Nightshade for Warning

by Bailey Cattrell

  Ignoring Cynthia’s quirked eyebrow, I reached for my wineglass. Just because she was always on the prowl didn’t mean I was.

  Larken’s glass was already empty, and her cheeks were flushed a delicate pink beneath her smooth tan. Now she piped up. “Mr. Sontag, I’ve read several of your articles in Conscience. I’m a subscriber, you know. To the online version, now that we travel so much.” She smiled at Colby.

  For the first time Blake looked pleased.

  “Talk about a small footprint,” I said. “My brother has been living in his Westfalia for, what—three years now?”

  Colby nodded. “About that.”

  Blake made a face like he’d just caught a whiff of skunk.

  All my big-sister defenses rose with a vengeance, but I kept my face neutral. The guy was a jerk, but it wasn’t catching, and he’d be leaving town soon. Colby wasn’t a child, and he could hold his own with an unhappy journalist.

  I just hoped I could.

  Beside me, Larken sighed. I looked over and was surprised to see a dreamy, faraway look in her eyes. “Someday,” she said. “Someday I want to have a little plot of earth. Somewhere I can keep animals and sustainably grow our food, and we can support ourselves off the land. My grandpa left me some money years ago, and I’ve been saving it to buy a place of my own.”

  I blinked. Really? She was crunchier than I’d thought. And what about Mr. Gadabout? I looked at Colby, who appeared to be concentrating on his glass of beer.

  Uh-oh.

  Blake shook his head. “Sounds like something out of the sixties.”

  I bit my tongue.

  Two tray-laden waiters arrived with our food. The layered fragrance floating up from my pasta reignited my appetite. Larken smiled down at her Greek salad with quinoa and roasted beets, and Colby made an appreciative noise when he saw his plate piled with Guinness-braised short ribs and colcannon. Cynthia dipped a bite of cedar-planked salmon into a pool of lemon-tarragon sauce with a sigh of contentment. Blake had requested that his New York strip be served “cremated,” and his plate was the only one that didn’t make me want to ask for a bite.

  Silence descended as we ate. Thank God.

  Then Larken spoke. “My dream might sound like something out of the sixties, Mr. Sontag, but so what? Corporate agriculture has taken over our food supply. It’s ruining the environment, damaging the soil, killing the bees and other pollinators, and poisoning our water. If I want a little land where that doesn’t happen, then what’s wrong with that? It’s a way to fight back, at least. To make a difference.”

  Colby put his hand on her arm. “Lark.”

  She jerked away from him. “Don’t ‘Lark’ me. Mr. Sontag knows exactly what I mean. Don’t you?” She directed a pleading look at the journalist.

  He laughed. “You’re out of luck, honey. You can do your hippie-dippy thing if you want, but corporate agriculture isn’t going away. It’s going to get bigger and bigger. I predict small family farms will be completely wiped out within the next decade.”

  Larken’s fork clattered onto the table as she stood. “No! Not if enough people are dedicated to change! Not if we educate the public. Not if—”

  Blake snorted his derision and shook his head.

  Tears filled her eyes.

  “Lark,” Colby tried again.

  She pushed her chair back. “What kind of environmentalist are you, anyway?”

  Blake looked wry. “A very practical one. And one who understands that it’s a losing battle.”

  “That’s horrible!”

  He shrugged.

  “And you’re a horrible man!” She whirled and ran out of the restaurant.

  Colby jumped up and followed her without a word.

  I started to push away from the table as well. Cynthia’s hand shot out, her fingers curling around my wrist. “No,” she hissed. Then she seemed to regain herself. “Let Colby handle it.” And don’t leave me here alone with this guy, she seemed to be saying.

  Blake seemed utterly unaware that anything was wrong or that he’d managed to drive two of his dinner companions from the table. He took a bite of steak, then reached over and pushed Colby’s chair back. Scooting his seat over, he smiled. “A little more room now.”

  • • •

  I QUICKLY finished my meal. So did Cynthia. We skipped dessert and coffee, and as soon as it was decent to leave, I said good night and fled the restaurant.

  In the lobby, I looked around for Colby and Larken. When I didn’t see them, I went out the French doors that led to the swimming pool at the rear of the hotel. The only people I saw were a group of tweens playing Marco Polo while two couples sat watching them. Back inside, I checked the Horseshoe Bar. I wouldn’t have been surprised if they’d decided more alcohol was in order after their encounter with Blake. However, if my brother and his girlfriend had gone to a bar, it wasn’t the one in the hotel.

  Colby and Larken didn’t answer their room phone when I asked the concierge to call it. My brother didn’t answer his cell, either. I put my phone back into my purse and rubbed my face with both hands. Then I took it out and texted Colby:

  Call me when you get a chance—so sorry!

  Movement in my peripheral vision snagged my attention, and I turned to see Cynthia and Blake standing outside the restaurant entrance. She was talking, gesturing animatedly to make her point. He shook his head, and I saw his mouth form the word “no.” She frowned, and her eyes narrowed.

  I’d seen that look before, and was happy it hadn’t ever been directed at me.

  Then she smiled and leaned in to say something into his ear. As she did so, her finger trailed along his arm. I remembered the gesture as one she’d used on Ritter just after he’d come back to Poppyville. I’d been sure she was making a play for him then, and she might have been. Ritter, bless his heart, hadn’t even seemed to notice.

  Now Blake’s lips quirked up in a half smile, and he nodded.

  Well, if anyone was going to get him on the side of the Poppyville business community, by hook or by crook, it was Cynthia Beck. I had to admire her success even though it sometimes seemed that she needed to get more of a personal life.

  As for me, I was bone weary and had no more patience for Mr. Blake Sontag that evening. As I was going out to the hotel’s front veranda, the other half of the double door slammed open with such force that it hit the wall behind it. I leaped out of the way, stumbling and catching myself on the back of a chair. A big man in a Panama hat shouldered past me without so much as a glance. It was the same guy that had so nicely held the door open for me when I’d arrived. Now he barreled toward the bar.

  Sighing, I went out and descended the steps to the street, gratefully inhaling the sugared scent of Victorian tuberoses that dotted the beds in front of the veranda.

  I heard the memory of my gamma’s voice. Tuberoses for dangerous desires. Ellie, can you hear what their scent is saying? And over there—the marigolds. Can you smell their message?

  Marigolds for cruelty, Gamma.

  Very good, my child. And she’d ruffled my hair.

  As I approached my Wrangler, I saw the big black SUV was gone, replaced by a red Volkswagen. The lights on the silver Lexus next to it flashed on with an audible beep, and I turned to see Cynthia coming down the steps.

  She gave me an apologetic look and waved. I waved back and got behind the wheel. All I wanted was to go home and curl up with Dash.

  • • •

  HOWEVER, once I settled in, my little home felt foreign. Sterile. I’d spent so much energy getting it just right for Sontag and his photographer that it hardly felt like my own as Dash and I snuggled together on the love seat with my grandmother’s garden journal. There would be dog hair on the cushions now, and the pillows would no longer be perfectly plump.

  I just couldn’t bring myself to worry about it after that horribl
e dinner. After how awful Blake Sontag had turned out to be.

  Who cares what he thinks?

  I opened the dirt-smudged cover of the journal, hoping for the peace it so often brought me. It sounded crazy, but I swore Gamma communicated with me through that book. Her book. It was full of drawings, some black and white, some that she’d created with colored pencil or watercolor. Mixed in were a hodgepodge of practical plant descriptions, Latin names, and snatches of song and verse. Throughout, she’d noted the meanings of plants in the language of flowers from Victorian times—and long before that. There was no index, no alphabetization, no order whatsoever.

  And sometimes the journal, well, it changed. I’d had this record of hers since I was eleven years old, but in the last few months I’d looked at it nearly every day. Even so, I continued to stumble across pages with new information that I hadn’t seen before, often information that I just happened to need to help someone. For example, the previous week Essa Mae McLory was feeling exhausted, and my usual pick-me-up blend of rosemary, peppermint, and eucalyptus wasn’t working. That night Gamma’s journal fell open to a page on the many uses of carnation. I’d remembered the meanings in the language of flowers as she’d written them in script around the four edges of the page:

  Pink means I’ll never forget you.

  Red, my heart breaks.

  White is sweet and lovely.

  Yellow means disdain.

  But Gamma had also noted that the scent could promote physical energy. The next day I’d distilled an absolute from a mixture of fragrant blooms in my garden. Sure enough, it had worked a charm, and Essa Mae was soon back to her usual, bouncy ninety-year-old self.

  I flipped past a page heavy with fine-inked lines showing a murmuration of starlings in flight, and another that outlined the delicate veining of an oak leaf in pale shades of green. Finally, I closed my eyes and simply let the book fall open where it might.

  When I opened my eyes I saw a drawing of a purple-red bell-shaped flower, deep purple berries, and a cross section of a green berry surrounded by five leaves. I recognized it immediately.

  Atropa belladonna.

  Nightshade. Deadly nightshade, to be specific.

  Nightshade for warning.

  A chill shivered down my back, leaving goose bumps in its wake. Beside me, Dash sat up as if he’d heard a strange noise.

  “Gamma?” I whispered.

  A gust of wind rattled the window latch, and I jumped.

  Stop being silly, Ellie.

  To the side of the drawing, a paragraph stated,

  Delicious and sweet at first but with heinous undertones. Once used by maidens to dilate pupils for beauty. Poison is naturally occurring atropine (see jimson weed and mandrake). May cause tunnel vision and hallucinations prior to convulsions and painful death. Nonetheless, extremely effective in homeopathic preparations. Slow to germinate. Grows 3–4 feet tall. Dried or fresh, scent is similar to the pungent fragrance of fresh tomato leaves.

  Slowly, I closed the book and rose to put it back on the shelf. It was late, and the interview tomorrow morning, which I’d once anticipated with nervous eagerness, now loomed as a stressful event I simply had to get through. Best to do that on a full night’s sleep.

  But the image of the beautiful, bell-shaped nightshade flowers haunted every one of my dreams that night.

  Warning . . . of what?

  • • •

  WITH a sense of vague dread, I watched dawn spread across the angled skylight above. Checking my phone revealed Colby had texted after I’d gone to bed, assuring me that he’d found Larken and everything was copacetic. I texted him back that I’d call after the interview.

  Downstairs, I brewed strong coffee. Then I showered, taking my time under the hot water and rinsing my hair with the heady rosewater left over from my last essential oil distillation. The sweet scent helped tame my nervous tension about the upcoming interview. I dressed in a swirly skirt and simple blue tank top that Astrid had assured me would photograph well in case Sontag decided to include me in any of the pictures.

  Or would that be up to the photographer? The one who had stopped at the table last night.

  Those grass green eyes. And he’d smelled of grass as well, newly mown and sprinkled with fresh rain. I shook my head and ran gel-covered fingers through my dark curls in a feeble attempt to tame them.

  My thoughts veered back to the garden journal. Was the appearance of deadly nightshade a real warning from my gamma? Or was I making more out of it than I should? I’d always been fairly practical, despite my gifts. I mean, smell is a sense, right? It was a kind of empiricism to trust what it told me. But in the last few months, I’d finally opened myself to things that could be sensed at the edge of awareness, still discernable but only with concentration and heightened attention. So yes: I was willing to believe my grandmother had directed me to the nightshade for a reason.

  The warning had to be about Blake Sontag interviewing me. What else could it be?

  Sontag hadn’t been anything like I’d expected. Of course, I hadn’t actually spoken to him before the disastrous dinner in the Empire Room; his assistant had set up the interview. But I’d assumed that anyone so devoted to reporting on the environment would be a decent guy. Was Gamma warning me that this interview might do more harm than good for my business, or even for Poppyville? Scents & Nonsense and the Enchanted Garden were my life. I’d worked so hard to re-create myself after the divorce, and now, despite a few hiccups along my journey, I was the happiest I’d ever been.

  What about Ritter in Alaska?

  I pushed the thought away.

  Oh, and now Colby was back, too! Probably not for long, but it was so good to see him. And Larken was a gem.

  A sudden thought stabbed through me. What if the nightshade wasn’t a warning about Sontag at all? What if it was about Colby?

  No. Not my little brother. Nothing can happen to him.

  I made my bed in the loft, checked that everything was neat as a pin downstairs, and opened the blinds to show the view of the meadow and spiky Kestrel Peak. Still, doom dogged my steps as I led Dash out to the garden. As always, the lush greenery calmed me. And everything looked great, almost as if the plants were determined to make the best showing they could. I smiled as I passed the rosemary I’d planted the previous afternoon. It had been shaped into a perfect cone and now graced the edge of a miniature fairy tableau. Come December, I’d add tiny lights, and the wee folk could enjoy their own Christmas tree.

  Oh. There. Three obviously dead blooms on the hydrangea. I retrieved the pointed little deadheaders from the basket by the water spigot. As I snipped off the spent blossoms, the latch to the gate rattled, and Astrid came in. Precious trotted beside her, this time outfitted with a harness and leash.

  Dash ran up and stopped short as he realized this was the strangest dog he’d ever seen. He comically tipped his head one way, then the other, looked at me, and finally lay down and allowed the pig to come over to sniff his nose.

  We laughed at their antics as Astrid handed me a plastic container of cookies. “Calendula tuiles.” She brought cookies by Sense & Nonsense most mornings, but lately she’d been on a flower cookie kick, using fresh or dried blooms from the Enchanted Garden.

  “These are gorgeous,” I said, examining the delicate wafers formed into crunchy arcs that represented French roof tiles, or tuiles. “You really went all out.”

  “You want to impress the big-time journalist, right?”

  I sighed, lacking the will to tell her about the whole dinner fiasco the night before.

  “Now, don’t worry about Precious here. I’ll keep out of the way. Besides, Blake Sontag is bound to think she’s cute as a button.”

  “I highly doubt that,” I muttered.

  Astrid looked hurt.

  “Never mind,” I assured her. “Precious is adorable.”r />
  • • •

  TEN o’clock came and went. Then ten thirty. Astrid had opened Scents & Nonsense. I fussed in the house, in the garden, with my curly hair, which seemed determined to be more crazy than usual. Finally, I went into the shop.

  “I don’t think he’s coming,” I said to Astrid, who was dusting the soap displays. Then I explained what had happened at dinner.

  When I was finished, she planted her fists on her hips, her face livid. “That’s just wrong, Ellie. You need to call him up and tell him so.”

  “I only have his assistant’s number,” I said, opening the front door and stepping out to the boardwalk.

  Immediately, I saw the silent flashing lights. Red and blue and red and blue, three blocks down. A crowd of people. Police cars and a fire truck parked in the middle of Corona Street. An ambulance in front of the Hotel California.

  I took off toward them at a run.

  CHAPTER 4

  ALL I could think was that my brother might be in trouble, and I’d been dithering around my garden waiting for an interview that was never going to happen.

  “Ellie! Wait!” Astrid called from behind me.

  I kept running. When I got to the hotel, I tripped going up the steps, caught myself on the railing, and pushed into the crowd of people clustered in the doorway.

  “What’s going on?” I asked. “What happened?”

  A few people looked over, but no one answered. Setting my jaw, I elbowed through the throng into the lobby. More people were gathered in clusters, speaking to one another in hushed tones. I scanned the faces, looking for my brother. There was a uniformed policewoman chatting with an elderly couple, jotting something in her notebook as they spoke. She nodded, and they moved away as she approached a lone man dressed in shorts and a polo shirt. Outside the French doors, I saw more people milling around the pool. I caught a glimpse of Spence, the photographer, but didn’t see if Blake Sontag was with him.

  A squeal sounded behind me, and I whirled to see Astrid had made her way inside, too. She was carrying Precious, who looked none too pleased. The pig blinked with agitation and made a distinct snorting noise, which attracted the attention of those standing nearby. My friend ignored them and pointed toward the registration desk. I nodded, and we hurried over.