get married?”
Margie selected another recipe card. “I guess they planned to. At least that’s what that floozy blabbed to anyone who’d listen. But it never happened.”
“Oh, really? Why not?”
“Well, first, Ole left her, and then Samantha Berg got herself murdered.”
Handing me the card, she uttered in a voice absent any emotion, “This here’s the recipe for the bars ya seem to like so much. Ya better write it down.”
Chapter 3
Before I could inquire about Samantha Berg’s murder, two old-timers came in, and Margie excused herself to wait on them. Despite the August heat, both men wore long-sleeve shirts and bib-overalls. Each also sported a baseball cap, one advertising John Deere tractors, the other, chemical fertilizer.
Sitting down at the counter, the chemical-fertilizer guy asked Margie if it was hot enough for her, while the other tipped his head in my direction. Ignoring the weather-related question, she told them who I was and what I was doing there. They seemed impressed.
Margie served them carrot bars and coffee, all the while chatting about the upcoming beet harvest. Even though sugar beets, used to create the alternative to cane sugar, were sometimes grown in the southern part of the state, they were king of all crops in the Red River Valley. According to my research, they’d made wealthy people out of many of the Norwegian and Swedish farmers who called this sparsely populated area home.
The two guys and Margie talked, but I paid little attention. I wanted the men to leave so Margie and I could return to murder. Or, at least, our discussion of it.
I finished copying the mint-bar recipe about the same time Margie began regaling them with a story about an apparatus Ole had rigged up years before to “rotate the filler wheels on his beet lifter.”
The men chuckled. “Oh, that Ole,” the guy with the John Deere cap said in a Scandinavian accent so strong it put Margie’s to shame, “he was a thinker.” Although it sounded more like, “he was a tinker.”
He swiveled on his stool to face me. “Ya know, he also was the first guy in these parts to try modern organic farmin’, and—”
His friend cut him off. “That there’s nothin’ to brag about.”
John Deere twirled his seat back around. “For cryin’ out loud, now why would ya go and say somethin’ like that?”
“‘Cause I don’t think much of organic farmin’, that’s why.”
Without making any eye contact whatsoever, John Deere argued, “For your information, Ole got prit near ‘tirdy’ a bushel for his soybeans one year.”
“Ya ain’t tellin’ me nothin’ I don’t already know. But he had to work a lot harder.”
“There’s nothin’ wrong with hard work.”
“He was always pullin’ weeds.”
“So?”
“So sprayin’ weeds is easier.”
“Well, easier ain’t always better.” That last remark was spoken brusquely and was obviously meant to end any further debate.
“Say, Margie,” John Deere then said, shifting both his focus and his tone, “I remembered that Ole and Lena joke I wanted to tell ya after Ole’s funeral there. Care to hear it now?”
“Do I have a choice?”
A grin inched across his face. “No, not really.”
She slouched against the stainless-steel prep table and crossed her legs at her ankles, “In that case, go ahead and get it over with.”
John Deere shoved his cap back from his sunburnt face and scratched his pale forehead. “Well, ya see,” he began, looking quite pleased with himself, “like most Norwegians, Ole, a professional fisherman, was pretty dang frugal. But when his wife, Lena, passed away, he reckoned he better put an obituary in the paper. So after fishin’ one day, he went on down there to the newspaper office and told the editor to write that Lena had died. Well, the editor said, ‘For land sake, Ole, ya gotta say more than that. You were married to the woman for dang near fifty years, and she was your partner in the fishin’
Margie selected another recipe card. “I guess they planned to. At least that’s what that floozy blabbed to anyone who’d listen. But it never happened.”
“Oh, really? Why not?”
“Well, first, Ole left her, and then Samantha Berg got herself murdered.”
Handing me the card, she uttered in a voice absent any emotion, “This here’s the recipe for the bars ya seem to like so much. Ya better write it down.”
Chapter 3
Before I could inquire about Samantha Berg’s murder, two old-timers came in, and Margie excused herself to wait on them. Despite the August heat, both men wore long-sleeve shirts and bib-overalls. Each also sported a baseball cap, one advertising John Deere tractors, the other, chemical fertilizer.
Sitting down at the counter, the chemical-fertilizer guy asked Margie if it was hot enough for her, while the other tipped his head in my direction. Ignoring the weather-related question, she told them who I was and what I was doing there. They seemed impressed.
Margie served them carrot bars and coffee, all the while chatting about the upcoming beet harvest. Even though sugar beets, used to create the alternative to cane sugar, were sometimes grown in the southern part of the state, they were king of all crops in the Red River Valley. According to my research, they’d made wealthy people out of many of the Norwegian and Swedish farmers who called this sparsely populated area home.
The two guys and Margie talked, but I paid little attention. I wanted the men to leave so Margie and I could return to murder. Or, at least, our discussion of it.
I finished copying the mint-bar recipe about the same time Margie began regaling them with a story about an apparatus Ole had rigged up years before to “rotate the filler wheels on his beet lifter.”
The men chuckled. “Oh, that Ole,” the guy with the John Deere cap said in a Scandinavian accent so strong it put Margie’s to shame, “he was a thinker.” Although it sounded more like, “he was a tinker.”
He swiveled on his stool to face me. “Ya know, he also was the first guy in these parts to try modern organic farmin’, and—”
His friend cut him off. “That there’s nothin’ to brag about.”
John Deere twirled his seat back around. “For cryin’ out loud, now why would ya go and say somethin’ like that?”
“‘Cause I don’t think much of organic farmin’, that’s why.”
Without making any eye contact whatsoever, John Deere argued, “For your information, Ole got prit near ‘tirdy’ a bushel for his soybeans one year.”
“Ya ain’t tellin’ me nothin’ I don’t already know. But he had to work a lot harder.”
“There’s nothin’ wrong with hard work.”
“He was always pullin’ weeds.”
“So?”
“So sprayin’ weeds is easier.”
“Well, easier ain’t always better.” That last remark was spoken brusquely and was obviously meant to end any further debate.
“Say, Margie,” John Deere then said, shifting both his focus and his tone, “I remembered that Ole and Lena joke I wanted to tell ya after Ole’s funeral there. Care to hear it now?”
“Do I have a choice?”
A grin inched across his face. “No, not really.”
She slouched against the stainless-steel prep table and crossed her legs at her ankles, “In that case, go ahead and get it over with.”
John Deere shoved his cap back from his sunburnt face and scratched his pale forehead. “Well, ya see,” he began, looking quite pleased with himself, “like most Norwegians, Ole, a professional fisherman, was pretty dang frugal. But when his wife, Lena, passed away, he reckoned he better put an obituary in the paper. So after fishin’ one day, he went on down there to the newspaper office and told the editor to write that Lena had died. Well, the editor said, ‘For land sake, Ole, ya gotta say more than that. You were married to the woman for dang near fifty years, and she was your partner in the fishin’
Similar Books
The Greatcoat
Helen Dunmore
The Girl In the Cave
Anthony Eaton
The Swap
Megan Shull
Wicked Kiss (Nightwatchers)
Michelle Rowen
Diary of a Mad First Lady
Dishan Washington
Always Darkest
Kimberly Warner
Football Crazy
Terry Ravenscroft, Ravenscroft
An Incredible Case of Dinosaurs
Kenneth Oppel
The Sweet-Shop Owner
Graham Swift