The Solace of Bay Leaves

by Leslie Budewitz

  “Pat sounds like a terrific guy,” Nate said. “I wish I’d known him.”

  Laurel gave him a grateful smile. But I was stuck on an incongruent fact: The man who never missed a game had begged off the team trip claiming he had to work, and yet there was no evidence clearly tying his murder to his work. Maddie’s shooting with the same gun made that seem even less likely.

  The same gun didn’t mean the same shooter. But the odds of a murder weapon showing up in someone else’s hands, who used it to shoot a woman the murder victim had known, only blocks away, in a building that had been the subject of a dispute . . .

  Well, those odds were odd.

  And Mike Tracy had taught me that when something looks odd, take a closer look.

  THE Uber picked us up at the willow tree. The bus runs down East-lake, but no way was I going to hike up the hill and wait in the rain in high-heeled boots and a velvet dress, even with a borrowed coat.

  “When’s the food tour coming through?” Nate asked once we were in the car. “Will they cancel with this rain? Although it looks like it’s tapering off.”

  “Eleven-thirty, fingers crossed. We’re the appetizers before lunch. The Market’s pretty popular in the rain—so much of it is under cover. But you never know.”

  “I suppose it makes tourists feel like they got a taste of the real Seattle,” he replied.

  “They said it rained all the time up here,” our driver piped up. “I didn’t believe ’em.” He grinned at me through the rear-view mirror.

  “Where did you move from?”

  “Southern California,” he replied, and the old song popped into my head.

  Then the light changed and he hit the gas. Traffic wasn’t heavy this early on a Saturday morning, but skirting through South Lake Union, home to Amazon, and winding down to Western, between the Market and the waterfront, navigating hills and one-way streets, required a driver’s attention. I was glad it was his job, not mine. He zipped past an old redbrick building, the upper story partially covered by ghost signs, those faded reminders of businesses long gone. Such a contrast to the sleek glass and metal structures nearby. Minutes later, we reached my building.

  “Musta been a great night,” our driver said as Nate held the door for me, “from the way you two are dressed. Get some rest.” Had we been in last night’s clothes for any other reason, I’d have laughed along with him.

  Inside, we reclaimed Arf from my neighbor. “He’s been walked and fed,” Glenn said with a wink. “Don’t let him tell you otherwise.”

  Arf is a courtly gentleman, an Airedale terrier about five years old. But when it comes to food and treats, he’ll lie with his big brown eyes. “Don’t worry. I’m on to his tricks. Thanks again.”

  “I don’t suppose you can take the dog,” I said to Nate once we were in the loft. It’s classic industrial style, a mix of redbrick, old wood, and twelve-foot-high windows, and I adore it. “Today will be crazy, not to mention wet.”

  “Wish I could, but I’ll be on the boat all day, working on the engine, if I’m going to go fishing next week.”

  “Seems like you’re always working on something or other.” I hung Laurel’s coat on a hook by the door and sat to peel off my boots.

  “Because something or other is always breaking. It’s like farming. You wanta grow wheat or apples, but you’ve got to be a mechanic, too.”

  “And a philosopher.” I swatted him on his adorable backside and headed for the shower.

  As the hot water warmed me, I thought about Laurel and Patrick. About the devastation untimely death leaves behind. I’d thought it was discovering a body on my doorstep thirteen months ago that set me to a life of crime, as my mother puts it. But maybe I’d started down that path earlier. Maybe it was the inevitable result of my childhood in a communal house that wore its motto, PRAY FOR PEACE AND WORK FOR JUSTICE, on the bumper sticker of the van used to pick up day-old doughnuts and bruised bananas and put them to good use in a free meal program. Of being hauled to this rally and that parade by parents who met during an antiwar protest, he a tall vet wearing his Army jacket, she the hippie chick he rescued from an oncoming truck.

  Or maybe it was the example of Brother Cadfael, the crime-solving medieval monk in the books by Ellis Peters. A man whose very life blended work and prayer as easily as he blended tonics and teas for the community he served. He grew herbs, I sold spice. Though I was no monk, that was for sure.

  I pulled on my shop uniform—stretchy black pants and a black T-shirt with our logo, a shaker spilling salt into the ocean. Nate took his turn in the shower, then I snapped Arf into his rain jacket, and the three of us descended to the parking garage and piled into my ancient Saab, Nate at the wheel.

  “I know you love the Mustang,” Nate said, “but this is a better car for driving hills in the rain.” The dark blue 1967 Mustang was my father’s baby, handed over to me when my parents left for Costa Rica and now in dry dock for the winter.

  He pulled up to the curb at First and Pike. I gave him a kiss, then another.

  “Stay safe, you maniac boat mechanic.”

  “And you, crazy spice queen.”

  A moment later, my dog and I stood on the corner, he in his yellow slicker, me in my red coat and red-plaid rain boots, looking across First Avenue at the entrance to Pike Place Market. My happy place.

  Wondering why on earth Special Agent Meg Greer was standing on the opposite corner, staring at me.

  Four

  More than fifty years ago, according to the Seattle Times, a thief fled from Pike Place Market into the Great Northern railway tunnel and was never seen again.

  THE LIGHTS CHANGED AND FOOT TRAFFIC SURGED INTO THE all-way intersection. By the time Arf and I crossed, Greer had vanished. Had I imagined her? Had she slipped into the Atrium, the corner building anchored by the Italian grocer? Or disappeared down one of the Market’s many passages and back alleys?

  It was nearly eight thirty and the bakeries and coffee counters were beacons of light in the gloom. Or more precisely, beacons of caffeine and sugar. Stores with doors, like mine, were still closed, but the cobbles on the main thoroughfare, the L-shaped Pike Place, glistened as trucks and vans made their deliveries. At the daystalls, men and women in rain gear unloaded buckets of flowers and crates of produce. The drizzle dampened the sounds of the Market, but not its energy.

  But the coffee I’d downed at the houseboat had worn off, and as my caffeine levels plunged, so did my mood.

  I started coming to the Market as a kid, tagging along on my mother’s weekly shopping trips. The sample cups of tea at the Spice Shop were as much a treat as the mini doughnuts we picked up from the Daily Dozen.

  Even so, when I stumbled over my husband and a parking enforcement officer practically plugging each other’s meters in a downtown restaurant, just before scandal destroyed the law firm where I worked and took my HR job with it, all within months of my fortieth birthday, I never expected to find solace in bay leaves.

  But crazy as it sounded at the time, buying Seattle Spice may have been the smartest thing I ever did.

  Today, though . . . Despite the bustle in the streets and my determination to sound upbeat when Nate asked about the rain, I worried. Saturday is our busiest day, but locals might stay home if the drops turned to torrents. Tourists could shop or stroll through the city’s museums instead of getting drenched down here. Every food tour guide had a Plan B to keep the clients warm and well-fed elsewhere.

  I’d been counting on a good October. The next big step for the business was to expand our production facility, with full-time staff and pricy new grinders and packaging equipment. To make it fly, we needed strong fourth quarter financials. Fall cooking and Christmas baking were the ticket.

  The Market is so alluring in autumn, when the last of the fall produce and flowers fill the stalls. Not to mention Halloween. Where else can you buy warty gourds, fresh pumpkins, ghost peppers, and
a Dracula costume in one shopping trip?

  But worry is a retailer’s ritual. As the news of Maddie’s shooting and its possible link to Pat’s murder soaked in, my sense of dread grew. Add in Laurel’s nightmare and her questions, and I had to ask: Why now?

  And what next?

  Arf’s leash looped through my hand, I bought a paper at the newsstand and stuffed it in my striped jute tote. Squeezed by the stacks of papers and magazines waiting to be unpacked and threaded my way down the congested aisle, patted Rachel the brass pig, the official Market mascot, and got in line at my favorite bakery.

  Minutes later, the counter woman handed me a cinnamon roll and a nonfat double latte. I stood beside a column topped with a Victorian cast-iron capital, one of the features that prompt visitors to ask why modern architects don’t do that, and took the first sip. Instant attitude adjustment. You could make a fortune selling this stuff.

  As Mr. Starbucks and Mr. Folgers well knew.

  Across Pike Place, the produce seller and the old lady from the Asian market were jawing at each other, each pointing at a pile of flattened cardboard boxes, then at the other’s storefront and back at the boxes. I didn’t say everyone in the Market always gets along.

  Then my dog and I headed into the Arcade, where I traded a wrinkled ten for a giant bouquet of sunflowers, a riot of red and yellow. We dashed across the cobbles to the shop and unlocked the front door.

  I paused on the threshold to breathe it all in. Cinnamon and cardamom, ginger and nutmeg, cumin, cloves, and garlic. Spice in all its variety, the stuff of my life.

  When new customers walk in, they often describe, unprompted, a memory evoked by scent: a fragrant stew, their grandmother’s apple pie, a day exploring the lavender fields in the south of France. There’s a reason for that. The same part of the limbic brain that detects smells also houses memory. They are physically linked.

  Call it magic, for short.

  I set my bounty on the counter and unhooked Arf. He let me wipe his feet and run a towel over his tan legs and tail; happily, the slicker had kept his head and the wiry grizzled fur on his back, called a saddle, dry. I gave him a rawhide chew bone, which he carried to his bed behind the front counter. Official Market policy says no dogs, but no one pays any attention, and the Market Master carries treats in his pocket. After I hung our coats and stashed my tote in the office, roughly the size of your standard refrigerator, I found a vase for the flowers. Even the worst grouch can’t help but smile at sunflowers, especially on a rainy day.

  But before the day came rushing in, I had reading to do. I took the newspaper and my breakfast to the mixing nook, a small booth where we conduct taste tests. Flipped pages, the only sounds the ticking of the railroad clock beside the front door and my dog chewing.

  On the front page of the local section, I found a short update on the shooting. As Tracy had predicted, Maddie was named now, described as a property investor who had apparently surprised an intruder. No pictures, no other details. No mention of Pat Halloran’s murder, though the annual recap would run soon. If the link between the two cases was public by then, the story would be front page news.

  I let the last sip of coffee linger on my tongue, bitter mixed with sweet.

  Then it was time to get to work. The staff arrived earlier than usual to prep. Food tours are all the rage with tourists and locals who trust an expert to find the best of the city’s food and drink. Some focus on wine, or chocolate, or sushi. The Market tours give guests a close-up with merchants and vendors, and a taste of history. Guests buy tickets, so we’re not paying kickbacks to the tour operators. And they shop. A group of eight or ten can easily drop several hundred dollars on spices, tea, and books, and order more online when they get home.

  Sandra’s husband had driven her to work today, and I helped him haul in a cooler filled with appetizers. Cayenne set up the serving table and warming trays for the stuffed mushrooms and baked paprika cheese, with help from Reed, our college kid computer whiz. Paprika cheese is an invention of one of our favorite customers, and he’d been thrilled to hear we planned to serve it today. All week, we’d been serving our new chai—a spice blend or masala brewed with strong black Assam tea and vegan coconut cream. But today it was back to our signature tea, and Matt started the first batch brewing in the giant electric kettle that looks like a Russian samovar. The scent of cinnamon and cardamom filled the air. We’d go through vats of the stuff—the colder and wetter the weather, the more we serve. And the more we sell.

  “Trial run for the anniversary party,” Sandra said.

  In two weeks, we’d be marking the end of my second year as Mistress of Spice. Was it shallow to celebrate something so trivial with Laurel’s more ominous anniversary on the horizon? Life is full of difficult juxtapositions. Besides, Laurel would never begrudge me a celebration, or a glass of champagne.

  “And you said it wouldn’t last,” I replied. The corner of Sandra’s mouth twitched. The shop’s long-time assistant manager, she hadn’t been sure about me when I went from loyal customer to owner. But we make a great team, feeding on each other’s ideas.

  “I’m happy to help you cook as long as I get free samples,” her husband said, then kissed her goodbye.

  “Taking bets,” I called. “What samples will be most popular?”

  Five people, five opinions. I rolled my eyes.

  Cayenne brought out the decorative gourds she and I had found at the farm stalls. Nothing jazzes up a buffet like goblin eggs and speckled gremlins.

  “Feeling up to a full shift?” I asked quietly. This was her first day back after an extensive bout of testing related to her multiple sclerosis. She hadn’t shared last summer’s diagnosis with the rest of the staff yet, and I’d honored her request for privacy.

  She nodded, the roll of red-and-black braids on top of her head bobbing. “The tests confirm that it’s the remissive type. How long remission will last, we don’t know—it could be months or years. But the rain is a relief.”

  Turns out that hot, dry weather aggravates MS. And Seattle had just endured one of the hottest summers on record. “Then let it pour.”

  Matt finished setting up the tea cart. He and Cayenne joined the staff last spring, and they couldn’t be more different. She’s a trained chef who, at thirty, had never held a job outside the kitchen, but longed to trade the stress of restaurant work for a more normal life. She helps Sandra and me create the recipes we give our customers, and she had begun to experiment with developing new blends. In contrast, Matt’s a retail whiz with a talent for handling difficult customers, but he’d never worked in the food business. He happily takes on the heavy jobs like wrestling a hot tea kettle or breaking down boxes and hauling out the recycling. The two of them clashed last summer when what she called “her clumsy spell”—losing her balance and dropping things—had tested his patience. But equilibrium had been restored, for now.

  “Sandra and I will herd the tour guests and keep the table stocked,” I told the staff. “Other customers could be tempted to crash the party, so let’s give them their own treat. Cayenne, would you find a bowl for these?” I handed her a bag of our spiced glazed nuts and pretzel mix—I’d whipped up a double batch earlier in the week for exactly this purpose.

  “Good thinking, boss,” she said, using Sandra’s nickname for me.

  “I have my moments.”

  Then I gave the display of seasonal blends a once-over. It looked good—heavy on fall faves, along with the chai masala and baking blends. We pack our blends in small bags and containers with custom labels, but also keep bulk supplies behind the front counter. A rack mounted on the end of the cookbook shelves holds our signature recipes, including a few highlighting the featured blends.

  Moments before our ten o’clock opening, Sandra pulled me aside. “What’s up, boss? Not your usual sparky self.”

  “Laurel got some news yesterday,” I said. “About her husband’s murder.”


  “A break in the case?” Sandra asked. Laurel is a good customer and the staff all like her. Though Sandra isn’t part of Flick Chicks, my weekly movie night with Kristen, Laurel, and two other friends, she always enjoys hearing about the movie and the food, and giving me ideas for what to serve when it’s my turn.

  “Cross your fingers,” I said. Then it was time to unlock the door. I packed up my troubles in my old kit bag, whatever that is, and prepared to smile, smile, smile.

  THE rain gods were in a good mood, pulling back the clouds in time for the tour guide to give the Market trek the go-ahead. Now, ten people crowded around as I told the story of Seattle Spice. Then Sandra described the process of developing our blends. Some, she said, are updates of classics, like our pie spice, poultry blend, and curries. Others were prompted by recipes we’ve dug up. A few are pure invention.