by Jinty James
“My mother.” He noticed Maddie’s glance and gestured at the photo. “She’s a widow. I help her as much as I can.”
“Oh,” Maddie’s voice was soft. She didn’t know what else to say.
“So what can I do for you two?” Walt cleared his throat.
“We wanted to know when Maddie’s interview will be in the paper,” Suzanne began, “and also why you mentioned in your article in the Sunday newspaper that Dave Dantzler held one of our coffee cups in his hand.”
“That’s because he did.” Walt frowned. “I have a responsibility to report the news. This paper tries to cover everything that happens in the area, and Dave being found dead at the coffee festival was front-page news. My editor approved it.”
“Is that him?” Suzanne motioned to the older man they’d seen earlier – the one with the pencil stuck behind his ear.
“Yeah, that’s Arthur,” Walt replied. “And if you read the article, you’ll notice I didn’t mention that Dave had cappuccino foam dribbling from his lips that could have been from one of Maddie’s cappuccinos.”
“But it wasn’t,” Maddie felt compelled to inform him. “And ... thanks for not mentioning that bit in the paper.”
“Maddie’s been cleared by Detective Edgewater,” Suzanne told him. “It wasn’t her coffee that killed him.”
“Glad to hear it.” Walt gave them a small smile. He pressed a few buttons on the keyboard and a calendar appeared on the monitor. “As for your article, it should be in tomorrow’s paper. It would have appeared sooner, but my editor wanted to run with Dave’s death which is why the festival interviews were bumped.”
“Thanks,” Maddie replied.
“Do you know if the sheriff has a suspect yet?” Suzanne asked.
“Nope.” He looked at her with interest. “Why? Do you know something?”
“No,” Suzanne said regretfully. “But since Detective Edgewater had to consider Maddie a suspect until she was ruled out, we’ve taken an interest in the case. We were told an overdose of digoxin killed Dave.”
“Suzanne!” Maddie hissed. She didn’t know if they were allowed to disclose that information to anyone or not.
“Yeah, I heard about that,” Walt replied.
“How?” Suzanne asked eagerly.
He tapped his nose. “I have my sources.”
Would now be a good time to try the Tell the Truth spell on Walt? Suzanne looked as if she was about to ask him another question.
By now, Maddie knew the words by heart. Still, her fingers found the piece of paper in her purse, and kept in contact with it as she silently recited the words. “Show me,” she whispered, hoping Walt wouldn’t hear her.
“Did you see anyone by the judging tent just before I was announced as the winner?” Maddie asked.
“No.” He shook his head. “But, there was a scandal about the judge, Edward Grenville, a while ago.”
“Really?” Suzanne leaned in.
“Dave interviewed him on his show – I think it was last year,” Walt told them. “He accused the judge of taking bribes at other coffee making competitions, including one of the big Seattle competitions – like the one you’re going to compete in next month, Maddie.” Walt glanced at her.
Maddie had listened intently to Walt, but didn’t feel anything at all. Not the deep-down certainty that he was telling the truth in answer to her question. She frowned. Did that mean the spell wasn’t working?
“What?” Suzanne stared at the reporter.
“Yep.” He nodded. “It did major damage to the judge’s reputation.” He chuckled mirthlessly. “And the allegations were untrue. There had been accusations about this judge, Grenville, which turned out to be total fabrications, and it had all gone down before Dave interviewed him on his show. He was just raking up an old scandal, and didn’t allow Grenville to correct him. Just cut him off when he tried.” Walt shrugged. “So although I didn’t see anyone near the judging tent at the time of the murder, I would say the judge had a good reason to want Dave dead.”
“How do you know all this?” Maddie asked.
“The judge came to us after the radio show last year and asked us to print the truth,” he replied. “Which we did. But by that time the damage was done. Why do you think a judge of Edward Grenville’s caliber was at the coffee festival? It might have been good business for Estherville, but it’s not in the same league as the big Seattle competition next month.”
Maddie nodded, wondering once again if she would be out of her depth in Seattle.
But she still didn’t know if Walt was telling the truth or not. Did that mean she was now unable to cast this particular spell? Or maybe – maybe she wasn’t a witch at all. Maybe the full moon last night had taken away her powers to do spells.
But if that was true, then why had she been compelled to write down the Escape your Enemy spell? That was the only spell in Wytchcraft for the Chosen last night that had leaped out at her. Would she be able to cast that new spell? Maddie hoped she’d never be in the unfortunate situation to find out!
Suzanne looked at Maddie, as if expecting her to ask another question. But how could she, when she was unsure if the Tell the Truth spell was even working?
“Well ... thanks,” Maddie finally said, shooting Suzanne a defeated look.
“Um ... yeah.” Suzanne rose. “We’ll definitely buy the newspaper tomorrow and check out Maddie’s interview.”
“You won’t be disappointed.” Walt smiled.
As soon as they left the office, Suzanne stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and turned to Maddie.
“What happened in there?”
Maddie looked around but there were only a couple of people on the opposite side of the street. Still, she didn’t want to take any chances.
“Not here,” she murmured, striding to the town square. “I’ll tell you when we’re inside the truck.”
A few minutes later they were inside Brewed from the Bean. Luckily – or unluckily – there weren’t any customers waiting for them to reopen. Maddie made sure the serving window was locked before she spoke.
“I don’t think the Tell the Truth spell worked.”
“What?” Suzanne stared at her with wide eyes.
“I didn’t feel anything.” Maddie shrugged in frustration. “I couldn’t discern whether he was telling the truth or lying.”
“Maybe he was lying,” Suzanne suggested. “The other two people you’ve tried it on turned out to be telling the truth and you said that somehow deep down you could tell.”
“Yeah,” Maddie said glumly. “But today I didn’t get that feeling of certainty. And if he was lying, wouldn’t I also get the same kind of feeling?”
“You’re the witch, not me.” Suzanne’s face was a mask of disappointment.
“Not much of one.” Maddie’s shoulders slumped.
Suzanne patted her on the back. “You’re learning, that’s all. Maybe the full moon last night made things go a bit wonky.”
“That’s one way of describing it.”
“Hey!” Suzanne snapped her fingers. “Maybe there’s something in the book about this spell that we’ve missed.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know.” Suzanne shrugged. “Something about the way you have to cast it – are you sure you did it right?”
“I cast it the same way I did on Tuesday at Bob’s coffee shop.”
“Oh.” Suzanne’s brow was furrowed in thought. “Perhaps there’s something we missed in the book about the full moon,” she eventually suggested. “Or this particular spell. We should go back to your place right now and find out!”
Maddie looked at her watch. “It’s three o’clock. We don’t usually close until four.”
Suzanne unlocked the serving hatch and peeked out at the town square.
“And there isn’t anyone here demanding a cup of coffee either. So now is the perfect time to get some witchy stuff done.”
“What about the health balls?” Maddie pointed out. �
�I thought you wanted to make some more this afternoon.”
“Darn. I guess we could buy the ingredients on the way back to your house, then ask Trixie to show us the info in the book we’ve missed about either the Tell the Truth spell or the full moon. Or both!”
“You think Trixie will know?” Maddie asked.
“I think she knows more than us,” Suzanne said.
“True.” Maddie nodded. “I just wish she could speak English sometimes. Then we would know everything she knows or senses about the book.”
“Maybe there’s a spell in there about that.” Suzanne’s eyes lit up. “Or one that can make you understand cat!”
CHAPTER 13
They went to the small grocery store just off the town square to stock up on ingredients for the health balls, then drove the truck back to Maddie’s house. Maddie felt a little guilty for closing up early, but Suzanne had been right – there weren’t any customers.
“Tell me again why we’re still investigating now that I’ve – we’ve – been cleared,” Maddie said as she pulled up outside her house.
“We still haven’t got all our customers back,” Suzanne replied, as if their customers were missing sheep that needed to be rounded up and brought back to them. “So maybe all of them haven’t heard yet that you’re – we’re – totally innocent. If we can help Detective Edgewater catch the murderer, we can ask Walt to write a story about our involvement and how we were totally innocent in the first place. Word will get out, and our missing regulars will come back, feeling guilty that they doubted us in the first place, and maybe even buy extra large drinks or more health balls to try and make it up to us in a customer sort of way.”
“That makes sense ... I guess.” Maddie knew it did in Suzanne logic.
“I wonder if your radio interview will still go ahead?” Suzanne mused as they walked up to the house. “Will they get a replacement host for the show? Or will they axe it?”
“That’s a good idea,” Maddie said as she opened the front door. Trixie scampered down the hall to greet them. “Maybe this has nothing to do with coffee at all. Maybe it’s got to do with the radio station. With Dave out of the way, who would benefit from his death?”
Maddie and Suzanne stared at each other as they realized they might have been looking at things all wrong.
SUZANNE WAS A HOTBED of impatience at the thought that perhaps someone at the radio station was the killer.
“But we still haven’t spoken to the judge,” Maddie reasoned with her. “Or checked Wytchcraft for the Chosen to find out why the Tell the Truth spell didn’t work this afternoon.”
“You’re right.” Suzanne shot her a rueful smile. “But what if the murderer really is someone from the radio station?”
“Do you think Detective Edgewater is covering that angle?” Maddie asked.
“Probably.” Suzanne looked downcast for a second.
“Catching killers is what he’s paid to do,” Maddie pointed out. By this stage they were in the living room, sitting on the smoky blue sofa with Trixie and Wytchcraft for the Chosen.
“Yes, but don’t forget we also discovered who murdered Joan, our customer, last month,” Suzanne said, her ponytail bobbing.
“Mrrow.” Trixie delicately placed a paw on the ancient tome. She sat on Maddie’s lap, while Suzanne sat on the other side of the magical book.
“Okay, Trix.” Maddie stroked the cat. “We’ll look at the book now.”
“Good idea.” Suzanne smiled at Maddie and the feline. “Why didn’t the Tell the Truth spell work, Trixie?”
Trixie blinked at Suzanne, then stared at the book. Maddie opened the front cover of Wytchcraft for the Chosen, carefully paging through the crumbling book.
“Maybe we should look at the page the truth spell is on,” she suggested as she finally reached that section. None of the other spells had tugged at her as she’d glanced at them.
“How to discover if someone is telling the truth,” she read out.
Trixie’s ears pricked up. Maddie scanned the page, but couldn’t find anything that explained why she hadn’t been able to make the spell work that day.
“I can’t see anything different on this page.” She pushed the book over to Suzanne.
Suzanne studied the page, eventually giving it back to Maddie and Trixie. “Me neither.”
“Mrrow!” Trixie’s paw hovered over the bottom of the page, where it was blank.
“What is it, Trix?” Maddie frowned. “There’s no writing here.”
“Mrrow.” Trixie frowned up at Maddie, as if she was missing something obvious.
“Can you sense anything?” Suzanne asked.
“No.” Maddie crinkled her brow. “Nothing feels different to me.”
“Obviously Trixie thinks there’s something there that we’ve missed.”
“Mrrow.” Trixie looked at Suzanne approvingly.
“Mmm.” Maddie slowly read through every word of the spell again. There was no addendum, no special instructions anywhere on the page. So why was her cat insisting there was something there?
Unless ...
“Invisible ink.”
“What?” Suzanne raised her eyebrows.
“Maybe there’s invisible ink here.” Maddie touched the blank part of the page.
“Ooh!” Suzanne jumped up. “Awesome! So what do we do to make it visible? Is there a spell in there you can do?”
“I don’t think so.” Maddie cast her mind back, trying to remember every spell in the book. Since she’d gone through the book hundreds of times since she was seven, she had a pretty good idea of what was in there, but sometimes she’d notice a spell that she didn’t remember.
“Let’s do an online search!” Suzanne dug her phone out of her purse and tapped some buttons. “It says to use an incandescent bulb to reveal the writing. Or a hot stove.”
“Maybe trying a light bulb would be safer.” Maddie rose, picking up the book. “Come on. We can try my bedside lamp.”
They trooped down the hall to Maddie’s bedroom. She turned on the small lavender colored lamp – luckily she had an old-fashioned light bulb in it - then held up the book.
“Suze, can you hold the other side of the book?” The book was old – and heavy.
“Sure.”
The lightbulb shone on the page, revealing spidery white writing on the fly-spotted page.
“It’s working!” Suzanne was in danger of dropping the book with her excited jump.
“This spell can only be used once per full moon,” Maddie read slowly.
“Does it say anything else?” Suzanne frowned.
Maddie squinted and angled the book under the light so all the bottom of the page was illuminated. “Yes – this spell cannot be used on the day after the full moon.” She stared at Suzanne.
“That’s why it didn’t work on Walt!” Suzanne’s eyes widened.
“I wonder why that note was hidden, though,” Maddie mused, placing the heavy book on the bed.
“Yep, that’s weird.” Suzanne nodded, her ponytail swishing. “But Trixie knew, didn’t you?” she smiled at the cat.
“Mrrow.” The feline looked pleased at the praise.
“You’re so clever, Trix.” Maddie bent and patted the Persian. “I just wish we knew why that information was invisible. Did the person who wrote the book want people to fail using the Tell the Truth spell?”
“Ooh, maybe they didn’t want that spell to fall into the wrong hands!” Suzanne’s face was alive with excitement. “What if they were worried their enemy was going to steal the book, so they wrote that information about the spell in invisible ink, so their enemy would be at a disadvantage if they tried it more than once per full moon – or the day after the full moon, like you did?”
“Maybe,” Maddie said thoughtfully. Then she sighed. “I guess we’ll never know.”
“I wonder if any of the other spells have invisible ink addendums,” Suzanne said.
“I guess every time I want to try a spell,
I’ll have to come in here and check the page with my bedside lamp.”
“We better test the Escape your Enemy spell right now!” Suzanne picked up the book.
“You’re right.” Maddie paged through the book until she found the spell, then she and Suzanne held the book up to the light, but no invisible writing appeared on the page.
“Nothing.” Maddie blew out a sigh.
“You’re right.” Suzanne’s tone held a note of disappointment.
“Broomf,” Trixie joined in.
“So,” Suzanne’s tone brightened slightly, “I guess this means you can cast the Escape your Enemy spell anytime you want!” She giggled. “You could try it out the next time you run into Claudine.”
“You mean when she runs into me. She’s the one always coming over to the coffee truck.”
“You’re right.” Suzanne furrowed her brow. “I just wish she’d stop.”
“Me too.”
“What if there’s a spell in there you can use to make that happen?”
Why hadn’t Maddie thought of that?
“Good idea. But I think I’ll wait until after the killer is caught. Then I’ll – we’ll – have plenty of time to look for that kind of spell.” Maddie couldn’t immediately think of a spell that would discourage Claudine from coming over to Brewed from the Bean and annoying them.
“You’re right,” Suzanne agreed. “We shouldn’t get too distracted. After all, we’ve got a killer to catch!”
CHAPTER 14
On Friday morning between serving customers, Maddie and Suzanne discussed what they should do next as they looked through the newspaper. They’d bought it early, and now they finally had time to read Maddie’s interview.
“There it is.” Suzanne tapped the page. There was a double spread with photos of the contestants from the coffee festival – Claudine was featured, too.
“You sound really good,” Suzanne remarked as she read the article.