Mona halted with her back to a forest. "Smythe, don't you maintain a trail into your woodlot?"

He politely showed her the trail without pointing out that she was merely five feet from it. With Pete beside her, she marched along the wide pathway that Smythe had obviously kept neatly cut.

Haylee, Naomi, Opal, Edna, and I walked together, chatting about the difficulties of getting up so early.

Mona stopped and raised a hand. "We must all be silent." Her head wobbled back and forth. "To best experience the wildlife." If the wildlife had any sense, they'd be cuddled into warm nests and dens.

We managed to stop chatting, but our boots were not exactly quiet. We bumbled along, tripping over roots and halting whenever Mona lifted her binoculars and scanned trees. "Woodpeckers have been here," she stated once. Apparently, her voice wouldn't frighten the wildlife.

Smythe hiked behind Mona and Pete. Haylee caught up with him. Who could blame her? He was not only handsome and sweet, he drew cute bees and was fun to be with. And he had offered me a huge pumpkin. Knowing him, he would lend me his pickup truck and wheelbarrow to transport it. Opal and Naomi walked side by side behind Haylee and Smythe, and Edna and I followed them. Aunt Betty and Rhonda were close behind me, breathing loudly.

Mona stopped and pointed at the ground. "Coyote scat."

"Scat, coyote," Edna mumbled, which earned her a dirty look and another head shake from Mona.

I had something to worry about besides coyotes. We had expected to be in a forest of bare trunks and limbs where we could easily keep track of everyone, but the trail had entered a grove of evergreens, and Karen and Herb had fallen back where I couldn't see or hear them. Karen could be alone with a murderer. I whispered to Edna, "Karen must be somewhere behind us. With Herb."

Edna's eyes opened in frightened shock. "We'd better go back and find her."

"But what about Hay-"

"Naomi and Opal will stay with her."

I hoped Edna was right. We retraced our steps, passing hikers I didn't know, then Irv with a woman I'd seen at the roast beef dinner. Jacoba and Luther were behind them. Jacoba threw me a half smile.

Finally, Edna and I were alone with pine trees that whispered mournful secrets above our heads. Someone stumbled on the path behind us. I pivoted around.

Rhonda ducked behind a large pine. Somebody coughed and was shushed.

"We'll have to lose them," Edna murmured.

I wasn't sure how to go about that. If we stepped off the trail, we might lose ourselves and not be found until summer, except by those coyotes.

We found Herb and Karen standing apart, like a couple in the midst of a quarrel, with their backs to us. Herb must have heard us. He turned around and asked cheerfully, "Going back already?"

That might have been nice, but we had to stick to this pair until they joined the rest of the crowd.

Edna, seldom at a loss for words, began talking about recognizing trees by their bark. Since the only tree I could identify, and not by the bark, was a weeping willow, which I suspected we weren't likely to find in the midst of a forest, I hoped she knew more about tree bark than I did. Or than Herb and Karen did. She adroitly herded them toward where we'd last seen our friends. We passed Rhonda, stooping to help Aunt Betty disentangle the tops of her clodhopper boots from her pant legs.

Finally, we emerged from the thick pines and caught up with the others in a more open section of the woods that had once been used for what farm woodlots were supposedly meant for-firewood. Stumps dotted the ground.

Mona darted angry looks at us as we joined the group circling her and a particularly large stump. "You may think that Smythe is a lazy woodsman," she said, "leaving all this brush about, but there's a method to his madness. Can anyone guess what it was?" She shook her head as if discouraging anyone to answer.

Nodding his head beside his wife, Pete looked totally unconcerned. Maybe he had no idea that half the village pictured him whenever they heard the word "lazy."

Smythe's face reddened. From the cold or from being called mad, I wasn't sure. He opened his mouth.

Mona forestalled him. "No, don't tell them, Smythe, let them guess why you didn't clean up the brush." With every phrase, she shook her head no, while her husband nodded his head yes.

Picturing their dinnertime conversations, I stifled a giggle.

Pete's cold blue eyes bored into me.

I finally came up with the pun I'd been wanting to make the entire time I'd been creating a version of machine stumpwork. "I'm stumped."

Rhonda and Aunt Betty tiptoed out of the woods and crept closer.

"Wildlife," Edna stated loudly.

Mona glared at Edna like she didn't want anyone, especially laggards, coming up with answers to her questions. "Habitat," Mona corrected Edna. "Wildlife needs habitat."

So did I. Preferably with central heating. I mentally designed a coat for Pennsylvania winters. I'd make it hooded and ankle length, which would be nice and warm. And would also provide plenty of yardage to embroider. Right, I reminded myself, and then I'd really fit in with the most eccentric of the Threadville retailers and tourists.

Meanwhile, Mona presented us with an exciting, nature-inspired activity for a freezing winter morning. "I want you all to count the rings on this stump. As you can see, the tree was very old." She shook her head. "By counting the rings, one for each year, we can find out how old."

Opal and Naomi joined the group of hikers who were obediently bending over, pointing with mittened and gloved fingers, and muttering numbers under their breath.

"What kind of tree was it, Mona?" Edna asked. She looked innocent and curious, but I had a feeling she knew the answer and wanted to find out if Mona did. As far as I could tell, the fur around Mona's hood was fox, as real as the mink she'd worn yesterday. Were all naturalists this unnatural?

One thing I could say for Rhonda was that her fur did not appear to come from any animal. I didn't dare turn around to double check, though, for fear I would accidentally knock her down. On the other hand, if I knocked her down, she might learn to stay more than an inch away from me.

Mona blustered about the stump having weathered since the tree had been cut down.

Good excuse. She was the one who had suggested counting mostly invisible rings.

"I can tell you what kind of tree it was," Irv said. "Black walnut." He threw a challenging stare at Smythe.

Clutching at his back, one man straightened from his ring counting. "It was at least a hundred," he said.

I couldn't help a gasp. "What a pity, to cut down such an old tree!"

Smythe's cheeks became redder and his blue eyes watered. I immediately felt guilty for my outburst, and tried to tone it down. "I suppose trees die of old age, anyway, and the wood just rots away, so it's best to cut it down while it can still be used for firewood."

"Black walnut for firewood?" Irv's voice was full of scorn. "It's worth too much as fine lumber for furniture and such. No one would burn it up." Again, that wordless challenge aimed at Smythe.

I felt worse. Was selling lavender honey, plus a field of corn one year and soy the next, and maybe a few giant pumpkins, a reliable way of making a living? Maybe Smythe needed cash. If forced to choose between killing a tree or selling the farm to a stranger who might chop the trees down anyway, who wouldn't opt to save his farm?

Smythe twisted toward Haylee and cradled the tops of young shrubs between his work gloves. The shrubs had rooted themselves in a crumbling log. I was close enough to hear him murmur, "Forests regenerate themselves. Dead trees provide fertilizer for new plants."

The woman who had been with Irv at the roast beef dinner lifted a spray of bright pink and mauve plastic orchids to her nose as if enjoying their fragrance. Obviously, I didn't understand the finer details of nature hikes.

Hiding her face behind the artificial flowers, she drifted off the pathway, slipped between the lower branches of two massive pine trees, and disappeared.

Irv made an abrupt turn. Clenching his jaw and placing his feet carefully between twigs on the frozen ground, he dodged silently into the woods after her.

Edna and I looked at each other in dismay. Irv had been one of Mike's gang. We'd been focusing on Herb, but, like almost everyone on this hike, Irv could be a murderer.

30.

WITH UNNERVING STEALTH, IRV DISAPPEARED into the woods behind the woman with the plastic orchids. Whoever she was, she could be in danger.

Edna nudged me. We ducked under pine branches. Aunt Betty and Rhonda stayed with me like I had them on leashes.

In a clearing, Irv and the woman he'd pursued stood side by side, holding hands and gazing downward. Her garish pink orchids stuck out of a rotting log, an incongruous sight in February. A candle burned next to the log. Quietly, the rest of the hikers filed into the frozen glade. Irv raised his head and launched into another eulogy about what a fine man Mike had been.

Another memorial service? What had we gotten ourselves into?

I'd become good at understanding my friends' wordless communication. Haylee, Opal, Naomi, and Edna were as thrilled about being tricked into yet another service for Mike as I was.

"My wife and I thought we should include a little tribute to Mike as part of this morning's events," Irv intoned. "In Mike's woods."

I thought we were in Smythe's woods. Smythe had drawn grapes on the lower corner of his map-to indicate Mike's vineyard? I didn't want to make crinkling sounds, so I didn't haul my map out of my pocket to check. Haylee had directed me to a different part of Mike's farm in the dark, and we'd made several false turns. Suddenly, part of the geography south of Elderberry Bay fell into place for me. Mike's house had to be near the south boundary of his farm, or vineyard, as he'd preferred to call it, and these woods had to be on the north boundary.

Irv corroborated it. "Mike's woodlot was next to the vineyard where he toiled so many years, trying to make an honest living for himself. And now he has been mowed down." Irv glared at me. "Unmercifully, at a terribly young age."

My heart beat so loudly I was sure everyone could hear it. Had Mike's buddies conspired to bring the village's newcomers to this lonely spot in Mike's woodlot so they could exact revenge for his death? I tensed, ready to grab my friends and flee. I felt their resolve to do the same thing shimmer through the air between us.

Mike's buddies did come precariously close to slaying us.

With their singing.

The hymn's first verse dove catastrophically into a minor key. The second shattered into dissonant wails with no recognizable tune. Where was Dr. Wrinklesides when we needed him?

Giggles were hard to control. Not only because of the singing, but because of the array of outerwear in that clearing-Aunt Betty in her reprehensible snowmobile suit, Rhonda in that ratty parka, Haylee and her mothers in their perfectly handcrafted coats, Mona in her foxtrimmed parka, Irv in a navy blue jacket with the plastic tie that had once held the price tag still sticking out of a seam, his wife in cashmere, Jacoba and Luther in bulky down-filled coats, and last but not least, Smythe in his bright yellow parka and bee-stinger stocking cap.

Fortunately, no one seemed to remember the words to the third verse, and they pulled their scarves up over their mouths like a bunch of bandits trying to figure out which bank to rob.

Or who to chase through Mike's forest.

I edged backward. Edna did, too.

So did Rhonda and Aunt Betty.

Mona and Pete charged past us toward the trail. Most of the group followed, but Haylee and Smythe hung back. Without even the smallest signal passing between us, Edna and I waited.

Haylee bent over and blew out the candle. Standing, she gave Smythe a defiant look. "I wouldn't want a fire in Mike's woods to spread to yours."

He thanked her and gave her shoulders a squeeze. Seeing Edna and me watching like old-timey chaperones, Haylee blushed, though she had to understand that we were only guarding each other as we'd promised.

Throwing the pair a bland smile, I offered an excuse, mainly for Smythe's benefit. "We were going to put that candle out if Haylee didn't." The snuffed wax smell lingered like an unwanted memory. After a last glance at the shrine with its dismal fake orchids, I followed Haylee, Smythe, and Edna out of Mike's woodlot and into Smythe's. Mona waited impatiently, as if we couldn't find our way back to Smythe's house, even with him along.

Leading us along the wide trail, Mona made sporadic comments about flora and fauna. "In the spring," she announced, shaking her head ominously, "these woods will be full of songbirds."

Maybe by spring, someone could coax me to go on another nature hike. Maybe, but I sincerely doubted it.

Walking beside my loyal protector, Edna, I pictured the antique black walnut floors in my shop and in The Ironmonger, the buttons Mike must have crafted from thin walnut branches, and the carved treasure chest that the flood had left behind. Who was I to criticize someone else for wanting to enjoy the beauty of black walnut? I hadn't meant to criticize Smythe, and had probably hurt his feelings.

Edna pulled at my sleeve. Haylee and Smythe had gone ahead, out of view, and Opal and Naomi were trying to forge past Mona and Pete, who were very neatly blocking their path.

I stopped. Rhonda crashed into my back. Ignoring her shrill swearing, I grabbed a pine bough. "Mona," I called. "Can you tell what kind of tree this is?" It looked exactly like every other pine tree around us.

My ploy worked. Mona and Pete came shaking and nodding back to us, allowing Opal and Naomi to rush off after Haylee and Smythe. "How many needles in a cluster?" Mona asked.

With Aunt Betty wheezing alarmingly close to my shoulder, I took time counting to give Opal and Naomi a chance to catch up with Haylee.

"Five needles," Edna answered for me.

"W-H-I-T-E," Mona spelled, shaking her head. "Five letters and five needles. It's a white pine."

I thanked her, and she rushed to the head of the line again, at least to the head of the line that we could see. Opal, Naomi, Haylee, and Smythe had to be way out in front.

Edna and I stuck to Herb and Karen along the trail through the woods, across a corner of the field, through a natural windbreak of bushy evergreens, and into Smythe's farmyard. We passed his barn and outbuildings, all recently painted and very neat. Padlocked, too, maybe to keep the latest generation of teen gangs out.

Irv positioned himself beside the straggling line of hikers and collected Smythe's maps. With an innocent smile, I kept my map hidden in my pocket. I would find out when Smythe's birthday was and I'd embroider a version of his map on a fabric card for him.

Aunt Betty and Rhonda straggled behind. They may have decided they didn't have to continue playing detective. Or they couldn't keep up.

We climbed onto Smythe's screened porch. He opened a door, showing off a spotless, warm, and inviting kitchen. He'd taken off the yellow parka and bee-stinger cap, and had donned a yellow and black striped apron. Behind him Haylee, Opal, and Naomi wore aprons identical to his. They all looked extremely proud of themselves.

"Come on in, everybody," Smythe called. "Coffee's on, and we'll have toast and honey."

He had rushed ahead to prepare breakfast. Apparently, Haylee, Opal, and Naomi had volunteered to help.

I hesitated. Smythe's breakfast sounded delicious.

"Are you coming in?" Edna asked me.

I shoved my coat sleeve back to catch a glimpse of my watch. It was nearly eight. "I need to get back to take my dogs out again before I open the shop so the poor babies won't have to wait until noon. You stay."

She made a show of eyeing the black pickup trucks parked along both sides of the winding driveway. I got the message. Anyone could be hiding behind or in one of them. "I'll walk you to your car," she muttered.

I whispered, "And who will escort you back to Smythe's house? The others are inside helping him."

She raised her chin. "I'll be fine."

I suggested in a quiet mumble, "Just watch from here until I get to my car."

She agreed.

I ran down Smythe's porch steps and jogged past Jacoba and Luther, who were sitting in one of the black pickups with its engine running. I got into my car and negotiated the driveway's curves.