Chapter Fifteen

Wilma could feel the tension in the air as soon as she set her bags down on the kitchen counter and hung her keys on the key rack by the door.  She searched the kitchen with her faded blue eyes, but could see nothing that looked amiss.

It was late afternoon and only two days before Nick would go into retreat.  She didn’t expect to see him outside doing heavy labor, but he hadn’t finished all of the planting of the garden.  It was possible she’d find him sowing the last rows of seeds.  Something wasn’t right, and she needed to know what it could be.  Nick would tell her.

Stepping onto the back porch, she shaded her eyes to help her better see into the immense garden. It produced far more vegetables than they could ever think of using over the course of the year, but it wasn’t planted just for the household use.  Long ago, the aunts made the decision to donate at least half of their crop each year -no matter the