Little Black Book of Murder (8 page)

Last night's asparagus had also gotten me thinking it would soon be time to get some veggies started in the garden. In the fall, I had spent a week putting the garden to bed, so the spring cleanup was going to be a snap. Ralphie sat in the grass, blinking in the sunshine as he watched me rake up the straw.

I said to him, “This garden is not going to be your buffet.”

He gave me a happy grunt that sounded like a request to hurry it up and plant something juicy.

I was down on my knees in the dirt with a trowel when I saw a fat blacksnake.

It was sunning itself in the dark earth a few yards away. One second I saw it, and the next second I was standing on the porch, doing a dithery dance.

About that time, Emma's red pickup came rumbling up the drive. She was towing a horse trailer. She parked by the pony fence but came over when she saw me hugging myself on the porch. At her heel trotted her speckled spaniel, Toby.

“What's with you?” she asked.

“A snake.” I pointed a shaky finger. “In the garden. A really big black one.”

“Blacksnakes are good snakes.”

“I don't care. I want it gone.”

“Jeez, Nora. You live on a farm. Time to get over the snake thing.” Emma strolled over to the garden and took a look. For all her tough talk, though, I noticed she didn't exactly stride confidently into the rows where I planned to plant lettuce. She kept her distance and peeked. A moment later, she came back, shaking her head. “You must have scared it away.”

I sat down on the top step of the porch, and Toby licked my face with sympathy. Ralphie poked me with his snout. I said to him, “Thanks a lot, Ralphie. You could have earned your keep by killing that snake for me.”

Ralphie gave a snort to say he didn't like snakes, either.

“Mick around?” Emma asked casually. She leaned down to scratch Ralphie between the ears. He gave a sigh of pleasure and leaned against her legs.

“Michael went to church.” I pointed at her trailer. “Are you here to pick up ponies?”

“Nope, just dropping off a horse. And I got some extra work making livestock deliveries in the neighborhood, so this is a drive-­by. I'm taking some heifers up the road.”

By the sound of it, she was taking any work she could get. I admired her hustle. Like a child begging for a parent to hurry up, one of the young cows in the trailer gave a plaintive moo.

I said, “What horse are you dropping off?”

She grinned. “Your favorite. Mr. Twinkles.”

I did like Emma's jumper, a splendid chestnut she hoped to ride in summer competitions. I said, “Is he healthy enough to jump this year?”

“I think so. But I can't afford to board him at Paddy Horgan's stable. Mind if he bunks here for a while?”

“The more, the merrier.”

Toby and Ralphie followed us to the trailer and watched while Emma unfastened the tailgate and went inside to unload Mr. Twinkles. The nervous gelding hated riding in any vehicle, but he must have smelled familiar territory, because he came down the ramp in a rush and nuzzled my sweater.

“Hi, bad boy.” I rubbed his neck and let him snuffle me.

Emma led Mr. Twinkles over to the paddock and turned him loose. He took off at a gallop and bucked with joy at being free again. Ralphie went to the fence and watched the horse with interest. Eventually, Mr. Twinkles cantered back and stuck his nose down to sniff the pig.

“Well, I've heard of dogs and goats keeping horses company,” Emma said, “but never a pig. Ralphie will behave himself, right?”

“If he doesn't, we'll have ham for Easter.”

Emma laughed. “I doubt it.”

“Where are you off to now?”

She checked her watch. “I'm supposed to deliver these heifers to Starr's Landing. A guy I know owns a dairy farm, a good one, and he sold three heifers to Swain Starr for his fancy farm experiment. Anyway, I was actually hoping you might ride along this morning.”

“Why me?”

She rolled her eyes. “Zephyr Starr was giving me the stink eye a week ago. Like I was there to hit on her antique of a husband. I mean, he could barely walk. If you're along, I won't have to deck her.”

“Was he flirting with you?”

“No. In fact, he looked half sick. But the power of Viagra,” Emma said, “gives some women exaggerated ideas about what their husbands can do. Can you come?”

“Sure.” With the snake in my garden, I wasn't keen on going back to digging in the dirt. “Let me change my clothes and—”

“We're not invited to a party,” Emma said. “I'm just delivering cows. With luck, nobody will see either one of us. I'll just turn 'em loose in a pasture and leave.”

“Okay.” I dusted the worst of the garden earth from my jeans. “Let's go.”

In a few minutes, we were speeding up the road ­toward Starr's Landing in Emma's cluttered pickup. I'd had to shove aside an old coat and an extra shirt to sit on the passenger seat, and my feet got tangled in a couple of halters on the floor. I saw a six-­pack cooler there, too. I had to put my feet on top of it. Toby sat on my lap with his head out the window, tongue lolling.

The Delaware River ran smoothly on our right. Fishing season hadn't started yet, but in a few weeks the river would be full of anglers wading out into the silvery water. With a pang of dismay, I realized Michael wouldn't be fishing this year. His house arrest forbade it.

To Emma, I said, “Having any luck finding that Filly Vanilli toy?”

She sighed. “I tried to wrestle one out of the arms of a scary grandma at Toys ‘R' Us yesterday. It was the last one, too. I lost.”

“Childbirth might have diminished your killer instinct. Anyway, you don't want to get arrested for assaulting a grandmother.”

Emma rubbed her shoulder. “She had a really good right hook. But she made me more determined than ever. I gotta keep looking. It's a mission for me now. I'm like one of those navy SEALs—­swift and deadly. The grandmas won't see me coming.”

“Just don't hurt anybody. How was your date last night?”

“Date?”

“You said you had a date. Jay, the dishwasher.”

“Oh yeah. It was nothing special. Tell me about Swain Starr's fancy party.”

“It had a surprise ending.”

I told her about Marybeth and her musket.

Emma laughed. “Those Rattigans have short fuses. Remember back when Tommy was in school? He broke all the windows in his kindergarten classroom. The ones he could reach, anyway.”

“He's turned into a bore now. He hopes to become a celebrity chef, I think, but he was giving very dull lectures about food at the party.”

“Marybeth had all the personality in that family. Was she really going to shoot Zephyr?”

“She was angry about something else when she arrived. But then Zephyr showed up, and instinct took over.”

“Zephyr better watch her step.”

“I bet she stays on the farm most of the time. She's committed to growing healthy, organic food, and Swain talks passionately about raising animals in a humane and organic way.”

“Organic, huh?”

I heard derision in her tone and glanced at her. “You disapprove?”

“Hey, I'm as humane as the next person. Just—­these new organic farmers crack me up. Organic fruits and vegetables have no more nutrients than any other kind.”

“How would you know that? I've seen you pour beer on Corn Flakes.”

“I can read a newspaper. Organic fanatics pretend everybody else uses poisons and toxins to grow their food.”

“Big commercial farms do use pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers that get into groundwater and—”

“So wash your food before you eat it. Besides, everybody around here has been organic for two hundred years. Need fertilizer? You plow some manure into the ground.”

“I think the organic movement is admirable.”

“I think the people are sanctimonious,” Emma shot back. “The way they act at the farmers' market in town on Wednesdays? It's like they've seen the Virgin Mary in a head of cabbage.”

“You're in a mood today. What's up? I don't think losing out to a grandmother put that frown on your face.”

Emma kept her eyes on the road, but her jaw tightened. “My mood's the same as always. Nothing new.”

Emma had moved out of my house nearly two months ago. I knew she came to Blackbird Farm very early to feed her ponies. She arrived when Michael and I were still asleep, so I hardly ever saw her anymore. If she was galloping racehorses at five a.m., she wasn't enjoying much nightlife. Something had her usual schedule scrambled.

I said, “Giving up your baby can't have been as easy as you'd like us to believe, Em.”

She blew an irritated sigh. “Can't I catch a break from you?”

“I'm just saying, you can talk about it if you want. I'm not upset about the way things turned out.”

She glanced at me, then back at the road again. “I wanted you to have the baby, y'know.”

“I know,” I said, more steadily than I felt. “And we wanted to take him. But not if that meant losing you. Seeing your child with us would have been very painful for you. It would have driven you away from us, for sure. And I couldn't stand that.”

She reached for a squished pack of cigarettes in the clutter between us.

I said, “But lately you've been staying away anyway.”

Emma punched the lighter on the dashboard and waited for it to heat up. “Think I'm dodging you? Forget it. I'm just giving the two of you a honeymoon. You don't need me hanging around.”

“It's a big house. Why don't you come home? We like it when you stay with us.”

“Does Mick say that?”

“I know how he feels.”

Emma didn't respond to that.

I changed the subject before she could get mad. “You're not the only one with problems. I've been thinking I should get a second job.”

Emma knew all about the tax problem our parents had stuck me with when they hightailed it to South America. I still owed the lion's share of the two million they had skipped out on, and the problems of maintaining the farm had only escalated lately. There just wasn't enough income to support the outgo. She lit her cigarette. “A job doing what?”

“That's the problem. I'm not really trained to do anything. I could work in a bookstore, maybe. Or wait tables.”

Emma laughed. “I can't see Mick letting you take orders down at the corner diner.”

“It's honest work. And,” I added, “he doesn't have to know.”

She blew smoke and shot me a derisive glance. “Mick's got guys reporting to him all the way from Serbia. He'd learn about your waitress job before you poured your first cup of coffee.”

“I have to do something. Are there any jobs in your world?”

“Mucking out stalls and hauling feed. Swain Starr has hired half the neighborhood to do that kind of work at his place. From what I hear, he and his ex-­model wife aren't getting their hands dirty. You'd have to leave your Givenchy collection at home, though.”

I considered her suggestion. “I'm ready to try just about anything. But maybe that's too far off the charts for me.”

“Yeah, okay. I'll keep my ears open. Here we are,” Emma said.

The lovely green pasture and white fence had been rolling along on our right for the better part of a mile. Emma eased on the brake at the barred gate. Across the road from the gate stood an old ferry landing, which had been restored to its original Revolutionary War appearance—­a charmingly rustic landmark. A flock of Canada geese had taken up residence on the landing. They looked charming, too, but they were probably coating everything in goose poop.

Emma pulled her truck and trailer to the gate, and she pressed the intercom button.

We waited for a response.

After thirty seconds, Emma pressed the button again.

“They're expecting you, right?” I asked.

“Yeah.” She planted her finger on the button and held it there.

No answer.

She laid her hand on the horn.

“Hang on a minute,” I said. “For the party, I was given an access number, remember? Maybe it still works.”

It took several tries before I remembered the combination of numbers correctly, but finally the automatic gate swung open. Emma drove through and headed down the lane. When we curved around a stand of hemlock trees, the picturesque barn came into view.

The farmyard looked exactly as it had for the party, minus the guests. Even the white tent remained. The trash cans hadn't been emptied. The bunting on the tables billowed in the breeze. It looked as if our hosts had walked away from the setting as soon as the guests departed. On the hillside overlooking the farm, the modern Shaker-­style house looked magnificent in the morning sun.

The whole place was eerily quiet.

At the paddock fence, the cows and the burro lined up to watch our arrival. Even the sow with the piglets stood at attention.

Emma stopped in front of the barn, and we got out of the truck. Emma rolled down her window and told Toby to stay.

“Hello?” she called. Her voice echoed back at us.

The cows lowed, sounding plaintive. Emma walked over to the fence. She frowned. “These cows need to be milked.”

“How can you tell?”

“Look. They're full.” She pointed at the swollen udders. “They're also miserable. And that sow looks as if she doesn't have any water. Where the hell is the famously humane butthead who owns this place? How come he's not taking care of his animals?”

“The code on the gate must have kept out the workers. What can we do?”

Emma's annoyance gave way to purpose. She pointed. “See that hose? Fill up the water troughs. Then go pound on the door. Get Starr the hell out of bed. I'll see if I can figure out where the milking parlor is.”

We split up. The cows eagerly followed Emma ­toward the barn.