by Nancy Warren
His face was drained of color and his eyes wide as he looked at Mom and then me. "Logan Douglas suffered a heart attack last night."
"What?" My mother and I both said at the same time. "Is he all right?"
Dad shook his head. "It was fatal."
I couldn’t believe it. I’d seen him only a few hours ago, laughing and heading home, his arm around Priya. "You mean he's dead?"
"I'm afraid so, Lucy."
My mother put a hand to her head. "But he was perfectly fine last night. Healthy and clearly enjoying himself."
Dad shrugged, looking helpless. "Sometimes it hits a young person like that. A hitherto unknown weakness in the heart or the circulatory system, always a tragedy."
Of course, my mind was racing. I thought about that potion I had fed to all my guests, a potion Margaret Twig had concocted. She was a powerful witch I knew nothing about. Had she given me, not revealing potion, but something that could be toxic? I felt hot and cold. Apart from my sorrow over poor Logan’s death, I wondered if an autopsy would reveal whatever was in that mysterious potion.
My mother voiced the thought clanging in my head. "Could it have been something he ate?” She looked at me, her eyes wide. “He must have eaten his last meal, here."
My mind kept bouncing around. Even if Margaret’s potion was sound, I hadn’t cooked that shepherd’s pie. I’d allowed an employee I barely knew to cook for my family and colleagues.
I felt sick. Absolutely sick. Had I inadvertently killed someone? The only thing I could think of was to get hold of Margaret and find out exactly what she’d put in that potion. I cursed myself for a fool. Why had I taken her on faith, without checking her out at all?
I had to be in the shop in less than an hour, but still I texted Rafe and told him I needed to go back and see Margaret again. Naturally, I didn't even know how to get hold of her. She probably had email addresses and phone numbers, but of course, I hadn't got any of them.
To my great relief he got back to me almost right away. He was tied up at the Bodleian until ten, and then he said he’d pick me up.
When I got down to the shop, Eileen was already there. Just seeing her placid presence calmed me down enormously. The shop was as neat as I’d never seen it and she was sitting in the visitor's chair, crocheting another poppet. She looked up when I came through the door from my flat. "Good morning, Lucy. How was your dinner last night?"
I must've shuddered visibly for she looked closer. "My goodness, what's happened? You look as though you'd seen a ghost."
Oh, my, how close she was to the truth. I'd seen Logan last night. This morning, he likely was a ghost. I said, "The dinner was wonderful. And your food was delicious, I can't thank you enough. But, unfortunately, one of the students who came for dinner died in the night."
She looked most concerned, as well she might seeing she had cooked the dinner. “Do you know how he died?"
"No. I imagine there will be autopsy and an inquest, but Dad thinks perhaps it was an aneurysm or something. One of those fluke events that kill young, healthy people."
Her face was creased with concern. "I’m sure it wasn’t my food. Of course, if there was anything wrong with it, you'd all have fallen ill. And no one dies of food poisoning that quickly. At least I don't think they do."
Not being an expert in death or food poisoning I couldn't comment.
I walked up to the front door but couldn’t face putting up the ‘open’ sign. "I'm such a mess. I wonder if you'd mind watching the shop for an hour or so this morning? I need to get away and clear my head."
“Of course," she said in her motherly way. “I brought a little kettle from home and I’ve set it up in the back room. Why don't I make you a nice cup of tea?"
It was so nice of her, when she must know I had tea-making facilities upstairs. But I appreciated the gesture. "No. I’ve had too much coffee this morning already. But, thank you."
There wasn't time for more, as it was now time to open the shop which Eileen did, since I couldn’t face it. She was so efficient, I was fairly confident the shop could run without me.
I got through the first hour of the day somehow. It was all a blur. I doubt I even served a single customer. I think I sat behind the counter, pretending to do inventory or some important task, while just staring at the blank screen of my computer. We weren’t very busy, and Eileen efficiently took care of the few customers we did have.
At ten o’clock, I made my excuses and left her. Rafe picked me up in the lane behind the flat. As Eileen had done, he took one look at my face and asked, "Lucy, what's happened?"
I was surprised he hadn't heard. Rafe always seemed to know everything. But he was clearly both surprised and shocked at the news of Logan's death. "And you suspect Margaret?"
"I don't know. All I know is, I sprinkled her potion on the food and, within hours, one of the people who ate it was dead."
He nodded. Then he started the car and we drove out of the lane. “I’m sure I don’t need to remind you that eight other people consumed the potion and were perfectly fine.”
"But what if he had some kind of weakness, like an allergic reaction to whatever she put in that stuff? And what if it shows up in a tox screen? I'd be a murderer."
"I can't imagine Margaret putting anything dangerous or toxic into that potion, but I think you're right that it would be best to tell her what's happened and perhaps seek her advice."
What was this thing he had for Margaret? "Seek her advice? First, she steals my cat, then she kills my dinner guest. The only advice I want from Margaret is what I need to do to keep her out of my life."
He glanced sideways at me. "And yet, we’re heading to see her right now."
"Only because I want some answers. And I miss Nyx."
It took a little longer to drive to Margaret’s small village now that there was substantially more traffic on the road, but we still managed to pull into her gravel drive while the morning sun was glinting so prettily on the fading hydrangeas.
By the time we walked up the path, Margaret was standing at the open door. This time she wore red silk patterned with big black flowers. "I just heard. That poor boy."
"Margaret," I said, noting a strong scent of mint as I walked into the cool flagstone hallway. "What was in that potion?"
She looked a little taken aback at my question. "Just a little of this and a little of that. I don't give away my recipes."
I held onto my temper with effort. "Was there anything in that potion that could have killed Logan?"
She still looked puzzled and I said, "He had dinner at my place, last night. I sprinkled some of the potion on top of the shepherd's pie and fed it to him. And by this morning, he was dead."
"Good heavens. Then you were one of the last people to see him alive?"
"Yes. And he seemed fine. Perfectly healthy. He was an archaeology student. He wanted to go out on a dig with my parents. He was twenty-six years old. And now he's gone."
She led us into her kitchen and I saw that her cauldron was bubbling away with a mixture that smelled strongly of mint and, now that I got closer, of other fragrant herbs. I identified chamomile, lavender, and ginger and the rest was a blur on my senses.
She said, "Logan was a wizard."
I felt as though an electric shock had zapped all the way up my arm. "No, he wasn't. He was an archaeology student."
"And a wizard," she said, patiently. "Really, Lucy, you'd know all this if you came to the potluck, or at least joined our closed Facebook group. That's how I heard about Logan’s death, this morning."
Rafe had said nothing, watching our interchange. Now, he spoke up. "What else did you hear?"
She shook her head. "That young man did not die of natural causes."
"What?" I pictured myself sitting in jail explaining how I'd sprinkled a mysterious liquid, given to me by a well-known local witch over Logan’s food and, no, I hadn’t bothered to find a what was in the potion.
While my mind kept running back to the part where I found my
self held responsible for the death, Rafe's mind was clearly going in another direction. He asked, "What do you think happened to him?"
She glanced at me sharply. Then she turned away and began stirring the contents of the bubbling cauldron with a very long-handled wooden spoon. "His coven in Glastonbury lost one of their oldest and most powerful members. I suspect it was Athu-ba who killed him. Logan, though young, was quite a powerful psychic. I think he had a vision that this demon was in Oxford and, perhaps, came to try and stop him."
My heart felt like an ice cube. I wanted to sit down, but there was no chair so I leaned against the cold, granite counter for support. "You mean that scary dude who’s after me, killed Logan?"
She looked up from stirring. The steam had brought a flush to her cheeks. "As a theory, it makes more sense to me than an aneurysm."
She stirred the bubbling pot for another moment. In spite of myself, I was drawn to find out what she was doing. I breathed in. "That smells wonderful."
She smiled, and her cheeks bunched up like apples. "It's a tonic for pregnant women. It eases morning sickness, and the aches and pains that come with the condition. Of course, I put a little extra magic in it to calm the anxiety that pregnant women always face."
I kept looking around, trying to see my cat. Finally, I asked, "Where's Nyx?"
She took the spoon out and turned her back to the potion before answering. "She's in disgrace. She scratched my face and neck when I tried to pick her up this morning.” She eased away the red and black silk scarf that she wore, wound around her neck, and I could see faint scratch marks. I thought that Margaret must be quite allergic to the scratches for they were lined with something that looked like bubbles. I said, "Nyx never scratched me."
Margaret replaced the scarf and said, quite coldly, "She's no longer your cat. And she'd better learn that I'm her mistress, now."
As we left Margaret’s cottage, I looked back and, in an upper window, I saw Nyx. Our gazes connected and the cat put out her paw and began banging on the window, asking to be freed. I drew Rafe’s attention to my imprisoned familiar. "That horrible, old witch has Nyx trapped. We have to get her out of there."
Rafe took my eagerly pointing hand, clasped his around mine. "Right now, you need Margaret, you need her strength, her magic, and her cooperation. Once this confrontation is over, then we can think about getting your cat back. Understood?"
It was pretty much what he’d said the day before. He didn't know how much I missed my cat, but I conceded that he might be right. Thanks to Margaret, I knew Logan had been a wizard.
Besides, I comforted myself by recalling the bubbling near the site of the cat’s scratches. It looked very much as though Margaret was allergic to her stolen cat.
As we drove away, Rafe said, "The good news is that Margaret's magic potion didn't kill your friend."
I replied, "And the bad news is the same demon who’s after me, killed Logan, without a fight."
Chapter 13
He reminded me that he was never far away and he added, further, that he had recruited some of the other members of the vampire knitting club to keep an eye on me. "Any time, day or night, you're never alone. One scream and somebody will be there, instantly."
It was comforting, if somewhat unnerving, to know that a whole nest of vampires was that tuned in to me. But, I thanked him and went back to work. I wished I had known Logan was a wizard who was possibly after the creature now stalking me. It would have been so nice to exchange confidences with someone like me, and perhaps pool information. I wondered how Logan had known about the demon, and if Meritamun had somehow been involved in causing his death.
When I got back the shop, I realized that the vampire knitting club took surveillance duties seriously. I blinked, on finding Clara deep in conversation with Eileen about her latest project, a knitted sweater-coat. She appeared to be struggling to knit the collar.
When I walked in, she gazed at me, as though having trouble placing me, and then said, "Lucy, isn't it? The new owner of the shop? I was telling Eileen, here, how much I used to enjoy coming to Cardinal Woolsey’s when your grandmother ran it.” She looked around as though she hadn’t seen the place in years, when she was up here at least twice a week for meetings, and only lived downstairs.
Now, she sighed, with a mix of nostalgia and sweetness. “Cardinal Woolsey’s never changes. It’s up to you, now, Lucy, to continue the fine tradition.”
I blinked and said, “Yes. I mean, my grandmother was a wonderful woman. I can never fill her shoes.”
“No. But you’ll do your best, I know.” Then she smiled sweetly at my assistant. “Eileen’s been helping me interpret this fiendishly difficult pattern. I was going mad, thinking I wouldn’t finish my sweater before Christmas. I do want to wear it."
Clara rarely bothered with patterns, so it was a real active sacrifice for her to pretend to be confused, and to be guided by a mere mortal. She managed to drag out her visit for a little longer and then she left. It seemed only moments later that one of the male knitting vampires, Alfred, walked in. He did a good job of looking slightly bewildered, as though he’d never held a pair of knitting needles in his life, when I had personally seen him turn out a pair of exquisite knitted gloves in a complicated shell pattern in the space of one evening. He smiled at us both, vaguely, showing no recognition when his gaze rested on my face.
Eileen went forward. "Can I help you?"
I listened, quite entertained, as he described how his wife was feeling poorly and so had sent him to get extra wool as she had run out. He did an excellent job of dragging out his visit, since he couldn't remember what kind of wool she needed, what sort of a jumper she was working on, even what color. Eileen very obligingly pulled out nearly every leaflet we had in the shop and showed him a variety of different wools. In the end, he decided to choose an entirely new pattern and enough wool to knit the entire thing. Since I suspected it was a project he planned to do himself, I simply enjoyed the transaction.
And that's how it went for the rest of the day. No sooner had one vampire left than another would come in. They’d come in to browse, or they’d pass the time asking questions, dragging out the shopping experience, and Eileen’s patience, for as long as possible.
Even though I felt I was in no danger in the middle of the day in a public shop, I loved their kindness. Especially as most of them had interrupted their sleep in order to take the shift.
My mother worried that I didn't have very many friends, but she was wrong. They might be slightly unusual, but these knitting vampires sure acted like friends.
About three o'clock I glanced up when the door opened, to see, not another of my undead knitting friends, but DI Ian Chisholm, looking slightly more serious than usual.
My heart sank as he came straight up to me and said, "Lucy," in his crisp, police officer tone.
“Ian," I said, then I stalled. I couldn't say ‘How nice to see you,’ or ask if I could help him, since he knew that I knew why he was here. So my words just petered out and I looked at him.
He obligingly picked up the conversation ball that I’d dropped, wet and chewed, at his feet. "I need to ask you a few questions, in a professional capacity."
I nodded, feeling sick and hollow inside. Even though Margaret had assured me that it was the demon, and not her potion, that had killed Logan, I wasn't completely convinced. I asked Eileen if she would watch the shop for little while, and, of course, she said she would. Her eyes nearly popped out of her head as she realized I was about to be questioned by the police. I only hoped my connection to a crime wouldn’t make her rethink her employment with me. I thought, on top of everything that was going on right now in my life, losing Eileen would be the biggest disaster of all.
I took Ian upstairs and asked him if he'd like anything to drink, but he declined. My parents were out and even Nyx was missing, so the place was curiously still and quiet.
He said, "I understand you had a dinner party here, last night."
&nb
sp; I winced. "I wouldn't call it that, exactly. Mom invited the Miss Watts for dinner and then invited three of the grad students that are planning to help on the archaeological dig in Egypt. And then she and Dad invited a colleague.”
“You heard what happened?”
I nodded. "My father received a call this morning that one of those three students was dead."
He didn't say anything, only looked at me. I knew it was a cop’s trick to get me to keep talking and, with me, it always worked. "I feel just terrible. I imagine the meal he had here last night was the last one he ever ate."
He nodded. "Can you tell me what you served for dinner?"
Of course, I told him, and that we'd all eaten the same thing. I took a deep breath. "How did he die?"
He shook his head. "We don't know. There are no marks on the body. No obvious physical signs of illness or trauma. We have to treat this death as suspicious until we find out otherwise."
“I understand.” I liked Ian. I wished I could tell him everything I knew, but he was a man of the physical world. He dealt in black and white, crime and victim, guilt and innocence. How could I tell him that there were creatures from antiquity out causing havoc? That I was a witch and Logan had been a wizard?
I couldn’t. It was hopeless.
He asked, "How did he seem to you, last night?"
I thought back to the evening. "He was jolly. Everyone was. He brought beer and some of the others brought wine and scotch and it just turned into one of those surprisingly fun evenings, considering what an odd collection of people we were." I walked Ian to the dining table, still with its nine chairs crammed together. “He sat right there,” I said, pointing to where, just last night, Logan had been telling stories and laughing along with the rest of us.
"Would you let me know what you find out about Logan? I feel awful that he died the same night he had dinner at my place."
"If it's any consolation, everyone I spoke to remarked on what an entertaining evening they had here. At least you made his last evening a good one."