Farm Fresh Murder (32 page)

“You saved my life. ‘Thank you’ seems weak, but it’s all I’ve got,” I said to Barry and Sam. I’d said it a million times already, but I didn’t impose a limit on how many more times I’d say it.

Barry waved away my words.

“No, it’s not all you’ve got,” Sam said.

Silence fell over the patio. Was he being flirtatious? I avoided Ian’s glance.

“No, you’ve got, well, you
will
have pumpkin preserves very soon. I’ll take some of those, please.” Relief washed over the party.

“You can have as many as you want,” I offered.

“Pukins, pukins. I want a pukin,” Mathis said.

“Well, come with me, little man. We’ll find you one right now.” I stood and took my nephew’s hand, and we moved away from the crowd and into my pumpkin patch.

I walked like I was injured but would be fine. I was very grateful to have escaped any permanent damage. My emotions were still too close to the surface, though, and I hoped that the tears and choked voice would stay at bay for the evening.

As Mathis led the way, I was once again convinced that there might be no better place in the world than the middle of a pumpkin patch. It was currently a delightful array of green and orange. Fall, perfect fall. The sunlight had just the right amount of yellow and the air had just the right amount of clean coolness. It was good to still be around to enjoy another fall and be among my plants.

Mathis was easily entertained, and wanted to thoroughly inspect every gourd. I sat and watched him and the people on my patio.

My sister and her husband were sitting very close together, as though the events of late made them not want to be far from each other for very long. I approved.

Barry had surprised me by being more emotional than anyone else. He had grabbed me and pulled me into a close hug. He didn’t let go for a long time, and he was still intermittently dabbing at his eyes.

He’d known all along who’d killed Matt Simonsen—or at least he’d suspected. Though he had moved away, both physically and emotionally, from his past, he had observed his old friends over the years. They’d all known who Jessop’s biological father was—Barry included. He’d told them that it was a bad idea to keep secrets from Jessop, but no one had agreed.

Barry had sought out Jessop the day after the murder and confronted him. Jessop denied everything, but Barry knew better—he just couldn’t figure out how to prove it. Jessop had been his mystery trench-coat-clad visitor the night of the party, there to tell Barry that Abner had been arrested. He’d known this because he was the one who shot at Abner and me when we were in the cabin. He drove away, but returned and hid as he watched the rest of the events unfold.

Barry knew Jessop wasn’t stable, and that was why he’d wanted me to quit “worrying my pretty little head” over the matter.

Barry’d wanted to protect me, and I’d just gotten angry at him. Fortunately, he finally called Sam and told him as much of the story as he could. Sam took it from there.

I’d invited Carl and Mamma for two reasons. I wanted to apologize for being so weird around them and suspecting Carl of anything. And I knew Mamma would volunteer to bring some dessert. She did—Mamma Maria’s Mmmm-Amazing Lemon Meringue. Yum!

And Carl had come with his own apology. He had seen Jessop chop at the tree. He’d gone out and stopped him from going further. I had observed Abner begging Carl not to go to the police with the information. Carl might never forgive himself that he hadn’t told Sam sooner.

We’d all forgiven him, though.

Officer Sam Brion had saved my life and had become a friend. I didn’t know what our friendship would evolve into, but I was pleased to have him in my life.

Jessop Simonsen was still alive. Sam’s shot hadn’t killed the killer, but injured his shoulder enough that Jessop would be in the hospital awhile before he went to jail, probably for the rest of his life. Jessop’s madness had come on suddenly and had stayed long enough to do some terrible damage, but along with help for his physical wounds, he was getting emotional help, too. But there were terrible times ahead for him. He’d realize what he’d done and would probably never be able to forgive himself.

Pauline Simonsen had been totally in the dark about what had happened. She really thought Abner had killed Matt. I couldn’t imagine what she would have to overcome to live the rest of her life in some sort of peace. She’d saved me from her son, though, and for that I was very grateful.

Abner was free from jail, even if he never would be free from the ghosts of his past.

A few days before Matt started at Bailey’s, Jessop had started snooping around the house for evidence of his mother’s past. What he’d observed between Pauline and Abner at the Smithfield Market had been eating at him, and he finally decided to see what he could find.

It didn’t take long for him to discover the truth of his birth—he found a letter from Abner to his mother and the pictures in his mother’s closet. Then Jessop, for all practical purposes, fired his father from Smithfield. Thinking time had healed most wounds, Matt took it upon himself to set up a space at Bailey’s. He was wrong, and Abner and he couldn’t find a way to get along, but it hadn’t been Abner who killed Matt. It had been Jessop, who though he’d gotten Matt out of his work environment, couldn’t forgive the lies that had been told for more than forty years. He killed Matt, hoping to frame Abner and expose his mother’s past, hopefully embarrassing and hurting her more deeply than he thought she could stand.

Abner would eventually be fine, but his decades-earlier affair with Pauline would haunt him for the rest of his life—sometimes the truth doesn’t set you completely free. He would have taken the fall for Jessop, but he knew Jessop’s breakdown wasn’t over. In fact, Abner knew that Jessop wanted to harm me because of my snooping. When Abner asked me to the cabin, it had been his goal to make me stop my investigation. He was going to turn himself in that day, anyway—the drama of what happened in the woods made him wish he’d done it earlier. He thought that if he really did go to jail, Jessop would leave me and everyone else alone.

That might have been correct, but
I
wasn’t capable of leaving anything alone. I couldn’t let my friend go to jail for something he hadn’t done. My curiosity had almost done me in, but not quite.

I had been irritated at Abner for not sharing his address with anyone, but over the course of the last week, I had found that I’d been almost as guilty of such negligence. I hadn’t known where some of my closest coworkers lived, and I’d never invited them over for much of anything except maybe to help with the pumpkins. But I knew where they lived now, and this barbecue was the first step of what I hoped was a new phase of friendship in all our lives.

It really wasn’t that I’d made a lot of new friends as the result of a terrible tragedy, but that we all had become closer. And one of the new friends I had made and most looked forward to getting to know better was flipping hamburgers with a hand marked by a sun tattoo and was the owner of potentially magic spit.

I smiled at the memory of our kiss and at the fact that because I hadn’t been gunned down in the greenhouse, there might be more kissing ahead.

“Did you find the one you want, Mathis?” I stood slowly, favoring my sore hip, road-rashed leg, and stiff shoulder. It wasn’t pretty.

“Yes.” He pointed at the biggest pumpkin in the patch.

“Good choice. Let’s grab it and go have some dinner.”

“I don’t want a m’burger, Aunt Becca. I want peanut butter and some of your strawberry jam.”

“That sounds good. Come on, I’ll see if the cook will help me in the kitchen. He and I will find you some peanut butter and jam.”

I smiled at the thought and, hand in hand, we walked toward family, friends, and hopefully a fruitful future.

Start with good fruit at its peak, not overripe. Canning doesn’t improve the quality of the ingredients you use.

 

Don’t add any butter or other fat to a recipe. These don’t store well and could increase the rate of spoilage, as well as slow the rate of heat transfer, which could result in an unsafe product.

 

Always “heat process” your products by water bath or pressure canning (I use water bath process). Ignore any recipe that tells you to invert the jars as the final step.

 

To sterilize them, boil small jars for at least five minutes, large jars for at least eight. Higher altitudes might require more time. Always check recipes.

To prevent darkening of your cut fruits:

 

Use a commercial product made to prevent the darkening.

 

Put the cut fruit in a solution of 1 teaspoon ascorbic acid (vitamin C, available in a powdered form from the drug store) and 1 gallon water. Drain before canning.

 

Or

 

Put the cut fruit into a lemon juice solution (¾ cup lemon juice to 1 gallon water). Drain fruit before canning.

 

Use standard mason / Ball / Kerr (etc.) jars for home canning. Commercial food jars, such as mayonnaise jars, are not heat tempered and often break easily.

 

Do not use jars larger than specified. Quart jars are the largest size you should ever use.

 

To remove scale or hard-water films on jars, soak the jars for several hours in a solution of 1 cup vinegar per gallon of water. Keep the jars warm until ready to fill them—this will help reduce breakage from thermal shock.

 

Prepare the two-piece metal canning lids by washing them in water and following the manufacturer’s instructions for heating the lids.

 

Check the jar seals twelve to twenty-four hours after processing for leaks and broken seals. Press down on the lid. If it is sealed, it will be sucked down tight. If it did not seal, it will flex and make a popping sound when pressed.

If it didn’t seal, refrigerate the product and eat it as soon as possible. If one of my seals is broken, I don’t take the jar to market, but just use the product myself instead.

 

Most important tip: enjoy every minute of your time within your crops and in your kitchens. There’s not much else that is as satisfying as growing something, preparing it, and then seeing someone enjoy the “fruits” of your labor.

 

BECCA

Boil jars (at least five minutes). My dishwasher has a fancyschmancy sterilize mode, but that feature is still rare.

Remove the jars with tongs and place them on a cookie sheet to dry and cool.

Prepare lids by placing them in a saucepan of gently boiling water. I don’t ever use the dishwasher for the lids.

Prepare the strawberries by dipping them in a sink of cold water and immediately putting them into a colander to drain.

Hull strawberries, using a sharp paring knife or a strawberry huller or even a paper clip. Place half the strawberries at a time into a food processor and process for 5 to 10 seconds; they should still be slightly chunky. This step becomes intuitive over time. Some people like larger chunks of fruit in their preserves, but I prefer uniformly sized pieces that make an even “spread.” (Hint—the chunks of fruit are what make the preserves. Jams are made with totally crushed fruit and, typically, less sugar.)

Place the strawberries into a 6- or 8-quart pot. Stir the sugar into the fruit and mix them well. Bring the fruit to a full, rolling boil over high heat, stirring constantly.

Add fruit pectin and return the mixture to a full, rolling boil. Boil hard for 1 minute, stirring constantly to prevent scorching.

Remove the preserves from the heat and skim off and discard any foam, using a metal spoon. Ladle the preserves into a liquid measuring cup and fill the jars immediately to within 1/8 inch of the tops.

Wipe jar rims and threads with a clean, damp cloth.

Place the lids on the jars and screw them on tightly.

Fill the canner half full with water; then cover it and heat the water to boiling.

Using a jar lifter, place the jars filled with food on the rack in the canner. If necessary, add boiling water to bring water 1 to 2 inches over the tops of the jars. Do not pour boiling water directly on the jars. Cover them and boil for at least five minutes. Longer for higher altitudes (check the recipe on the package of pectin).

As soon as the processing time is up, use a jar lifter to remove jars from the canner. If liquid boiled out of the jars during processing, do not open them to add more. Do not retighten screw bands, even if they are noticeably loose.

Check the seals after one hour to make sure the lids are curving down. If seals are not tight, refrigerate and use the product as soon as possible.

The preparation and preserving methods used for the strawberry preserves are the same for the pumpkin preserves. The ingredients and recipe are different and are as follows: