CHAPTER FIVE

Candy and her team transported into a barn that was full of tobacco. She quickly checked her time indicator. It was the right time and right place. Kentucky, U.S.A. 1925.They engaged their interrupter shields to try to keep the time stream from showing a transport had been made. Candy did not realize how hard it would hit her being in a similar time that she had been rescued. This momentary distraction caused him to delay giving her first set of instructions. She had just completed them when they heard the barn doors squeak open. They all ducked behind nearby bales of hay.

Peeking around the hay, Candy saw a young boy wearing nothing but a worn pair of overalls and a torn straw hat. He appeared to be sort of inspecting the tobacco hanging near the door. He had not gone far before they all heard a gruff voice calling.

"Wayne? Wayne, where are you boy?"

"I'm coming Mr. Lancaster," the boy called out.

He quickly went out of the barn, slamming the old doors shut with a bang.

Candy motioned for her team to resume their set up. She went to the door and after seeing no one around she slipped out. She rounded the corner of the barn and practically fell over Wayne who was sitting on the ground up against the barn,

"Whoa...are you alright?" Candy asked trying not to fall.

"Who are you?" Wayne asked in a surprised tone.

"I am Connie Jones, who are you?" Candy asked politely.

"I'm Wayne Topps."

"You are dressed awful fancy, what are you doing out here?"

Candy was not prepared to answer a lot of questions, especially from a seven or eight-year-old boy. Thankfully, Wayne answered his own question.

"I bet you're a lady reporter. I have seen a couple in town, and they all dress real fancy," Wayne said with a smile.

Candy smiled back.

"My, my Wayne Topps, you are a bright young boy." Candy gave him another smile and knelt to speak again.

"Tell me Wayne, will you take me to Mr. Lancaster?"

"Oh, yes ma'am!"

Wayne jumped up, grabbed Candy's hand, and tugged her around the barn and led her towards the large front porch that wrapped around the large southern home. There sitting in one of the three rocking chairs was a gray-haired southern gentleman in a white shirt and clean gray overalls.

"Wayne, what kind of stray animal are you bringing me this time?" The man yelled.

"Taint no stray sir, it be a lady reporter." Wayne said enthusiastically.

"Just as bad," Mr. Lancaster said softly, as he put down his pipe and slowly stood

up.

"I am sure Miss lady reporter can find her way up here. You get back to your chores." Mr. Lancaster said, and waved him off.

"Yes sir," he said and slowly let go of Candy's hand and mopped off.

"Thank you, Wayne, you have been quite the gentleman," Candy called to him sweetly.

This perked him up and he waved goodbye to her. When she got to the steps, Mr. Lancaster held up his hand.

"That is close enough. What do you nosey press people want this time? Just because they send a gussied-up lady reporter, it doesn't mean I am going to tell you any more than what I have told the fellers before you."

"Could I please come sit down?" Candy asked a friendly but firm tone.

"Would it matter if I said no?" He asked as he stared at Candy

She returned the stare.

"No, I guess not; come sit," he mumbled.

He went back and sat himself. After picking his pipe back up he started rocking.

"I will tell you the same thing that I have told all your partners, I don't care what anyone else says, I am right about this matter and no one has the right to say I am not!"

"And what supposedly are you right about?"

Mr. Lancaster stood up suddenly and pointed his finger at Candy.

"Even if you are not from these here parts, I doubt your idiot editor did not send you here to ask me about the weather, so cut out the dumb act.

"Mr. Lancaster, you may be hard of hearing, but I am not. So, I would appreciate it if you put that finger back where it belongs and lower your voice."

"Look here miss manners, this is my porch, sitting on my land, so I will yell if I darn well, please! Especially when it comes to this subject."

Candy stood up.

"You are right sir, it is your farm, your land, and your porch, at least for now. However, if you want me to write your side of the story, you will have to control yourself." She gave him a cold hard stare.

Mr. Lancaster raised his eyebrows, slowly lowered his hand, and shook his head slightly. He slowly sat back down in his chair, lit his pipe, and started to rock.

"Look here miss, miss..."

"Connie Jones."

"Jones?

You ain't related to that swindler of a banker R.T. Jones, are you?" Mr. Lancaster asked in a tone of discuss.

"No sir, all my folks are paper people," Candy answered quickly.

"Well Miss Jones, I will tell you right now that I don't like, or trust bankers, sheriff's, preachers, or reporters. I have not known any women since my Lucy died ten years ago, but the ones I knew then were shady. So, if in your thinking of having me believe that you are on my side, you might as well forget it!"

"Well Mr. Lancaster, let me tell you something. I am the youngest of eight, all brothers, and as I said all paper people. I do not take nothin off, politicians, lawman. businessmen, editors, or grumpy old farmers. I write what is truth and fact. If anyone doesn't like that they can just stuff it in their pipe and smoke it!" Candy stated firmly.

Mr. Lancaster about fell out of his chair with laughter.

"If I believed in reincarnation, I swear that Georgette Lancaster had come back from the dead." He paused a moment.

"Okay Missy, you have earned ten minutes. Remember, I get the suspension you are fishing for something that isn't there, and I'll give you the boot."

"Fair enough, and if I feel you are holding back, I will keep digging for the worm,"

Mr. Lancaster laughed again.

"Seven older brothers? Yeah, I say this should be an interesting interview."

"Now Mr. Lancaster, enough has been written about other opinions, my readers want to hear both sides of the story."

"Both sides? I will do you one better." He stood up and grabbed a nearby cane, then

called out.

"Wayne, Wayne, where are you boy?"

Wayne came running from the barn,

"Here I am sir."

"Fetch old Rupert and hook him up to the wagon and bring them here."

"Yes sir, Wayne said with a big smile and a wink to Candy.

"You wanted truth, let me show you a few things, miss power of the truth, and see what you think truth is." He said as he slowly made his way down the porch steps. It was not until she saw how he struggled to get down the steps that she realized how immobile his left leg was.

"Staring at me ain't gonna heal my leg or make me move any faster. This bum leg ain't due to old age or an old war injury. It is another part of your truthful story that you wanted to write. However, that part will come later." He told her as he had Wayne help him into the wagon.

"To the platform." Mr. Lancaster instructed Wayne.

"Climb to the top and tell me what you see." Mr. Lancaster told Candy when they arrived at the three-story old, weathered fire tower.

Candy not wanting to show the fear that was ramping up in her as she climbed the handmade wooden steps that most were missing a nail or two, called out to him,

"Are you sure this thing is safe?"

"If I wanted you dead, you never would have made it to my porch, now hurry up there and tell me what you see."

"Tobacco fields," she yelled down to him.

"For how far? "

She slipped out a proxcimiter and checked it. After she carefully slipped back into her pocket, she waited a few more seconds before answering.

"I would guess about two hundred yards in any direction."

"That means it has shrunk another two hundred feet or so. Miss Jones, less than three weeks ago as far as the eye could see there was nothing but healthy thriving tobacco plants."

Candy took several scams of the area before she climbed down.

"Others say it is a blight." Candy stated.

"That is what those that don't understand real farm life would like everyone to believe.

"Wayne, Miss Jones her thinks it might have been a blight that is killing my crops."

"I said that is what others have said." Candy corrected.

"Miss Jones, all farmers know that blight, locus and everything in between is a

killer that takes down all fields completely. This, whatever this is takes only

a little at a time in a fixed pattern." Wayne explained.

See there Miss Jones, even young sprouts know more than those in power. Of course,

young spouts don't have their pockets lined with the tobacco associations cash."

"Mr. Lancaster, are you suggesting some sort of arson?"

"Oh no Miss Jones, arson would be much too easy to prove. No this is something new. One thing for sure is that the only farms suffering from this ...whatever this is attacks only the small farms that have refused to sell out to the tobacco association. So, no investigations, everything simply goes down as a localized blight. Farms go bankrupt, the association picks up the farm for next to nothing, then miracle of miracles, the farms make an amazing recovery."

Mr. Lancaster had Wayne drive them out to the edge where the dead crops met the healthy ones. He and Wayne went into long explanation of how blights work and spread. They also explained how infected crops are destroyed and how it effects the nearby healthy plants. Then let her know that none of that was evident in this case.

"Next week I will get another buyout offer, which I will refuse. Within another week, another "blight" will wipe out another portion of my healthy plants before they can be harvested. That will continue until I have no choice but to sell. It has happened to thirteen other small farms within the last two years."

"I don't recall reading any of that in the papers." Candy stated.

Mr. Lancaster shook his head.

"I don't know what kind of people your brothers worked for Miss. Jones, but freedom of the press is not something that is practiced in this area, I have the feeling that if you do find out what is going on, you will not be allowed, or alive to print it."

"Don't worry about me Mr. Lancaster, when I find a story, it makes it to print!"

Candy got Wayne to take her to a hotel in town where her team had transferred to set up.

"I don't know what the Jesters are up to, but it looks like they have moved into more serious territory." She stated as she entered the room.