by Judith Mehl
“I found nothing amiss,” she told him, discouraged. By the time the shop opened she was calling him Fulton and she’d insisted he call her Fanny. Fulton promised he’d still take her to lunch to discuss future plans, then left. He needed a few hours to regroup. The break-in brought concern to the fore, however, and a plainclothesman was assigned to watch the store whenever Detective Hill couldn’t be there.
Lunch time came all too soon. Too many questions remained unanswered, but the detective appeared right on time to walk Fanny to the natural food cafe on the corner.
In the guise of friendly interviewing, Fulton elicited Fanny’s background. Apparently she held impeccable credentials, and he’d check each one. She’d graduated from Smith College, worked her way up and served as an executive in a manufacturing chain before chucking it all and “going back to the earth,” as she called it. He rethought the whole concept, seeing as she looked 18 instead of 30. Next time he wandered the shop aisles, he’d look for the bottle labeled “Fountain of Youth.”
To keep his mind on the case, Fulton brought up some of the possible suspects provided by Agatha and Kat. He asked Fanny about the lady who was irate about her disastrous hair—the one who claimed it was the store’s coloring product that caused her problem.
Fanny said, “A few weeks ago she’d come around to complain, and it escalated into screaming as she described what she used. She threatened to sue. She wore a hat. Her hair peeked out at different lengths.”
Fulton’s brows met in the middle, a question evident in his eyes. “From hair dye?”
“Yes, it can happen. Hers looked like a bad dye job, or worse, the hair cut from hell, leaving her as if stranded in a wind tunnel.”
Their orders came and when the friendly waitress left, Fulton motioned with his hand for her to go on and explain how that fit with hair dye.
“Many people want to change their hair color in efforts to look younger, or just different. Gloria. That was her name. Gloria Kessel—and it does mean ‘gloria,’ was like that.”
Fulton felt absolutely lost, finding nothing so far that made sense. He kept eating in hopes that something would fall into place and he’d see her as a demon suspect. One could only hope.
Fanny continued. “Her friends tied her to the Gloria in George Bernard Shaw’s play, ‘You Never Can Tell.’ You know, where Gloria claims to be a modern woman with supposedly no interest in love or marriage?”
Fulton just stared at her.
She finished eating the rest of her sprout sandwich and explained. “How could she live up to the name Gloria with her mousy brown hair? She’s overweight, in her fifties, and shrinks from poverty. Looking for a husband late in life. I mean she tried dying it reddish brown and it failed—turning it into a carrot with brown and green caps. That’s when she came to the Bittersweet Herbs Shop. She’d heard we sell only organic products.”
Fulton forced himself to turn away from the original picture of Gloria in his mind with black scraggly hair to a literal carrot-top.
“So if you sell only organic, healthy products, what happened?”
“I understood, and wanted to help, but it can get complicated. We discussed the dyes and their problems. Chemical hair dyes can be hazardous to your health. You also have to be careful of hair dyes that say ‘natural’ because they even contain hazardous chemicals such as resorcinol, ammonia or. . . Okay, I see your eyes glazing over already.”
“No, that’s all right. Just skip to the good part.”
“Gloria decided to cover it all with an organic dye of black walnut powder found at our shop. Black walnut powder is a potent natural hair dyes which can have calamitous results if you have recently used chemical hair dye. I warned her to wait six months before trying it.”
“Okay. She didn’t wait. So she was angry when it turned out bad.”
Fanny nodded, “Once I talk with her and remind her of our conversation, maybe try to help her smooth things out, I’m sure. . . .”
Fulton set down his half-finished hamburger. “Let’s stop right there. This lady is a murder suspect. You stay away from her until we clear her from the list.” He stared directly at her until she mumbled what sounded like agreement. “You claimed no knowledge of any of the other suspects. Did you know Professor Peterbolt? Or use his soap?”
“I wasn’t there when Professor Peterbolt’s soap was pulled from the shelf. Wait a minute. Are you implying I need to use a soap called ‘Skin Blaster’?”
“Uh-oh. I’m in deep now and better hide the shovel.” Fulton reached for his burger and started chewing. “Your skin is beautiful. I didn’t know that was the name of his product. I just wondered if you used some of the herbal stuff in the store. I don’t know much about it all.”
She smiled.
He stuffed some fries in his mouth. Fulton didn’t know why she smiled, but was afraid he’d find out soon enough.
Fanny sipped some of her spritzer with glee. “I think I’d rather my skin look beautiful than blasted.”
With a sheepish look, Fulton fumbled through his pocket for his wallet. Should he say thank you? Maybe he’d better just pay and deal with it all later. He had the feeling there was more going on than sandpaper skin.
Fulton placed money on the table to cover the check and rose, smiling at Fanny once again.
He’d convinced her to let him pay by mentioning his expense account. What he didn’t say was that he was paying for their lunch himself. In reality, he invited her today out of personal desire to spend some time with her and had to stretch his mind a little to even think up some more questions for her so she’d believe him.
Thus are the beginnings of deceptions, he thought.
Later he dropped her off at the shop and found a parking place in the long-term lot nearby so he could investigate the other businesses in the area. An antique store, a boutique, and a photography studio lined up and down the street, quaint and innocent looking. The owners were interviewed briefly after Rosalin died. Now that the shop was broken into they should be checked again. He was designated the lead on the break in. He called the officer who questioned them before.
“Tom, I’m near the Bittersweet Herb Shop. It was broken into last night. We are reinvestigating what’s going on around here. Any tips on who to talk with?”
Tom’s report was short. Nobody saw anything bad happening around the shop. No druggies, no bums.
As Fulton returned to the shop he told Tom, “Let me come up with some modified questions and you can try again.”
He roamed the aisles of herbs a little longer, hoping to find someone lurking there who didn’t belong. Most of the employees knew him by now so the subterfuge wasn’t for their sake. Fanny approached him as if he were a customer and said, “May I help you find something?”
He just smiled and said, “Yes, I wondered where you kept the Fountain of Youth.”
She responded with a glowing smile and raised eyebrows.
As he worked the room, he studied the nooks and crannies, seeking anything from a bomb tucked in among the plants, to a clue as to why someone wanted to harm these women. And there was no bottle marked “Fountain of Youth.” He’d have to ask Fanny outright if he wanted to know about her rosy bloom.
Her hours at the store impressed him, not for their quantity, but their quality, as she dealt with each customer. She exuded exuberant energy, flitting from one task to the next like a happy bee.
The new assistant, Rita Mae Dobbs, sat most often in the back office doing paperwork. He’d see her bring sales invoices to Fanny, ask some questions, and return to the back. Once in a while, she’d stroll the aisles, count a product, then return to the office. While in the shop, she lingered, listening to customers as they chatted among themselves. She’d nod discreetly and continue on.
He became an avid herb connoisseur, hoping his numerous hours in the store looked less like the surveillance he was performing and more like a smitten neophyte.
The scents surprised and pleased him. They didn’t overpower and h
e spent some time determining the source. The herbal wreaths hanging on the walls and lining one cork board display contributed the most to the cornucopia of fragrances, some tangy, some a sweet perfume, all pleasant.
He actually recognized the minty fresh aroma of the eucalyptus leaves on some of the wreaths, reminding him of long ago days when his mom hung a similar wreath on her door. He continued to watch Fanny and the other store occupants while opening a bottle now and then and sniffing. A display of hand lotions intrigued him, considering the sign that encouraged customers to try the sample ones. The freesia emitted a light, delicate perfume, while the one with shea butter and avocado oil was more pungent.
He finally bought a package of moist wipes in hopes of ridding himself of any scents before he returned to the department. He could just imagine their response to the freesia. Burly Richards, who couldn’t be parted from his lumberjack shirts, would bust his gut laughing on that one. Ms. McLeod waited on him, saving him the embarrassment of dealing with Fanny. She’d comment on the freesia right away.
He followed her home at a discreet distance. Not knowing if she was a suspect or a victim made a mess of the rules. He sat in the car for a bit and tried to straighten out his thoughts.
Through the living room window, he could see her answer the phone and make some notes. He never saw her relax in a chair and read a book, though he admitted his spy hours quit when she settled into her bedroom for the night. Maybe she read there. And what did he care? They were deep into an investigation, involving duo murders and a break in. And Fanny was a possible suspect.
Chapter 13
One who crosses the t’s on the high side exhibits a good self image and seizes opportunity, even if it means working for it.
Kat loved her work, but today her friends faced danger. She quickly tackled her tasks so she could visit the sisters and steer them into a new investigation prompted by her herbal thoughts. Could herbs have induced Margaret’s death?
Death strikes democratically. It fells friend and foe alike. But Kat Everitt found death intolerable when it struck her friends, with herbs the hatchet. Her favorite gardening book spoke of how herbs enchanted with their fragrance, delighted with their color, and enticed with their flavor. Most of all, they lifted the spirit and healed the body. Today they held a different spin.
She presented Lizzie and Delia with the paper from Chief Burrows. “Here’s the list of flowers in the bouquets, for what it’s worth. Margaret’s seems the most iffy. That comes from the police photos only including them as a peripheral shot.”
Lizzie pulled the list forward. “How come?”
Delia jerked on her arm. “Let me see, too.”
“Cool your jets, sis. I’ll share.”
Kat raised her eyes heavenward, though her thoughts weren’t exactly angelic. She answered Lizzie’s question in hopes of pulling them back on track. “No one suspected the flowers of killing Margaret. Agatha remembered some of the flowers she’d seen. Between that and the photo we should have them all.”
Lizzie sat down with pad and pencil and started making notes. She spoke as she worked. “Herbs as medicinal plants served at one time as the only healing agents, with knowledge passed on from one generation to the next. That they would now be employed as the instruments of death in whatever twisted way, infuriates me.”
Kat knew many of Margaret’s associates were questioned when she was found, but didn’t think this included the sisters. She explained, “Agatha discovered the body when she returned from a conference. At the time, Agatha frantically queried everyone, trying to piece together Margaret’s last days. The police said she’d been dead less than a day when Agatha found her. She only remembered a few of the flowers in the bouquet, not knowing they might be important.”
Delia pursed her lips while studying the list. “What do we look for?”
“Let’s focus on whether any of the flowers in the bouquets could have caused Margaret’s death, by touch, or fumes, or ingestion? That last one sounds kind of far fetched, right? Why would she have eaten one of her flowers?”
The sisters didn’t laugh. Delia said, “We won’t rule that last one out. Lizzie and I will give it some thought. Could something similar to one of the flowers in the bouquet have been slipped into her food?”
They all studied what they had. Margaret’s bouquet included the odd assortment of camellias, foxglove, forget-me-knots, and Michaelmas daisies.
Delia pointed out the incongruity of what looked like foxglove amidst a disparate bouquet of wildflowers and hothouse blooms. They all knew its relation to digitalis. “This has to be significant,” Delia said. Kat found it so important she called Detective Hill right away. He wasn’t in so she was transferred to Chief Burrows.
Kat didn’t want to irritate him by her seeming interference in a case. She had Delia, the shy one, grab the phone and describe the plant to him. “It’s the glycoside in the foxglove, called Scrophulariacae, that is worrisome. It’s a cardioactive glycoside and works on the muscles of the heart.”
Delia waited for Burrows to respond. She scratched her head as if mimicking him. Finally, his voice bellowed out of the phone, “Okay, let’s back up. What’s foxglove?”
“It’s a biennial herb. Grows to five feet tall in gardens or in the wild. Flowers are purple to white and bloom in midsummer.”
Delia turned the phone so the others could hear Burrows’ loud voice. “It’s not midsummer. How was it in bloom?”
“That’s why it might be noteworthy. It had to be grown in a greenhouse, not an easy feat. And all parts of the plant are toxic. It’s Latin name is Digitalis purpurea. It’s a heteroside—a potent drug. The dosage must be carefully adjusted to needs of the individual.”
“Well, I know the coroner ordered some toxicology screens. I doubt if they’re in yet, though.”
Kat jotted a note on the pad in front of Delia. “Ask him if she was already taking medication for CHF.”
Delia did, and added. “If she was on something, just a little more from the plant could have been too much.”
Burrows promised to look into it and Delia hung up. She reported his final words to them.
Kat wondered aloud, “Could Margaret have ingested the foxglove on top of her medicine? The coroner’s report would reveal any abnormalities found.”
“But I read that the leaves don’t taste that great,” Delia said. “And, boy, did I hear it from a florist. None remembered putting a camellia in a bouquet with wildflowers, but one really jerked my chain about the foxglove. She said, ‘I’d never put foxglove in a bouquet. What do you think I am? A killer?’”
Kat turned to the other flowers and photos. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
A couple of lily of the valley and a sprig of scotch thistle appeared on the edge of the photo. Earlier, they had dismissed the camellia as being a sweet message meaning loveliness.
“Lizzie already checked on the lily of the valley because of its toxins,” Delia said.
“You know Margaret. She never would have been careless with lilies of the valley. Besides, can you see her drinking the water from the flower vase?” Lizzie asked.
“You’re right Lizzie. We need a poison that is released in a less common way. It has to be more than touch too.”
“I agree, Kat. Margaret knew not to touch leaves or roots of poisonous plants.” Delia pulled one of her obscure plant books forward. “We must search for something less well known.”
“I wonder if the flowers were meant only as a warning,” Kat said. She encouraged them to continue, urging equal stress to the significance of the traditional message and the physical ability to kill. She suggested they organize their search to work on one bouquet at a time so they stuck to Margaret’s bouquet.
The women continued their herbal exploration.
“The forget-me-nots were bright and airy. Did they hold only a friendly reminder or a deadly message? Nothing toxic about forget-me-nots, though,” Delia stressed. She researched thoroughly to be sur
e.
“Okay, the bouquet is at the least a warning, and at the most, a deadly weapon, Lizzie said.
“But the scotch thistle, with a meaning of retaliation, and the farewell message that could be associated with Michaelmas daisies, says that the bouquet was meant to convey a threat, Delia added.
“Did the killer give Margaret time to study the bouquet and understand the warning, or was it a macabre signature of some kind?” Kat questioned rhetorically.
“We’ll never know,” both sisters chimed together.
The possible threat provided added incentive to the women to study Rosalin’s flowers with super diligence.
“This sure is confusing,” Lizzie said.
“You’re always confused, Lizzie. You mean the threats, the flowers, or your state of mind.”
“That’s enough, girls,” Kat said. “Lizzie, what did you mean?”
“Rosalin feared the lilacs because of their meaning, though they carried no poison. The other flowers bear a lovely gracefulness in late spring, and created an unusual bouquet, dull in its simplicity and lack of artifice.”
“Now I’m following,” Delia said. “The columbine, phlox, and Celandine poppies turn many a field into a fanfare. They only speak of quiet beauty in a posy, not death.
“And, they aren’t dangerous per se, but marigolds definitely express jealousy,” Lizzie said.
“The jealousy angle doesn’t seem to fit anything we knew about Rosalin. Who was jealous and why, Kat said, turning to the rest of the flowers. “Maybe we can learn more about pennyroyal. It was a great insect repellant. Maybe it was more than that?”
The comments zinged back and forth between the sisters as they proceeded to document the second bouquet. Kat contemplated her next move. She’d packed personal items the night before for Nick to deliver to Agatha and vowed minimal contact for fear of endangering her. She knew Nick and his men, though engrossed in their own work, would keep her safe. She excused herself and headed out.
She needed to employ more handwriting analysis to break open this investigation. She had an idea. She ran into Sheila’s Card Emporium and found just the thing. She zeroed in on a very large card that showed angels supporting an old woman in the air with delightfully light messages of well-being. Armed with Agatha’s list of employees Kat decided to ask them if they’d want to add a note to a card.