A Beeline to Murder

“Oh, Lord.” Abby latched the henhouse door and sank onto a bale of straw, her thoughts swirling. Of course, morgue space would be needed for the incoming. Now Abby understood the urgency Philippe had expressed about proving Jean-Louis death was not a suicide. He couldn’t face putting his brother’s body in the ground if people were thinking his brother had taken his own life. It was already day six. The body was going to have to be buried somewhere . . . and soon. But another thought loomed—once the body was buried, if murder was proven, it just might have to be exhumed and reinterred. There was the whole issue of embalming.

Abby sat on the bale, elbows on her knees, cell phone to her ear, listening as Philippe rambled. She knew that a buried body took its secrets with it. Murder victims required an in-depth external and internal exam, but had Jean-Louis’s body received that kind of scrutiny? From what Abby remembered from the coroner’s report of their limited investigation, an external examination had been done, and blood and tissue samples taken for toxicology—usual for homicides but getting those results could take up to two weeks. The ruling of suicide meant Chief Bob Allen could close the case, which he did because all indicators pointed to suicide. That conclusion would save the cash-strapped county money. Chief Bob Allen might be a pain in the rear end, but he did everything by the book. Furthermore, the coroner’s office could make the call to do an autopsy with an internal examination, or not. Abby realized she would have to take another look at the report and work the case even faster to get at the truth before Jean-Louis was laid to rest.

Henrietta, the small speckled Mediterranean hen, began a series of trilling purrs as she took her dust bath, squirming, scratching, and tossing herself sideways. Her sister hovered on the nesting box. Houdini eyed Mystery, a large black Cochin, whose feathers never got ruffled over anything, as if to say, “Hey, baby, come perch with me.” Reminding herself that her chickens seemed to respect the rooster to make decisions for the entire flock in times of distress, Abby asked Philippe, “What is your father’s advice?”

Philippe’s voice dropped slightly, as if the edginess he’d felt over the problem had somehow dissipated by talking it over with Abby. “My father says perhaps it would be best to bury Jean-Louis here. My mother is in the hospital—complications from her late-stage Parkinson’s disease.” He hesitated and then added, “My father doesn’t want to leave her. What if something happened to her while he is here? Abby, he isn’t in the best health, either. This overwhelms me. I need your help.”

“Of course. You have it, Philippe.” Abby hurriedly created a mental checklist. Contact Shadyside, the local funeral home. Choose a burial site. Plan a wake. Or consider a graveside service. Find out if videotaping is permitted. How else could Philippe’s parents witness their youngest son’s final send-off?

Staring at a pile of freshly deposited chicken droppings, Abby heard herself say with more optimism than she felt, “Don’t worry, Philippe. We’ll work this out.”

When Abby had finished cleaning and refilling the chicken watering canister, she gathered the eggs and, deep in thought, walked back down the gravel path to her farm kitchen. On any other day, she would check the ripeness of the apricots and peaches, count the number of fruits on her White Genoa fig tree, and note the swelling and striping of the Fuji apples, espaliered against a wooden trellis. But the state of her orchard seemed less important than the state of mind Philippe had worked himself into as a result of inaction.