Its lights were on and, aside from an all-night radio station blaring over the weak speakers, Maggie could hear the high spirits of some rowdy young people who chose the place as their regular hangout. It was nothing out of the ordinary, she knew, for them to convene there, but something about them was different.
The group seemed louder than usual and upon closer inspection, Maggie could tell that it was overly wild and energetic, even for teenagers. Maggie’s eyes grew wide.
“You? This is where you come back to?” she frowned.
The boy she had almost hit was among them, looking explicitly awake and untarnished by the earlier incident. Any kid would have been shaken by the narrow escape, but not this one. Maggie decided to go and buy some gum at the gas station shop so that she could have a closer look.
They came at her. All of them. They came straight at Maggie in a crowd of madly running, laughing hooligans. There were about eight of them, boys and girls, charging at Maggie while singing football chants and cackling. She cowered, expecting revenge for what had almost gone very wrong before, but they ran right past her.
Maggie turned to see them cavorting onwards, across the main street and into the park. She realized that they appeared to be on some kind of intense stimulant, much like what she had seen before when she lived in Boston. At least she could rest assured that the boy held no grudge against her and was fine. This was the only positive thing Maggie could take from the peculiar situation, but what scratched at her tolerance was not knowing why.
6
Sheriff Carl Walden sighed and tried to be pleasant with Miss Hastings and her twin sister the next day. The two old spinsters had been in Hope’s Crossing longer than God and they enjoyed privileges because of it. If something bothered the two religious sisters, Sheriff Walden was to attend to their calls first. Most of the time, though, their complaints were maddening for the spread thin and tired sheriff. One time, Mrs. Hastings complained about her mother’s headstone not “saying the right things.” Her sister, another time, expected Sheriff Walden to do something about the weather, it appeared. Apparently she was upset that the rain drowned her plants and that caused an awful smell of rot that she “had to report.”
Here he was again, responding to another call from the Hastings ladies.
“Noises, Sheriff, ungodly noises,” Miss Hastings the First noted in a mysterious tone.
Her sister quickly added, “Like crows. I mean, really. How many times have you heard crows cawing past midnight, Sheriff? Evil people walk these streets. Evil.”
“Evil,” her sister echoed. “When I looked out the window, I saw some young’uns, you know, from the local parish.”
Sheriff Walden cleared his throat.
“So this was actual people you saw?” he asked the old lady.
“What did I just say? For Pete’s sake, sheriff. Open your ears,” she whined.
He pursed his lips. Inside, where Carl could think whatever he liked, he imagined them being haunted by their own dead carcasses. That rot they always complained about was probably their own, he thought in a spiteful spurt of annoyance.
“They were people! Making like crows. Freaks,” she reiterated.
Her sister raised a crooked finger, gesturing that she needed to add something, but it eluded her and she was left with a pointy finger and black expression instead.
Carl asked, “Were they tourists perhaps, Miss Hastings? Tourists usually don’t have a curfew and act as if they own the place, especially this time of year.”
“No, no, they were children from our town. I mean, really, sheriff. Don’t you think I know the people who live in this town? I see them every day, coming from school. Them be locals, I says,” she insisted. At least this time her condescension was toned down.
“All right, ladies,” Carl concluded as he finished making notes on what was probably the only legitimate complaint the Hastings sisters had ever lodged. “I am going to investigate this noise complaint and see if I can have a talk with those youths. Please call me the moment they do this again.”
“Thank you, Sheriff,” they croaked over one another.
“This is the fifth noise complaint I have gotten in this area,” he revealed. “I would like to catch them red-handed to identify the culprits. Please call me when it happens again.”
“I will, my boy,” Miss Hastings the Second nodded as she ushered the sheriff out.
His big body dwarfed theirs as they flanked him on the veranda. Carl was glad that he had not suffered any of their really bad biscuits this time round, but he was worried about the sudden escalation of complaints in this area.
He looked at his watch.
“Hold on, Maggie. I’ll be right over,” he exhaled.
Nellie was at the Corey shop with Maggie again, after Carl had had to impose on Maggie for another babysitting gig. His mind raced with ways to reward Maggie for her trouble, but all he could think of was flowers, and Maggie Corey had enough things with leaves. The clouds were still forming a dome of gray overhead, but the weather was mild and nice. There was no sign of the angry heavens from last night. In fact, when Carl had received the call from the Hastings sisters, he’d reckoned they must have been disturbed by the rumbling sky and mistaken it for people making noise. Now he knew that their grievance, for once, held some validity to it.
When he joined Maggie and Nellie on the porch of the old Corey house, he heard the same thing from Maggie. She recounted the night before and the schoolchildren acting strangely.
“And then they capered right past me like maniacs,” she completed her story.
“Loudly?” he clarified as he braided Nellie’s hair while Maggie poured some milk smoothies. “I have had five noise complaints from that very area today. Even the Hastings sisters called about it.”
“Wow! They made sense this time?” Maggie gasped in jest. “No wonder you are concerned.”
“I tell you!” he joked along.
“I know this is probably not as weird as we think, but I can’t shake this idea of them being … under the influence,” she winced, not sure of the right term.
“That’s all right. As long as they only drive sneakers,” Carl played, but it did give him some cause for concern after the Hastings sisters also mentioned youths. However, after years as a cop, Carl was not in the habit of jumping to conclusions. It might all just be a coincidence.
“Strange though,” he added.
“What is?” Maggie asked.
“How these complaints are coming from a specific area, more so than from the bars. Usually noise complaints or reports of this kind center around the bars and late-night spots, you know?”
Nellie thanked her dad for the hairdo and took Bramble for a tumble on the lawn while Maggie served up another round of beers. It was getting humid, so she elected to take off her big shirt. Carl caught his breath when Maggie revealed her stringy tank top underneath, a tighter number that showed off her contours. He cleared his throat and practically drowned in his beer while she sat down, apparently not noticing his reaction.
Maggie’s bright blue eyes stared contemplatively into the distance. “I really hope this is not the start of trouble brewing again. It is far too random to be random, you know what I mean?”
Carl was sweating, trying to keep his eyes from straying to her bosom, but he had to answer, which meant he had to strain to think straight.
“Yeah, I feel the same,” he replied as casually as he could. “But we shouldn’t worry about things that we might be wrong about. There is enough time for that when it actually turns out problematic. Perhaps it is nothing, but we’ll keep our eyes open.”
Maggie nodded as they watched the girl and the cat cavort. Carl sniffed loudly, poking his nose in the air like a bloodhound.
“What’s wrong?” she asked him, a smile creeping onto her face.
“My God, what is that smell?” he groaned in ecstasy. “It smells like heaven.”
“I call it …” she paused as she leaned towards
him, “vanilla.”
“Vanilla?” he frowned. “Yeah, but what is it?”
“Biscuits! I am trying a crossover thing,” she chirped happily as she headed inside. “Like shortbread and cookie batter all put together with vanilla and nutmeg.”
“Wow,” he grunted, “I am sticking around for that.”
“Good,” she said as she vanished into the house. “Stick around. I’ll be right back.”
The beer was done. The day was done. The visit was almost over, but Maggie, Carl, Nellie, and Bramble were not done. Eventually the coffee came out with more biscuits and Bramble got a solid dose of catnip that entertained Nellie no end.
The two adults forgot about the toils and problems in their town for a brief time, while somewhere else, more young people were getting out of hand.
7
“Listen, Sheriff, I know what I saw!” Mr. Grant moaned, shifting his thick, black-frame glasses on the bridge of his nose. He had summoned the sheriff after being kept up all night. “Look, it is the second time this has happened now in the stretch of three days and I want something done about it, dammit!”
“All right, hang on, Mr. Grant,” Carl said, shifting on the chair as he took notes. “You know these kids?”
“Two of them. I know two of them, but there is a whole gang of them. Seen some older kids, like maybe college age, leading the pack,” he complained.
Carl knew that Mr. Grant was not making it up for the sake of bitching, although he was the type. Harry Grant was a regular churchgoer, just like Carl. Always on time and in the front pews, Grant was an annoying accountant who had a problem with anything fun. Even the most innocent, short-lived merriment, he would construe as spiteful and rowdy, so Carl did not expect much validity from the man when he first received the call.
However, one look at him told Carl that Harry Grant was not lying. He looked like hell. His hair was greasy and dark circles tainted his bloodshot eyes. Harry Grant looked alarmingly exhausted. Carl could tell by his mood and snapping comments too that the man was very out of sorts since the last Sunday he had seen him at the church service. It was clear that Harry had not slept at all and his mood proved it. Normally he was quite even-tempered, even for his constant rigidity. Now he was catty and sarcastic.
“All right, Mr. Grant, I am going to send one of my officers to your house tonight. If they come along again, we’ll snag them and you can get some sleep,” Carl told the fatigued and pissy nerd.
“Good! Good! Put my bloody tax dollars to use for a change,” he bitched.
Carl bit his lip, holding his tongue and wishing he had chosen a different vocation. He had to keep his cool while he wore this badge, so he tucked away the urge to punch Grant in the face and instead smiled. “Besides, I need to find out what these kids are up to anyway. Putting a squad car here might help me get to the bottom of it.”
With that, Carl simply got up and walked toward the door to assert his authority. He looked around the accountant’s house one last time as he left. In his wake, he still heard the accountant babbling, but Carl just ignored him. It had been a week since Maggie discussed the same problems with him on her porch and since then, he had had a flood of complaints similar to Harry Grant’s, most of them occurring at night. Things were escalating and Carl figured it was time to stop putting it aside as minor coincidences.
The area was always the same—those few blocks near the gas station and the park, far from any bars or likely spots of disturbances. It was mainly a residential area and most of the complaints were born there, Carl knew. It was time to find out what was brewing in Hope’s Crossing.
When he spoke to his next call, Carl managed to get a little more information. Nancy from the pharmacy asked him to log a formal complaint.
“You know I have a baby, Sheriff,” she whined, “and to get him to sleep at all is a mission, ya know? Now it is every night. I finally get him to sleep and then, boom!” Nancy gestured wildly. “Suddenly this unholy racket happens out in the street and my son is screaming his head off again.” She leaned in to whisper, a look of confidentiality on her face. “Don’t tell anyone, but I have had to resort to, you know, medicine, so that we can get some sleep.”
“Oh that’s not good,” Carl agreed.
“No, it ain’t good, Sheriff. Now I have to dope up just to get some shut-eye and I have had it with those kids. You tell Ollie that if he and his buddies keep us awake one more night, I am going to start shooting,” she threatened in a genuine tone.
“Shooting?” Carl lifted an eyebrow.
“I have a license,” Nancy replied nonchalantly. “I’ll use it too.”
“Okay, all right, wait a minute,” Carl protested gently. “Let’s not, excuse the pun, go off half-cocked here. Let us do our job and maybe save you from a prison sentence if things go wrong.”
“Yeah, well, then do something about it, Sheriff. Do your damn job so citizens don’t have to,” she snapped with narrowed eyes.
“Ollie? You said Ollie? Is that Ollie Miller you are talking about?” Carl inquired.
Nancy nodded. “Him and a few pals, girls too, from high school. Also, I’ve seen some kids I don’t know; you know, bigger, older kids.”
“Ah I see,” Carl nodded slowly. “That is actually a good start. That little bit of info really helps, Nancy. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, Carl,” Nancy replied with a proud nod.
Carl was excited for the first time since the complaints came in. Finally, he had one lead where he could start his investigation. Ollie Miller was a fifteen-year old local Carl knew from his daughter’s school and baseball camp a few years before. The boy had skills, but lately he had given up sports and just loitered around town.
It was not really surprising, given the boy’s petulant manner and bad home life, but Carl never expected the likes of Ollie to be involved in what sounded like small-time gang activity. Perhaps he was just naïve, Carl reckoned. After all, it was always the ones he least expected that ended up being quite disturbed or criminal. He canvassed town to find Ollie, but to no avail. Not even the gas station, where the kid was a regular. Carl was getting frustrated, but he knew that a good detective bided his time, even if that time ran at a general deficit due to short staff.
Maggie felt knackered when she came home. It had been a normal day at Corey’s Herbs and Simples, but the humid weather had drained her of all her energy. She had a few fans on in the shop, but the wet air made it impossible to cool down and she was relieved to finally get home to the fridge and to the iced strawberry tea inside it.
“Now imagine what I feel like with all this pelt,” Bramble tried to evoke some pity. He was very uncomfortable as he came into the kitchen, sighing a lot, until Maggie looked at him with a long exhale. Hands at her side, she asked, “Should I give you a nice cold bath?”
Bramble hissed with eyes wide, the gasp of astonishment exhaled with overdone drama.
“How could you even suggest such an atrocious thing?” he shrieked to Maggie’s amusement.
“What?” she asked innocently to tease him. “I just thought you would appreciate the cooldown.”
From the lounge, Maggie’s cell phone rang. Her stomach turned to knots, expecting another harassing summons from Gareth, especially when she noticed yet another private number on her screen.
“Oh God, no,” she groaned. “I wonder what it would take to shut him up for good … next to the obvious of course.”
“Bind his tongue. There is a good spell in the green and gold book for that one,” Bramble tried to assist, but he knew Maggie was not far gone enough to resort to such things. On the other hand, Gareth was pushing hard for it.
Maggie picked up the call, but she did not say anything. If Gareth was this desperate, he would definitely speak first and she had no desire to grant him her consideration.
“Maggie? You there, girl?” a familiar voice asked.
Maggie sighed with relief. “Hey, David. What’s up?” she greeted cordially, her eyes
finding Bramble to affirm that the tongue-binding spell was not necessary just yet.
“I am so sorry I haven’t gotten back to you until now, Maggie,” he started. “It completely slipped my mind.”
“Um, what completely slipped your mind?” she frowned, having no idea what he was on about.
“Oh!” he chuckled awkwardly. “Remember that Green Demon thing you talked about?”
Maggie gasped excitedly. “Yes! Yes, I remember. What did you get?”
“Well, I did some deep-scan searches on the name and guess what?” he rambled hastily. “Green Demon, my dear Maggie, is, in fact, a drug!”
“No way,” she replied, thinking about the giddy kids around town.
“Yep, it is an herbal extract that was briefly sold around Boston, and of course, online it has been available through the more nefarious sites if you know where to look, you know.”
“But not for sale anymore, I take it?” she inquired.
“From what I get from my sources, this thing is currently under investigation,” he elucidated. “Bad rep.”
“Okay, okay, so just tell me a bit more,” she begged, her mind rapidly building the puzzle she had had trouble filling up with pieces. “How potent is this stuff, David? I mean, you say it is herbal in nature, so how bad could it be?”
“Belladonna is herbal. Pretty deadly stuff, my dear,” Bramble mentioned lazily from her side. It was true, Maggie reckoned. Just because it was not chemical in nature did not mean that it was particularly healthy.
David explained. “It is a component or extract of khat …”
“Khat?” Maggie scoffed in confusion. “What, as in pussycat?”
Bramble sniggered. “They like us so much they name drugs after us.”
David continued to clear up for Maggie what the substance was about.
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