Рита Браун - Sour Puss

"Didn't think you were, but we all were wondering what Fiona will do. Maybe shecan carry it by herself. A lot of work." Harry's voice was without any accusatory trace.

"I offered her a very good price for the place." Rollie sounded like a charitable man.

"After the funeral?" This time Harry's voice betrayed her surprise.

"Someone has to be first in line, and that's going to be me," Rollie explained himself.

"I suppose. I figured the Belgians would hurry back to Dulles Airport after finding Hy at Tinsley Crossroads," Harry replied. "Called Bo to see how he was doing after finding Hy. He told me they're still in the hunt and that he's fine."

"Probably a lot more exciting than what happens in Belgium." Rollie couldn't help but smile. "Bo will be telling that story for the rest of his life."

"It will be a long life. Only the good die young." Harry adored Bo, as did many women. She liked teasing him. Harry then inquired, "Is there a grape resistant to the sharpshooter?"

"Lake Emerald grape. They developed itin Florida. It's used as a rootstock mostly. Used a lot around Leesburg, Florida."

"We're too far north?" Harry asked.

"Yeah, but it's not the kind of grape we want to grow." Arch left it at that.

"You two need to get back to work and so do I, but I saw your trucks and thought I'd say hello."

"Hey, where's the donkey?" Arch asked.

"BoomBoom took him."

"Place is kind of lonesome without Jed," Arch said.

"Do you mind if I stop by the barn? Think I dropped my penknife in there when I was searching for Jed."

Rollie answered, "Go ahead. I don't think there's much in there."

"I didn't see a knife," Arch offered.

When Harry walked into the barn, she headed straight to the supply room. The boxes of flypaper were still there. She thought maybe Toby had put those sharpshooters in her peach orchard. It would have made more sense to put them in her grapes or someone else's grapes if he had hoped to destroy their business. But Toby could be sly. Maybe he was testing to see if they would survive. She was the only person who went to the peach orchard regularly, and most Crozet friends and neighbors roughly knew her habits and schedule.

She looked around for jars, for any evidence how he might have kept the insects alive. Nothing turned up.

As to the quantities of flypaper, all she could figure out was maybe he got a deal. That wasn't so unusual. She left as ignorant as when she arrived.

36

"I told Coop I snooped around at Toby's barn." Harry and Fair played with the foals when Fair came home from his calls. Although it was Saturday, horses pay no attention to weekends.

The more they were handled, the better the babies would be when they grew up.

"They might be small, but those little buggers can still hurt you,"Mrs. Murphy remarked as she sat on a fence post.

"It's the biting."Pewter steered clear of the foals.

"They're smart. They'll learn, and Harryand Fair make it fun." Tucker watched.

"And the mothers like the humans, so that helps."Mrs. Murphy noticed hundreds of tiny green praying mantises who hadpopped out of their pod. "Wow, glad I don't have to feed that family."

Tucker squinted, for the newborns crawled on wisteria wrapping up and over a small pergola Harry had put at the entrance to her flower garden. "/ can't see that far."

"You can't see much anyway."Pewter felt ever so superior.

"/ can see better than you think. I can see colors, too, even though humans used to think dogs couldn't, and furthermore, Miss Snot, I see better than humans in the dark."

"But not as well as I do,"Pewter cattily said.

"/ didn't make that claim." Tucker smiled as the light bay foal nuzzled Harry's cheek.

"Funny how humans get things wrong,"Mrs. Murphy mused. "All that business about dogs seeing black and white, and now they have research to prove otherwise. Research can be a good thing, but why don't they trust their own senses?"

"The sixth sense is the important one."Pewter shifted her weight on her fence post, a bit small for her large behind.

"Knowing without knowing. Yes, they should listen,"Tucker agreed.

Fair dug in his pocket for dried-appletreats for the patient mothers. "Coop say anything?"

"Not much. I told her I was researching diseases of grapes. She's been doing it, too. Do you know, when I ran off the names, names only of stuff that can attack grapes, I had four pages, two columns each, single spaced? Now I wonder how any grape ripens."

"The same could be said about any crop." He felt a soft muzzle fill his hand. "Back in the office today I was reading where Asian soybean rust is in Georgia. And it's one of those diseases carried by the air. After all that's happened I'm paying more attention."

"Spores?"

"Yep. Fungal, and it's so virulent that it can destroy plants in one month if untreated."

"Damn, that is a hateful one." Harry pondered. "What can the farmers do?"

"Spray, but that's expensive. The chemicals to kill Asian rust cost eighteen dollars an acre. Not cheap."

"Did it get here on a plane—you know, spores on someone's pants?" Harry was curious.

"No. It's the damnedest thing. Hurricane Ivan carried it here in a matter of weeks. It's been moving slowly through Asia, then Africa, and then South America—slowly as in decades—and all it took was one big hurricane to carry the spores across the ocean."

"But Hurricane Ivan was two years ago."

"Hit Florida bad, and that's where they first found the fungus, on kudzu."

"God, kudzu will take over the universe." Harry gasped.

"I don't know about the universe, but the spores sure managed to get from the kudzu in Florida to the soybeans in Georgia with unseemly haste." He handed out the rest of the apple treats. "I e-mailed Ned and he e-mailed back. I didn't know that soybeans account for sixteen percent of our country's agriculture production. Soybeans are twelve percent of U.S. export. Tell you what—first, that impressed me, and then second, Ned is up to speed."

As they walked back to the house Harry quietly said, "You're as caught up in this murder stuff as I am."

"I'm the one telling you to butt out, keep your nose out of other people's business."

He brushed his boots on the hedgehog scraper outside the screen door. "But I keep coming back to vineyards and revenge of some sort."

"And to the fact that growing grapes and making wine are becoming big business. There's millions to be made."

"But first you have to spend millions. It's a rich person's game. People like Dinny Ostermann benefit, and I hope we do, too, but we won't make the millions."

"What else have you been doing at your computer?" She felt Pewter brush against her leg as she walked into the kitchen.

"Tuna!"

"Pewter, let me make tea. I need a pick-me-up. You'll get your tuna soon enough."

Fair smiled. "How do we know she isn't saying, 'rib eye rare'?"

"Yes!"Pewter stood on her hind legs.

Mrs. Murphy along with Tucker padded into the kitchen. "A ballerina. Our very own toe dancer "

"If we get steak it will be because of me,"Pewter bragged.

"Steak!"Tucker's ears stood straight up and forward.

As it happened, Fair decided to grillsteak. Harry knew not to interfere with his cooking, but she had to laugh behind his back at how "the boys," as she thought of them, ruthlessly competed about their grilling techniques. Ned, Jim, Blair, Tracy, even Paul de Silva had outdoor grills. She didn't know what he was doing out there with his apron around his waist as he wielded a dangerously sharp long fork and knife.

When Fair brought in the steaks, the aroma filled the kitchen.

As they ate their supper, giving the animals small steak tidbits, they kept going over events.