Olivia flashed back to their store event on Tuesday and Heather’s rosy cheeks. Maybe she hadn’t been wearing makeup after all. “I fervently hope no one caught Heather’s virus yesterday,” she said. “That was quite a crowd we had.”
“I’m drinking orange juice and hoping my flu shot still works.” Gwen began to arrange cookies on large plates. “These look irresistible, as always. However, I shall resist, at least for now. I don’t think my skin will stretch any farther.” She was about five feet tall, and her current width looked a close second to her height.
“How can I help?” Olivia asked.
“I’m afraid the house needs some straightening. We’ve been so busy lately, what with preparing for the baby and moving Paws to our big barn.” Both Gwen and Herbie were vet techs with a dream. They had opened the Chatterley Paws no-kill animal shelter about three years earlier and quickly found they needed more space. “That’s the thing about a no-kill policy,” Gwen said. “We spay and neuter our animals, but that only slows down the inevitable. Lately we’ve been getting pets from families who can’t afford them anymore. It’s so sad. I don’t suppose you’d like a kitten? Or two?”
“Um . . . Bertha Binkman is allergic to cats, so no, but I’ll spread the word.”
“Maybe Maddie—?”
“Did you mention something about a bathroom that needs cleaning? Point me to the noxious chemicals and I’ll get to it. Can’t have you breathing that stuff.”
By five thirty p.m., Olivia had cleaned two bathrooms, decorated the living room, and made a bowl of punch. While arranging chairs, she realized there were only enough for ten guests. She found Gwen in the kitchen, cutting sandwiches into animal shapes.
“Oh gosh,” Gwen said, “Heather was going to bring a bunch along with her. She keeps a huge supply of folding chairs for family picnics, and she carts them around in her truck. What can we do? Guests are arriving in less than two hours.”
“I hate to bother Heather when she’s not well,” Olivia said, “but maybe I could drive to her place and pick up the chairs myself?”
“Oh, would you? That would be perfect. And you wouldn’t have to bother her because I know where she stores the chairs—in the small barn way at the back of her property. Not the big barn behind her house; that’s where she keeps her horse. She adores horses, you know. And cats, thank goodness. Just follow the gravel drive past the big barn to the beginning of a grove of trees, and you’ll see the small barn. Heather never locks that barn because there’s nothing of value in it. I mean, I guess the chairs are valuable, but they aren’t books or horses. That’s all Heather cares about, books and horses.”
“You’re sure I shouldn’t call and warn her?”
“Totally sure. Even if she hears your car, she’ll see the painting of The Gingerbread House on the side, and she’ll know you’re helping me. You’re an angel to do this, Olivia. I will never, ever buy a cookie cutter from anyone but you and Maddie. I’d hug you, but . . .” She pointed to her rotund middle and laughed.
Heather Irwin’s farm was several miles down the road from Gwen and Herbie’s, in an isolated area of the countryside. Whereas the Tuckers had neighbors across the street, Heather was able to look out any window in her old farmhouse and see nothing but fields and trees. It was an ideal setting for a shy woman who loved books and horses.
Olivia turned onto the gravel drive that wound past Heather’s place. She braked for a moment and rolled down her window, still wondering if she should let Heather know what she was doing. The quiet, dark house convinced her to drive on. If Heather had managed to fall asleep, it was better to leave her alone.
The drive curved in back of Heather’s house to skirt around a large maroon barn. Like the farmhouse, the barn looked recently painted and in good repair. Olivia heard a horse whinny as she drove past. The gravel thinned and mixed with hard dirt as Olivia traveled through the middle of a fallow field toward the copse of trees where the small barn nestled. She wondered if the trees might once have marked a boundary between properties. The building’s orientation seemed odd, facing into the trees rather than back toward Heather’s house. The fields behind the barn had all gone fallow in a wild way, as if no one cared.
The little barn had seen better days, though maybe not much better. It looked like it was hand built by an amateur. Only a few remnants of brown paint dotted a door barely large enough to allow more than one animal at a time to enter. The door was unlatched. Olivia carefully wedged it open—she didn’t trust the rusty hinges to hold it upright.
Little daylight penetrated the small, dirty windows, and the air smelled of rotting hay. Olivia heard the unmistakable rustling of little rodent feet scurrying to escape the human intruder. She decided it was best not to dawdle. The folding chairs were easy to locate. They leaned against the wall in neat stacks of four, close to the door. Ten stacks added up to forty chairs. The baby shower invitation list had contained about fifty guests, and most had accepted. The PT Cruiser could hold a lot, but it didn’t have the capacity of a truck. Olivia decided to pack in as many as possible, and that would have to do.
Carrying four chairs at a time proved painful. On her first try, one chair slid from the middle of the stack and directly onto Olivia’s big toe. She held on to the other three and limped to her car. Transporting two chairs at a time, she filled her trunk, then packed the back seat so high she wouldn’t be able to see out her rear window. She thought she’d wedge a few more on the floor of the passenger’s side of the front seat and then call it quits.
Olivia reentered the barn and picked up three chairs at a time, hoping to make this her last trip. Burning pain seared through the shoulder she had injured some months earlier in a car accident. She lowered her burden to the floor and closed her eyes, willing the pain to subside. As it eased, she became aware of an odor in the stale air, besides the natural ones she’d already learned to ignore. She smelled coffee.
Opening her eyes, Olivia slowly swiveled her head, trying to locate the direction of the odor. This is silly, I don’t have time for this. But coffee? In a virtually empty, unused barn? Heather must have visited recently and dumped the remains of a cup of coffee on the dirt floor. Not today, though, if she was as ill as Gwen said she was. How long would the smell of coffee linger in the air, given the competition from ranker odors? An hour or two? Surely not an entire day. It wouldn’t hurt to go fetch that new flashlight she’d put in her glove compartment and check out the source. She was probably making a big deal out of nothing, but given the unsolved murder hanging over the town, she’d feel better if she had a quick look around that barn.
The bright, hot daylight steadied her. Feeling silly, she dug out her little red flashlight and wedged it into the back pocket of her khaki pants. Back inside the barn, Olivia switched on the flashlight and began to explore. The rodents, she hoped, would be in hiding.
At first Olivia saw nothing in the barn that aroused her curiosity, only an abandoned pile of hay in one corner and a couple of tractor attachments she couldn’t put names to; she wouldn’t know a combine if it ran over her. Otherwise, the barn looked empty, with the exception of two stalls along the opposite wall. The door to one stall hung open, and the other was latched shut.
Olivia checked her watch, which she should have done earlier. She’d already spent nearly forty minutes on her errand. Gwen would be getting anxious for her to return. Okay, a quick check of the stalls, and if she found nothing, she would leave the coffee puzzle unsolved. Olivia crossed the barn and ran her flashlight around the insides of the open stall. The coffee smell was stronger, but she saw no evidence of any in the stall.
Olivia moved to the closed door of the second stall. She lifted the latch, then dropped it and jumped sideways as two rats ran past her feet to escape into the barn. Through the thudding in her head, Olivia listened for more scuttling sounds. After some moments of silence, she clutched the latch and rattled it. Three more rats ran out under the door. Olivia figured that any rodents left in the stall were either dead or armed. She knew she had to look inside, if only to convince herself there was nothing of importance to see.