THE HERBALIST (Books 1-5)

by Leslie Leigh

  “The way murders have dropped in our laps lately, it seems that wherever we would go, they would still show up.”

  “Okay. That’s sounds perfect then. I’ll get the training I need, and then we can travel the world and just wait for homicides to come along.”

  “Hmm…when you put it that way,” she said.

  They both chuckled.

  “Well, let’s hope the Catalonia murders are done for a while anyway. I’m not sure how many this town could withstand before it starts to make a statistical difference in government funding.”

  He searched her face to see whether she was joking, “Are you serious?”

  “No,” she squealed, “but I can see your expression. I had you going.”

  “Only for a second,” he defended.

  The rain showed no sign of letting up. She picked up her cell phone to call the market. “How’s it going up there?” she asked.

  “The rain pretty much daunted many afternoon customers,” Vivian said, “but not before all the meringues and cream puffs disappeared. Oh, speaking of disappearing, I found three bottles of supplements missing. It was strange because I know no one bought them today.”

  Melissa knit her brow. “Wait, are you talking about the ones that were missing this morning? How did you know? I just made myself a note to looking into it, and then restocked the shelves.”

  “I’m not sure what you’re talking about,” Vivian said, “these had to have disappeared late this morning because I checked all the shelves shortly after I came in.”

  “Weird. Okay. Do you have any idea of who might have been there late yesterday that was there late morning today as well?”

  “You think somebody took them?”

  “I think they had to have taken them. I don’t know. I haven’t thought it through. But if you think of anyone that fits both of those time frames, just make a note of it. I’m taking the afternoon off. I’ll be in tomorrow morning.”

  “Sounds good. Flora and I can run through the people together. Between the two of us, we should be able to figure it out.”

  “I hope so,” Melissa said. “It’s not like we haven’t had something here or there come up missing before, but nothing like this. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She disconnected the call.

  “Something wrong?” Brian asked.

  “Just something odd. We’ll figure it out, I’m sure,” she said.

  “Good,” he said, pulling her back down beside her and planting a kiss on her forehead. “Now, where were we?”

  Chapter 2

  The next morning, the UPS man had just left, and Melissa was unpacking her new stock. A woman who looked remotely familiar to Melissa came into the market. Melissa stood up so the woman could see her. The woman noticed her immediately. “Melissa?” she asked.

  “Yes, I’m Melissa.”

  “I’m sure you don’t remember me,” she said. “The only reason I know you is because someone told me I could find you here. When I saw, though, I did remember. I’m Corinne Bailey; I used to be Corinne Johnston.”

  “Oh, yes, of course,” Melissa said. “Someone mentioned you yesterday. I just heard about your dad. I’m really sorry.”

  Corinne nodded. “Dad is what I want to talk to you about, Melissa, or more pointedly, his death.”

  “Would you like to sit down, Corinne?” Melissa asked. “That corner table back there is fairly private. What can I get you?”

  “Something…soothing,” she said.

  “I have just the thing,” Melissa said.

  The woman made her way back to the corner table, looking around as she went. Melissa brought her a cup of tulsi and lavender tea, and two of the tiny cream puffs which were plain today instead of chocolate.

  “Soothing tea and comfort food as well,” Melissa said.

  “Thank you,” Corinne said.

  Corinne continued to look around them. “You’ve done very well for yourself, Melissa. I remember the old days when buying groceries locally meant a convenience store or that tiny market, which was good in a pinch, but not fare you wanted very often.”

  “I do have a rather captive consumer base,” Melissa admitted. “It’s something that was sorely needed.”

  Corinne nodded then took a deep breath which ended in a sigh. “Have you heard anything about my dad’s death? I mean—any details?”

  “Not really. Simply that it was his heart and that it happened over breakfast.”

  “Well, during and after breakfast, I think. The county called me. The nurse who had been looking in on him for the past few weeks found him.”

  “Oh?” Melissa asked. “Who was that?”

  “Her name is...oh, let me see, I wrote it down a while back. I know it like I know my own name, but my mind is not functioning well today.”

  “I understand.”

  “Here it is,” she said, “Donna Magnusson.”

  “I don’t believe I know her,” Melissa said.

  “I think she’s new with the county.”

  Melissa nodded.

  “Anyway, to cut to the chase, I’m not sure my dad died of natural causes.”

  “What would make you say that?” Melissa asked.

  “Well, I saw the doctor’s report. Because my dad was on hospice anyway, they didn’t do an autopsy. Dr. Lamond in Sonorita examined him and did some lab work. The death certificate says he died of heart failure. The lab results showed nothing unusual—normal amounts of digoxin in his system since he was on Digitalis. His electrolytes were really low, which was probably what caused the heart failure.”

  “Okay. Those all sound like natural causes.”

  “Yes, but here’s the strange thing,” she said. “The last week or ten days,” she said and then paused because she was starting to tear up. She swallowed several times, and Melissa handed her a napkin. “Let’s back up a little. I wish you could have known my dad, Melissa. He was the most calm, rational, non-judgmental person you could ever meet. Everybody loved my dad because he treated everybody the same. Through all of his illness, he’s been really cheerful. He had a heart attack before my mom died, but he managed to outlive her.

  “People criticized me for not coming back here to live or not taking him to California to live with me. That’s the way he wanted it. He didn’t want to leave the house where he and my mom had lived for forty years. He loved gardening, and he just wanted to stay there. I offered to move back, and he said no. He knew my and my husband’s careers were doing really well. So, instead we talked almost every day. He even mastered technology and would phone, text, or email me something every day. His mind was really sharp.

  “But in the last ten days or so, he seemed to be confused. I didn’t hear from him for a day and a half, so I started calling him. I emailed him, too, because I thought maybe something had happened to his phone. When I finally got a hold of him, he was not himself at all. He was confused, and the worst part about it was, he started talking about committing suicide.

  “I knew something was odd then. In all my dad’s illness, he has never been depressed. I started making sure we talked every day, but at least three times he told me he was going to hang himself—and where and when. Then, I would talk and talk to him, and he would seem to be all right by the end of the call. The third time he said it, I made arrangements at work and got a ticket to fly back, but the county called me and told me he was dead before that could take place.”

  “Did they do a full tox screen on him?”

  “I think so. According to what I read, nothing seemed out of order.”

  “No new meds or some other sudden change?”

  She shook her head. “Nothing showed up on the report.”

  “I understand everything you are telling me, and I understand how confused and helpless you must feel. But what are you suggesting when you say you don’t believe he died of natural causes?”

  “I…I don’t know. It’s hard to articulate.”

  “Hard because you don’t understand it, or hard because it emb
arrasses you to say it?”

  Corinne’s eyes flew wide. “I…I guess it’s because I’ve always been taught to think the best of people, and that if I think ill of someone, it’s more than likely my attitude.”

  “I understand. But you think someone is at fault for your father’s death.”

  She began to cry. She nodded while holding her face in the napkin.

  Melissa could see her trying to get ahold of herself. Corinne cleared her throat a couple of times and wouldn’t look at Melissa until she felt in control again.

  “Here’s what I don’t get. If he had a nurse looking in on him daily, how did she not see this? There’s nothing in her notes, and I didn’t get a call from the county until he was dead, yet his behavior had changed markedly. Even if he said nothing about suicide to her, surely she could tell that he was confused, which he never had been before.”

  Melissa looked at her while she processed all the pieces. “So you think…?”

  “That the woman is guilty of gross negligence if nothing else.”

  “That would be somewhat difficult to prove, Corinne, given that the examination and tox screen don’t show anything, and that there is no one, really, to tell us what was going on with him other than what you were able to perceive from a distance.”

  Corinne sat, elbows on the table with her fingers laced together in front of her face. She laid her head against her hands and looked at the wall, shaking her head.

  “I understand exactly what you are saying, Melissa. But you didn’t know my dad. I have a feeling that goes way beyond grief that there is something really wrong here. I want to hire you and your detective friend to look into it.”

  Melissa showed marked surprise. “You likely can hire Brian,” she said, “and I can be there to assist him in any way I can. Let me give you his phone number, and you can call him. You can tell him what you want and tell him he can get whatever details you don’t want to deal with from me.”

  Just then the door to the market swung open, and Brian walked in. Melissa beckoned to him, and he walked back to the table. “Speaking of,” she said to Corinne. “Brian, this is Corinne Bailey, née Johnston. Corinne, this is Detective Brian Byrne.”

  Corinne looked up at him with a wan smile, but reached out, giving him a firm handshake. “Detective Byrne,” she said, “I believe I am in need of your services.”

  He looked at Melissa who gave him a nearly imperceptible nod.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Corinne,” he said, taking a chair.

  “Corinne’s father, Lloyd Johnston, passed away two days ago, Brian. Corinne believes he did not die of natural causes.”

  Melissa stood. Brian looked up at her. “Can you get me a coffee, please?” he asked, “And maybe some…?”

  “Lunch? Of course. Corinne, you go ahead. I’ll get Brian’s coffee. Is there anything else I can get you?”

  “Another cup of this tea would be really nice, Melissa, thanks. It is helping me to feel a little clearer headed.”

  “Coming up,” she said.

  Corinne filled Brian in on the details while Melissa rounded up drinks for them and a sandwich for Brian. By the time Melissa returned, they had discussed rates as well.

  “I’m staying at my dad’s,” Corinne said, when she was ready to leave. “Here’s his address and my cell number. Please don’t hesitate to call if there is anything you need to know.”

  Brian took the information and looked at it. “Mrs. Bailey, if I might, have you already been to your father’s house?”

  “Yesterday. Why?”

  “Did you clean anything up?”

  “No. I went in and looked at things, but I didn’t stay. I wasn’t ready then. I think I can handle it now.”

  “So you stayed…?”

  “I stayed at the Sonorita Inn last night. I came directly here after checking out this morning.”

  “Actually, that’s good. If we may, I’d like to treat this as a crime scene. We won’t need to dust for fingerprints; I wouldn’t expect to find any that didn’t belong to your father, his nurse, the doctor, or any other people who came or went such as funeral personnel. But I would like to look at it with my own eyes before anything else is disturbed.”

  “I would like that very much,” Corinne said. “Thank you. Are you available to follow me now?”

  “Certainly. Melissa?”

  “Yes, I can come,” Melissa said.

  “Thanks, both of you.”

  “My pleasure, Mrs. Bailey,” Brian said.

  # # #

  When they drove in, Melissa recalled what Corinne had said about her parents living there together for forty years. It wasn’t large at all—just a cottage, really—and Melissa could imagine a young, happy couple and their little daughter living here. The front of the house was completely occluded by a stand of mature oleander in clouds of white and fuchsia-colored blossoms.

  “The downstairs bedroom was converted to a hospital-type room for dad,” Corinne said, “so that he didn’t have to go up and down the stairs once he became ill.” She waved toward a room that Melissa could see was set up with a hospital bed, a chest of drawers, a lamp table, and a television. “But after his surgery, he was so much better that it was sort of unnecessary, but by that time he was used to it.”

  “If he was so much better, Corinne, why did you put him on hospice?”

  “Truthfully? Because dad’s doctor kept prodding him to have other procedures done, and my dad just wanted to be left alone. So, if we entered him into the hospice program, it was indicating that he wanted palliative care only, plus the county would send a nurse to check on him once a week. He was ill, and we never knew how long he had to live because anytime we tried to get a prognosis from the doctor, it always came with a ‘well, if you let me do this procedure, we can buy him this much time.’

  “My dad wasn’t afraid to die; he was just busy enjoying life. That’s the way he wanted it, sitting in his rocker by the window, looking out into the mountains and the pastures. He always talked about just hoping, as everyone does, I’m sure, that he would just go to sleep one night and not wake up. So, I think you can see how all this confusion and talk of suicide shook me up considerably.

  “The evening before he died, he called to tell me that his heart was ‘acting up.’ I asked what he meant by that, and he said it felt like it was speeding up, then it would slow way down, like it didn‘t want to beat anymore. I thought he was just having some palpitations, which can be normal with his condition, but he knew that, too. The fact that he seemed worried about it should have told me something, but considering his confusion, I just tried not to worry any more than I already was. I was on my way out here in two days anyway.

  “When the nurse found him, it was right after breakfast. He had gotten part way through his breakfast, then he came and laid back in bed, clothes, shoes, and all. When I talked to the doctor who examined him, he said dad had his hand over his heart.”

  “I thought you said the nurse was coming daily.”

  “Dad said she was. She was only supposed to come once a week, but she started coming over every day.”

  “Did that please your dad or upset him?”

  “He never said one way or the other.”

  “Okay, Corinne,” Brian said, “if you don’t mind, we’ll just have a look around for ourselves. Please don’t touch anything until after we leave.”

  She nodded. “I’m going out back to sit in the garden,” she said. “There’s some shade back there so it should make the heat a little more bearable.”

  Melissa nodded back, and Corinne went out.

  “What are we looking for, Brian?” Melissa asked, quietly.

  “I’m not even sure. I just want to get a snapshot in my head, even if I don’t find anything particularly out of the way now.”

  Melissa went to look out the front window. There was a white fence enclosing a small, neat yard with the oleander bushes beyond. The blossoms were holding up surprisingly well, considering how
they must have been pounded in the rain yesterday.

  “Melissa, you want to check his meds, in case you see anything out of the ordinary?”

  Melissa went into the bedroom. She looked at the meds that were there then looked around in other places: the drawers in the chest, the lamp table, the medicine chest, and the kitchen.

  “Find anything?” Brian asked.

  “I’m actually more disturbed by what I don’t see than what I do. The digitalis and the diuretic had been recently refilled, but I can find no trace of potassium, calcium, or magnesium supplements which would explain why his electrolytes were so low.”

  “Do you think maybe his nurse was having them refilled when he died?”

  “We can check that. I’ll take the digitalis bottle with me, and we can call the pharmacy.”

  “You probably should just write down the information you need and leave the bottle here—just in case. In case of what, I’m not sure, but better safe than sorry.”

  “Sure,” she said, getting out her phone to enter notes.

  After combing the downstairs thoroughly, the pair went upstairs, just to be thorough. Melissa walked down the hall first, looking into the room on the right, then on the left.

  “Brian,” she said, “look at this.”

  They entered the room on the left. There was a rectangular impression on the bed as if there had been a suitcase lying on it. There was a towel lying across the closed toilet, and the medicine chest door was standing open.

  Brian backed out of the bathroom, walking across the small room and opening the closet. Hangers were strewn about, some on the floor. When Brian picked up a couple of the hangers, he saw a camisole lying beneath them. He picked it up with the crook of the hanger and cocked his eyebrow at Melissa.

  Melissa opened the window and looked down. “Corinne,” she said, “could you come up here for a moment?”

  Corinne came up the stairs. “What’s up?” she asked.

  “When were you last in this house, Corinne?”

  “I came out to see Dad last April,” she said.

  “And did you sleep in this room?”