Pushing Up Daisies db-1

by Rosemary Harris

  My first impression was of a hodgepodge of stuff. Different styles, different eras, giving it the appearance of an upscale flea market. The Peacock house was furnished in an idiosyncratic style not unlike its garden: mostly New En gland, some Italy, a touch of France.

  We tiptoed around, as if there were someone there to disturb. In the main entrance, at the top of the stairs, a stained glass window featured an ornate vase overflowing with pink cabbage roses. To the left were various bedrooms and sitting rooms. To the right was the room we were looking for.

  The library had a large bay window, with a window seat overlooking the entire garden. A great wooden table in the middle of the room was covered by a patterned dark green velvet throw, moth-eaten in spots. A dusty floor globe stood in one corner.

  More framed needlepoints shared the shelves with Dorothy's books, which were in no order I could instantly recognize. Most were gardening books ranging from 1840's Mrs. Loudon's Gardening for Ladies to Martha Stewart's Gardening. They even had a copy of The Temple of Flora, a very rare nineteenth-century book of flower illustrations. I wondered if Richard knew about this small gem.

  "'What shall we do for our sister? Come into my garden, my sister.' Sounds familiar," Neil said, reading two of a series of needlepoints.

  "Not to me."

  In the same way one's eyes eventually adjust to low light, my eyes adjusted to the unique arrangement of the books—some by author, some by subject, some by country of origin. After a while, it made sense.

  Then I found them: two bays devoted to herbs and herbal remedies. One entire shelf held books with the words Materia Medica in the title. There was a hardcover copy of the ginseng book I'd read about and a personally inscribed first edition of Jethro Kloss's classic Back to Eden. Alongside King's American Dispensatory, I saw the Culpeper's. Unlike my cheap paperback edition, Dorothy's was a well-thumbed, leather-bound copy printed in 1906, and stuffed with bookmarks and crumbling sprigs.

  We searched every inch of the library for Dorothy's journal, but found nothing.

  "I've got to get back. I have a client at five," Neil said, checking his watch.

  "I'm leaving, too. And I'm borrowing this," I said, shoving the Culpeper's in my pack. "I don't think Dorothy will mind."

  CHAPTER 23

  When I got home, I found O'Malley on my doorstep. Given my recent, unauthorized exploration of the Peacock house and the book I'd snatched, I thought he was there to read me my rights. Then I noticed the grocery bag, a plastic bag from Shep's Wines and Liquors, and a ten-pound bag of charcoal leaning against the door.

  "At the risk of sounding inhospitable, why are you here?"

  "You didn't strike me as a gas grill person."

  "You must be a detective. Let me take something." I reached for the charcoal, but he handed me the smaller bag.

  "Salmon okay? Wild, not farmed."

  "Is this an official call?"

  "Officials have to eat, too."

  Upstairs, he unloaded everything onto the island in the kitchen. I dumped my stuff in the bedroom, buried the book under my pillows, and went back to see what Mike was up to. I watched silently while he made himself at home, unpacking bags and whipping up a respectable sesame-soy-ginger marinade for the salmon. He stuck it in the fridge, then opened the wine, picked up the charcoal, and started for the deck.

  "I'm a sucker for anyone who wants to cook for me, but is there a legitimate reason for this visit?"

  "Got a laptop?" he asked.

  "Do bears go in the woods?"

  "Get it. I'll start the fire and meet you back here in ten minutes. And bring your candy notes."

  Uncharacteristically, I did as I was told, retrieving my laptop from my office, and clearing a spot for it on the kitchen counter. Mike came back with a flash drive and a detailed picture log, presumably so I wouldn't have to look at any of the more graphic shots.

  "Candy, little girl?"

  Instantly, a picture of the crumpled candy wrapper appeared. "Okay, you're on," he said.

  Even at 500 percent magnification, it was impossible to see a date on the package, but we were able to see one thing clearly: Cadbury. I shuffled through my research.

  "Okay, Cadbury merged with Schweppes in 1969, so this package predates that."

  "Can you make out the name on the bar?"

  It was difficult to read; the wrapper had spent the last few de cades crumpled in a box, and the cops' efforts to flatten it out only served to hasten its disintegration.

  "I don't know," I said. "It looks like one word, starting with a P . "

  "Does it say Paula?" he asked, leaning in.

  "Idiot. It probably says Picnic. If the package says Picnic, and doesn't say Cadbury Schweppes, it was made and buried sometime between 1958 and 1969. If the mother was a teenager when she gave birth . . ." I noodled with my next calculation.

  "Let's say, for the sake of argument, the childbear-ing years are fifteen to forty, all we have to do is look for a woman who was born between 1918 and 1953. Your candy wrapper may tell us who isn't the mother, but it doesn't tell us who is."

  He did the math so fast it made my head spin.

  "If the child was buried in 1958," he explained, "and the mother was forty, she would have been born in 1918. If the body was buried in 1968, and the mother was only fifteen, she could have been born as late at 1953. Too large a group. Why are you smiling?"

  "Nothing. My aunt Jo used to say, 'and if my Grandma had wheels she'd be a trolley,' or something like that."

  "There's a rude version of that."

  "Aunt Jo knew that one, too. So virtually every woman in Fairfield County over the age of forty-five is a candidate. That narrows things down." I tried to sound optimistic. No one's as optimistic as a gardener.

  "And why limit it to Fairfield County?" he said. "She might have moved. She might be dead. Look, it's an interesting exercise but it doesn't prove anything."

  "Someone once said that when you have eliminated the impossible, what ever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."

  "Was that Aunt Jo again?" he asked.

  "I think it was Arthur Conan Doyle—Sherlock Holmes, wise guy. Any ideas about the other stuff?" I asked.

  "More annoying than dangerous. Anna's encounter could have been a prank. And bunking down in the green house isn't life threatening, even if it isn't fun."

  No, but it could have been, I thought.

  "What is it? Has something else happened?"

  "No, no." If O'Malley knew about my near miss with Felix, he did a good job of hiding it.

  "We don't know that your incidents are remotely connected to the body. It could be a business rival or someone who's ticked off at you."

  O'Malley might have had something there. I didn't think there were a lot of people who wanted to see me dead, but there was no shortage of people I'd pissed off. Once a year they all met in Yankee Stadium.

  "Too large a group," I mimicked.

  "What about the ex?" he asked, for the first time venturing into personal territory.

  "Not that crazy. Look, maybe we should take a break," I said, steering him away from the subject. "Didn't you promise me a gourmet meal?"

  "I did indeed."

  After dinner, we sat on the deck. Mike fiddled with the grill's dying fire, and then settled in across from me on an old rattan loveseat.

  "You haven't talked much about yourself. All I know is you were some big television honcho, and now you're in the garden business. How did you come to be a gardener? Don't most city folk have one house plant they either neglect or overwater?"

  "Hardly a honcho, just a cog in the machine. But I've been a gardener since grade school. One day my second-grade teacher had us bring in avocado pits for a class project. I didn't even know what an avocado was— they were not on my mother's shopping list. She cooked vegetables no one in my class ever heard of—escarole, broccoli rabe, fennel, stuff like that."

  "Holliday isn't a very Italian name."

  "You
are a detective. I'm half-Italian, on my mother's side. It was strictly an Italian menu, except for corned beef and cabbage once a year."

  "I should have let you cook."

  "I'll ignore that. Anyway, we planted the avocado pits in cut-off milk containers, and I checked them every morning for signs of life. I've been hooked ever since."

  "Are you good at it?"

  "That's an astute question. A good gardener," I answered slowly, "knows what to put where. And not just aesthetically—it's the zone, the microclimate, the soil, a lot of things. So, yes, by those standards, I am a good gardener."

  "Ever married?"

  "That's a switch. Nope."

  "Not interested?"

  "Bad timing, mostly. I was in a relationship that ended a few months ago. We met cute and parted ugly."

  "Sorry."

  "That's okay. What about you?"

  Mike was single. That helped him avoid the twin occupational hazards lots of cops succumbed to, alcoholism and divorce. He spent most of his spare time kayaking and renovating a cabin in northern Connecticut. Dad was a cop, uncle was a cop, most of his friends were cops. I got the picture.

  "Dad and I are a couple of grizzled old bachelors. I thought he might remarry after my mum passed, but it never happened. We live just a few blocks apart. Some nights he cooks, some nights I do. I just stopped smoking—eighteen months ago; so mostly I'm battling the weight I put on. Walking the dog helps, but I need to get back in the gym."

  "What do you have?"

  "A border collie. Her name's Jessie. Guzman looks after her while I'm on duty."

  Guzman again. Were they a couple? Then what the hell was he doing here with me? And what the hell was I doing? For the second night in a week, I was sitting in the dark, getting cozy with a man I barely knew. Either I was lonelier than I thought or hornier. And he's apologizing for his weight, which means he's somewhat interested.

  A blast of music from the other side of the woods ripped through the night, nondescript rock, the kind you'd get on a cheap drugstore party CD.

  "The noisy neighbor, I presume?"

  "Comes with the springtime; all the slugs come out. He hasn't been too bad lately. At least there aren't any squealing bimbos frolicking in the hot tub."

  "Still, it is late for a school night," Mike said, glancing at his watch.

  I used it as a cue to end the evening—before bachelor number two decided to make his move. "Excellent point," I said, standing up. "I don't know about you, but I have a full day tomorrow." I walked him down to his car, and watched him pull away in the direction of the music. Heh, heh, heh, that'll teach my noisy neighbor.

  CHAPTER 24

  Back in the kitchen, the old laptop's screen saver showed a haunted house, inhabited by digital bats and screeching cats. (Who remembers what significant documentary I was working on when I chose that one.) I'd barely touched the mouse when the phone rang.

  "Jesus, you scared me!"

  "Is that the way you answer the phone? When was the last time you got a call?" Lucy said.

  "I knew it was you—I saw it on caller ID."

  Lucy filled me in on France, and I filled her in on Springfield. Mid-conversation, she forced me to put down the phone and set the house alarm. "What if there was a connection between Anna's attack and your green house incident? Why are you still up there? Stay at my place until this is sorted out."

  "Can't. I have to work. Besides, Mike's right—it's probably nothing."

  "Oh it's Mike now—no more Mayberry jokes? What am I thinking? Is he still there? Don't answer, cough. Then I'll know you're not alone."

  "No one else is here. But there has been some action on that front." With little encouragement, I gave Lucy the broad strokes on my encounter with Felix.

  "I always say the best way to get over someone," she said, referring to my ex, "is to get under someone. Too bad you weren't ready. And where is he?"

  "Mexico, I think. Family business."

  "Wow. My rejects rarely feel the need to leave the country, but I suppose a clean break is best. Is that why his backup was at your house so soon? You're not turning into the town slut, are you?"

  "Please. To night was all business." I told her about the pictures on the flash drive and reeled off the shorthand descriptions on Mike's photo log.

  "Hmmm. Babhdbck. What's that?"

  "I'm guessing baby's head, back."

  "I think I can skip that one," she said. "Anything about the necklace?"

  I didn't know if I was supposed to be looking at the other pictures, but why not? By accident or by design, Mike had left the drive. I scrolled down to the necklace images and waited for the first to load. It was a tiny medallion on a slim chain that might have been silver. On the front was the worn image of a female saint with a border of horizontal lines emanating from her robe to the edges of the medal.

  "It's the Virgin of Guadalupe," I said, "the patron saint of Mexico. In 1531, she revealed herself to a poor Indian named Juan Diego on the outskirts of what's now Mexico City. Her image miraculously appeared on his cloak and supposedly it's still there after almost five hundred years. They're talking about making Juan Diego a saint, too."

  "I'm impressed. How do you know this? Don Felix?"

  "I worked on a documentary called Religions of the World. Besides, you've been to Mexico. She's everywhere, on guest soaps and shopping bags. When I was there I bought a Virgin of Guadalupe devotional candle, the thick glass kind you find in bodegas in the Bronx.

  "Anyway, the Virgin told Juan Diego to climb this hill and cut some flowers. Even though it was December, and Juan Diego couldn't believe there would be flowers growing in the winter, he climbed the hill. When he got to the top, it was covered in roses of Castile. He took them to the doubting Thomases in town, who fell to their knees at the miracle. When he dropped the flowers, the Virgin's image was on his cloak."

  "You believe that?" she asked.

  "I didn't say I believed it. It was a souvenir. And the candle was cheaper than the Zapata T-shirt."

  "Come to think of it, I bought soap on Bourbon Street once that was supposed to wash away evil spells. I had to repeat this one line over and over while I was lathering up. Is there any writing on the medallion, you know, like a prayer or incantation?"

  "You bought spell-removing soap at Marie Laveau's and you're giving me grief about someone twenty-six popes have recognized? Let me see." The front was easy, Con ella todo, sin ella nada. "With her, everything, without her, nothing." The back was trickier, a lot of microscopic writing. I squinted at the tiny, imprecise lettering. I zoomed in on the picture.

  "Something she was supposed to have said to Juan Diego. 'Let not your heart be disturbed. Do not fear the sickness. Am I not here, who is . . . your mother?' Holy shit."

  "It says that?" Lucy asked.

  "Up to the holy shit part. Don't be afraid, little baby? Am I not here? Your mother? Some poor Mexican woman buried her child with this medal. Someplace she knew it wouldn't be disturbed. A place that wouldn't cost her anything, that she could visit as often as she wanted."

  "Did the Peacocks have any regular help?" Lucy asked.

  "Not inside, only garden help. And even that stopped as they got older."

  "That's not much help," she said. "Ever find out what became of the real sister?"

  "No. I can't believe I keep getting suckered into telling O'Malley stuff, when he volunteers nada."

  "What did Hillary say?"

  "I haven't seen her. I have been working, you know. I'm more likely to bump into Gerald Fraser at the diner."

  "That reminds me. Dave Melnick knows him. Well, not really. Knows of. Dave's at the Cop Channel now. I bumped into him and he asked about you, so I told him about your case, and he e-mailed me some stuff. Your Fraser's some kind of hero cop. I don't think they're going ahead with it, but he was researched for an episode on a missing girl. Want me to forward what Dave sent me?"

  "Great." Maybe I'd try to see Hillary and Gerald this week.<
br />
  "Jeez, 'Am I not here . . . who is your mother?'" Lucy repeated.

  "Yeah," I said, "but where?"

  CHAPTER 25

  Only one eye was open when I heard the door downstairs. If Anna was here already, I'd overslept.

  "Meez Paula?" she called.

  "Up here," I mumbled. A steady rain had fallen all night and was falling now. Maybe subconsciously I knew gardening was out, so I slept in.

  Still in my jammies, I made my way to the kitchen and, zombielike, started the coffee. Anna put down her voluminous handbag and her packages and just stared.

  "Don't you need to grind those beans first? Why don't you let me do that while you get dressed?"

  I yawned and nodded. Fifteen minutes later, I was back. The smell of the coffee stoked my appetite. When Anna offered me one of her four heavily buttered Portuguese rolls, I wolfed it down.

  "This is delicious," I said, mouth stuffed.

  "You need to eat more. You are too skinny."

  I repeated my mantra. "I'm not, I could lose a few."

  "Says who? Some magazine?" She pushed another roll toward me, but I passed.

  "When the man holds the woman, he doesn't want to feel bones. It's true." She nodded sagely, and who was I to question the words of an experienced courtesan?

  Revived by the caffeine, my brain was functioning again. I reached for more coffee and noticed the time on the coffeemaker—6:34.

  "Anna, isn't this a little early for you?"

  "I got a ride. I was waiting for the bus in the rain, and someone offered me a lift." She mumbled something in Spanish and looked agitated.

  "Is there something you want to tell me?" I asked.

  "It is nothing," she said. Anna lifted the coffeepot and offered me more, launching into the nonstop Spanish she knew I couldn't keep up with. One thing I was able to understand, "Boca cerrada, no entran moscas." Loosely translated it means, "Flies can't enter a closed mouth." Or "keep your mouth shut." She retreated to my office and closed the door behind her. I kept my mouth shut; maybe she and Hugo had had a spat.