EGGS

When I moved to my farm just outside the town of Moneymore, the first thing that caught my eye was the big hill known as Moneymore Hill, and the two homesteads—one on either side— that had burnt to the ground. I eventually asked my neighbours and a few of the townspeople what had happened. Along with some surmises of my own, this seems to be the story:

Johnny Flynn owned the farm at the top of the east side of Moneymore Hill—the Hill actually being two hills formed by a glacial ravine with a little river running through, adjoining two lakes—and Earl Flannagan owned the farm at the top of the west side. Both men were in their early sixties, single and inseparable friends. Both were quite poor but owned their properties outright, and managed to pay land taxes, house insurance and other bills mostly by cutting and selling cedar posts and firewood. Johnny never married and had no siblings; he was left the farm by his folks who both died in a car accident when he was eighteen. He had no close relatives, only a couple of estranged aunts who lived somewhere Out West. Earl had bought his farm as a young married man, but his wife died in childbirth and the insurance money was just enough to pay off the new mortgage. He had no living relative.

Johnny and Earl enjoyed working together. They partied little, but when they did it was just the two of them with a forty-ouncer, a deck of cards and a set horseshoes. They went to town seldom, but when they did, went together in either of their blue pickups. Both were amiable and well liked. They were not educated men; nor were they stupid men.

One April day Johnny Flynn received a letter in the mail from a Calgary solicitor. Enclosed was a cheque for $1,200, bequeathed to him by his late aunt Florence who had been living there in an old-age home. Earl was as happy as Johnny at the news.

“What are we gonna do with all that dough?” Earl asked.

“I got plans, Earl. Big plans. I always thought I’d like to raise chickens for their eggs. I’m gonna be an egg farmer. I’m gonna sell ‘em from the house, and the stores in town, and maybe even in Toronto some day! Ever notice that the stores only sell white eggs? I’m gonna sell brown eggs. Big farm-fresh, brown eggs that are good for ya. It’s time I made somethin’ of myself. I’m gonna be a respectable business man, Earl.”

Earl was a little taken-back by all of these Is and I’ms, but he still felt good for Johnny. Besides, he knew nothing would ever become of his friend’s plans. Every time either of them would get a few dollars ahead something would happen: the transmission would go on one of the trucks, or a rear tire on one of the tractors, or a household water pump would go on the bum for good. That’s the way it always was.

Not long after receiving his money, Johnny drove, all by himself, to a nearby lumber mill where he bought a great deal of supplies including sheets of plywood, two-by-fours, rolls of corncribbing wire, bags of nails and new tools. He was determined to build the best damn chicken coop in all the county. Earl saw him drive by. On the following afternoon, while getting his mail, Earl saw Johnny again—driving like a bat out of hell towards home—and he wasn’t happy with the spray of gravel he received. And he wasn’t too happy with the idea that they were supposed to be cutting limb wood promised to a neighbour that day. And he wasn’t too happy at being left out of Johnny’s other plans either.
A few days later Earl had a call from Johnny: “Earl? Can ya come over? Gotta surprise for ya.”

It took Earl just thirty seconds to get to the other side of the Hill—and there, in the middle of Johnny’s living room, was the hugest peep of chickens. Heat lamps dangled above them and on layers of old newspapers sat dozens of little hoppers filled with grain and water.

“How do ya like my little birds, Earl? They’re day-olds, and what’s called a harco sex-link. Don’t know exactly what that means, but they’re supposed to grow up to be a little black hen with a big asshole. A brown egg-layer that lays nearly every day of the year. And they never lay eggs smaller than large and mostly they lay EXTRA large! There’s a hundred and fifty of ‘em, Earl. Cost me a dollar apiece and tax. Gonna keep ‘em in the house till June ‘cause the nights are still too cold. Whatcha think of my little chicks, Earl?”

But before Earl could answer: “Let’s go to the barn, Earl. Gotta show ya somethin’.”

Johnny had been busy as a beaver on amphetamines. The inside of the barn had been totally renovated. There was new lighting and newly paneled walls; pens wired with sturdy corncribbing with properly hinged doors to each; laying boxes—a hundred too many—and elaborate roosts made of long two-by-fours and two-by-twos. There were feed hoppers and water hoppers of varying sizes and several new 40-gallon metal drums filled and labeled: Chick starter, Chick Grower # 1, Chick Grower # 2, Cracked Corn, Scratch and Laying Mash—twelve drums of the latter. Earl couldn’t believe his eyes.

“Pretty impressive stuff, Johnny. Must’ve cost a fortune.”

“Gotta spend money to make money, Earl,” Johnny answered in his new businesslike manner. “But let’s go back to the house, old buddy, I bought us something.”

On the kitchen counter were three 40-ouncers of booze: one whiskey, one gin and one Irish cream. This hurt Earl more than anything. He couldn’t get Johnny’s last words out of his mind: Old buddy. I bought us something. I bought us something! I BOUGHT US SOMETHING! Before, they enjoyed buying luxuries together. And the Irish cream—a first—should never, ever have been bought by one of them alone. Johnny had gone too far.

Johnny and Earl remained friends but Earl had nothing to do with Johnny’s hens—not even as a visiting bystander. They also did far less together than what they had; but still they managed to cut a little wood together to pay the bills. Both were broke. Johnny spent every cent of his inheritance money on his egg-layers and glorified coop, but had the good sense to buy enough grain to see him for six months. He also bought another fridge, just for his eggs. He was patiently waiting for that first one.

And then one morning, in early October: there it was. It was laid by three hens sitting on top of one another. The egg weighed one pound and was encased in beige crystalized diamond dust and its center—as envisioned by Johnny—was of pure Incan gold. Yet, it was too delicate to frame and put on the wall, so Johnny ate it—with a thick slab of Black Forest ham that he was saving in the freezer for the occasion. He fried it, gently, sunny-side up, and when he finally poked it with the fork, that sun once worshiped by the ancient Egyptians again appeared on Earth and poured forth and engulfed his being and palate. It was the best egg he had ever eaten. He barely touched the ham. He paced back and forth across the kitchen floor thinking of his inevitable millions. He checked the nests a hundred times that day and found two more eggs. There were five on the second morning. Eight on the third. And within two weeks he was getting more than a hundred a day. He put the sign he had made out by his mail box: Farm-fresh Brown Eggs - $1.50 doz. He had lined up every grocery store in town—all two of them—to buy his eggs on consignment. Also, three local convenience stores took them and two health-food stores in Belleville—just a couple a dozen a week by each store, for starts, but already Johnny was wondering if he had bought enough hens.

One morning, about a month after he had found his first egg, Johnny drove up Earl’s laneway. “Earl, old buddy, look what I brought ya. It’s a flat, Earl. Two and a half dozen of my eggs. And guess what, Earl. They’re double-yolkers. That’s why I had to put ‘em in a flat. The lids wouldn’t close on the regular cartons. I saved them just for you. And see that giant rippled one sitting on top? That’s a triple-yolker, Earl. I had one for breakfast on Saturday. They’re rare, Earl. Can ya imagine? Three eggs in one! Good thing they don’t lay more of ‘em ‘cause the stores only take singles.”

This was the worst thing that could happen to Earl. Not only was he being given “freebies” by his best friend but freebies nobody else wanted. Something happened to Earl’s mind; that rubber band that had been stretching and stretching all year long didn’t finally break, but snapped back with the explosion of an atomic bomb. Earl himself was about to venture on a business of his own. He would become a business man to be reckoned with. The richest and most ruthless in all of the county.

II

Early one November morning Earl received a desperate phone call from Johnny: “Earl!”

“Johnny?!”

“Earl! I got coons in my barn! They’re eatin’ my chickens! My gun don’t work! Can ya come over and bring your gun?!”

“You got what?” Earl shouted back. “Coons! Coons! RAAACOONS! Bring gun!”

“Be right there, Johnny.”

Earl showed up with his old beat-up .22-caliber and found poor Johnny pacing the coop.

“Look at that, Earl! Six dead hens—half eaten. And their eggs. And my grain all shit on and look at that!” Johnny pointed, with tears in his eyes.

Sure enough, two fat coons crouched on one of the outer barn beams that supported the upper loft floor which was also the roof of the coop.

“They know how to get in but not out,” Johnny said. “Would ya shoot ‘em for me? I got the shakes, Earl.”

So Earl shot the coons for his friend Johnny—a clean shot through each head. Neither Johnny nor Earl took much to guns. They never hunted nor did they ever raise livestock except for the odd chicken or duck that always got killed by a coon, fox or coyote long before it was ready for the pot; so nothing ever really needed protecting. Both owned a rifle but only used it on occasion to shoot a skunk that wouldn’t leave the summer kitchen or a porcupine that was damaging an apple tree.

“How do ya suppose they got in, Earl?”

“They say if a coon can get its head through a hole it can squeeze its whole body through, no matter how fat. Why, they probably got through that window there, Johnny. The wiring is loose on one side. Better put cribbing over it and staple it real good.”

“You’re right, Johnny. I’ll hop to it right after I bury these coons.”

“Better give ‘em to me, Johnny,” Earl said. “If ya bury ‘em round here other coons will smell ‘em out and dig ‘em up and before ya know it every critter in the county will be sniffin’ round tryin’ to git in. I’ll take ‘em over to my place and bury ‘em in that big old sand pit behind the barn—better take the hen carcasses too—I’ll pour a little gas over ‘em for good measure.”

“Would ya, Earl?” said Johnny. “Appreciate it, old buddy.”

“No problem, Johnny. Here, keep my gun. Coons are everywhere round here but there’s nothin’ for ‘em to damage over at me. Gimme a call if ya need a hand.”

“Will do,” said Johnny gratefully. “Thanks, Earl.”

Next morning Earl received another desperate call from Johnny: “It’s me, Earl. The coons got in again. Seven of ‘em. Can ya shoot ‘em for me, Earl? I’m all nervous—afraid I’ll wound one and it’ll bite me and give me rabies!”

“I’ll be right over!”

So Earl came to his friend’s aid for a second day, and shot the coons.
“They got eight of my good hens and ate only the guts out of some of ‘em, Earl. It’s terrible. And they must’ve eaten a whole bag of mash. How can they eat so much? How come they can get in but not out? I fixed that window, just like ya said, Earl. I’m losin’ my business right before me. It’s horrible, Earl. Horrible!”

“They’re a lot like minnows, Johnny. They can get into a trap okay but get too confused to get out,” Earl replied as he scouted the coop.

Johnny’s “coop” was really half the lower half of a big T-shaped barn. At one time it consisted of three separate stables used for calving and milking.

“Heeere’s your problem, Johnny,” shouted Earl with joy. “The corner of that old door rotted out at one time and it’s been patched with thin plywood. You do that, Johnny?”

“Years ago, Earl, but coons never got in before.”

“That’s ‘cause ya never had birds and grain in here before. And these here carnivores—that’s what they’re called, Johnny—are smart and have good ears and smellin’ and hands on ‘em like people. Why, they just pried the corner of that door and walked right in. The biggest was the first and held it for the rest. Lookit!”

Earl placed pressure on the corner of the door and the bottom pushed out, revealing daylight. “That’s where they’ve been getting in all right,” said Johnny. “I’m gonna nail that door right shut. Should’ve done it before. I’ll use spikes. Have no use for it anyway.”

“Then I’ll let ya get to it, Johnny,” said Earl, as he patted him on the back. “Help me throw these big buggers and the hens on the truck and I’ll bury ‘em with the others. Gimme a call if ya need.”

But the coon invasion didn’t end there. The following morning there were another five, and then another five or six, and then another five or six or seven—they were coming in whole family groups to Johnny’s smorgasbord—Johnny lost count of the coons, but he knew how many hens he had lost in the past two weeks: ninety-eight. Every morning he called Earl, who came down to point out where they had been getting in: through a loose floorboard, or a loose roof board or a missing one that was covered with hay. They got in through holes under the sills, or tunnels that they had dug but the hens had scratched over. Earl even suggested that they stood on buckets and lifted the latch on the door, so Johnny put a big padlock on it. But there was no stopping the coons. How they were getting in, Johnny hadn’t an inkling. And he didn’t care. He had decided to get out of the business. He hadn’t made a cent, but had no bills either.

That night however, Johnny received a call from a church group in Ratbrook, about twenty miles north of Moneymore. They were celebrating the 150th anniversary of the erection of their church and were holding an egg-sausage-pancake breakfast on December the first. A parishioner had noticed his roadside sign one day in passing. The committee had decided on farm-fresh brown eggs—“not the white store-bought ones that run all over the pan.” They needed sixty dozen. Johnny had fifty-two in his egg fridge but could make up the rest with double-yolkers, if needed, for he had a few days before the due date. This rejuvenated Johnny’s sense of entrepreneurship, and he immediately got an idea: he’d reinforce his coop with pure metal. There was a stack of old stainless steel barn-roofing in the T-section of his barn that was remnant of a secondary barn that had burned down when he was just a boy. It had probably lost some of its temper but should suffice. Nothing would get to his hens ever again.

Johnny showed up at the Ratbrook Anglican Church on the scheduled Saturday morning with his sixty dozen eggs, every egg individually hand-washed and polished. The lady who headed the committee greeted him and asked him to stay the night at her home so he could enjoy next morning’s breakfast, but Johnny gratefully declined. He had to “...attend to his hens.” The lady also informed him that the owner of the Ratbrook Trading Post was interested in seeing him about his eggs. Johnny took his $90 with many “thankyous” and Japanese bows, then drove across the road to the Trading Post. A gigantopithecan—huge and ugly, with hair growing out of his throat and fingernails— greeted him with a voice that could have passed for a twelve-year-old choir singer. Johnny almost broke out laughing, but reminded himself that he wasn’t that kind of man. Besides, this was business, or so he presumed.

“I’m Johnny Flynn, the Egg Man.”

“John Tunny,” said the seven-foot-tall 300-pounder as he shook Johnny’s hand.

Something in the back of Johnny’s mind wanted to make him laugh at the name too, but he didn’t know what. So he didn’t. Which was good, for John Tunny had biceps on him the size of footstools and hands the size of army boots.

“I’ve had some church people put in orders for brown eggs, since that’s what they’ll be serving at the Social tomorrow. Could use probably ten dozen a week, Mr. Flynn, to start...if you can manage...” said the big man. “I can pay $1.20 per dozen.”

“Yes...yes! I can supply that many no problem, Mr. Tunny,” Johnny answered importantly. The words Mr. Flynn rang like a clear dinner bell on a frozen day and reverberated into an endless echo. He’d buy more hens, if he had too. He’d take down his road sign—most customers beat him down to $1.00 per dozen anyway. That was cost.

“You’re from Moneymore I understand, Mr. Flynn.” John Tunny stated.

“Do you happen to know an Earl Flannagan down that way?”

“Why, Earl’s my next-door neighbour.”

“Really! Bin bringing in some mighty fine coons over the past couple weeks—must be over fifty so far. Good quality. Had to pay him $125.00 each for some of the big silver boars. If ya take the yen to do any night shootin’, could make yaself a buck, Mr. Flynn. Good quality and good price this year but won’t last. Them animal activists are puttin’ a quick end to the fur business. Another ten years they won’t be worth two bucks apiece—and that’s if ya skin ‘em yourself. Don’t worry about no license or dog tag—I got that all covered.”

“I’ll mull it over, Mr. Tunny. Thanks.”

As Johnny drove home, his head was a gear within a gear within a gear with all their cogs missing: Where’d Earl get the coons? One hundred and twenty-five dollars a coon—that’s one hundred and twenty-five dozen eggs at cost! He got ‘em from my barn. Fifty coons in two weeks! He’s been lettin’ ‘em in somehow. One hundred and twenty-five dollars a coon! I’ll make ‘im pay, PAY! PAY!

When Johnny got home he immediately went down to the barn and started to walk its perimeter—something that never occurred to him to do before. He had been concentrating too much on how to keep the coons out from the inside. When he got to the southwest corner—on the same side as the old door that he had nailed shut—he discovered a narrow but deep path that lead through the dead bromegrass to a stone fence. There at the barn’s corner were some rotten loose bales of hay, where the path ended. When Johnny kicked the hay to one side, all his questions were answered. For there in plain sight was a shiny new hinge that hung a barnboard that had been cut horizontally about a foot above the ground. At its base was a latch, similar to one used on every house door, so that it was self-locking. Also, there was a coil of wire attached to the bottom of the board. It was a coon trap. Johnny’s mind was as sharp as a fish hook. When Johnny’s lights went out at night—which could be seen from Earl’s—Earl would sneak down the hill and across Johnny’s front field. Then he would pull the wire over a low limb of the apple tree next to the barn. This was how he let the coons in. Then Earl would wait somewhere, or even go home just to return a couple of hours later and release the wire. BANG! The board would slam shut and the coons were inside, where they could chomp away on his hens and mash. Johnny followed the coon trail through the grass to the rock fence. There he saw the stripped carcass of one of his hens—feathers still attached. None of his hens had ever been outside. Earl had taken the dead chickens from his barn, and instead of burying them, used them to bait the coons. This was the last sane deduction Johnny was to make in his lifetime. Something stretched to its limits within his mind. And it was never to snap back.

That night, Johnny left his lighted home for the last time, and all the way down the Hill and up the other side he chuckled to himself as he swung and swished the gasoline from side to side within its container. The chuckles became external as he splashed the fuel over the porch and front of Earl’s house. Then they became great big belly-laughs as he stood back, legs apart, and threw the match.

“Burn, bastard, burn! Burn in hell, traitor!”

And the old wooden structure happily crackled in flame as if it were built one hundred years ago just for this particular moment. Johnny rolled on the grass, laughing. Laughing great big laughs that shook the universe as he pounded his fists against Mother Earth.

But Earl had not been idle. From a window he had seen Johnny splashing the gas from its can and light the match. He immediately recognized that it was too late to do anything but put on his pants and rush from the house. In a rage of his own he jumped over Johnny’s writhing body and into his old Ford and tore up the other side of the Hill. Inside Johnny’s kitchen he stood for a moment with the intelligence of a chicken’s head still blinking after being severed. Then he noticed the pot of cooking oil on the stove. He splashed it over the kitchen floor, then taking a match from the cutlery drawer he lit the box and flung it. As he turned to flee, he slid on the grease, fell, and hit his head against the corner of the counter; and there he lay, until the coroner signed the document that allowed his charred remains to be legally removed.

One April evening I visited Earl Flannigan’s farm. His barn was a relatively new structure. It could have been used for anything. I wondered what would have happened if he had been left the $1,200. Had he a dream of his own? Would his plans have included his best friend, Johnny?

Then I walked down the Hill and up to Johnny’s farm. I opened the door to the great chicken coop. A big coon snarled at me and I slammed the door quickly, placed my head against it, and wondered what would have happened if Johnny had shared his money — shared his dream — included Earl in his plans. Where would the two of them be now if that damn cheque had never come in the mail—Earl now dead and Johnny locked away in that hospital.

And as I walked back towards my own farm, I wondered what I should do with the place when I wasn’t writing. Perhaps raise a few pigs. Maybe a cow or two. Some meat birds—those big white rocks—and maybe a few turkeys. And of course, laying hens. One must have laying hens and his own extra-large, farm-fresh, brown eggs if he is to become a successful farmer.

And the whole while home, I found myself humming that great tune made famous by Old Blue Eyes—you know the one: That’s life. That’s what all the people say. You’re riding high in April, shot down in May...

(from The Monster of Moneymore (Lion’s Head Press, 2004)