Thread and Buried (9 page)

Haylee had driven only about a mile toward home when a certain farmland aroma made us close the pickup’s windows. She pointed. “There’ve been times in my life when owning a manure spreader might have come in handy or been a lot of fun.” The manure spreader twirled like a small but jolly merry-go-round. All it needed was the music to go with it.

Asparagus grew in the field. The stalks were longer than the ones we commonly saw in stores or bought directly from farmers, but they hadn’t yet branched out into their ferny greenery. I asked, “Do you suppose someone sold asparagus after spreading manure on their fields, and the salad lady bought some? She served it raw. What if she didn’t bother washing it?”

Haylee nodded. “Food poisoning, maybe? How about if we do the rest of our shopping at the supermarket, go home, put away our groceries, eat supper, and later, when it’s dark—”

I finished the suggestion for her. “We’ll use my nicely nondescript five-speed car and bring the dogs out for a ride and their late-night walk.”

16

H
AYLEE AND I HAD OUR AFTER-DARK
snooping down to a science. If we had questions, we took the dogs for a ride wherever we thought we might end up with answers. Usually, the dogs scored a walk. Sometimes, we found evidence. Occasionally, we landed ourselves in trouble.

We had learned to be careful.

I put away the groceries, ate supper, and played with embroidery until dark, which, only two days after the summer solstice, was late. I left the kittens to sleep or vandalize my apartment, then walked my dogs down Lake Street to my car. They hopped into the backseat.

Haylee strolled uphill from the vicinity of the bandstand. Like me, she was dressed in black from head to toe. We got in, and I started the car and eased out of Threadville.

Haylee asked me, “Did anything go missing from your table at the sidewalk sale Friday night?”

“No. I had Ashley with me, and that girl sees everything. And no fights broke out over my merchandise. I don’t know why,” I teased, “since it’s every bit as nice as yours.”

Haylee grunted. “The shoplifter or shoplifters may have hit me as well as Opal and Naomi. I remember putting out a small box of water-soluble thread. It had nine or ten spools in it, last I knew. Today, Ralph came over from Disguise Guys. He was in a panic because he’d run out of the stuff, and I couldn’t find it. That poor guy! He loves creating costumes, the more original the better, but he hates ripping out basting stitches. He was miffed, too, because Duncan had apparently refused to shop in my store.”

“Duncan’s shy.”

“I don’t know how Ralph, who is so outgoing, managed to raise a son who, although he must be over thirty, can barely string two words together.”

I suggested, “Maybe Duncan likes you.”

“That’s what his father implied, but I think it was wishful thinking. He muttered something about Duncan never working up the courage to ask anyone out, so how was he, Ralph that is, ever going to have grandchildren to make costumes for?”

I laughed. “Has Ralph been spending time with your mothers?”

She turned toward me. I took my eyes off the road for a second. She was grinning. “Makes you wonder if they could be conspiring to matchmake, doesn’t it? It’s not going to work, though. Duncan’s handsome in a sort of nerdy way, and probably very nice, but how would anyone get to know him?”

“What do you think happened to the missing thread?”

“Either I put the box away in a very strange place, or someone stole it. Poor Ralph will have to rip out basting stitches until I get more water-soluble thread for him.”

“A lot of those costumes he makes look like they shouldn’t be dunked in water. The fur might mat.”

“He claims he has tricks up his furry sleeves.”

I slowed for a corner. “Maybe the blonde stole it. She was the one who tried to pick a quarrel about thread—embroidery thread—at my sale table. What a
strange
coincidence.” Sarcasm twisted my tone. “Opal’s knitting needles, Naomi’s quilt batting, and your box of thread all went missing around the time the blonde and the salad lady attracted our attention.”

“And then the salad lady went and poisoned half the village? If that woman knowingly harmed Edna, I’ll—”

I interrupted her. “And I’ll help you. Ugh. I wonder if your thread was used with the batting and knitting needles to wrap up Neil’s body.”

Haylee sighed. “I hope not. But I’d better be prepared for weird accusations from Chief Vicki Smallwood and the state police.”

Asparagus could tolerate dry, sandy soil, and most of the asparagus farms we’d patronized during our penny-hike shopping expeditions were close to the lake.

First, I drove to the farm where we’d seen the manure spreader at work earlier in the evening. All was quiet in the moonlight, but the smell had not diminished. The dogs raised their noses and sniffed. We closed the windows. I kept driving.

Not much farther down the road, we spotted a dark, banged-up minivan teetering on a slope beyond the shoulder. Concerned that the van might be in danger of rolling into a ditch, I slowed the car.

We couldn’t see anyone in the van, but Haylee pointed toward the field. A hefty man was quickly gathering asparagus stalks and stuffing them into a white plastic bag.

“It’s a funny time to harvest,” she commented.

“Both the time of year, when the asparagus is past its prime, and the time of day,” I agreed. “I mean night.” I nodded at a piece of farm machinery parked at the back of the field. “And most asparagus pickers use those things.”

We’d seen the homemade harvesting contraptions often during the asparagus season, and I’d asked one farmer what they were called. He’d thought awhile, and said he called his an Easy Ride, but he wasn’t sure what others might call theirs. Their construction varied, and most appeared to have been homemade, welded together at the farm where they were used. Most were centered on lawn tractors with winglike extensions on their sides. Seats and footrests dangled from the wings. As the Easy Ride trundled down a field’s rows, people sitting on the low seats reached between their raised feet for the spears. Canopies protected the harvesters from the worst of the sun and rain. Although picking the spears all day would still be hard work, doing it from an Easy Ride had to be more comfortable than walking and stooping like the figure in the moonlight was doing.

We’d spent so much time using each other’s vehicles as our snooping headquarters that we both knew where to find the important tools. Haylee opened my glove compartment and took out my flashlight.

It was small but powerful. Haylee opened her window and aimed it at the figure in the field. He turned away, even though his hood shielded most of his face from view. Like us, he was dressed in black.

I drove until we would be out of his sight, then turned around and flicked off my headlights, which I didn’t really need the night after the full moon, anyway. I urged the car forward at a crawl.

The man had returned to the van. He opened the driver’s door, threw his bulging plastic bag inside, hopped in after it, and roared off. He’d kept his hood up, and neither of us had recognized him.

The night air was redolent of recently spread manure. I muttered, “Don’t tell me someone’s going to poison
more
people with unwashed asparagus.” I was tempted to gun the motor, but I held back in the hope that my lack of headlights would prevent the thief from noticing we were following him.

Apparently having satisfied themselves that whatever had created the prodigious amount of manure was nowhere near us, Sally and Tally flopped down on their seat.

Ahead of us, the road ran flat and straight, a ribbon of gray in the moonlight. The van’s taillights diminished, but I kept them in my sight and dropped back. We left the smelly field behind and opened our windows.

The van turned off the main road onto one that would lead him straight to Elderberry Bay.

I glanced in triumph at Haylee. “We’ll find him.” I pressed harder on the gas.

17

W
E WERE ALMOST AT THE INTERSECTION
where the van had turned. Wind whipped into the windows, blowing our hair into our faces, but we only laughed.

A dark monstrosity lumbered out of a field and onto the road in front of us.

An Easy Ride.

“Farmers work long hours,” Haylee commented.

Yells came from the machine. “Farmers’ sons
play
even longer hours,” I said.

As far as I could tell, five teenage boys were riding on the thing, each of them brandishing a bottle of beer. Instead of boxes for vegetables between the seats, the Easy Ride carried cases of beer. The entire monstrosity, welded superstructure and all, took up both lanes of the country road.

Surely, the kids would pull into a field any moment.

They didn’t. They kept their Easy Ride chugging along, filling my car with exhaust fumes. We closed the windows.

Unless I could pass the Easy Ride, I had no hope of catching up with the asparagus thief and his load of probably tainted asparagus, no hope of finding out where he lived, who he was, or warning him to wash that asparagus thoroughly.

No. I wouldn’t talk to him or let him see us. Whoever had poisoned the community could have killed Neil, directly or indirectly. I would tell Vicki about the asparagus thief and let her do the interrogating.

But first, I had to find that van, which meant I had to pass the Easy Ride. The shoulders weren’t wide enough to drive on them safely, but the Easy Ride could have made an abrupt right turn onto the shoulder. The thing’s wings would then be parallel to the road and I would be able to pass it. Although I was certain they knew we were behind them, I honked and turned on my headlights.

The boys knew we were there, all right. They turned around, waved their bottles at us, shouted something I couldn’t make out, which was probably just as well, and kept going, continuing to block both sides of the road.

If the tractor propelling the Easy Ride had a headlight, it didn’t cast any light that I could see. What if an oncoming vehicle didn’t see the Easy Ride, and plowed into it?

I dropped back.

I was glad I had when bottles flew from the Easy Ride and smashed on the pavement in front of us.

Broken glass, just what I needed to drive through. I still had a snow shovel in the trunk. And I always carried plastic garbage bags.

I pulled off the road and we all tumbled out. Haylee walked the leashed dogs up and down the shoulder and snickered as I shoveled up bits of glass from the asphalt and dumped them into a garbage bag.

A car barreled up from behind us and stopped beside me.

Vicki Smallwood, in her cruiser without its gaudy sweater, opened her passenger window, and leaned down so she could see us. Sally-Forth and Tally-Ho wagged their tails.

Vicki looked pointedly at the snow shovel in my hand and raised a delicate eyebrow. She hollered over the sound of her engine, “Snow too deep for you?”

Silently, I held up the garbage bag.

Vicki covered her mouth, but her eyes gleamed with mischief. “Stoop and scoop? I hope that shovel’s overkill.”

I shook the bag. It rattled, but she probably didn’t hear that. I walked to her car and bent to speak through the open passenger window. “Glass. The kids in front of us were throwing bottles.”

Wrist draped over her steering wheel, Vicki peered out her windshield. “I don’t see anyone.”

Sure enough, the road was empty.

I explained, “They were riding on one of those asparagus-picking contraptions, drinking beer, and tossing the empties. That contraption takes up both sides of the road. I couldn’t pass. They must have pulled off. You’ll find them in a field or barnyard.” If she hurried.

She didn’t. Abandoning her casual pose, she gripped her steering wheel and gave me one of her stern police officer glares. “Were you driving without lights for a while back there, Willow?”

I shuffled my feet, which of course she couldn’t see from inside her cruiser. “I forgot them at first. The moon is bright.” Not a great excuse for “forgetting” the headlights, I knew.

“Taillights can keep you from being rear-ended.” She scrutinized my face.

I tried to maintain a neutral expression, for all the good that did. I managed not to say anything.

She looked past me to Haylee and called, “How did you get here so fast, Haylee?”

The dogs had given up on any sort of outing and were lying at Haylee’s feet. Hanging on to leashes with one hand, she raised the other one, palm up, to show she didn’t know the answer to Vicki’s question.

“She didn’t get here fast,” I answered for her. “We were creeping along behind the harvesting thing. I probably reached speeds exceeding six whole miles an hour.”

Vicki tilted her head in question. “But I saw Haylee in Elderberry Bay only ten minutes ago. She was in a silver BMW with a Norse god.”

“Impossible,” I said. “She’s been with me for almost an hour.”

“An
hour
?” Vicki scowled. “You two aren’t playing detective again, are you?”

“Of course not. We drive around most nights and walk the dogs.”

“On the shoulders of roads. And maybe in ditches. Lucky dogs.” She had definitely recovered from her illness.

“Most of my yard is still out of bounds,” I reminded her. Telling her about the man picking possibly contaminated asparagus in the moonlight would be too much like a confession of snooping, so I didn’t. If Haylee and I managed to collect real facts, we could give them to our police chief. For the moment, I was happy enough to discuss something else. “Are you sure it wasn’t Opal you saw?” I asked Vicki. “She and Haylee resemble each other.”

“So do you and Haylee, but I can tell you apart. This woman was not Opal’s age and looked almost exactly like Haylee. I wondered who the hunk was and how long Haylee had been hiding him from the rest of us.”

“I wish,” Haylee joked.

Just wait until Friday night,
I thought.
Clay has a plan . . .

Vicki promised, “I’ll go look for those kids and their undoubtedly unlicensed contraption and beer bottles. Don’t forget your headlights on your way
home
.” Her emphasis on the word “home”
was far from subtle. “You might accidentally puncture your tires on broken glass.” She peeled away into the night. I hoped
she
would watch for fragments of glass.

Haylee, the dogs, and I piled into my car. I turned on the headlights and drove at a sedate speed, though by then we would have been no more than two pinpricks of light in Vicki’s rearview mirror.

“Vicki hinted rather broadly that we should head home,” I said.

“Let’s.” Haylee could be very agreeable. “The asparagus thief turned toward Elderberry Bay.”

Grinning, I followed the road the van had taken. I drove slowly so we could check driveways, but neither of us saw the old van.

How were we going to prevent people from eating unwashed and recently fertilized asparagus if we didn’t know who had picked it and where he lived?

“Could the asparagus thief have been the salad lady?” Haylee asked.

“Maybe, if she’d strapped on stilts and shoulder pads.”

“Perfect for harvesting asparagus!”

I had to laugh. “Did the salad lady’s truck or tent have a company name on it?”

“A sign at the tent said ‘salad.’ I think the truck was unmarked.”

“Who helped Mona organize the picnic?” Mona was very good at delegating, which was why Haylee, her three mothers, and I had not accepted her invitation to join the organizing committee.

Haylee laughed. “Don’t you mean, ‘Who
actually
organized it?’”

“Yes. Someone on her committee must know who brought the salads.”

Haylee suggested, “It’s kind of late now, but shall we talk to Mona tomorrow?”

“Sure.” Vicki wouldn’t be able to complain, at least not much, about our interfering with an investigation if all we did was ask Mona for a name.

“How about tomorrow? I have appointments with fabric representatives most of the day—planning what to stock next winter. But I left a couple hours free at lunchtime. Can you bring the dogs to the park for a picnic, and then we’ll tackle Mona?”

“It’s a deal.” I drove down Lake Street, parked the car, and took the dogs home to a pair of kittens who were more than ready to get up and play. They were still tackling my toes when I drifted off to sleep.