Birder, She Wrote

Book 33: Meg Langslow Mysteries

by Donna Andrews

Genres: Craft & Hobby Cozy Mysteries; Humor & Satire; Punny book titles

Synopsis

"Listening to Bernadette Dunne perform the Meg Langslow audiobooks gives listeners a sense of coming home to a beloved family." —AudioFile on The Falcon Always Wings Twice

Meg is relaxing in the hammock, taste-testing Michael’s latest batch of Arnold Palmers and watching the hummingbirds at their feeders when her hopes for a relaxing early summer morning are dashed.

First her father recruits her to help him install a new batch of bees in the hive in her backyard. Then Mayor Shiffley recruits her to placate the NIMBYs (Not in my backyard), as she calls them – a group of newcomers to Caerphilly who have built McMansions next door to working farms and then do their best to make life miserable for the farmers. And finally Meg’s grandmother, shows up, trailed by a nosy reporter who is writing a feature on her for a genteel Southern ladies’ magazine.

Cordelia drafts Meg to accompany her and Deacon Washington of the New Life Baptist Church – and the reporter, alas – in their search for a long-lost African-American cemetery. Unfortunately what they discover is not an ancient cemetery but a fresh corpse. Can Meg protect her grandmother – and Caerphilly – from the reporter who seems to see the worst in everything . . . and help crack the case before the killer finds another victim?

A Macmillan Audio production from Minotaur Books.

Release date: August 1, 2023

Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

Print pages: 304

Sample

FRIDAY, MAY 5

Chapter 1

“This is the life,” I said, as I wriggled into an even more comfortable position in the hammock.

I wasn’t talking to anyone in particular. As far as I knew, there was no one within earshot. But just in case there was, I was going to do my best to look—and sound—like someone who was deeply contented and should not be disturbed for anything short of an actual emergency. Although the people most apt to interrupt me were safely occupied elsewhere—Michael, my husband, was teaching his Friday classes at Caerphilly College, and my twin sons, Jamie and Josh, were at school until three.

My notebook-that-tells-me-when-to-breathe, as I called my comprehensive to-do list and calendar, was nearby, but I’d already checked, and nothing in its pages had to be done right now. For the next hour I was on hammock time. I could read. I could put on my headphones and listen to some music. Or I could just lie here and enjoy the balmy May weather, the masses of blooms in our flower beds, and the fascinating aerial ballet of hummingbirds darting to and from the nearby feeder.

The hummingbirds. I sat up with a frown. The last time I’d found the time to watch them, there had been half a dozen of them, impossibly small, their iridescent jewel-toned bodies sparkling in the sunshine as they paused, sipped, and darted away. Now there was only one, flitting around the feeder. And he didn’t even seem to be feeding—just darting about.

Was there something wrong with the latest batch of sugar water? This little guy and all his fellow hummers had been keeping us busy refilling the feeder—sometimes they went through two batches of sugar water a day. And if the feeder ran low, they could always turn to the vast quantities of pollinator-friendly blooms we’d planted in the yard. Every year we added more flowering perennials—multiple cultivars of bee balm and columbines, salvia and milkweed. Great ropes of native honeysuckle covered long stretches of the fence around our yard. And while I preferred to spend my energy on perennials—if you’re going to all the trouble of digging, why not plant something that will stay around for at least a few years?—Rose Noire, our nature-crazy cousin-in-residence, had gone overboard with the annuals and biennials—foxgloves, hollyhocks, cleomes, petunias, nasturtiums, zinnias, and who knew what else. We had almost as many flowers on display as Flugleman’s, the local garden supplier. We even had baskets of jewel-colored fuchsias hanging from limbs and poles at various spots around the yard, and a vast field of purple clover just across the fence in a pasture that was technically part of Mother and Dad’s neighboring farm.

The sight of all the flowers cheered and calmed me. Maybe this hummingbird just wasn’t hungry at the moment.

Just then another hummingbird flew toward the feeder—only to jerk back as the first hummingbird attacked, making a sort of buzzing noise and stabbing with his needle-sharp little bill. The newcomer fled, and the first hummingbird resumed circling the feeder, like a sentry patrolling his station.

Was this dog-in-the-manger act normal hummingbird behavior? Did our beloved little pollinators bully each other away from the feeder? I should ask my grandfather. Sometimes it was useful to have an eminent naturalist in the family.

Then again, did I really want an hour-long lecture about the feeding and reproductive behavior of hummingbirds? I’d ask my grandmother Cordelia. When it came to backyard ornithology, she was just as knowledgeable and a lot more practical.

I’d film a little of the suspected bully’s behavior first. I was reaching to pull out my phone to do this when it rang. Okay, that was convenient. But when the caller ID showed it was Randall Shiffley calling, I sighed. Randall might be trying to reach me about any number of things, but the odds were that he was calling me in my role as his part-time assistant in charge of special projects. Or, as I sometimes called it, the Mayor’s Special Assistant for Headaches and Nuisances.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“The NIMBYs are at it again.”

I winced and stifled a groan. The NIMBYs—short for “Not in my backyard!”—was our shorthand way of referring to many residents of Caerphilly’s ritzy Westlake neighborhood who were constantly filing complaints against their neighbors. Not, usually, their fellow Westlake residents. Unfortunately, their neighborhood was on the outskirts of town and bordered by several farms. And most of its residents were, as Randall put it, “not from around here.” Affluent retirees. Businesspeople who either didn’t mind a long commute or managed their far-flung empires remotely. The occasional distinguished professor

recruited by Caerphilly College. Not, for the most part, people who had any previous experience of living cheek by jowl with working farms.

Those of us who were locals, or at least long-term residents, could almost predict when newly arrived Westlake residents’ raptures over the lack of traffic noises would give way to complaints about the roosters waking them up at dawn. When they’d notice that the green, unspoiled landscape they liked to gaze out upon contained not only cows but also cow pies and muddy pig wallows. When they’d realize that the fresh country air they’d been rhapsodizing over was often scented with manure.

And that’s when they’d suddenly become Caerphilly’s problem. Or, more accurately, my problem.

“Who’s in their sights this time?” I asked.

“Edgar Bortnick and his bees.”

“Oh, good grief,” I muttered.

“Yeah. Apparently, Edgar had another big dustup with Wally the Weird.”

I knew Edgar well, because last year Dad had gone in for beekeeping in a big way and Edgar was his guru. And Walter Inman, aka Wally the Weird, a retired businessman from the D.C. area, was my personal candidate for the worst of the NIMBYs, mainly because on top of harassing the neighboring farmers he frequently picked fights with his fellow NIMBYs.

“Supposedly Edgar promised he’d move the hives that are right across the fence from Wally’s patio,” Randall continued. “But it’s been a week now, Edgar’s bees are still dive-bombing Wally and his guests, and Edgar’s nowhere to be found. Hasn’t answered his door, and his voicemail’s full.”

I felt a brief twinge of anxiety but reminded myself that this was normal for Edgar.

“Remember,” I said. “Beekeeping’s a sideline for him.” Even in my own head I was careful not to repeat my mistake of calling it a hobby. A passion, an obsession, a vocation, a calling—but not, according to Edgar, a hobby.

“Yup, I know the wildlife photography’s his main gig.”

“Which means he’s always going off in the woods for days or even weeks with nothing but a canteen and his camera,” I pointed out.

“And normally I’d assume that’s what he’s doing now,” Randall said. “But there are a couple of people he usually asks to keep an eye on his place when he does that—my cousin Sam, who has the farm next door, and your dad. I checked with both of them, and he didn’t say anything to either about being gone overnight.”

Definitely worrisome.

“It’s always possible that something happened to delay him,” I said. “The other day Dad was telling me about how Edgar once sat in a tree for three days, trying to get some good pictures of a nest full of newly hatched screech owls. And you know how spotty cell phone coverage is the second you get a few miles from town.”

“Odds are that’s what’s happening,” Randall said. “And that if he did agree to move his hives, he’ll be doing it when he gets back—although I kind of doubt that Wally the Weird is telling the truth about Edgar agreeing to move the hives. But there’s not much use in my trying to explain any of that to the NIMBYs. Could you maybe go over and work your diplomatic magic?”

Under most situations, I’d have said Randall was at least as diplomatic as I was. But he was right—I usually had better luck soothing the savage NIMBYs. Of the three people whose farms bordered Westlake, Edgar was the one the NIMBYs hated the most, but they complained almost as often about Randall’s cousin Sam, who specialized in organic, pasture-raised pigs. Wally the Weird and the rest of the NIMBYs seemed to confuse “organic” with “odor-free” and resented

having the pig pasture visible from their elegant, upscale backyards. And they also assumed that Randall’s refusal to ban his cousin’s pig-keeping was due to nepotism rather than common sense.

“So you want me to go over and calm Wally down?” I asked.

“No, actually it’s the Brownlows complaining today,” he said. “Apparently Wally was bragging about winning his argument with Edgar, so they were all expecting the beehives to be gone by now. Though if you can track down Wally, that would be a good thing, too. Mr. Brownlow seemed to find his absence downright suspicious. We don’t want poor Horace having to dig up Sam’s pig wallow again.”

“Right.” Last year Wuzzums, the Brownlows’ pampered Maltipoo, had gone walkabout for a few days, and Wally swore he’d seen Sam burying a Wuzzums-sized something in his pasture. My cousin Horace had been halfway through a forensic excavation of Sam’s pig wallow when another deputy apprehended Wuzzums on a farm ten miles away, covered with ticks, fleas, and mud, and looking as if she’d been having the time of her life. Which apparently she had—when her pregnancy became visible, the horrified Brownlows had dumped her at the county animal shelter, asking to have her “put down.” Luckily, Caerphilly’s shelter is a no-kill one, and Wuzzums—aptly renamed Wild Thing—was now living the good life, protecting the hens on a nearby poultry farm. But the whole episode had left me with a very low opinion of the Brownlows.

“So, pacify the Brownlows and verify that Wally the Weird is still among the living,” I said. “And Edgar, too. Or if I come across any evidence that Wally has done away with Edgar, I’ll call Chief Burke. Will later today work? My grandmother’s coming over pretty soon to take me on an expedition. We’re helping Horace and Deacon Washington look for the old Muddy Hollow graveyard.”

“Oh, good idea,” he said. “Finding that’s more important—it’s such a vital part of the county’s history. The NIMBYs can certainly wait till you’re back. Or even till tomorrow if it takes you all day to find the cemetery. If the NIMBYs call again anytime soon, I’ll tell them I’ve assigned you to track Edgar down. Which wouldn’t be a bad idea, if you can manage it. I’d like to hear his side of the argument with Wally.”

“Roger. You don’t ask much. I’ll put it all on the list for today if possible, and I’ll let you know what I find out.”

We said our farewells, and I settled back in my hammock.

I tried to recapture my earlier relaxed mood. Focused on the flowers. On the sun glinting off the bright copper feathers of our Welsummer hens. On our llamas’ gentle, contented humming.

But I feared I wasn’t going to recapture my relaxed mood quite so easily. I pulled out my phone again and checked the time. Almost ten o’clock. Cordelia was supposed to be here by eleven for our expedition. Technically I had enough time to get over to Westlake and back with five or ten minutes to spare. But there was no way I could placate even one of the NIMBYs in under an hour.

So I scribbled a couple of items in my notebook. Calm the Brownlows. Calm the Griswolds if necessary—they were the other Westlake denizens with a view of Edgar’s beehives. Find Wally the Weird. Find Edgar. And then after a moment of thought, another two items I’d been too relaxed to write down earlier. Ask Grandfather about hummingbirds. Ask Cordelia ditto.

I gazed sternly at the offending hummingbird, now perched on a flowering dogwood branch near the feeder, presumably so he could guard it with less energy expenditure.

“Your time’s coming,” I

muttered.

I tucked my notebook away under the hammock pillow, lay back again, and closed my eyes. Usually, writing something down in my notebook as a future to-do item enabled me to get it off my mind and concentrate on what I was doing in the present. Of course, it sometimes took a little time.

I concentrated on the distant, erratic tinkling of the wind chimes. On the smell of the nearby lavender. On the—

“Hey, Meg.” My brother, Rob. “You busy?”

“So much for hammock time,” I muttered.

 

Chapter 2

I glanced over to see what Rob needed help with. He was carrying a small sturdy packing crate and had an assortment of tools and objects wedged under his arms, including a flattish crowbar and what looked like a prop from the set of The Wizard of Oz—the head of the Tin Man, with a small silver accordion soldered to it. What the—?

I rolled out of the hammock. Right-side up, I realized that what I’d mistaken for the Tin Man was actually Dad’s bee smoker. You lit a fuel source in a cylindrical container—the head—and used the accordion—actually a small bellows—to pump the resulting smoke out through the spout that looked like the Tin Man’s upside-down funnel hat. The smoke was supposed to calm the bees and keep them from attacking.

And the flattish crowbar was what beekeepers called a hive tool—used for popping off the top of the hive, scraping out debris, and other arcane bee management chores.

“Don’t tell me,” I said. “Dad’s new shipment of bees has arrived.”

“Actually, he thinks of them as your bees,” he said. “Since they’ll be moving into the hive here at your house. Can you grab all this stuff while I carry the bee box?” He lifted his arms. The smoker, the hive tool, and a small collection of other items fell to the ground.

“Dad can’t carry any of it?” Not that I waited for an answer to begin picking up the scattered instruments he’d dropped.

“He’s putting on his beekeeping outfit,” Rob said.

I wasn’t quite sure how this would keep Dad from helping to carry at least some of the equipment he’d be using when he approached the hive. Then again, I’d long ago figured out that it was hopeless to expect Dad to perform mundane chores while wearing a costume—and however useful and practical it was, his beekeeping outfit was definitely also a costume.

The screen door slammed, and I turned to see Dad emerging from the kitchen, ready for action. Last year he’d done his beekeeping chores in some rather scruffy gear handed down from Edgar, but this year he’d invested in a new outfit. His beekeeping hat, which was rather like a pith helmet, supported a long veil of netting that pooled around his chest. He wore a baggy off-white shirt and matching pants—I assumed the loose fit reduced the chance that any bees who landed on the cloth would get close enough to his body to sting. The pants legs were tightly strapped around the tops of his knee-high white PVC boots. His shirtsleeves disappeared into the tops of his elbow-length white-and-tan leather gauntlets. What the well-equipped apiarist will wear. You could tell by his jaunty manner that he thought he cut a very dashing figure. I would never spoil his fun by suggesting that he looked less like Indiana Jones than the Pillsbury Doughboy.

“Your bees are here!” he exclaimed as he drew near, walking carefully because his new boots were on the large side.

“So I gathered,” I said. “Are you going to put them in the hive now? I thought the boys were all excited about helping you.”

“Yes.” His face fell. “But your mother put her foot down. She doesn’t want the boys anywhere near the hive until the bees are safely installed and have calmed down. She’s completely overreacting.”

Overreacting? Or demonstrating the common sense we all knew Dad often lacked. I had to confess, I felt a sense of relief, knowing the bee installation would be over with by the time the boys came home. Especially since Dad was doing it without Edgar’s expert help.

“Don’t start till I get my camera,” I said. “I want to document this.”

“Great idea!” He beamed at me, and then continued clumping toward the back of the yard.

I thought it was a pretty nifty idea myself. Having a lot of photos might help console the boys for missing all the excitement. And besides, if I was in charge of documenting the bee installation, I’d have a perfect excuse for keeping my distance from the action. I’d noticed that one of the items Rob had left in my charge was what Dad called his Bite Bag—a specialized first-aid kit for treating family and friends who fell afoul of bees, wasps, hornets, and other stinging pests. While I very much approved of the Bite Bag, whose contents included everything from antihistamines and topical steroids for itching to epinephrine injectors for anaphylactic shock, I wanted to avoid anything that would require my getting treatment from it.

I jogged to the barn, which housed both my office and my blacksmithing shop, and located my digital camera. When I emerged from the barn—

“Meg? What’s going on?”

I turned to see the tall, jeans-clad figure of my grandmother Cordelia emerging from the kitchen. Right behind her was a young woman I didn’t know. The newcomer was dressed in what she probably considered casual clothes—or maybe business casual: beige linen slacks, a beige silk blouse, low-heeled beige shoes that

 were probably more expensive than sensible. Her wheat-blond hair was caught up at the nape of her neck with a pair of chopsticks in the sort of artful arrangement that only looked easy.

Cordelia glanced back at her, and a brief flash of annoyance crossed her face before she composed herself.

“This is—” she began.

But the young woman interrupted her, stepping forward and holding out her hand.

“Britni Colleton,” she said. “That’s B-R-I-T-N-I. Sweet Tea and Sassafras.”

“Meg Langslow,” I said as I shook her hand. It sounded incomplete—was I supposed to add something? Surely she could spell Meg, especially since I used the plain-vanilla version. Was “sweet tea and sassafras” a beverage order? Should I tell her that we could provide the sweet tea, but I couldn’t promise the sassafras? Unless my cousin Rose Noire had some in her herb and natural medicine collection.

Cordelia noticed my puzzled look.

“Britni is the reporter who’s interviewing me for the Sweet Tea and Sassafras magazine,” she said.

I nodded and braced myself to pretend I’d actually heard of the publication.

“She wants to meet and perhaps interview some of my family for the article,” Cordelia went on. “But if this is a busy time—”

“Dad and Rob are busy at the moment,” I said. “The bees came.”

“For your hive!” Cordelia exclaimed. She looked more cheerful and strode toward the back of the yard where Dad and Rob were heading. “This could be fascinating,” she said over her shoulder, presumably to the reporter.

“Actually, I prefer to think of it as Rose Noire’s hive—since it’s right in the middle of her herb fields.” I began picking up the things Rob had consigned to me. Cordelia circled back and held out her hand, and I gave her a few items to carry. Then I fell into step beside her as we headed for the far end of the yard.

I glanced back to see the reporter following us. She had her phone out and was busily taking pictures of anything that caught her eye. Of our copper-and-black Welsummer hens, who mobbed her just as they did anyone who entered the yard, on the assumption that they must be planning to scatter chicken feed. Of our five llamas, who had sensed that something exciting was about to happen and were already gathered at the end of their pen closest to the herb field. Of our barn, which was still an unconventional pale pink, with elaborate painted garlands of roses and lilies—the supposedly temporary paint with which it had been decorated for last summer’s wedding festivities had proved to be a lot more durable than expected.

“They’ll be pollinating your flowers along with her herbs,” Cordelia said. “I’d call the hive just as much yours as hers.”

“Ssh,” I said. “I’m hoping to avoid taking on any of the extra work the bees will cause.”

We arrived at the fence separating our backyard from Rose Noire’s herb field. Rob was waiting on the other side, so we handed over the various beekeeping implements we’d been carrying and settled in to watch, leaning on the top rail of the fence. On the outside. Away from the hive. Cordelia and I—and Britni the reporter, of course—weren’t wearing head-to-toe protective gear. If the bees emerged from their shipping container in a bad mood, we’d be better off if we didn’t have a fence with a narrow gate blocking our path to safety. After taking a few dozen photos of the hive and of Dad in his beekeeping outfit, Britni joined us.

“I do wish Edgar was here,” Dad said.

“Who’s that?” Britni asked

“Edgar Bortnick,” I said. “Dad’s beekeeping guru.”

“He’s not coming.” Dad was laying out his various tools and gadgets as methodically as if he were a surgeon getting ready to perform an operation. “I can’t imagine why he’s not here. I called yesterday, when the bees came, and got his voicemail. So I dropped by his farm, and his truck was gone. He must be off on one of his expeditions.”

“Expeditions?” Britni echoed. So while Dad sorted out his tools, I explained about Edgar’s wildlife photography.

“I think he’d have let me know if he was going out of town,” Dad said. “A couple of days ago he mentioned checking out a possible sighting of an eagle’s nest, but that was someplace here in Caerphilly County. Meg—could you ask Randall to have his cousins keep an eye out for Edgar while they’re in the woods?”

“They won’t be spending all that much time in the woods this time of year,” I pointed out. “If it were hunting season, yeah, but this time of year they’re all busy at their farms and construction sites and whatever.”

“True.” Dad looked concerned.

“And anyway, Randall’s already got his family keeping an eye out for Edgar,” I added. “In fact, this morning Randall asked me if I could help with the search.”

“Wonderful!” Dad looked completely relieved.

Nice that someone had such confidence in my Edgar-finding skills.

“And meanwhile we can’t afford to wait for him to come back.” Dad’s good mood had returned. “These bees need to be hived immediately! But don’t worry! I know exactly what to do. I helped Edgar last time.”

“Last time?” Britni asked. “I thought this beehive thing was new.”

“This will be our second try at getting bees established in this first hive,” I explained. “Edgar brought over a batch last spring when some of his bees swarmed, and he and Dad set up the hive, but a few months later all the bees were gone.”

“They all died?” Britni looked alarmed and drew back, as if afraid whatever had killed the bees might be contagious to humans.

“No,” Dad said. “If they’d died, we’d have seen a lot of dead bees. They disappeared. Flew off and set up their hive somewhere else. I spent some time looking around in the woods, but I never did find them.”

He looked sad, as if still wondering what he’d done to cause the bees’ desertion.

“They do that sometimes,” Cordelia said, in her most consoling tone. “And it’s rarely something the beekeeper has done. They just get notions.”

“Edgar would agree with you,” Dad said. “But I want to do everything I can to prevent it from happening again. I have some ideas about what might have caused it. I’ve been doing quite a bit of reading about apiculture over the last six months.”

And doing his best to get the rest of us to share his fascination. He’d even given Michael and me spare copies of what he considered the most interesting and useful books for beginners, on the theory that we should know at least a little about the latest additions to our household.

“Meg, are you ready?” Dad asked.

For a second I thought he was expecting me to pitch in with whatever he and Rob were about to do. Then I realized he meant ready to take pictures. I lifted my camera and nodded.

“Hmm.” He frowned. “You can do either photos or video with that, ...