“Every time I try to talk to you, you avoid me. And what was that bit with the Dumpster? You weren’t just throwing something away, you were destroying it first. You’re up to something.”
“Up to?” Monsieur’s stare was blank, but I wasn’t buying any of it.
“Don’t pretend you don’t understand what I’m talking about. You’ve been as jumpy as a June bug ever since the first day of class, and just in case that doesn’t translate into French, June bugs are very jumpy. You’re jumpy now.”
Monsieur backed away from the counter. “No.”
“Yes, you are. Nobody hops around from foot to foot like that unless they’re uncomfortable about something. Nobody moves things around under the counter unless he’s trying to…
“You’re hiding something!” I never knew I could move so fast. I leaned over the counter as far as I could and snatched at whatever it was that Monsieur had tucked away under there.
Which was a great big container of seasoned salt.
The cheap, generic kind I’d seen at the local market: sixteen ounces for one ninety-nine.
I stared at the glass container of salt. I looked back to Monsieur, who was looking at me, his expression teetering on the brink of tears, as if he thought I’d just exposed some national security secret.
And the truth hit like a two-ton truck.
“You’re kidding me, right?” But I didn’t wait for him to answer. Instead, I reached under the counter again and found exactly what I feared I’d find.
A big spoon.
A funnel.
And empty Vavoom! jars.
How many different ways are there to sayFeeling like a fool?
For thinking that Monsieur ever had anything to do with Drago’s death. And for every single one of the jars of Vavoom! that had ever taken up residence in my kitchen cupboard.
I dropped back to the soles of my shoes, my mouth hanging open with disappointment and surprise.
“You’re repacking cheap seasoned salt! You’re marketing it as magical seasoning!”
“Magic is where you find it, yes?” I was surprised to hear a calm-almost resigned-tone to Monsieur’s voice. I guess now that he realized I was more let down than angry, he figured he could come out of the culinary closet. Or maybe he just knew he was trapped, and no amount of lying was going to convince me otherwise.
He shrugged. “Customers, they believe Vavoom! is special. A special thing, it needs a special price. Do you not think so?”
“Not when I’m the one paying that special price!” I thought of all the jars of Vavoom! I’d stockpiled, just in case there was ever a shortage and I was in danger of going without. I propped my elbows on the counter and dropped my head into my hands. “All this time, all you’ve been doing is trying to cover up your little shell game.”
“This is true. Yes.” He had the nerve to look repentant. “I must smash the glass containers that the salt comes in. So no one will see and discover what I have been doing.”
“Then it’s not a secret recipe?” I should have gotten that part through my head by now, but some legends die a hard death. “There’s nothing rare and exceptional about Vavoom!?”
Monsieur’s shrug was answer enough.
“And you didn’t have anything to do with Drago’s death?”
This time, he didn’t shrug. He jumped as if he’d touched a finger to an electrical line. “Me?” Monsieur’s cheeks got red. “You thought I-?”
“You have been acting mighty suspicious.”
Another shrug. He glanced at the seasoned salt. “And now you see why.”
“And youwere having an argument with Drago that first night of cooking class.”
Monsieur nodded. “This is true. He came into the shop. He demanded that I let him upstairs. I did not think it would hurt until he said something about one of the students. The beautiful woman, Beyla. He said he must talk to her. And when I saw the fire in his eyes…” Lavoie shivered. “I did not think this was a wise thing. I told him no. I sent him away.”
“And he was so mad that you didn’t cooperate, he almost mowed me down at the front door.” I nodded, too. It all made sense. “And the Vavoom!?”
Monsieur held a jar out to me. “Lifetime supply,” he said. “If you do not breathe a word.”
I didn’t take the jar. I had enough at home to last at least a half a lifetime. Besides, now that I knew what it really was, how much I’d overpaid and for how long, the bloom was off the spice.
My illusions shattered, my faith in human nature (at least Monsieur Lavoie’s human nature) shaken, I headed back to class.
I didn’t say a word to Eve about what I’d discovered, partly because I was embarrassed and partly because I didn’t have a chance. Luckily, we weren’t actually making the venison stew, just talking about it. I’d missed the beginning of the discussion, but at the end, just as we began our cleanup, I managed to tell Eve that I’d eliminated Monsieur as a suspect. Fueled by the thought and the realization that it left us with only one viable culprit, I watched Beyla work at the other end of the big sink where we washed up the pots and pans and dishes that we’d dirtied in class.
“She’s in an awfully big hurry,” I told Eve, and it was true. Beyla had whisked through her dishes and her pots and pans in no time at all. (Then again, from the praise I’d heard her get from our classmates and from Jim, I don’t think she had scorched orange sauce to deal with.)
Eve’s gaze followed mine. “Suppose she has a hot date?”
I wiped up the sink and tossed my sponge. “Suppose we should find out?”
“You mean…” Eve’s eyes lit up. She always was up for an adventure, but she was blown away by the thought that for once, maybe I was, too. “Annie, are you talking about following her?”
Was I?
The new bold and daring Annie Capshaw warred with the person I used to be, the play-it-safe woman who didn’t have a thing to show for thirty-five years of doing just that. Except an ex who’d left her for greener pastures, a bank account that would never support a house payment, and a job that was safe, dependable-and completely boring. Oh yeah, and a whole lot of jars of seasoned salt that she’d been conned into buying because the roly-poly Frenchman on the label had seduced her with promises of culinary wonder.
I threw back my shoulders and stood as straight and tall as a short person can.
“You’re darned right I’m talking about following her,” I told Eve. Right after Beyla walked out of the classroom and headed downstairs, I grabbed Eve’s hand.
“Let’s go.”
Thirteen
THEY MAKE IT LOOK REALLY EASY ON TV BUT IN reality, the whole following-the-bad-guy thing is about as tricky as cooking and as sticky as my failed orange sauce.
It also takes a whole lot of logistical coordination.
Lucky for us and for our investigation, I might have been a disaster when it came to cooking, and I was definitely a chicken when parallel parking was the name of the game, but I was a crackerjack organizer.
I was also quickly becoming a pretty good liar.
Remembering my promise to Jim-the one about how I wasn’t going to investigate anymore-I made up a convincing (if I do say so myself) excuse about how I had to get home quickly because I was expecting a phone call from my folks in Florida. With that taken care of, we were out of the cooking school and downstairs in the shop in a flash.
By then, I already had a plan. And the moment we stepped out the door and into the humid evening air, I put it into action.
First, I sent Eve to follow Beyla so we could find out where she was parked and what kind of car she was driving. Then, because I’d driven that night, I hurried to get my car, leaving Eve with specific instructions to keep an eye on Beyla so she could point the way if Beyla up and left before I returned.
Of course, thanks to a parking lot tight on spaces, a series of one-way streets, and traffic that was as dense as peanut butter, Beyla up and left before I returned.
Was that go
ing to stop me? No way! The excitement of the chase pumped through my veins like fire. I was hot in pursuit and on top of my game.
I knew Eve was feeling the exhilaration, too. When I finally cruised by the front of Très Bonne Cuisine where she was waiting, she jumped into the car before I had a chance to come to a complete stop. Breathless, she pointed directly at my windshield. “That way! She went that way!”
I flicked on my signal and turned back into traffic with far more daring and far less civility than I usually displayed. I claimed my patch of street right between a dark sports car and a light-colored SUV, the driver of which had a few choice words to describe both me and my driving skills. Any other time, I would have been appalled, not to mention upset. But tonight, I didn’t care one bit. I was on a mission, one the SUV driver couldn’t possibly understand. And I wasn’t about to let a little thing like traffic stand in my way.
Up ahead, the traffic light turned from red to green, and I scanned the cars in the line in front of us. “What kind of car?” I asked Eve.
She buckled her seat belt. She was as jazzed as I was, and her eyes sparkled when they met mine. She gulped in a breath, so proud of her part in the hunt, she looked like she would burst. “Green.”
Good thing traffic was moving like molasses. We didn’t jerk (at least not too much) when I slammed on my brakes.
“Green? As in green sports car? Or green minivan? Or green sedan? What make of car is it? What year? Did you get a look at the license plate?”
Eve shrugged, and her smile wilted. “Green. It was green. You know, the same color as that winter coat I bought a couple years ago. The one I never wore because it made me look fat.”
The way I remembered it (and I knew I remembered it correctly), the coat in question never made Eve look anywhere near fat. But there was no use getting into that discussion again. We’d gone a few rounds at the time she bought the damn thing. What mattered now was that I remembered the coat. I knew exactly the color she was talking about. It was green, all right. Dark green. Like a Christmas tree.
Which was great, and actually might have been helpful if the traffic in front of us wasn’t as thick as flies at a church picnic, if it wasn’t just past sunset, and if, between the glow of the streetlights and the glare of the headlights from the cars headed toward us from the other direction, every car in the sea of cars didn’t look the exact same dark color.
I scrambled to come up with a plan B.
“Which lane did she get into?” I asked Eve.
She closed her eyes, thinking hard. “Right,” she said. “No. Left. Definitely left. She pulled away from the curb and angled her way across a couple lanes. Like she was going to turn.”
She imparted this piece of information just as we cruised under the light. I didn’t have time to wonder if it was right or wrong. I didn’t bother with a signal, either. I turned left.
Traffic wasn’t quite as heavy in this direction. I glanced over the cars up ahead. The bright lights of a bar washed over the sidewalk and out into the street; in the glow, I saw a green car.
“There!” I didn’t wait for Eve to confirm my hunch. I stepped on the accelerator, and we took off as fast as a four-year-old Saturn can. When the green car made a right at the next cross street, we did, too.
I hung back a little. Just in case it was Beyla. Just in case she looked in her rearview mirror and saw that we were following.
“What do you think?” I asked Eve.
She leaned forward and squinted to get a better look at the car twenty feet or so in front of us. “It looks like the right one. Maybe. I dunno. It could be. Yeah!” Her expression cleared, and she sat up straight and grinned. “It has one of those magnetic signs. One of those yellow ribbons on the back of the trunk. Beyla’s car had that. I remembered because I thought the yellow looked good against the green. Definitely. Yeah, it’s her.”
“Good. Let’s not lose her again.” I waved toward where I’d tossed my purse on the floor of the front seat. “Open the front zipper pocket,” I told Eve. “There’s a notepad in there, and a pen. Write down the license plate number, and that it’s a green Taurus. I don’t know the year; do you?”
I didn’t know why it mattered, either; I only knew I wanted all my ducks in a row. And I wasn’t talking ducks with orange sauce.
The traffic light up ahead was yellow, but when Beyla cruised through the intersection, I followed. When she turned, I turned. When she headed across the Potomac toward Georgetown, I glanced at Eve.
“What are the chances she’s heading for Arta?”
“The gallery?” Eve was skeptical. I was too busy concentrating on the road and on my quarry up ahead to spare her a look, but I could tell from the tone of her voice. “That doesn’t make any sense. If she’s got the computer disc and she’s trying to keep Yuri from finding it, she wouldn’t be taking it back to where she stole it from in the first place. Besides, just because we’re headed across the river doesn’t mean anything. There are a million other places in this direction.”
It was true; there were. But Beyla was headed to only one of them.
When we turned onto M Street, I knew I was right; that one place was Arta.
OK, so my smile was a little on the smug side when I turned it on Eve. But who could blame me? I was starting to get the hang of this Sherlock Holmes thing. And truth be told, I suspected-or should I say deduced?-that I was getting pretty good at it.
I stepped on the brakes and pulled up next to the curb in an area clearly marked No Parking, Bus Stop, watching as Beyla slowed just before she got to the gallery, then rounded the corner onto the nearest street. Though I couldn’t see her car, I knew from the faint red glow of brake lights that she’d stopped. I knew we had to act fast. If we were going to keep her in our sights, we needed a parking place, too.
Have I mentioned that finding a parking place in the D.C. Metro area is like trying to get out of the seventh circle of hell?
Except this time.
Like a gift from heaven, a spot opened up twenty feet ahead, across the street from and just a little ways past Arta. Before I had a chance to remind myself that I was scared to death by the very thought of parallel parking, I shot ahead, poked the gearshift into reverse, manuevered my car into place, and cut the engine and lights.
“Now what?” Eve whispered.
“I don’t know,” I whispered back. Not that there was a chance Beyla was going to hear us; she was across the street and around the block. But I guess there’s something about a stakeout that demands secrecy. “We’re going to have to check it out.” I paused, the wheels in my head turning a mile a minute.
“I’ll head over to the gallery,” I told Eve. “There’s got to be a back door. Maybe I can see if it’s open, see if she went in that way. Why don’t you-”
“Oh, no!” Eve shook her head so hard and so fast, it mussed her hair. Always conscious of appearances, she smoothed it back into place. “No way are you sending me off on my own. Not in the middle of the night in a strange part of town. I’m sticking with you. You’re in charge, fearless leader! Just tell me what to do-as long as it involves doing whatever I’m doing at the same time you’re doing it.”
There was no use even trying to argue with logic like that.
With a nod that told Eve I was ready, I slung my purse over my shoulder, opened my car door, and pointed across to the gallery. “Let’s take a look. Only we’re going to need to be quick. And quiet.” I mouthed the words and hoped that in the dark, Eve could see enough to know what I was saying.
I didn’t have to worry. Eve stuck to me like a limpet on a rock. Together, we crossed the street and closed in on Arta.
There was a spotlight trained on the burnt orange and turquoise Arta sign. Instinctively, I skirted its glow, keeping to the shadows. Maybe it was instinct, too, that told me to keep my back up against the wall. When we got as far as the front window of the gallery, I signaled Eve to stay put and pivoted to take a look.
There was no one i
n the gallery. Most of the interior lights were off. Here and there an overhead light shone on some objet d’art: a blue glass vase artfully displayed on one shelf, a hammered copper bowl on another, an abstract painting on the far wall that looked like water lilies. Or was it a New York City taxicab?
Before I had time to give it any more thought, Beyla walked into the gallery.
I dropped to my knees below the window and the window box in front of it, pointing inside as I did. “She’s in there,” I whispered just loud enough for Eve to hear me. “I wonder what she’s doing.”
There was only one way I was ever going to find out.
With a signal to Eve to stay put and keep quiet, I rose to my feet. The window box was overflowing, and I positioned myself behind a spicy geranium and parted the red impatiens, trying for a better look. I was just in time to see Beyla peering into the copper bowl.
That might not be a weird thing for a customer to do, but it struck me as an odd way for a burglar to act.
So did the fact that when she’d satisfied herself that the bowl was empty, Beyla lifted it, looked underneath it, and ran her hand over the shelf where it was displayed. When she was done, she took what looked to be a man’s big, white handkerchief out of her pocket and wiped every surface she’d touched.
“She’s not looking to hide anything,” I told Eve while I shifted positions from the cover of a geranium to a curtain of marigolds. “She’s searching for something.”
“You think?” I saw Eve’s muscles tense and stopped her with one hand on her arm before she could move. It was dangerous enough for me to be risking exposure. There was no use taking the chance of Beyla seeing the two of us watching her through the flowers.
When she was done with the copper bowl, Beyla moved on to the blue glass vase. It was big and obviously heavy and she used two hands to lift it. She studied the vase and the shelf where it was displayed carefully before she put it back into place. She gave the same kind of attention to each of the paintings on the wall. When she walked over to the counter where purchases were written up and wrapped, I figured I’d better provide Eve with some kind of narrative.
Cooking Up Murder Page 14