Pushing Up Rhubarb (A Millsferry Mystery Book 1)

by Diana Saco

  “Right,” I nodded. “They’d argue that she wanted to shut Kirkland up so that he couldn’t tell anyone that he gave her oxalic acid.”

  “Speaking frankly, Nina, I’d be coming to the same conclusions if the suspect wasn’t Chloe. Which is why I have to proceed as if I didn’t know the prime suspect.”

  “Okay so let’s review what we know so far,” I said. “We know that sometime in mid-July, Chloe got oxalic acid from Randall Kirkland.”

  “Right. And on the twentieth, Monica Munch died from eating a rhubarb dessert that was laced with a lethal dose of oxalic acid,” Bruno added.

  “Lethal for her,” I corrected. “Remember that Dr. Peebles couldn’t rule her death a homicide because the levels might not have been fatal for someone with two healthy kidneys. In fact, she couldn’t be certain that the levels were artificially introduced.”

  “Okay, right,” Bruno said. “So now Randall Kirkland. Chloe gives him a jar of tainted jam, what, the day after Munch’s death?”

  “Yes, that Sunday morning. And I interviewed her in the afternoon. You know, she’d have to be a really cool customer to be talking to an investigator on the heels of committing, from her perspective, two back-to-back homicides.”

  “No kidding,” Bruno said. “And that’s why I’m having a hard time believing this was intentional.”

  “Except that in Kirkland’s case, the oxalic acid levels in the jam were higher than in Monica’s case,” I reminded him.

  “We don’t know that for certain, yet,” Bruno cautioned. “We only just found out Friday that the source was rhubarb.”

  “Have they finished testing the other contest entries?” I asked.

  “Still in progress. They had a lot to go through. But after I got the Doc’s report, I called the lab and told them to focus on anything containing rhubarb first.”

  “How did we get the results from Kirkland’s jam jar so much faster?” I asked.

  “Because the jar was labeled. Easy to identify as something containing rhubarb. When we collected the desserts, we labeled them numerically by tent number expecting to cross-reference them later with the contest-entry records. My deputies are still reviewing those records.”

  “I never asked Chloe what she made for the bake-off,” I said.

  “Even that doesn’t make sense,” Bruno mused. “If Chloe was targeting Monica Munch, why would she poison her own entry? The desserts would be tasted by the judges first. It would make more sense for Chloe to poison one of Monica’s entries, assuming Monica would taste her desserts one more time before serving them up to the judges.”

  “But Al asked the husband what Monica made for the bake-off, Bruno. And she didn’t bake anything with rhubarb in it.”

  He glanced at me and said, “We need to find out once and for all what Monica Munch ate that day. And why.”

  9. The Jam Thickens

  In his Founder’s Day speech a few years back, Loyal Bingham introduced himself as one of Millsferry’s village elders. The locals in the crowd laughed at the understatement. A native son and owner of several establishments, including Bingham Golf and Country Club, Loyal was a prominent and respected Millsferryzian. In the 80s, he had been the first African-American chair of the town’s board of selectmen, a duty that he said had dulled his senses. His aversion to politics is why he declined the office of District Attorney of Nantucket County several years earlier, preferring the A.D.A. position he now occupied in Millsferry. It was less prestigious, but being a big fish in a little pond suited him better. He liked being the town prosecutor.

  Loyal’s wife Lily still carried herself like a first lady of Millsferry, and no one seemed to mind it. She adopted the mantle of responsibility, not the airs of privilege that come from being married to a prominent man. She rejected the idea that a woman’s status depends on her husband’s. She wouldn’t even allow her own identity to be overshadowed by a surname, which is why Lily agreed to marry Loyal on the condition that they make it clear at the wedding that she would not be taking his name. Lily herself admitted this was a trifling victory for feminism given that her maiden name was also Bingham (no prior relation). For a time, she considered hyphenating, but she decided that Lily Bingham-Bingham simply gave the wrong impression. At best, it sounded like a stutter; at worst, like incest. This made her tolerate people’s assumption that she’d taken her husband’s name.

  Lily compensated for the accidental conformity by being as different from her husband as two people could possibly be and still have something to talk about over dinner. The mother of two grown sons, she now spent most of her time growing medicinal marijuana in her private garden, organizing demonstrations for a variety of causes, and practicing witchcraft. Lily was Wiccan.

  Before I met her, the only witches I knew of were the ones in the television show Charmed. She had laughed when I told her that. She admitted that their ranks swelled with fans who didn’t know anything about their faith and weren’t properly initiated into one of its covens. Not that she had minded.

  “The more the merrier,” she had said. “Besides, ‘An it harm none, do as ye will.’ That’s my credo.”

  I learned later that she was reciting from the Wiccan Rede, the moral counsel underlying the religion’s open form of neopaganism. It was as good a moral code as any, a consequentialist ethic that Lily took to heart. She was decisive but only after carefully considering the possible outcomes of her actions. Rebellious by nature, she also liked that Wicca was a spiritual practice that wasn’t overly structured by rules. I just thought it was cool and unconventional to be a modern-day witch. I suspected that this was another reason Lily was Wiccan, and I called her on it once.

  “Oh my, yes, Nina,” she asserted. “I live in Massachusetts. They used to burn witches here. This is my way of sticking it to the man.”

  And stick it to the man she did. Wherever Lily found injustice, she was ready to stage sit-ins and engage in a little civil disobedience, even if it meant getting arrested. Loyal had been forced to bail her out on several occasions, which is probably another reason he turned down offers to become District Attorney. One potential backer caught up with Loyal at the sheriff’s office on one such occasion to complain to him that if he had political aspirations, he needed to control his wife. I happened to be reading some reports in the lobby and witnessed the exchange. Loyal looked the younger man in the eye and explained manhood to him.

  “Son, I don’t know what century you think you’re living in,” he began, “but you might want to catch up. A man who thinks himself entitled to control women by virtue of his private parts shouldn’t call himself a ‘man’ at all. A real man has, at least, a knack for making sound judgments. And son, you are demonstrating a deplorable lack of sound judgment in criticizing my wife to me. That was your first mistake. Your second one was in thinking that my political self-interest is more important than my wife’s moral convictions. Lily Bingham is a woman of integrity, motivated by a sense of justice and fairness. I wouldn’t dare trample over that. And you’re not man enough to mock it.”

  I made the mistake of snorting at that last comment, which made it obvious that I had been eavesdropping. Loyal simply smiled at me and then turned back to his would-be advisor and said, “We’re done here.” I was certain he meant more than the conversation.

  I had the privilege of overhearing Loyal give a similar speech more succinctly on one other occasion. I was at the courthouse reluctantly using one of the stalls in the men’s bathroom—because the ladies’ room was out of order again—when Loyal and the man he was prosecuting for spousal abuse came in to use the urinals. The defendant was a former golfing buddy of Loyal’s but with a more privileged background. He assumed his cash flow could wash away any spot of trouble he got into, which deluded him into thinking he could commit even felonious acts with total impunity. He actually had the gall to criticize Loyal for prosecuting the case against him.

  “So I guess you’re pretty proud of yourself,” he said disgustedly.
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  “You shouldn’t talk to me without your lawyer present, Bill, but you don’t have to be upset. You’ve got a pretty good stream going there, too,” Loyal joked.

  “Don’t piss me off,” the man replied. I wasn’t sure if he meant the pun, but I had to stifle a laugh anyway.

  “You know what pisses me off, Bill?” Loyal asked rhetorically. “Guys who beat on their wives. It takes a real p—,” he said, using the P word.

  I snorted again from the relative privacy of my stall as I heard the other guy stomp out. I then heard one of the urinals being flushed and the tap being turned on. And then Loyal said, “Can you believe that, Nina? The fellow didn’t even wash his hands.”

  I laughed again. “It takes all kinds, Loyal.”

  “It certainly does,” he said. “My apologies for the foul language. I didn’t realize you were there until after.”

  I thought it was cool of him to apologize, especially since I’d invaded a male enclave without his knowledge. He was just demonstrating that he’s the kind of man who wouldn’t use such words in front of a lady. I didn’t take offense anyway because for a guy like this Bill the Wife Beater, that was about the worst thing you could call him. Loyal had simply opted to speak his language.

  As lead prosecutor, Loyal had a professional interest in the Munch case. So I wasn’t surprised when, the day after Kirkland’s revelations, Loyal and Lily showed up at the sheriff’s office. I was there reviewing tox reports with Bruno when they arrived. The perennial first lady of Millsferry brought a vase of red, white and blue hydrangeas to liven up the office. Bruno accepted the flowers with his usual aplomb.

  “Thank you, Lily,” he said. “A touch of summer and freshness is just what this place needed.”

  “Bruno, don’t you just ooze manners and molasses from every pore,” Lily said.

  I laughed, which earned me a big kiss and hug from Lily in greeting and a wink from Loyal before he got down to business.

  “Nina, I’m glad you’re here, too. I read the reports on Ms. Munch’s death and Mr. Kirkland’s poisoning, and I’m seeing a connection there.”

  “He suspects Chloe Owens,” Lily explained. “Which is, of course, ridiculous,” she added.

  Loyal just rolled his eyes.

  “Do you know Chloe?” I asked.

  “Yes, she’s a pagan, too. More eclectic than I, but we’ve gone to some events together. In fact, we just attended the Lammas Faire in Hopkinton.”

  “What is that?” I asked.

  Loyal answered with a touch of impatience. “It’s a celebration of the First Harvest of Grain, and includes an annual bake-off that Ms. Owens participated in, which is foolhardy considering she might well be a serial poisoner.” He directed the last part at Lily, and now it was her turn to roll her eyes. I couldn’t help but laugh.

  Bruno felt the need to step in. “We haven’t even confirmed yet that Chloe made whatever it is that killed Monica Munch. Or that she deliberately poisoned Kirkland.”

  “Well, that last connection is obvious. If Kirkland provided Ms. Owens with the poison she used to kill Ms. Munch, she’d want to silence him.”

  “Chloe’s a smart girl,” Lily protested. “If she wanted him dead, poor Mr. Kirkland would be on Dr. Peebles’ autopsy table, and not recovering in a hospital bed at Park General.”

  “Even smart people make mistakes, my Love. How else would you explain my egregious error in letting you tag along for this meeting?”

  Lily harrumphed at him as Bruno and I hid smiles.

  Sheriff Molasses gave a polite little cough to get their attention. “I expect to have more answers for you tomorrow, Loyal,” he said. “We’ll be getting the results back on the rest of the food samples from the bake-off.”

  “Is there anything more you can tell me now?” Loyal asked.

  “Stay away from rhubarb?” I suggested questioningly.

  “Not helpful, Nina.” He motioned for Lily that it was time to go and headed for the door. “Besides,” he added with a grin, “I happen to love tart things. Isn’t that right, dear?”

  Lily didn’t miss his double meaning and made a show of mock slapping his stomach on her way out.

  He tipped his invisible hat at me and then was gone.

  *****

  As Bruno predicted, we knew by the following morning what Monica Munch ate on that fateful Saturday. Thirty-six contestants created between two and four gastronomical marvels for the Millsferry Annual Bake-Off, giving the crime lab a total of 114 food items to test for toxins. It was slow-going until the toxicology report narrowed it down to something with rhubarb. Only five bake-off entries had rhubarb in them. The killer dessert turned out to be a sample that the forensics team had identified as a rhubarb cookie. And it had been taken from booth 22—Chloe’s booth.

  Bruno asked Chloe to come to the sheriff’s office that afternoon saying only that he had more questions for her. As the food-crime experts, Al and I were expected there, but Bruno only needed one of us in the interview room, and I wasn’t that familiar with rhubarb given that it doesn’t grow in Florida. In fact, I’d never even tasted the stuff and wasn’t sure if I ever wanted to. Luckily Al had learned all about rhubarb in Minnesota. He proudly mentioned that the Dupree family had a rhubarb patch in their backyard and enjoyed long summers of pie-baking and jam-making. So we agreed that he would join Bruno in the interview, and I would observe from the adjacent room via the two-way mirror.

  Chloe arrived at the appointed time, looking cool and casual in an ivory-colored summer dress, denim jacket and sandals. She was also wearing eyeglasses, and had the top half of her hair pulled back into a small ponytail with the bottom half hanging loose down her back. The ensemble made her look more bookish and feminine than on our initial meeting, like a schoolmarm, and I couldn’t help wondering if it was intentional.

  Bruno noticed, too, although all he said was, “You look nice.”

  After thanking her for coming in, he introduced her to Al.

  “Pleasure to meet you,” Chloe said, shaking his hand. “Is Nina here, too?”

  “She’s here, Ms. Owens. She’s takin’ care of some other business, but she may join us later then.”

  Chloe smiled broadly in response, but I couldn’t tell if she was happy that she might see me or just utterly charmed by Al’s fusion dialect. I decided it was the former, and I suspected from the way Al was dazzled by her smile that he felt it was the latter.

  “Lovely,” she said, still unclear as to which.

  “Chloe,” Bruno began, “would you mind taking us through the events on the morning of July 20?”

  “Didn’t you read Nina’s report of her interview with me?” she asked, genuinely confused.

  “Yes, of course, but it’s going to help us if you go over everything again. You might remember things a little differently.”

  “Maybe. I arrived at the Loop at about 8 a.m. I saw Marvin getting into his S.U.V., which was in the same parking lot I was in, and knew right then that there was going to be trouble.”

  “How’s that?” Al asked.

  “Because I knew Monica’s booth assignment was 22, which is closer to the bend, and right next to a more convenient parking lot. I concluded, correctly as it turns out, that Monica had taken somebody else’s spot. Mine.”

  “What did you do?” Bruno asked.

  “Even though I understood full well the game she was playing, I politely inquired what she thought she was doing. She replied in a deliberately obtuse manner and said only that she was setting up her area. I said, ‘But this is not your area. This is my tent.’ She said that booth assignments only apply to ‘unruly individuals who require structure and order,’ ” Chloe quoted in a thick southern accent. “ ‘But we civilized people can work out our place without needing to be told where to go. Don’t you agree, Chloe Owens?’ ”

  “Ya know, that makes me mad just thinkin’ about it,” Al said disingenuously. It was an interview tactic aimed at drawing out Chloe’s reaction. Her raised
eyebrow told me that she saw through the trick, but she seemed to answer honestly anyway.

  “I was merely annoyed, Mr. Dupree. The whole thing was too pointless to get angry.”

  “You sound like someone who’s been down that road before with Ms. Munch,” Bruno observed.

  “More times than I can count. She considered us arch-rivals. And I suppose in a way we were. We competed in many of the same baking contests. But at the end of the day, Bruno, a pie is just a pie. And investing so much time and energy in making your crust the flakiest is just plain flaky!”

  Bruno and Al laughed, as did I from my side of the mirror.

  “What happened next?” Bruno asked.

  “One of the coordinators overheard our exchange and tried cajoling me into allowing Monica to stay where she was since she’d already started setting up. I seriously considered standing my ground just to make that woman have to dismantle and move that entire shrine to herself. But the coordinator looked at me with such pleading eyes that I realized she would be more put out than Monica, so I relented. I just wanted to be able to put my heavy trays down. My only real objection was having to carry them four tents over, but the organizers got a cart and helped me get to my new spot. In short, I decided to be ‘civilized’ about it.”

  “Did the coordinators stick around to help you set up?”

  “No, I handled the rest myself. I put out the table covers, plates, napkins, and utensils that I’d been carrying, along with the first set of trays. I then went back to my car for the rest. Actually, I drove around to the other parking lot that was closer.”

  “So you left the booth unattended?” Bruno asked.

  Chloe nodded.

  “Do you know what time that was?” he continued.

  “Probably around 8:45. And when I got back, someone had taken one of my desserts. I looked around to see if any of the judges had already come by, but I didn’t see anyone who might have taken it. And then I got suspicious that someone might have tampered with them, so I threw them out.”