A Tine To Live, A Tine To Die Part 5

Cam drove fast along a back road paralleling the river. She looked over at the little magnetized clock she kept on the dashboard.

"Shoot, I'm going to be late. Picking took too long," she said aloud. "I hate being late." She drove her laden truck over a bridge, across a busy main street, and up a hill, to turn left at the Haverhill city park, with a sign on the corner that read WEEKLY FARMERS' MARKET, TUESDAYS, 12:004:00 PM. Colorful dancing cabbages and smiling tomatoes decorated the sign. It was right before noon as Cam backed into a s.p.a.ce adjoining the park.

"Rats, Mrs. Boukis got the spot I wanted." The vendor slots were on a wide sidewalk at the edge of the block-long park. Huge, old maples in leaf here and there shaded the walkway, which was transformed into a market every week. The spot Cam had snagged last week was under one of the biggest trees, so her produce didn't bake in the sun all afternoon, but she was too late. It had been claimed by an older woman who grew an acre of flowers and did a landmark business in mixed bouquets.

Cam hurried to unload a table and a.s.sorted containers of produce and flowers from the back of the truck. Certain farmers sold directly off the tailgate of their truck, but Cam preferred to set up a table, with bushel baskets and buckets full of flowers on the pavement at each end. She had a colorful cloth with bright vegetables printed on it to cover the table. An attractive display really seemed to draw customers, and the cloth helped. It also helped with the feeling of intimidation she had being around so many experienced growers.

Everyone else was busy setting up their wares, too. One big farm always used two slots and had its own colored canopy to protect the produce and customers from sun or rain. Another vendor was a widower with only a card table to sell from. An old friend of Great-Uncle Albert's, he was famed for his berries and could sell enough strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries to justify paying the market fee each week. He'd gone out of his way to welcome Cam, too.

"Hey, Rich. What's up?" Cam greeted one of the farmers, a robust retired opera star, as he strolled by. He sang a bit of an aria in response while he continued down the line several more s.p.a.ces to his own. She'd met him last fall, after she had moved to Albert's farm and had come to this market as a buyer, not a seller. Cam saw him pull blue plastic bins of lettuce out of his truck and set them on a long white display table shaded by a simple but effective homemade white canopy. He grew high-quality produce and claimed to do it all organically.

Cam continued setting up. She wondered if any of these farmers could have been on her land lately. Who would try to sabotage her work? She couldn't believe that anybody would be so threatened by her few organic acres. As she worked, hands moving rapidly so she would be ready when the customers showed up, she was so busy thinking through the list of farmers present, she almost missed seeing Bev Montgomery approach. Cam was surprised she was out in public so soon after her son's death, even though Bev was the market manager.

"Ms. Flaherty." Bev was dressed in a worn green plaid shirt and green work pants. She sported a Celtics cap atop her iron-colored hair and sun-fatigued face. She looked beaten, and more.

"Mrs. Montgomery, I am so sorry for your loss."

"I might not have lost him if you hadn't fired him. He was a good boy." She glared up at Cam, shading her eyes with her hand against the noon light.

Cam was taken aback. "What did that have to do with his death?"

"He needed his job. He needed that stability. I'm holding you responsible. Maybe you killed him yourself." She stalked away down the line of tables.

Cam took a deep breath. She looked around, hoping no one had overhead. So it wasn't only George Frost who thought she might have tried to get rid of Mike Montgomery.

Cam finished setting up and walked briskly four s.p.a.ces down the row, surrept.i.tiously noting the prices other farms were charging for strawberries, lettuce, fresh herbs, and bunches of flowers this year. She stopped at Rich's table. "We're lucky it's an early season, aren't we?"

"Absolutely. Last year strawberries didn't come in until a week after this, and this year we've been selling them two weeks already," he said, turning toward her.

"Have a good market."

He nodded, gripping a cigarette between closed lips as he grabbed another bin from his truck with both hands.

Customers began to crowd around the vendors, so Cam hurried toward her own spot. "Can I help you?" she asked the older couple clutching a canvas bag. As she sold them a half pound of asparagus, she looked at the lettuce in the sun. This was awful. She hadn't even brought her big umbrella. Cam chastised herself for being late and losing the shady spot.

An hour later, with people cl.u.s.tering around most of the stands, Cam muttered, "I wish I had rhubarb. People see there isn't any on the table, and they don't buy the berries, either. They just walk on."

The market looked like a scene from another country. Shoppers of all ages carrying string bags and canvas sacks picked over produce and flowers. Newly arrived Cambodians and Haitians rubbed elbows with second-generation Italians, fourth-generation French Canadians, and Yankees whose ancestors had founded the city. A baker hawked crusty round loaves, long baguettes, and huge cookies. The market was a portrait in contrast to the sterility of a supermarket.

Cam busied herself answering questions about organic methods, bagging lettuce, and making change, moving fast. Well, at least she was making money, rhubarb or no rhubarb. She had her envelope ready for food-stamp customers who had swiped their EBT cards in exchange for little wooden "nickels" they could use to pay for produce.

A rattly pickup backed into a spot at the opposite end of the line of farmers from Bev Montgomery's. A short, squat man in dirt-stained overalls jumped out, creaked open the tailgate, and pulled a few bushel baskets of red stalks to the rear of the truck.

Cam focused on the newcomer. What? Albert had told her Howard Fisher didn't sell at this market. Wasn't he a pig farmer? And it looked like rhubarb was the only crop he was selling. Cam handed the thin man standing at her table his change for two bunches of herbs and a bag of red mustard greens and thanked him automatically.

The crowds perusing the farm tables thinned somewhat, allowing the farmers time to sit down, chat with each other, and tidy up their displays. She finally had a minute of peace in this crazy week. She consolidated two half-empty baskets of herbs into one and realigned the bunches of asparagus standing upright in water. Her thoughts turned to Mike Montgomery's death, and the feeling of peace vanished. She wiped her brow with her purple bandanna. The sun was still strong, although the light of the day had begun its decline. The humidity kept the heat intense.

"Organic strawberries, hmm? I'll take four pints."

"Chief Frost. You come into Haverhill to shop?" Cam said to the uniformed Frost. Or was he here checking up on her?

"Well, I had to see a person of interest over in this neighborhood, so I stopped down here. My wife, you know, is nuts about fresh stuff, and even nuttier about your natural food. Why, times she drives all the way over to Andover just to get groceries."

"Whole Foods?"

"Yup. It being her birthday tomorrow, I thought I'd better see what I could get. I don't know that I could find anything that would please her more than these berries."

Cam smiled her relief. At least he didn't seem to be here to interrogate her. "You'd better get some salad fixings and fresh lemon thyme for her, too."

"All right. She'll be pleased. Now, there's no poison in that salad, is there?"

"Poison?" Cam's voice squeaked. She cleared her throat. "I don't know what you're talking about." She gazed at him. Was he kidding or serious?

The chief folded his arms, regarding her. His eyes didn't smile.

"That'll be fifteen dollars," Cam said evenly. She eased the pint boxes sideways into small paper bags, placed them in the bottom of a brown paper grocery bag, and topped it off with the bags of mixed greens and herbs. She worked carefully, her face somber, thinking of the lifeless rhubarb. She should report it. But would he think she had poisoned her own crop? Cam handed the bag to Frost and took his money. She began, "You know, Chief, there was-"

"Why, George! What? Shopping from the compet.i.tion?" Bev Montgomery suddenly appeared at Frost's side. Her green cap was pushed back on her head, her browned face flushed, her breathing slightly ragged, as if she'd rushed over. Bev avoided Cam's eyes, looking only at the police chief. "You get yourself down to Montgomery Farm's stand in a hurry. I saved you my choice Victoria rhubarb and a bunch of those turnips I know Hope likes." Bev Montgomery took Frost's elbow and led the officer down the line.

Cam would have to tell him later. Maybe. Rhubarb. It was everywhere. It seemed like everyone was selling it and talking about it except her. Frowning, she tucked the bills into one of the pouches of the cloth hardware store belt she used as a cash register, then rearranged the strawberries to fill in the gaps left by the ones she had just sold. Customers liked to see a full display so things didn't look picked over.

At around three thirty, business picked up again. Most farmers lowered their prices at the end of market. Growers hated to take product home and have to throw it on the compost pile. Cam knocked fifty cents off each pint of strawberries and marked the herbs and asparagus half price. Shoppers in the know, especially those with lower incomes, squeezed past each other to claim the well-priced, slightly wilted, but still tasty produce. Cam's last bunch of sage went to a young Hmong couple, the last asparagus to a stooped, white-haired woman, the last quart of strawberries to a harried-looking mother with a Jamaican lilt in her voice and young twin boys at her side, who handed Cam five of the wooden Supplemental Nutrition a.s.sistance Program tokens.

Cam's table was almost empty when she checked her watch. Four o'clock. She began to load empty baskets and buckets into the truck. Everybody around her also started to close down. She could hear Rich's booming voice in song again as he dismantled his display. Lonely leaves of discarded lettuce littered the sidewalk. Strawberry tops, still clinging to bits of red flesh, lay in the gutter where children, impatient for the sweet taste, had thrown them. Cam was about to pull into the street when Bev Montgomery appeared at the driver's side window.

"Here," Bev said, presenting Cam with a long plastic bag. Bev's worn hand held the bag gently. "Want some to take home? I didn't sell out, and I can't use it." Bev's faded blue eyes focused on the door handle.

Cam was tired from the day's work of picking and selling and emotionally fatigued from worry. She watched the older farmer. What was Bev doing? Trying to make up for accusing Cam of murder, and didn't know how? Or maybe rubbing it in that Cam didn't have any rhubarb for sale today. Bev couldn't possibly know what had happened to Cam's crop. Cam hadn't told anybody but Jake. Unless Bev watched television, of course.

Finally, Cam simply said, "Thank you, no. I've decided to go pure strawberry this year. See you next week." She steered the truck into traffic.

She glanced back in the mirror. Bev Montgomery still watched her, the bag of rhubarb hanging heavily from her hand. Cam should have taken it. Keeping the peace was important in a small town. She needed friends, not enemies. So far she'd been more adept at s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up relationships than fostering them.

Chapter 6.

Cam knocked on the doorjamb of room 116 at Moran Manor that evening. "Anybody home?"

Albert St. Pierre put a finger on the page he was reading and looked up. "For you, Cameron, I'm home." He waved her in with a thick, age-spotted hand. He would have looked like any other octogenarian in a red plaid shirt, relaxing in his recliner, except for the crutches at his side and the pants leg tucked up under his right knee.

Cam walked into the cozy room stuffed with books and photographs. "Your door is wide open, Uncle Albert." She kissed the old man's snowy-white hair. "Looks like you're home to just about everybody."

"Sit down, girl. You look tired."

Cam rubbed her forehead. "It was market day, so yeah, I'm tired."

"Now, tell me what in blazes you got going on up to the farm. Did they find whoever killed young Montgomery?"

"Not that they've told me. I'm afraid they think I did it."

Albert's pale blue eyes widened. "The devil you say! But why?"

Cam outlined the disagreement she'd had with Mike. She had called Albert earlier about the murder but hadn't given him much detail.

"So you had to let him go. Too bad. I thought having a steady job, doing honest hard work in the fresh air, might have turned the boy's life around. Bev asked me for that favor. And I owed her one."

"I'm sorry, Uncle Albert," Cam began.

He held up a hand. "Don't you go apologizing. You have your venture there. I gave the farm over to you to do what you liked with it. If organic meant you had to fire the boy, so be it. I'm not questioning you, Cameron."

"Well, the police have. I wish they'd focus on finding the real killer, though."

"Who's working on it?"

"Chief Frost has been asking questions. Plus a state police officer, a Pete Pappas."

"Pappas. I think I knew his father." Albert stared out the window into the still-rosy gloaming. "Ran a Greek grocery down to Ipswich, as I recall. We used to do joint Rotary events with them. But I believe he's gone on ahead these five years now, don't you know."

Cam smiled. Her great-uncle had quite the turn of phrase.

Albert shook his head back into the present and focused on Cam. "Are you safe out at the house? All by yourself, I mean?" He frowned at her.

"I think so. I have good locks, and this afternoon, on the way home from market, I picked up a motion detector floodlight for the back and installed it."

"How'd a girl like you learn electrical?" Albert c.o.c.ked his head.

Cam knew he was more curious than challenging. She flashed him a wry smile. "One of the few good things I picked up from Tom. He was always fiddling with lights, plugs, and wires. He didn't mind teaching me when I asked. It's not so complicated if you're careful."

Albert nodded. "What do you think happened with Marie's rhubarb, anyway?"

"I wish I knew." Cam c.o.c.ked her head. "Wait, how did you know about it? Did the reporter mention it on the news?"

"Oh, no, but it was in the background. I knew those plants didn't look right."

"It was a herbicide. I'm sure of it. But I have no idea where it came from or who applied it. I'm mad about it, I'll tell you."

"I'm sure you'll figure it out." He wagged a finger at her. "To change the subject, hear anything from your parents?"

Cam shook her head. "I got a postcard from Kathmandu a month ago." Her peripatetic anthropologist parents were academics who had spent much of their lives living in far-flung locales, researching the culture of peoples out of the mainstream. "I can't remember where they're headed next."

"It's too late now, but I wish they'd been more settled. You know, when you were little."

"Me, too, I guess. Although then I wouldn't have had summers on the farm." She smiled.

"True enough." Albert gazed at her. "You started coming up when you were what? About six?"

"I think so. Summer after first grade is what I remember."

"Yes. It was because of the . . ." He watched Cam. "Do you remember?"

"What my parents called 'the incident'?" Cam shuddered.

"That's best left in the past, I think. Now, what do you think of this gal who's running for Teddy's Senate seat?"

To citizens like Albert, the Ma.s.sachusetts Senate seat Edward Kennedy held until he died would always be Teddy's seat. She chatted with Albert for another thirty minutes about the political primary season, life in the a.s.sisted living complex, the farm, a recent piece of news.

"I wrote letters yesterday to our congressman and both senators. It's an outrage."

Albert might have been old, but his rabid liberalism had not dimmed. He'd always been vocal about his sense of justice and injustice, and he acted on his beliefs.

Cam nodded, then yawned as she rose. "I'd better get going. It's a busy season." If anybody would understand a farmer's life, it would be Albert He nodded. He held out his arms.

Cam embraced him. She brightened. "Hey, how about I spring you Friday night? Those customers of mine, the Locavore Club, are holding a Locavore Festival. Local food, local wine and beer. You can be my date."

Albert nodded slowly. "I suppose. Do me good to get out of here, I guess. This locavore business is kind of silly, though, don't you think? I remember when all we ate was local, because that's all there was, except for maybe a few oranges trucked up from Florida."

"It's a date, then. Hey, I'm curious. Why did you owe Bev Montgomery a favor?"

Albert gazed up at Cam for a moment. "We'll get into that another time, my dear. It's not a fast tale to tell."

Cam looked around the barn the next morning. She thought she had everything ready for Volunteer Wednesday. Despite Lucinda being such an eager helper, the workload at the farm was more than Cam and Lucinda combined could manage. Starting a weekly volunteer day was an idea Cam had read about on the Web site for the Ma.s.sachusetts chapter of the Northeast Organic Farming a.s.sociation, NOFA/Ma.s.s. She liked the concept and hoped she could find enough jobs for both the skilled and the unskilled. Hiring another farmhand wasn't easy and wasn't cheap. If this worked, maybe she wouldn't have to.

"Hey, Cam!" Alexandra strode in. "I know I'm early, but I couldn't wait to get my hands dirty." Today the tall young woman sported a denim work shirt tucked into short cutoff jeans. A yellow bandanna was tied around her head, letting her hair spill down her back, and a pair of work gloves stuck out of her back pocket. "Where do we start?"

The aura of fresh air surrounding Alexandra made Cam smile. Even in her early twenties Cam hadn't been so open and energetic. "Hang on a minute. Let's wait until a few others show up. I can give a quick orientation to everyone at once."

Alexandra nodded. "So did you think any more about us using the farm as our CSF pickup site?"

"No, but that would be fine. What day do you want to do it?"

"Can we do Sat.u.r.days? That way we can pick up the fish when we come for our shares."

"No problem."

"OMG, that's solid. Did you want to sign up, too?" Alexandra pulled a flat phone out of a pocket. "Here," she said, pressing a few b.u.t.tons. "Here's the information." She extended the device toward Cam.

Cam laughed. "I'll check them out online later, but thanks." Then she had a thought. "Alexandra, I don't suppose Web programming is among your talents, is it?"

"I'm not bad. I created the Locavore Club site. HTML is easy, really."

It was easy for people like Alexandra and herself. But Cam didn't have time to tackle it. "I want to set up a site for the farm. Would you be interested?"

Alexandra agreed.