by E. M. Moore
Pepper didn’t die because someone held a grudge against her for being evil. She died from something much more sinister. I looked up at Jackson, his detective eyes still scanning the scene. I was sure he saw more than I did. I’d been in Pepper’s shop before though not in a long time. I saw what I always did. Her trinkets, her tourist traps, the smell of sage… She’d always had incense going. Other than the fact that she was strung up like a puppet in her front window that morning and the bit of mess here at the front desk by the cash register, nothing looked out of place. It was like the murder in the library. Nothing was out of place except for George Sanders’ dead body.
Now, in the middle of Pepper’s occult shop, she lay encased in a bodybag on a gurney, waiting to be taken to the morgue. There was a new special kind of evil in Salem right now and that evil was the unknown.
Chapter 3
I had to give it to the Salem police force. They had Pepper’s shop cleaned up and the barricades taken down all before noon when the tourists were out in full force, walking up and down the streets, glancing in the shops and browsing in the bookstores. Even Joe Foster was out today in his pirate costume offering to take pictures with the visitors. He was usually a big hit with the younger crowd.
I’d been talking with Scilla Longbottom for most of the afternoon. She also owned a store in town and was using her table at the sidewalk fair to sell her trinkets. Her specialty was making these beautiful witch hats. She was very crafty and made a fortune during the Halloween season. In October, everyone walked around town wearing one of these hats. They were just beautiful and exquisite with black lace and spiders dripping down the brim. She sold them in different colors, too. Red, green, purple… It wasn’t just a plain old witch hat, they were much more than that. The tourists loved them and paid an astronomical amount for them too. Ever since they became popular, the other stores had tried their hand at selling similar hats, but no one could duplicate Scilla’s.
The walking tours strolling by the shops this afternoon would have no idea anything bad happened just up the cobblestone street as long as they weren’t out this morning. The only thing I noted was a few frowns from people who wanted to go in the shop and couldn’t. They weren’t aware a dead body was just pulled down from the window. To them, it was just an inconvenience to have one of their favorite shops closed during their visit.
I watched as Joe took a picture with an entire family, a set of twin girls in the front, when Mrs. Clark came around them. A smile instantly lit my face. “Mrs. Clark, how are you?”
She scooted along with her walker. It was one of the ones that had wheels in the front and two tennis balls in the back, bright green so everyone could see her coming. She was a hoot to talk to, and one of the main reasons why we really needed to get the funds for the library elevator. Sure, she had mobility issues, but she also was highly opinionated. Something I was sure Ray and Teddy got an earful of this morning when they had a hard time printing her genealogy research. She loved doing genealogy research or any research at all for that matter. She knew more about the Salem witch trials than any historian I’d ever met. The thing was, all our research materials were on the third floor and because of her mobility issues, she couldn’t make it up there. I brought down materials she requested, but it wasn’t the same. Finally, Mrs. Clark pulled up to my table and leaned down to pet Max. “I’m doing good, dear. How are you?”
“I’m fine. Beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“Any day is a beautiful day if I’m vertical and not horizontal, honey.”
I stifled a laugh. I never knew how to act when Mrs. Clark said things like that. Did she mean to be funny or was she just being practical? Of course it was a good day when you were vertical.
Her eyes gleamed as she stared at me and then down my table to look at all the brochures. She picked up the brochure about the fundraising for the library elevator and smiled. “I do hope we get one soon, Maddie. I don’t know how much more of this I can take about staying on that ground floor. It’s so boring, and did you hear the copier wouldn’t work this morning?”
I laughed. I couldn’t help myself. It wasn’t just that the copier was only lacking toner, it was also the fact that she thought the first floor was boring and not the third floor was the exact opposite of almost every other library patron. “I’m trying. We’ve got about a quarter of the money raised, we just need to raise the other three quarters.”
One of her eyebrows raised, then she looked down at me. At that moment, she reminded me of Mrs. Adams. “Maddie, if I can still get around in this cobblestone street with this godforsaken walker, you can certainly raise enough money to get a new elevator in the library.”
My mouth dropped a little then I clamped it shut. She was right, of course. What was stopping me from getting all the money? I didn’t have ailments like her. No excuses. I’d always been one to feel as if I was bothering people, but this elevator was important. People should know about it. People should want to donate money, to fix what was broken in their public library. This was their library, too, not just mine or Mrs. Ward’s or even Mrs. Clark’s. It was everybody’s. The fact that we couldn’t get to the reference section on the third floor should affect everybody.
A lightbulb sparked to life in my head thanks to Mrs. Clark. My lips peeled away from each other and split into a grin. “Thank you, Mrs. Clark. I really needed that. Speaking of…” I crouched down and pulled out an old fashioned milk jug I’d brought with me just in case I felt brave enough to ask anyone for money. The sign said elevator donations. I plopped it on the table. “How much are you going to give today toward your elevator, Mrs. Clark?”
Mrs. Clark nodded and then went there… That place where no one over the age of fifty should go. “You go girl. That is how you get people to donate to a cause.” She searched through her purse which was in the little basket at the front of her walker. She pulled out a ten and dropped it in the top of the jug. “Now, you do that with everybody walking through here and you’ll have enough money for that elevator.”
Scilla, who had been watching the scene from next to us, smiled and whooped. “Way to go, Maddie. Get it!”
I searched the crowd as Mrs. Clark moved on to Scilla’s table to talk about her witch hats. I smiled at everybody who walked through. I’d always tended to be shy, but this was not the time for being shy, this was a time to stand up and fight for what was right. This was the time to show Mrs. Adams what I was made of. “Excuse me,” I said to a family who walked out of one of the nearby shops with five bags full of stuff. “The Salem Public Library’s elevator has been broken for a couple months. With our elderly patron base—”
“You watch it, girl,” Mrs. Clark said from the next table over. She pointed a gnarled finger at me, smiling the whole time. The family laughed.
I laughed too and then started again. “With our elderly patron base,” I continued, smirking at Mrs. Clark. “… we really need that elevator. Have you been into the library yet? It’s a beautiful building. You should come.” One of the young girls was carrying around their map of Salem. “May I see that?” She handed it over, and I showed them where they could find the library on the map. “You just keep going down this street just a little further and you’ll find it. Really, it’s beautiful. You won’t regret it.”
“Thank you,” the dad said. “But if you’re here, who’s there?”
“Trust me, I’ve left the library in capable hands. If you head there sometime today, any one of my employees would be happy to give you a tour of the place and tell you all about its history.”
As I spoke, the dad searched through his wallet, pulled out a twenty, and put it in my milk jug. I beamed up at him. “Thank you, Sir. We really appreciate it.”
“It’s good to see your enthusiasm for it, Miss Styles,” he said, reading my name tag. “We love our library back home. We’d be lost without it. I’m happy to give to any good cause.”
By this time, the youngest girl had wandered toward Scilla’s table
with those fancy hats. I knew they would drop twenty to thirty dollars a hat each, but even so, I was happy to have received the twenty-dollar bill from them. I could do this. I really could do this. Two weeks didn’t seem like such an impossibility anymore. I couldn’t wait to put how much money I made at the sidewalk fair into my spreadsheet when I got back to the library.
From that point forward, I bothered everybody who walked by my table. Some of them gave, some of them didn’t. Some of them gave just a couple bucks and one even gave fifty. These were people who weren’t even in Salem all the time, they weren’t even from here, but I guessed if you were on vacation, you were willing to spend money. I was missing out on a whole other market. I thought the only people who would give money were the residents of Salem, but I was wrong and I had Mrs. Clark to thank for it.
The crowd had started to thin. I looked down toward Pepper’s shop and noticed Rich, the gentleman I bought my security system from, go into her shop. Jackson held the door open for him. I hadn’t noticed any cameras in her shop before, but it made sense that she had them. Every shop around here should have cameras. It was rare that we saw crime, but it was instances like this when it was a good idea to be precautionary. Hopefully they would find something on the tapes.
I would have told Scilla what I’d just seen, but every attempt I’d made of trying to talk about Pepper with her hadn’t gone so well. It was possible Scilla was in the same class as Mel and Pepper, but I couldn’t remember. Instead, I kept my mouth shut. At about four o’clock, I started to pack away my things. By this time, most of the tourist families were ready to find dinner, or were at the museums, or getting ready to figure out which haunted tour they were doing that evening. The pedestrian traffic had greatly diminished. Plus, I couldn’t wait to go back to the library to show Mrs. Ward how much money I’d raised today. I was just folding my table when Rich came up behind me. “Hi, Maddie.”
I jumped and pinched my finger between the two halves of the table. I yelled, pulled my finger out, and waved my hand in the air as if that would diminish the pain.
“Sorry,” he said, frowning. “I saw you over here and I just thought I’d come say hi. I’ve been meaning to call you after I saw the comment from Detective Ward in the newspaper the other week about inadequate security in the library.”
He had to bring that up, didn’t he? It still boiled my blood. During the most recent murder investigation, Jackson had told a reporter that during the fundraiser function, we hadn’t had much security in the library. He still claims it was taken out of context. I wasn’t convinced. Whether he meant it to or not, it made the library look bad. I was grateful Mrs. Adams didn’t mention it in our meeting. “Yes, I saw that, too.”
“And that’s exactly how I pictured your reaction. Did you want to sit down and talk sometime about getting new cameras?”
The cameras weren’t the problem. It was the angle of the cameras that Jackson had alluded to in his statement. I shook my head. “The only new camera I want is in the new elevator when we can get the money for it.”
“I bet. It would’ve come in handy a couple weeks ago, huh? Even if you had a camera there, it doesn’t mean you would’ve got anything.” He stepped closer and lowered his voice. Pointing down the street, he said, “Pepper had security cameras, but whoever it was who killed her stopped the cameras from recording.”
I gasped. “You’re kidding. You didn’t get anything?”
He shook his head. “Not a thing. It’s obvious someone knew what they were doing. They even went back and erased it from the time they came in the door. The tape just cuts off and there’s nothing after that.”
I stared down the street. Jackson and Dezi were just coming out of the storefront engaged in what looked like a heated conversation. “That’s too bad,” I said, looking past Rich to them. “I know it would’ve made their lives much easier.”
“Poor Pepper,” Rich said. “She was always really nice. She was so kind when I came and installed her security system for her.”
“It’s definitely a shock.”
Rich turned toward me. “Had you spoken to her much?”
“Not in years,” I admitted. “Mel went to school with her so she knew her more than me. She happened to be down here this morning and saw the whole thing. I could see it affected her, but I still don’t think they talked as much as they used to.”
“Oh, I see,” he said, staring down at the sidewalk. “Well,” he forced a smile to his face. “I suppose I should get back to what I was doing before I had to look and see if I could catch a murderer. I would’ve liked to put that on my business card.”
I smiled warmly. “It could’ve opened up a whole new line of work for you.”
“No kidding. Let me know when you get that new elevator so we can talk about a camera in there. Take it easy, Maddie.”
“You too, Rich. Have a good day.”
With laptop bag in hand, he strode away. I picked up Maxie’s leash and stood with the table in my other hand. I caught a glimpse of the look Scilla gave Rich’s back. Ouch. If looks could kill… I had no idea what that was about and didn’t want to get involved. “Bye, Scilla. See you tomorrow?”
She shook her head as if to wake herself from a dream and forced a smile to her face. “I’ll be here. Same bat time, same bat place.”
Salem was full of characters that was for sure.
Chapter 4
When I got home, I went to work making the cupcakes.
I’d put off thinking about Derek until my key hit the lock. It was amazing what the mind could do. I liked to call it compartmentalizing. This morning, I’d told myself I’d have all evening to think about Derek. All evening to cry if I wanted, or smile at his memory. I’d just needed to get through the day.
Losing someone close to you when you’re so young is like ripping your own heart out of your chest. Every day gets a little better though, a little easier to stand. Every day, instead of the searing pain, gratitude starts to take over for having that person in your life instead of the bitter anger that consumed you prior to that. If I didn’t have gratitude, I’d just have the hole his removal from my life made.
I took the two cupcakes, frosted them, and then walked out of my apartment with Maxie right next to me. I didn’t leash him tonight. I never did on nights like this. He was a good dog. The best dog, really. He wouldn’t leave my side. That much I could count on.
It was warm still. Though the sun had gone down, its mark remained, allowing me close to the ocean without so much as a sweatshirt. The sky was beautiful in its hazy dark blue. The stars were full out and twinkling even though it wasn’t completely dark out yet. It was everything I could’ve hoped for Derek’s birthday.
Derek died when we were twenty-two. We’d been dating since high school. We dated all through college. Went through the ups and downs of being stupid teenagers to trying to figure our way through life as adults. For the longest time, he was my everything and when he was taken, there was a moment when I thought… Well, I thought, I could die too. I didn’t want to live in a world without Derek. What was there for me? However, with every star-filled sky, with every kiss Maxie slobbered on me, and every twinkle of sunshine on the ocean, I felt better. A new life was worth living even if it was without him. Every day got that much easier. It wasn’t as if I forgot him, but the memory of him didn’t hurt so much. It filled me up instead of tearing me down.
Jackson was already sitting on my rock wall when Maxie and I got there. He turned and Maxie charged forward, his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth. Jackson easily lifted him up and plopped him in his lap as Maxie went to work welcoming him with sloppy kisses. He shifted Maxie to the rock wall, and I sat on the other side of him, Maxie between us. I handed Jackson the cupcake wordlessly.
“Twenty-four today,” he said. His fingertips grazed mine as he took the chocolate cupcake with green frosting.
“Twenty-four. Can you imagine it? At twenty-four, would he still be stubborn and pigheaded?�
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“Not even age could rid Derek of that. He’d be ninety-four and still be stubborn as hell.”
I giggled into my cupcake. “I think you’re right. Nothing would’ve gotten it out of him. The police academy didn’t.”
“I think the academy made it worse.”
The moon’s reflection played in the ocean, the waves breaking on the shore fragmented a perfect scene. I’d always loved it here. Loved that when I opened a window in my apartment, I could hear the ocean. The crash of the waves was like honey to my soul. This was the reason why Derek and I had wanted to live near the wharf, so we could do things just like this. Stare out over the ocean, watch the moon, listen to the waves, and feel good about life.
“My mom wanted to come,” Jackson said.
I turned toward him. “Really? She could’ve. There’s no reason why not.”
“I don’t know… I think she kind of thought this was our thing, you know? Like maybe her coming would interfere or something. I’m not sure, Maddie. She’s a woman. She’s my mom, but she’s still a woman. I have no idea how her brain works.”
“Oh, come on. We’re not that difficult.” I pet Maxie’s head after he nudged me with his nose. “It’s probably because we’ve been doing this for the past two years alone. But really,” I said, looking at him in the dusk light. His profile reminding me not of my Derek, but of the same type of person Derek was. “She can come next year.”
“I’ll let her know.”
“She can talk to me about him, too, you know. She can ask me about Derek,” I told him, remembering the way his mother had wanted to say something to me earlier and then just didn’t. “Anyone can ask me about Derek if they want to. I don’t want people to walk on eggshells around me anymore. Mel was a little preoccupied today, but the past couple of days leading up to this, she kept calling and asking if I was okay. I knew why she was asking, but she wouldn’t come right out and say why. It was frustrating.”