“All right. You can join me, but none of that knocking over business, okay?”
“Baaa!”
Hmm. My conversations with Petunia weren’t all that different from many I’d had with my former fiancé. That should have been telling.
Police tape surrounded the canning shed. Even though I had discovered Wanda’s body outside of it, it appeared as if the sheriff decided to cordon the entire area off. And there was a lot of crime scene tape. I recognized Deputy Anderson’s handiwork immediately.
I bit my lip, wondering if I had gone far enough. My curiosity about what may be on the other side of the shed got the better of me. I stepped around the side and there was a blue tarp held above the ground with wooden stakes. I knew better than to pull up the tarp.
I peered down at my feet. I had already made a set of footprints on the perimeter of the canning shed. Uh-oh. I hoped the rain would wash them away. The sheriff would not be pleased if he knew I was snooping around his crime scene.
So Wanda came back here. Had she stepped back here to eat her fry pie in peace? Had she run into someone? Had she planned to meet someone? If she had been alone, then it was a tragic accident. Was Rachel’s fry pie really to blame?
Petunia came up next to me and proceeded to chew on the tarp.
“Hey, stop that!” I clapped my hands at her.
She peered at me with one horizontal-pupil eye as if to say, “Really? You think clapping is going to stop me?” She kept going.
I bent over and tried to pull the tarp away from her, but she had a good grip and fought me. “Petunia, let go. This is a crime scene. You’re not supposed to eat it.”
She let go, and I went flying back into the mud with a splash. Another bruise for the collection. By the end of the day, I would look like an Amish quilt.
She munched on the bit of blue tarp left in her mouth. I decided it was wise to let her keep it.
“Eich! Petunia, why did you have to go and eat that? Don’t I feed you enough?” the goat’s owner asked.
I scrambled to my feet to find Gideon at the corner of the shed. Even though the rain had slacked off, water dripped from the brim of his black felt hat.
Petunia swallowed the bit of tarp and strolled over to him as if she didn’t have a care in the world.
“Will she get sick from eating the tarp?” I asked.
He turned to me. “Aww, she will be all right. She’s eaten worse. I had to call the vet one time when she chewed through the barbed wire fence. Other than barbed wire, she can eat just about anything. I wouldn’t say it was gut for her, but it is hard to stop her when her mind’s made up.”
No kidding.
“You’re covered in mud. Did you take a tumble? The grass can be slick from the rain. You have to pay attention.”
“It was something like that.”
“The boys told me you were here and wanted to talk to me about something.” He shoved his hands into his trouser pockets. “I have to say that I’m surprised to see you back here. I didn’t think the sheriff wants anyone back here until he finds out what happened to Wanda.”
“I followed Petunia,” I lied.
Petunia turned her head and glared at me with her left eye. Something told me she would remember the fib.
“What did you want to ask me? Did you forget something yesterday? We always have folks coming back the next day after the auction, claiming they left something behind. Most times, I don’t have it. It’s that person’s job to keep their stuff together. I’m too busy to run a lost and found.”
“I . . . well . . .” My mind was blank.
He removed his hat and brushed the water off it before setting it back on his head. “You’re here about Wanda.”
I blinked at him. “How did you know that?”
“Everyone Englisch and Amish knows you solved Joseph Walker’s murder. Do you think you will solve this one too?”
“Do you think Wanda was murdered?” I asked.
His face hardened. The friendly Amish man was gone. “It doesn’t matter what I think.”
“Why did you hire Reed Kent?” I asked quickly. “That’s what I came here to ask you.”
Gideon removed a handkerchief from the back pocket of his trousers and wiped the rainwater from his face. I didn’t bother to clean up. The only thing that was going to get me clean was a power washer.
“I needed to find a replacement for my son Josiah, who used to help me as much as he was able, and Reed needed the work.”
“Where is Josiah now? Did he leave home?”
He scowled. “That is not your concern.”
Okay, touchy subject. Perhaps Josiah left the Amish community.
“Do you have any other children?”
“Nee.”
That was unusual. The Amish tended to have large families.
“Has Reed been a good employee?”
“He knows his way around horses,” Gideon said. “Horses are popular here at the auction. We always have some that are being auctioned off. It’s nice to have an experienced handler on the property.”
My brow wrinkled. “He lived in LA. What would he know about horses?”
“He can ride and had a horse back in California. From what I gathered, he worked at the stables to pay for his horse’s board. The kid knows his stuff. I put him through the paces with a few horses I had on hand before I hired him. I’m not hiring anyone who’s not comfortable with animals.”
“Baaa!”
Apparently, Petunia agreed.
“But he’s English,” I said.
He rested his hands on his belly. “So are you. What of it?”
“With so many Amish young men who would love to work here at the auction house and have horse training experience, why would you hire an English teen, especially one”—I paused, thinking of Reed’s semi-Goth attire—“who dresses so differently than the Amish?”
“So you think Amish and English should be separated. Don’t you have Amish working at your quilt shop?” he asked.
Suddenly, I realized how ridiculous my question must have sounded. “I’m sorry. I must sound horrible.”
He shrugged. “You are not the first person to ask me that question, nor will you be the last. I even had to answer to my bishop about it.”
“But shouldn’t Reed be in school? He’s only fifteen.”
“That’s not my concern. If Wanda let him work here as much as she did she must have had a reason.”
What reason could that be? I knew a fifteen-year-old working during school hours wasn’t anything to give Gideon, an Amish man, pause, but why would Wanda, an English woman, allow it? And, excluding the Amish, wasn’t it illegal for children to be out of school under sixteen? I was almost certain that was the case.
He shoved his soaking wet handkerchief back into his pocket. “Reed’s good with horses. That’s why I hired him. That’s the only reason.”
The way he emphatically said that last sentence made me wonder if he was protesting a bit too much. There was more to Reed working at the auction than Gideon wanted me to know. However, I decided to let it slide for the moment. “I’m curious about Petunia. She’s almost like a pet to you. I didn’t think the Amish keep livestock as pets.”
He fondled her long floppy ear between his fingers. “Petunia is more like a companion than a pet, but you are right that it’s not the Amish way. I suppose I was just taken with her personality. Before I opened the auction house four years ago, I farmed dairy goats. I had a herd of thirty Nubians like Petunia here. I finally sold them all but couldn’t bring myself to sell her.”
“She does have a lot of personality,” I agreed.
He laughed. “The boys told me she knocked you down in the barn. She was only saying hello. Goats greet each other with head butts.”
“That’s what they said.” Great, Petunia thinks I’m a goat. What I always wanted.
Gideon went on. “It’s nice to have a good source of milk for the family, and there’s nothing like the cream from
goat’s milk in your morning kaffi.”
I would have to take his word on that.
“Now, if that’s all of your questions, I think it’s time for you to go. The boys and I have much work to do to prepare for the next auction. We are shorthanded too since Reed didn’t show up for work today.”
He didn’t show up because his aunt was dead . . . maybe murdered, but neither one of us said that aloud.
Chapter Seventeen
After leaving the auction grounds, I drove straight to my house, so I could clean up. Oliver and Dodger were both still at the shop with Mattie, so I was the only one there. I showered, changed into dry clothes, and decided to drop in on my friend Jessica Nicolson at Out of Time.
Cherry Cat, Dodger’s mother, met me at the antique shop’s door. Jessica stepped around the end tables, lamp stands, and coat trees to reach me as if she were performing an intricate dance. Dozens of jack-o’-lanterns decorated the shop. I wondered what kind of holiday-themed decorating Willow and Jessica could accomplish if they ever decided to join forces. “This is the perfect day for you to drop in. I haven’t had a single customer. The rain is keeping them away. I hope the storm doesn’t knock too many of the leaves from the trees. The tourists come to see our fall colors.”
“That would be a shame. The trees are gorgeous,” I said.
She glanced at my feet. “No Oliver?”
I laughed. “The thunder scared him. He opted to stay back at the shop with Dodger.”
She laughed. “And how is Dodger doing?”
“He’s into everything.”
“He was a high-energy kitten.”
“He’s only gotten more so since we took him home. Oliver adores him and has appointed himself the kitten’s guardian.” I inched around Knight Richard, a full suit of armor that Jessica had purchased from an Akron tire tycoon’s estate complete with head-chopping-off ax.
She frowned. “You must be chilled. I was about to make myself a mug of cocoa. Would you like some?”
“I would love it.” I followed her back to the counter. My hip connected painfully with the corner of a dresser. I rubbed my side.
“Just sit anywhere you like,” she said as she disappeared behind the curtain of beads to the back room.
I moved a vase out of the way and perched on the dresser. Cherry Cat jumped up onto my lap. I liked to think we have a special bond because she was Dodger’s birth mom, and I am his adoptive mom.
Jessica returned with two mugs of cocoa. She chuckled when she spotted Cherry Cat’s chosen spot. “I see you have a friend.” She handed me a mug and leaned back against the counter.
“I was about to tell her about her son’s latest antics, including his love of climbing curtains.”
Jessica chuckled, but then her face sobered. “Did you hear about Wanda Hunt?” Jessica asked.
I nodded. “I found her.”
Jessica almost dropped her mug. She placed it on the counter at the last moment before it crashed to the floor. “You found her? Like dead? You found her dead?”
I nodded, remembering the gruesome scene. Likely, I would never eat a fry pie again.
“You were there? And you let me go on and on about the weather and my inventory? Tell me exactly what happened.”
“There’s not much to tell. I took Oliver for a walk around the auction grounds and came around the canning shed. There she was, dead and holding a fry pie in her hand.”
Jessica held up her hands in the universal stop sign. “She was holding a fry pie.”
I squinted. Oops! I bet all the fry pies in Rachel’s bakery the sheriff didn’t want me to let out that little detail. I had told my quilt circle of course, but Amish women knew how to keep a secret, Sarah Leham notwithstanding. “You can’t tell anyone about the fry pie. The sheriff wouldn’t like it I told you that.”
Her mood lightened. “We wouldn’t want to upset the sheriff, would we?”
She knew about my crush on him. I rolled my eyes. “Back to dead bodies, please.”
“What were you doing at the auction?”
“Oh, I must not have told you. Rachel got me a space there to auction off some of my aunt’s quilts. They sold well.”
Jessica picked up her mug again. “Wow, I wish I could get in there, but I rarely peddle anything Amish. That’s all the auction will sell.”
I blew on my cocoa. “Did you know Wanda well?”
Cherry Cat stretched and walked off my lap. Apparently, I had ignored her too long. She pranced across the dresser’s top and vaulted herself onto the very top of a bookshelf, five feet above the dresser. Now I knew where Dodger got his penchant for climbing and leaping.
Jessica stirred her cocoa as if considering her answer. “Not really. I knew her for years, but nothing more than to say hello to in the market or smile at while walking down the street.”
I frowned. “I hoped you knew her ex-husband. I want to talk to him, but I don’t know where to find him. I don’t think the sheriff will tell me. He’s not too keen on me getting involved in the case.”
She made a T with her hands. “Wait. Time out. Why would you get involved with the case? You weren’t particularly close to Wanda, were you?”
I set my empty mug on the dresser. “It’s not for Wanda. It’s for Rachel.”
Her hand flew to her chest. “Rachel! Did something happen to Rachel?”
I shook my head. “No. Rachel is fine. At least, she is fine physically.” I licked cocoa from my lips. “The sheriff suspects that either Rachel or her husband had something to do with Wanda’s death.”
Jessica’s mouth fell open. “Why?” she was finally able to squeak out.
I went on to tell her about the pie factory and the blueberry fry pie, which had been Wanda’s undoing, coming from Rachel’s hand.
Jessica whistled. “Poor Rachel. I can see why you would want to help her. It doesn’t sound like Aaron takes this accusation seriously enough.” She paused. “I do know Wanda’s husband. His name is Troy. I see him here in Millersburg a fair amount, much more than Wanda, who seemed to stick to the township of Rolling Brook. He’s a truck driver.”
I crossed my ankles. “A truck driver? He might be hard to pin down if he’s on the road a lot.”
She shook her head. “An Amish truck driver. There’s a difference. He drives Amish around like an unofficial taxi service. If Amish have to go somewhere that’s too far by buggy, they call drivers like Troy to pick them up and drive them to their destinations.”
“In that case, Troy must have close ties to the Amish.”
She shrugged. “You should ask the Millers or Anna Graber. I bet they know how to get in touch with him. Usually an Amish family has a driver they prefer and call regularly, but they have a backup list too if that man is busy.”
“Man?”
She shrugged. “Ninety percent of the time, drivers are men. The Amish world is not an equal-pay-for-equal-work kind of culture.”
“I’ll ask them. Thanks.” I smiled. I finally had a real lead on the case, if there was a case. I needed to know from the sheriff how far he planned to take his accusations against the Millers.
A coy smile crossed Jessica’s face. “So you saw the sheriff yesterday I assume.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Yes . . . he was there on the job.”
“How did that go?”
“Not great, considering we stood over a dead body,” I said drily.
“Had the body not been there, you would have had a witty conversation. Just thinking of your little romance flutters my heart.”
“Really, there was nothing to flutter about.”
“I don’t believe that. I’m sure he was concerned when the call came in and he learned that you were the one who found Wanda.”
“Or annoyed is more like it. The only time I see him is when dead bodies are involved.” I winced as soon as I said this. Jessica’s cousin had been tied to the sheriff’s last murder case, and it had not ended happily for her cousin.
She gave me
a small smile. She knew what I was thinking. “The sheriff has a crush on you. I can see. Everyone can see it.”
“Whatever.”
“Ahh, don’t play coy with me. We’re girlfriends. I know he’s asked you on a date.”
“How do you know that?”
“I heard it from Willow, who heard it from the owner of the mercantile, who heard it from your landlord.”
“Is there anything else to do in this county besides gossip?”
She thought about that for a minute. “Not really. At least not until we get a movie theater.”
Chapter Eighteen
When I got back to the shop, I found Anna in my aunt’s rocker by the front window. Seeing her there reminded me so much of my aunt sitting there hour after hour when I was a child, especially on a rainy day like this when there were no customers.
She would rock and quilt and rock and quilt.
“Anna, I’m surprised to see you here,” I said as I hung up my damp jacket. I was beginning to wonder if I would ever truly be dry again.
“I stopped by to see if you had learned anything new. Since you weren’t here, I thought I would put in a few more stitches in this quilt. We will have to become more focused about it, if you want to finish it to sell at the auction house this season.”
“If I am invited back,” I muttered.
She set her quilting on her lap. “What do you mean by that?”
“I dropped by the auction yard this morning for a look around.”
Mattie ran a feather duster around the bookshelves. “You were snooping.”
“Maybe,” I said. “The worst was I got caught and Gideon asked me to leave. I don’t know if I will be welcome there again.”
“Bah!” Anna said. “He will have you back. Look at how much money you made on those three quilts. He made a profit on each sale too. Gideon Nissley is a businessman first.” She paused. “Maybe even before he is an Amish man. He will do what it takes to make money for himself.”
“Do you speak from some type of experience?” I glanced over at Mattie and she appeared surprised by Anna’s comments as well.
Murder, Simply Stitched: An Amish Quilt Shop Mystery Page 11