A Tale of Two Turkeys

“There’s a second turkey in the ‘fridge!” Calvin Fuller said.

“There’s the one I brought,” his brother Edward said. “I didn’t see a second one; where did it come from?”

“I bought it,” Cal said. “It’s been thawing here for what, three-and-a-half or four days, now. You didn’t see it?” He went on to confess, “It’s only a twelve-pound bird. I know we agreed on fifteen or sixteen pounds, but twelve pounds was all I could find – unless I wanted to buy a twenty-four pound monster.”

“Well, we’ll have twenty four pounds worth of turkey, then,” Ed said. “I couldn’t find anything but twelve pound birds either – and I thought I was buying, this year.”

Their parents had passed away that spring, and so this was the brothers’ first Thanksgiving at Cal’s house rather than at their father’s. They both were forty-four years old, non-identical twins of what they called the ‘middle’ generation: Those who were children when America had ratified the Nineteenth Amendment as part of a world-wide movement to institute Female Demancipation.

Their parents had been well into adulthood on the day of ratification, and their mother had worn her slave collar with a sort of grumpy acceptance. Their sister Meg had accepted hers without complaint, although she had also been pleased at getting a second given name, an indulgence that their mother wheedled out of their father to make up for her loss of her surname.

Meg’s brothers, of course, had purchased slave women of their own. It was an ordinary part of adult life for them, even if all three siblings had childhood memories of a time when not all women were slaves. Their children had been born after Demancipation, and so lacked those memories. They’d grown up with the idea that all women were chattel slaves owned by men.

None of those ten children were here for this Thanksgiving of 1954. They were variously in the Army, at a Finishing Estate, celebrating Thanksgiving with the families of their masters or their ladyslaves, or otherwise doing young-adult things. Maybe next year some of the younger generation would join them. This year, however, the eight of them were all from the middle generation: Cal and Ed and their slave women Kitty and Lori, Meg and her owner Rodney Lynn, and Daniel Banks, a close friend of the brothers from childhood, and his bond witch Susan.

“So what do we do with the second turkey?” Cal asked. “I think we should try to roast both of them together.”

Ed nodded agreement. “I’m sure we can find a second pan, and I wouldn’t want to delay cooking either one of them.”

They stepped into the living room. Dan had put a padlock on the plastic box holding the house-hobbles; their four slave women had taken up a challenge to spend the entire day barefoot. Their hobble-heels were in the closet along with their coats – November in Michigan is not deep winter, but it’s still winter.

All four of the slave women were tied hand and foot with cotton clothesline. Three of the four had two given names each, in defiance of probability – most women of their generation had only a single given name. Two of them shared the couch while the other two sat in armchairs.

Meg – Eleanor Margret – was a typical Michigander, like her brothers, with medium brown hair and medium brown eyes. She did, of course, have longer hair and a shorter height than her brothers, as befitted a slave woman.

Kitty – Kathryn Irma – was the second-shortest of the women, with hazel eyes behind thick glasses, blonde hair, and a stocky build that she struggled with to keep from turning plump. Her Master Calvin growled that she was too smart for her own good, but everyone knew that he loved her for that.

Lori – Loretta Elizabeth – was a black woman, with a black woman’s curly hair. Her father was a wealthy man and a Samsonite, and that made her purchase by a white master entirely unexceptional. Being well-raised, she never spoke of her dark exotic beauty, but instead allowed Master Edward to boast for her.

Susan – who had a single name (and no nickname) – was the shortest of the four women, a waif with dark hair and dark eyes. Her slave collar had a red glass bauble set in it, marking her as a bond witch, with above-average psychic gifts. Meg once had joked that she needed glasses to complete her look of mystery, and Susan had answered seriously that she foresaw needing glasses by the time she was fifty – but not yet, not yet.

The family tradition was that the slave women would be put to work in the kitchen starting when it came time to stuff the turkey. Before then, on Thanksgiving morning, the men would prepare the pre-feast snacks and cocktails, scrub vegetables, and take care of other such tasks. On the other hand, Wednesday’s prepare-ahead work had been part of the slave women’s duties. They’d fixed the coleslaw, baked the apple and pecan pies (but not a pumpkin pie – no one in the family like pumpkin), and made the cranberry jelly-mold.

Now Ed announced the decision to roast both of the two turkeys. The bound slave women silently assented, and Rodney commented, “At least we’ll have plenty of leftovers.”

Cal asked, “Does anyone want a cocktail yet? Or should I put on another pot of Brew?”

“I’ll make the Brew,” Dan said. He finished checking the knots securing his Susan, and gave her a caress and an exchange of smiles, before rising and repeating, “I’ll make the Brew.”

Cal gave way. Dan made the best Brew here, with the possible exception of Meg, and Meg couldn’t be allowed to make brew now. Dan left for the kitchen. Ed followed with a comment about needing to finish peeling the carrots. Cal remained in the living room; having three men in the kitchen crowded it.

Kitty sent a mental probe to start the oven pre-heating. It was a new oven, one that had psi controls and timers sensitive enough to respond to the mental efforts of an ordinary house slave – or even to a man’s probe, if he concentrated hard enough. The kitchen clock had older, female-only psi-relays. Back when Master Calvin had bought it, in the thirties, those had been the latest thing.

Three of the masters in the kitchen had crowded it. All four of the slave women could manage to work there at the same time. That might change, for either better or worse, when the turkeys went into the oven. They would remain barefoot, of course, but four pairs of hobbling chains were waiting for the second part of their Thanksgiving challenge.

Normally a slave woman at home had a choice between going barefoot and going hobbled, and could easily switch between the two. House-hobbles (or domestic hobbles, as some called them) were women’s house shoes equipped with a hobbling cord or chain. Their hobbles didn’t lock, unlike those of the more formal hobble-heels, and so it only took a moment to slip them on or off.

Today, however, the house-hobbles were locked away, and the women would either go barefoot, or barefoot *and* hobbled, at the pleasure of their masters. The only question was whether being barefoot-hobbled would make the crowding in the kitchen worse, or whether (as Susan predicted) it would actually ease that crowding.

“Uh-oh,” Kitty said after looking in the oven.

“What’s wrong?” Lori asked. Meg and Susan had the cornbread stuffing ready, and were attending to the first turkey while Lori waited for Kitty to come help her with the second bird.

“We won’t be able to fit both turkeys in the oven at once,” Kitty said. “Or at least not with the only two pans we have that will fit the turkeys.”

Susan asked, “Are both pans too big?”

“If both pans were the same size as the smaller one, it would be all right,” Kitty explained. “The problem is that the bigger pan is too big; if we put it in the oven, the smaller one won’t fit.”

“I don’t suppose we could squeeze both turkeys into the larger pan,” Lori said. She looked at the larger pan, now on the counter. “No.”

“No,” Kitty said.

“No,” Meg and Susan both agreed.

Kitty asked, “Could we jury-rig something with a cookie sheet and aluminum foil?”

“I don’t like that idea,” Lori said. “I can imagine it spilling.”

“It would spill,” Susan said with a nod. “At least anything we made would spill. But I believe our masters will provide.”

Meg said, “Yes, let’s ask our masters. Maybe they can jury-rig something.” She stepped into the living room. Her brothers were still in the basement, but Master Rodney and Mr. Dan were still there, talking and nibbling on snacks.

“What’s the problem, Meg?” her Master Rodney asked.

“We can’t fit both turkeys in the oven, master,” Meg said. “We need your help.”

Both men came into the kitchen. The slave women squeezed to one end and watched as they fiddled with a cookie sheet and a roll of aluminum foil.

“It’s not going to work,” Mr. Rodney said at last. “At least I wouldn’t trust it.”

“I wouldn’t either. If nothing else, it would spill hot juices all over whoever took the birds out of the oven.”

Mr. Rodney turned toward the slave women. “Meg, do you have any other ideas? Do any of you?”

“I believe Mr. Calvin and Mr. Edward will provide,” Susan said serenely.

Mr. Rodney turned to Mr. Dan. “I believe your bond witch is being mysterious again,” he quipped.

The sound of footsteps came from the basement stairs. A moment later the door opened, and Kitty saw Master Calvin emerge. “We couldn’t find the box of holiday dishes,” he said. “Susan, are you sure it’s to the left? We looked on the top shelf, then on all the shelves to the left, and then on all the top shelves.”

“We did find this,” Mr. Edward said as he followed his brother out the basement door.

‘This’ was a very large roasting pan.

“Do you think you can use it?” Mr. Edward asked. “Or should I take it back downstairs?”

“Yes!” Meg squealed. “It’s the monster roasting pan from Father’s house! I’d forgotten about it. Please don’t take it back downstairs, Edward. We can use it.”

“Will it fit into the oven?” Kitty asked.

“Try it and see,” Lori said. “The other question is whether both turkeys will fit in it.”

“The turkeys will fit,” Susan said. “I have Seen it – just a glimpse, but I have Seen it.”

“And it should fit in the oven,” Meg said. “It fit in the oven at Father’s house, and this one is at least as big. But as Lori said, we should try it and see.”

Now the men squeezed out of the kitchen. Kitty opened the oven door, and Lori slid the huge pan in and out again.

“It fits,” Lori announced.

Kitty sent out a questioning probe. “The oven is preheated now,” she reported. “We can put the turkeys in as soon as we get them both in the pan.”

“And after that, your hobbles are waiting,” Master Calvin said. “We’ll leave you now to decide whether you want to put on a pretty show of reluctance, or not.”

The four slave women grinned back at him.

Cal and Ed lifted the monster roasting pan from the oven and set it on a cookie rack to cool.

“Thank you, master,” Kitty said.

“And thank you, master,” Lori said.

“You’re welcome,” Cal and Ed both replied.

Kitty and Lori each took their master’s hand, smiling and leading them back to the living room. Cal and Ed cheerfully went along, letting themselves be fussed over as they sat down and then watching as their slave women whisked away the last remains of empty glasses and snack trays.

Rodney and Dan were still in the basement. In the kitchen, Meg was pulling the sweet potatoes from the oven, and Susan was finishing the giblet gravy. Kitty and Lori returned. The fluffy biscuits – a specialty of Lori’s – were waiting to go into the oven, delayed, along with setting the table, as the four slave women waited in hopes of the holiday dishes showing up.

“Ah!” Susan said. “My master has found the holiday dish box.”

A minute later the women heard steps on the basement stairs. Dan and Rodney emerged from the basement door, with Dan carrying a big cardboard box.

“They *were* on the top shelf and to the left,” Dan told Susan. “But pushed to the back, out of sight.”

“Pushed to the back and hiding behind a model train set,” Rodney amplified.

Kitty and Lori fell on the box, pulling out the holiday dishes. Now it was Meg and Susan’s turn to lead their masters to the living room and thus out of the way. When they returned, there followed a flurry of activity from the four hobbled and barefoot slave women. They set the table, placed one turkey on a holiday platter, found a second platter for the second turkey, and filled the serving dishes.

The four men came into the dining room and the women served everyone the initial course: Cups of cream of mushroom soup (courtesy of the Campbell Soup company). Then there was another flurry of hobbled feminine activity as they cleared the soup away and loaded the table with the main Thanksgiving feast. They brought out coleslaw and carrot sticks, a cranberry jelly mold, black and stuffed green olives, baked beans, butter-fried onions, baked sweet potatoes with butter and brown sugar, Lori’s special fluffy biscuits and, of course, the two turkeys, both with cornbread stuffing and giblet gravy. The apple and pecan pies still waited in the kitchen.

Finally the four women took their places at the table, each one sitting next to her master and owner.

“Should we tie the cooks to their chairs?” Cal asked, referring to a custom sometimes observed at formal dinner parties.

“I have another idea,” his brother Ed said. “We can shorten their hobble-chains for the meal.” He set four padlocks on the table.

Dan and Rodney approved loudly. The slave women kept politely silent, neither endorsing the idea nor protesting against it. But their eyes were bright as their masters put them in that one further bit of restraint.

The two turkeys were at either end of the table, each on a platter and each with a carving knife and fork next to it. Cal took up one of the big knife-and-fork sets, Ed took up the other, and the two brothers began to carve.

(End)