Murder Most Fermented

by Christine E. Blum

  Once again we stood up and applauded.

  “You are going to be famous.” I beamed at her.

  “Thank you, Halsey. This means that after today I won’t be able to attend many Wine Club meetings, but I did get some research done on the history of Rose Avenue, and with Paula we organized today’s presenters.”

  I started to look for the curtain from which the Wizard would appear.

  “I do have some things to update you on,” Aimee continued, “but maybe we should do that at the end.”

  “Agreed,” sanctioned Peggy. “And I too have news about the rumors of underground oil being found at that massive new construction site.”

  Paula dipped her head into her house and said in an audible whisper, “We’re ready for you. What? Well, just set it to record and come on out!”

  It was clear that Paula was counting on this to be her first big moment with the Wine Club.

  “Allow me to present two esteemed members of the Rose Avenue & Environs Historical Society, my husband Max Adler and his new associate Malcolm Abernathy.”

  Once again we stood and applauded, and I mentally checked my cardio for today off my list.

  Max looked like a diehard beatnik. He sported a pork pie hat, walked barefoot, and was clearly relaxed in his tall, lanky frame. He had warm eyes and a big smile that was in full bloom as he took center stage on the patio.

  “Well, hello,” he said in a melodic voice that sounded like a cross between Burl Ives and Seal. “My wife tells me that you are interested in the history of Rose Avenue.”

  “The area in general,” Paula said, nodding to us and hoping we would follow suit.

  “Okay then, let’s start with the provenance of the area. The land was originally occupied by what we call ‘California Rancheros,’ men of Spanish and Mexican descent who mostly raised cattle. About the time that the Mexican War was ending, Yankee immigrants were making their way across the country attracted by the discovery of gold here.”

  His easy, professorial approach was certainly drawing me in, but I needed to focus him to give us facts more germane to my mysterious cigar box and its contents.

  “Excuse me, Max, my name is Halsey. This is so fascinating, don’t you all agree? I wonder if you could tell us a bit about Anderson Rose. Did he own all the land around us? And was he also mining for gold?”

  “Perfect segue, Halsey. He was one of said Yankee pioneers. Shortly after he arrived, he began acquiring land. Some say over the years thousands of acres. He did initially mine, but with poor results, so he stuck to ranching.”

  “What about oil, Max? Was he doing any drilling?” Peggy asked and we all snapped to attention.

  “Best to let young Malcolm answer that, he is indeed the expert on this subject.”

  I hadn’t really noticed much about him up to now, but when he traded places with Max, I did my customary once over. He kind of looked like a cross between Harry Potter and the kid Sherman in the Mr. Peabody cartoons. Only grown up, mostly. He was a redhead with rampaging hair that took off in all directions.

  “Good afternoon, ladies,” he said, soft-spoken.

  I looked over at Sally and Peggy, who both looked like they wanted to adopt him. I then noticed that they would have to fight off Paula first.

  “The discovery of oil in Los Angeles at the turn of the century and the fight for ownership is the stuff of legends,” he said, sounding like he’d practiced this.

  He gave a light cough that made his milk and honey complexion go crimson. I doubted that he’d ever seen so many women at one time, let alone talked to all of them. The only one who wasn’t enraptured by this boy was Penelope, who seemed to be preoccupied with checking her emails.

  “Go on, honey,” Aimee encouraged.

  “You may recall the film, There Will Be Blood with Daniel Day-Lewis? Adapted from the book, Oil, by Upton Sinclair?”

  Crickets. This was more of a Magic Mike crowd.

  “I’ve seen it,” said Paula enthusiastically.

  Nobody likes a suck-up. . . .

  “Any-hoo,” said Penelope, looking bored and now inspecting her manicure for chips.

  “Well, it’s a story that played out over and over back then and it shows how the competitive lust for finding and claiming the most oil drives people into moral bankruptcy.”

  “So is there oil underground here or not?” Peggy asked. She was getting impatient and Paula had stopped pouring.

  “We may never know,” Malcolm hesitantly responded, fearing Peggy’s wrath.

  “Sweet Jesus on a moped, why can’t we find out?” Sally was also losing patience.

  “The reason we can’t be certain one way or the other,” Malcolm said, his cheeks now the color and vibrancy of cherry lights on a cop car, “is because they weren’t able to drill deep enough. By mandate they could only drill to a certain depth, and when that yielded no results, they moved on to other money-making endeavors.”

  “Oh, there’s oil down there,” Max said.

  “How can you be so sure?” I asked.

  “Because I’ve seen it with my own eyes,” he replied and disappeared into the house. When we heard the TV go on it was clear that class had been dismissed.

  “And the other wonderful news,” Paula said, trying to recapture her audience, “is that Malcolm is now our next-door neighbor!”

  Applause erupted all around, mostly.

  Paula was squeezing and hugging him so tightly that I fully expected his eyes to pop out like a Panic Pete squeeze toy.

  It was odd, I thought, that someone so young, working as an historian for a small community group, could afford a house so close to the beach. And didn’t Paula say that he was also putting in a basement?

  There’s more to this story.

  Malcolm finally wriggled free and Wine Club was adjourned.

  * * *

  The next morning greeted me with beautiful sunshine and temperatures in the low 70s. Bardot and I decided that the conditions were perfect for a brisk walk around the ’hood. I grabbed a fresh peach from my farmers’ market trove and slowly opened the door. I was expecting to find Marisol outside and was going to unload on her. But all was quiet on my porch, so we headed down the block.

  For a brief moment, I felt some concern for her; after all, I was the one who sent her on a mission to find out what Mr. Bobby Snyder, Esq. was up to. As I passed her big front window, I saw a shutter slat lift letting in sunlight that reflected off her gold tooth.

  Silly me, she was up to her old tricks.

  I spotted Peggy talking to Sally in front of her house, and we crossed over.

  “There’s my favorite pooch,” cooed Peggy as she plopped to the ground to snuggle with Bardot. My dog’s response was to roll on her back and do serpentine moves with her hips while airing out her hoohaw.

  Bardot is what you might call a free spirit.

  “We were just about to visit the construction site of that house they’re working on. The one where they claim they hit oil while digging. Want to tag along?” Sally asked.

  “Heck yeah,” I said. Peggy donned her pith helmet (there’s a story there but none of us have been brave enough to ask) and led the way.

  A stroll along Rose Avenue is always like a tonic to me. Every house tells a story, both by its appearance and by signs of human presence all around it. A small soccer goal net and an array of different sized balls on one lawn indicate that this sport is a family affair. At another, the sight of both the United States and Marine Corps flags flying tells of their patriotism. Collectively the homes on Rose Avenue speak of lives well lived, of fun had, and of growing families.

  We rounded the corner and walked over to the next street that was parallel to Rose. The corner lot was blocked from sight with covered wire fencing. From above it, we could see the beginnings of the framing but little else. The requisite port-o-potty sat at one end of the lot. You would think that that alone would provide enough incentive to try and finish if not early, then at least on time. We c
ould hear raised voices coming from the other side of the fence. So needless to say we got closer and quiet so that we could eavesdrop.

  “I can’t accept that as collateral. You can’t prove that you own the rights to whatever’s under here, which is probably nothing. Besides, I heard that everything belongs to Rose, so you need to pay me what you owe me!”

  We looked at each other. This was more than we’d bargained for.

  “Helloooo,” Sally bravely cooed. Being the tallest among us, she could just barely see over the top of the fence.

  The shouting stopped and moments later we watched a laborer exit through the gate in the fence. He quickly got into his truck and sped away.

  “Do I have visitors?” we heard a different voice ask.

  “Hi, Howard,” Sally said. “Remember me?”

  “Of course,” he said, joining us on the sidewalk while quickly closing the gate. “And you’ve brought friends, welcome.”

  Bardot emitted a low guttural noise, a sign that she wasn’t all too agreeable with our selection of this guy as a friend.

  We introduced ourselves. Howard was a jolly-looking guy, the corners of his mouth naturally turned up and his eyebrows arched when he talked. I guessed that he was somewhere in his middle to late sixties. He wore a button-down shirt and khakis, and though his sleeves were rolled up, his manicured hands betrayed any idea that he participated in manual labor.

  “I’m afraid that the site is too dangerous right now, otherwise I’d invite you in. Give me a few weeks and I should be able to give you the grand tour,” he explained.

  “We’re all intrigued by the idea of adding a basement, this is the second one we’ve heard of,” I said.

  “Yes, I don’t know why people see this as such a novel idea. A finished basement adds so much space for, say, a kid’s playroom, a screening room, or the traditional bar and games area.”

  “Rumor has it that you’ve found oil not too far down,” Peggy said, getting down to business.

  Howard studied her for a moment and then laughed.

  “Rumor is the correct word for it, we really have very little to substantiate that claim at the moment. This is more of an off-handed comment getting blown out of proportion. Don’t get me wrong, striking oil would be a blessing from the heavens, but I’m not counting on it. I’m just happy that I thought to secure the mineral rights when I bought the property to develop.”

  I need to look at that deed again and see how wide an area it covers.

  One look at Peggy and I could see that she wasn’t buying his vague response.

  “So in digging the basement, you haven’t found any sign of oil?” Peggy asked.

  “Just dirt and old roots. Say you look familiar. Have I ever done any work for you?” Howard asked.

  “No.”

  “You sure? I know, I’ll bet it was when I was a teenager. I used to apprentice for a contractor named Sam during the summers.”

  “Sure, I know Sam. He built our extra bedroom and addition when the kids kept coming.”

  Peggy was softening.

  “I remember that your house was always neat as a pin, which was mind-boggling. It seemed that all the neighborhood kids came to your house to play. Or, it might have been because of those homemade cookies that appeared out of the oven every afternoon,” Howard said, his face all lit up.

  “Sam called them little discs of delight,” Peggy cooed.

  Shoot, was Howard playing her?

  I glanced over at Sally, but she seemed enchanted with Howard as well. Perhaps I’d just eaten an extra bowl of cynicism that morning.

  Chapter 7

  When Bardot and I returned home, Marisol, who was sitting on my front steps, greeted us.

  “I have a restraining order, I swear,” I said as I sat down next to her.

  “Who’s going to execute it, Augie?” She laughed.

  The self-appointed “Mayor of Rose Avenue” loved to flaunt that she had the cops in her back pocket.

  “You been over to that damn construction site?”

  I felt around my clothes and hair, trying to find the bug she must have planted on me. When I came up empty, I started frisking Bardot.

  “We talked to the developer, yes. But he wouldn’t let us see anything.”

  “You got to go at night, when nobody’s around.”

  “Have you done that?”

  She shook her head, but I wasn’t convinced.

  “So what have you found out about Mr. Bobby Snyder? And don’t tell me about what he says he’s doing, I’ve read the flyer.”

  She looked to both sides to check if anyone else was listening.

  Really?

  “I told you he smokes, right?”

  “So?”

  “So he drops his goddamn butts out his car window onto the street.”

  “He’s a pig, that’s all you’ve got?” This was going nowhere.

  “For now,” she said, but she was grinning.

  “Come on, Bardot. I actually have a job, and must get to work,” I said mostly to Marisol.

  “I’ll know a lot more in a couple of days,” she added as I unlocked my front door.

  “Spill,” I said, rejoining her on the stoop.

  “I put one of those butts in a baggie and gave it to Augie. He’s running DNA on it.”

  “How did you convince Augie to do it? You had better not have brought up my name in connection with this, I’m already in enough hot water as you saw last night.”

  “You’re right, you’re in deep doo-doo.”

  “I can’t image that he can have the lab run random tests for no reason.”

  “I gotta go,” she said and disappeared.

  I gotta lie down. . . .

  * * *

  It was time for me to start doing some research on the deed, Abigail Rose, and anything else I could think of to get me off the suspect list. I did a quick run through of my emails, returned a call from my Coast Guard client, who wants to add to their website (billable hours, yay!), and pulled out the cigar box. With what I had learned from Frederick about the deed and ring’s possible value, I was now hiding the tin in a moderately secret place. I need to find a safer alternative, I thought.

  I delicately took out the yellowed document and laid it on my desk. It appeared to be on legal-sized paper and was being employed horizontally. There was printing and writing on both sides and it was scored accordion-style in four places. I didn’t attempt to fold it but imagined that when it was it would have fit nicely into a man’s inside jacket breast pocket.

  The deed was issued by the West Republic Land & Title Company, which seemed like as good a place as any to start. The business is now defunct, but my search led me to the USC archives, where I was at least able to view similar documents from that company. This one was pretty much a match. But when I drilled down and added the name “Anderson Rose” to my search, I came up empty. It was time to set up a query script and let it do the work. While I was at it, I created one for Abigail Rose as well.

  Just as I launched it, there was a knock on my office side door. I was going to ignore it and pack away my artifacts, but Bardot stood on her back legs at the window to the street and wagged her tail intensely. I peeked out behind her and saw Malcolm waiting by the door.

  He seems harmless enough.

  I tossed the jacket from the back of my chair over everything on my desk.

  “Hello, I do hope that I’m not interrupting your work. I was heading to the gardens and remembered you telling me that this was your office,” he explained at the threshold.

  “Not at all, come in.”

  I saw him take a quick look over my shoulder to my computer screen.

  “Would you like some water?” I asked, quickly ushering him toward the small kitchen at the opposite end of the room. When I looked back, the screen had thankfully gone into sleep mode.

  He chose coconut water and then we sat at the conference table in the middle of the room. I made sure that his back was to my desk
.

  “I was fascinated by your talk the other day, but I wondered what got you started on the history of our little community? You’re so young; wouldn’t you rather be exploring the world?”

  His cheeks went as orange as tungsten lightbulbs. “My family was among the first settlers in America and they go back all the way to the Mayflower. Eventually a few headed west, not so much for gold, but for land. My parents both died when I was young, drunk driver.”

  “Oh God, I’m so sorry.”

  He gave me a slight smile. “I was raised in a series of foster homes here in California, and it was only natural that I wanted to trace back my heritage. I started in the Bay Area, which is where I was born, and a series of discoveries has led me down to Southern California.”

  “So you have no relatives nearby? What about on the East Coast?”

  “None that are living, I’m afraid. So here I am, I get a stipend from the historical society, and I work as an archivist at UCLA.”

  Still doesn’t explain the house....

  I started to wonder why he was telling me all this and hoped he wasn’t getting the wrong idea. I had absolutely no interest in him personally. But Bardot seemed to like him and was sitting calmly, watching him. It may have been because she’d never seen a ginger before....

  He checked himself as he started to turn around and look at my desk. I wasn’t ready to reveal my find to him just yet, even if Paula and Max endorsed him. After all, I’d just met them.

  “You said that you are on your way to the gardens, do you have a plot up there?” I asked.

  “Me? No, I would love to have one, I hope someday, but you must know how coveted they are. And you?”

  “Funnily enough the Wine Club ladies procured one for my birthday. Someone knew someone who dated someone who heard about a lone patch that had been left unclaimed and unattended.” With those last words, I noticed his expression change ever so slightly.

  “Look at the time,” he said suddenly. “It was lovely to visit with you and your dog, but I must be off. Thanks ever so for the water.”