That’s good,” I said. “Because Saturday is the pie competition. You need to be here to cheer Muriel on to victory.”
Muriel Slattery, who ran the local diner, was a frequent medalist in the pie competition. I wasn’t sure if it was only Muriel’s pies that had inspired Denton to relocate to Caerphilly or if he also had designs on Muriel herself, but either way, mentioning her and her pies would ensure his attendance.
“So you just called to remind me to come to the fair?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “Actually I wanted to see if something is doable before I try to talk Randall into hiring you to do it.” I explained about the chicken thefts, and the winemakers’ theory that Genette was hiding the stolen animals on some property other than her vineyard.
“It’s doable,” he said. “Assuming there’s anything to find, how long it takes depends on how smart she’s been about hiding her ownership. Let me do a little poking around pro bono. If she’s stupid, I could find it with a couple of hours of checking online. If she’s smart, or has smart lawyers, it could be more trouble than it’s worth. Or at least more than I want to do pro bono and more than the county would want to pay for. But we can cross that bridge when we come to it.”
“I appreciate it,” I said. “And so will Randall when I tell him.”
After I hung up I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes. Just for a second. Would it really hurt if I took just a small nap? Or stole away to the llama booth to see what Michael and the boys were up to? Maybe I could collect the boys and we could all have a nap. Nothing like a nap to improve a person’s mood, regardless of age.
My cell phone rang. The front gate needed more change.
Another call. The portapotties were getting low on toilet paper. A reporter from Richmond wanted a press pass. A farmer from Jetersville wanted to know if he was too late to enter his cattle in the competition. Another farmer from Vesuvius wanted directions to the fairgrounds. One of the pickle judges had indigestion and needed an antacid. Someone’s prize sow had gone missing from the pig barn, which caused quite a bit of alarm until she turned up in the rodeo ring, where the high school kid who had raised her was about to compete in the teen calf-roping contest.
“Thank goodness we found her,” I said, as I watched the pig being led to safety.
“I wasn’t too worried,” the pig barn volunteer said. “She’s only a Chester White. A prize-winning Chester White, of course, but it’s a common breed, so I didn’t think it could be part of the rash of thefts of heritage breeds.”
“It’s not a rash. Not here at the fair. Two bantams does not make a rash.”
“I didn’t mean it that way.” He had started backing away.
“Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. It’s just that we’re a little sensitive about people thinking this is a fair problem. I’ve heard of several other people who have lost heritage animals from their own farms, long before we even thought of holding our fair.”
“True,” he said. “Been happening a lot over the last couple of years.”
“So it’s a problem that followed the heritage breeds to the fair,” I said. “I wish we’d known in advance they were such big theft risks, but now that we do know, we’ve tightened security. We’re determined that we won’t lose any more animals, and we’ll do our best to solve the theft of those two bantams.”
The volunteer nodded, but he was frowning, and visibly thinking hard about something.
“You know,” he said finally. “You say you wish you’d known they were a theft risk? I don’t think most of us knew that until we got here and began comparing notes. I’ve been raising Tamworths for ten years now, and not long ago I started running a few Mulefoots. Most of us—heritage pig breeders, I mean—we’re not trying to keep them to ourselves. We want the breeds to come back strong. We get excited if someone we know is a solid pig man—or woman—wants to buy some piglets and start raising our breed. Bigger gene pool’s gonna benefit all of us. Someone wants to get started, we do our best to help them. Theft wasn’t the big problem. Getting people to take us seriously was. But since I’ve been here I’ve been talking to people. Not just Tamworth and Mulefoot people or even Red Wattles and Gloucestershire Old Spot people, but cow and sheep and goat and poultry people. I don’t think I’ve ever talked to so many heritage breed people at one time, and we’re all realizing that theft’s getting to be a much bigger problem for all of us.”