a lot of skill…and you’re smart to have that in your background. No matter what, you’ve always got that to fall back on. There’s a young gal in town named Tot that Ida and Beatrice go to, who does hair out on her back porch, but I don’t think she’s licensed. What kind of business are you in, Clyde?”
“Uhhh…the bank business,” he said, as he buttered another biscuit.
“Oh, my, what a coincidence. My sister Ida, the one I was telling you about, is married to a banker by the name of Herbert Jenkins. Do you know him?”
Clyde shook his head. “No…I don’t believe I do.”
“Well, anyway, his daddy owns the Elmwood Springs bank. You need to go in and say hello to him. You’re gonna pass right by Elmwood Springs on your way to Joplin. It’s a real nice little town. My sister Gerta and her husband, Ted, run the bakery. My friend Beatrice and her husband, Ander, live there, too. Ander owns that big dairy farm you passed by.”
—
AFTER HEARING ALL ABOUT her ten-year-old nephew, Gene, the Cub Scout with all the badges, they were shown an old photograph of Elner’s parents, Nancy and Henry Knott, standing beside their prize-winning pig, Dumpling No. 3. “They’re both gone now,” she said. “Both up at Still Meadows. Momma fell off the back of a wagon and froze solid, and Daddy got TB. I sure do miss ’em.”
Almost forty-five minutes later, when the couple stood up to leave, Elner said, “Wait. I’ve got a little something for you to take with you.” She went to her pantry and pulled out two jars of her homemade fig preserves from a shelf full of jars. She handed them to the girl. “Here you go, honey. Made fresh yesterday, right off my tree. I hope you enjoy them.”
The girl took them and said, “Thank you,” as they walked to the door.
“Well, listen, good luck to you two. And if you’re ever anywhere around here again, stop by and see me again, will you?”
“We sure will,” they said.
“Oh, and don’t forget to stop by the bank on your way out. You can’t miss it. It’s right there on Main Street. Be sure and tell them Elner sent you.” As she washed the breakfast dishes, Elner was so happy to have had such a pleasant visit with such a nice young couple.
Elner had no idea until she saw their picture in the paper that the couple were the famous criminals Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker.
After the police raid of their hideout in Joplin, they’d managed to escape, but a camera with undeveloped film was found, and photos of the notorious couple brandishing guns were published by The Joplin Globe. Bonnie was shown holding a gun and smoking a cigar. Elner’s husband, Will, had been horrified when she told him that they were the same two people she had made breakfast for.