Plot Boiler

by Ali Brandon

  Like her sister used to do on road trips when they were kids, just to start a fight, Darla thought with a shake of her head.

  “Crazy cat,” she murmured as she set the coffee beans down out of paw’s reach. “I wonder why he’s so obsessed with this bag.”

  “I think Hamlet’s turning into a coffee expert,” Robert said, chuckling. “Maybe I can teach him how to use the roaster so he can, you know, help me out.”

  “Sure, but who’s going to teach him to be nice to the customers?”

  Picking up a squirming Hamlet and setting him on the floor, Darla reached again for the bag. Only when she held it right to her nose could she make out the faint, satisfying scent of perfectly roasted coffee. She had read that a cat’s sense of smell was fourteen times better than a human’s; still, the hint of coffee aroma through a lined and sealed bag shouldn’t be enough to send Hamlet into such a tizzy.

  Moreover, what was it about Perky’s blend, in particular, that raised his feline dander?

  “All right, Robert, let’s go about this scientifically. How about a little bean sampling first before we brew it up?”

  “We can make it, you know, a cupping party, like they taught us about in barista school,” Robert countered. “It’s like a wine tasting, except with coffee. Hang on; I’ll get the stuff.”

  While he rummaged behind the counter, Darla carefully unrolled the bag’s sealed top edge. As she did so, a more pungent coffee aroma began spilling out, but hardly anything she thought should offend His Royal Catness’s delicate nasal passages.

  “All right, here we go,” the teen said, setting out two small coffee cups and two spoons. Handing Darla a small silver scoop, he went on, “Measure out a scoopful into each cup. Usually you’d measure out more to do it right, but we, like, just have the one bag.”

  Once she’d done that, he plucked a bean from the cup nearest him and squinted at it intently.

  “Full City roast,” he determined, and then went on to explain, “You can tell by the deep chestnut brown color. And, see, there’s hardly any oil on the bean surface.”

  Darla nodded, taking a bean from the other cup and studying it herself. She’d picked up enough of the coffee lingo to know Full City was the lightest of the traditional roasts. And when she drank her coffee black, it was what she preferred.

  Moving over to the espresso grinder, Robert poured in his cup of beans and gave them a quick, coarse grind before dumping the now-ground coffee back into the cup. He did the same with Darla’s beans, then took a glass measure and drew some steaming water. He filled each cup to a bit beneath the brim, then said, “Okay now we let it cool for a minute.”

  While they waited, Robert related a few more things he’d learned in regard to tastings—such as the fact that coffee was like dark beer, meaning that it was better served at room temperature. And he also explained that at a full-fledged cupping party with lots of samples, everyone spit out the coffee after tasting, just like they did with wine at a tasting.

  “If you didn’t, you’d be awake for, like, a week afterward,” he finished with a grin.

  Then he picked up a spoon. “Okay, time to try the coffee. You want to dip all the way to the bottom and get a spoonful. Then you slurp it like soup.”

  Feeling a bit silly, Darla followed his example and did the soup thing. After smacking her lips a moment, however, she frowned. Apparently, she wasn’t a coffee connoisseur, for this particular brew wasn’t knocking her socks off despite its price tag.

  “What do you think, Robert?”

  He frowned a little, too. “Well, it’s medium body, fruity overtones . . . aroma a hint of chocolate and caramel,” he intoned, sounding a sommelier.

  Darla waved away his comments. “Sure, sure—but, bottom line, does this taste to you like it’s worth what I paid for it?”

  “You want the truth, Ms. P.? It’s not bad, or anything, but our coffee is, like, one hundred percent better than this.”

  She gave a relieved sigh.

  “Thank goodness it’s not just me,” she exclaimed. “I thought my taste buds were defective or something, because this reminds me of something you’d find in a diner. But how do George and Livvy get away with charging so much for this dinky bag of average coffee?”

  Darla grabbed the bag and opened it up again, peering inside for the secret. Then she paused, and her eyes opened wide. “What the—?”

  Dropping the bag onto the counter again, she hurried around to the back of the coffee bar and pulled out a serving tray. While Robert watched, expression puzzled, she set the tray on the counter and spread a clean towel across its surface. Then she reached for the bag of coffee again.

  “Robert, I have a bad feeling I know why this coffee costs so much.”

  She carefully poured the bag’s contents onto the towel, then gave the tray a little shake, so that the beans spread neatly into a single layer. Using the spoon with which she’d just been slurping, she poked at the small, plastic-wrapped bundle of something distinctively leaflike that sat atop the brown mosaic of roasted coffee beans.

  “Like, wow,” Robert muttered, leaning in closer. “Is that what I think it is?”

  Hamlet leaped back onto the counter. “Meow,” was his opinion on the matter.

  Darla shook her head. “I guess this is why Livvy kept asking me if I was sure I wanted to buy the Kona Blue Party blend. For what she was charging, I thought it was one of those handpicked coffees from some bush that only bloomed every ten years under a full moon. I never would have guessed she was dealing drugs.”

  “So what are we going to do?” Robert asked.

  Darla reached into her pocket and pulled out her cell. “Let me ask Jake what she thinks. I want to get this settled quickly.”

  A few minutes later, Darla was letting in a yawning Jake, along with the usual morning regulars who mumbled their hellos before making a beeline upstairs to the coffee bar. Fortunately, she’d had the presence of mind to cover the tray with another towel and had stashed what she was already thinking of as “the evidence” outside in the brownstone’s private courtyard.

  “Wait, can’t I grab some coffee first?” Jake protested as Darla led her to the back of the store.

  “Come with me first, and then Robert will brew you up a fresh mug,” Darla promised. Leaving the door between store and courtyard open so she could hear any other customers coming in, she walked over to the tray she’d left on the white wrought iron bistro table where she often ate her lunch. “I can’t believe Livvy and George are dealing drugs,” Darla lamented as she whipped off the towel to reveal the tray of beans with its damning bundle.

  “Don’t feel bad, kid,” Jake told her. “A while back, the cops busted an eighty-year-old guy who was supplementing his social security by acting as a mule for some cartel. Times get tough, and people do stupid things for extra cash.”

  “Maybe so, but they aren’t supposed to do it in my neighborhood.” Frowning, Darla gave the bundle another poke with the spoon. “So is this what I think it is, marijuana?”

  “No way to tell for sure unless we open it up.”

  So saying, the PI carefully undid the small baggie; then, clearing all the coffee beans to one side, she poured the leafy contents onto the tray. The baggie hadn’t held much, perhaps a couple of tall tablespoons’ worth.

  “Not pot,” Jake promptly declared.

  Since Darla had never actually seen marijuana except for on television, she took Jake’s word for it, though she asked, “How can you tell?”

  “The leaf is the wrong shape and texture for cannabis,” her friend explained, picking up a bit of the plant material to examine it more closely. “Also, the color is different, as is”—she paused and sniffed the leaf—“the smell. On top of that, it looks like there’s more than one type of plant mixed in here.”

  Jake picked at more bits of dried, broken leaves and th
en shrugged.

  “To be honest, this looks kinda like the herbs I remember Ma tying up in cheesecloth and tossing into her soup stock, to flavor it. In fact, if I’m not mistaken, this”—she held up one bit for Darla to look at—“is actually catnip.”

  “Me-ROOW!”

  Startled, Darla glanced toward the open door. She’d left Hamlet upstairs to hang with the morning crowd, but apparently the persnickety feline wasn’t about to let anyone else take credit for his detective work. Before she could shoo him off, he came trotting out into the courtyard and leaped up onto one of the bistro chairs, big paws planted on the table’s edge as he stared at Jake. She, in turn, looked over at Darla, who nodded.

  “Give it a try.”

  Grinning, Jake held out the leafy bits toward the cat. “All right, Hammy, we need an expert’s opinion here. Catnip, yes or no?”

  Hamlet’s whiskers twitched as he sniffed at Jake’s hand. His green eyes widened and he promptly bumped his head against her fingers, then reached up an oversized paw and began batting at her.

  “I think we have our answer,” the PI said, brushing her fingers together to dislodge the remaining crumbles, which Hamlet promptly pounced upon.

  Darla, meanwhile, gave a snort of disgust. “Catnip! At least now I know why Hamlet was so interested in the Perky’s bags.”

  “Yeah, my guess is that we’ve got nothing more than your basic backyard herbs here. Along with the catnip, there may be a bit of sage or lemon balm.”

  Darla picked up a few crumbles of leaves and gave them a tentative sniff herself.

  “Definitely some sage in there,” she agreed, and then sighed. “I can’t believe it. So Livvy and George were running a scam? You know, I’m not sure which is worse, thinking that they’re drug dealers, or finding out that they’re run-of-the-mill con artists.”

  “So, what do you want to do about it, kid—blow the whistle on them, or chalk it up to a learning experience and let it go?”

  “I’m not just going to let it go. At a minimum, I want my money back,” Darla declared, her redhead’s temper beginning to simmer. “After that, I’m not sure, maybe talk to Reese about it. You want to go with me to confront them?”

  Jake shook her curly head.

  “Sorry, I’m tied up today,” she replied, tone apologetic. “I’ve got to do a little work for a client, and it might take most of the day. But if you’re going to go over there, at least take James as your backup.”

  “He’s not in until after lunch again today,” Darla grumbled, scraping the herbs back into the baggie for safekeeping again, “but I guess things can wait until he gets here.”

  She glanced down at Hamlet, who was busy rolling about in the catnip crumbs Jake had dropped on the brick patio. Apparently Mr. Flying High Kitty wasn’t nearly as distressed over the situation as she was!

  Jake followed her gaze and grinned a little at the usually reserved cat’s antics.

  “Uh-oh. Looks like someone has a new vice. Better watch it, Hammy, or you’ll end up in kitty rehab.” To Darla, she said, “All right, kid, I’m off to get my coffee and then I’m out of here. Let me know how it goes.”

  Halfway through the door, however, the PI halted and turned.

  “I know you’re pretty ticked right now, but keep in mind that scammers don’t take kindly to being called on their scams. Maybe you should wait and talk to Reese first. It could get a little nasty if you and James just go barging in there.”

  Darla shook her head. “I want to shut this little operation down before tomorrow. What if they try selling this stuff at the block party? If word gets around and they get busted for fraud, it could hurt a lot of the neighborhood businesses, not just them.”

  “I understand your concern; I just don’t want you getting hurt. If you insist on doing this, at least have Reese’s number on speed dial, just in case.”

  “I’ll do that. Or,” she added with a small smile, “I could bring Hamlet with me for backup to James’s backup. Worst case, I can send him running for help like Lassie.”

  That last drew an eye roll from Jake, who gave her a wave good-bye and headed back inside the shop. Darla finished repackaging the coffee beans and faux drugs back into the bag and grabbed up the tray.

  “At least they could have used a better grade of coffee,” she muttered. “Come on, Hammy, the party’s over. Get back inside and sleep it off.”

  “Meow-rumph,” the cat replied, his tone decidedly peeved. Even so, he scrambled to his feet and trotted after her.

  Once back at the register, Darla stuck the offending bag in her purse, while Hamlet made a beeline for the green beanbag chair. Darn straight she was going to get her money back from the Kings, she told herself, still fuming. As for taking any further steps, she’d decide upon that later, once she had her cash in hand again. But no matter how things went down, no way was she going to let a pair of coffee con artists ruin her Fourth of July block party.

  SEVEN

  “Actually, swindling the illegal pharmaceutical-using public is a time-honored practice,” James assured Darla that afternoon soon after he arrived for his shift and she’d gotten him up to speed on the situation.

  Though appropriately appalled at the Kings’ tactics, the ex-professor also seemed a bit amused by the entire situation . . . much to Darla’s dismay.

  “I recall a friend of mine back in the early seventies who once placed an advertisement in the back of the local street newspaper,” James told her. “He offered ‘lids’—which was the slang term for small baggies of marijuana—for ten dollars each, mail order only, to his post office box. Considering that this amount was below the going rate, he received numerous responses.”

  “Pretty trusting, weren’t they, mailing money to a PO box to buy something illegal?” Darla wryly observed.

  James nodded. “It was, as they say, a kinder and gentler time.”

  “Right. So, don’t tell me . . . these folks sent in their money and got zilch back.”

  “On the contrary. My friend mailed a lid to each and every customer, per the terms of his advertisement. What he did not spell out in advance was the fact that the lids he was supplying were literal ones.”

  Darla gave a disbelieving laugh. “You mean, like jar lids?”

  “More specifically, they were the plastic snap-on covers designed for cat food cans. He had found a discarded case of them behind a Dumpster, and those are what he sent. Of course, his customers could hardly complain that they had been swindled, and so he had a tidy revenue stream going for several months.”

  James paused, his expression wry. “Unfortunately, one disgruntled customer finally traced him to his post office box and had a rather nasty ‘come to Jesus’ moment with the lad. Let us just say that, once he was discharged from the hospital, my friend decided to get out of the mail-order business permanently.”

  “All right, James, I get the point of your story—I think. But, don’t worry. I don’t plan on administering any beat downs.”

  “But are you sure you wish to do this? As Jake pointed out, those of questionable ethics often react poorly when called on it.”

  “I’m sure. Let’s wait until after four, so they’ll be closed. I wouldn’t want to confront them in front of customers, just in case it does get ugly.”

  * * *

  The afternoon sped on by, so that it was already a few minutes after four when Darla stopped what she was doing.

  “Ready to head over to Perky’s?” she asked her manager. At his nod, she added to Robert, “James and I are going to resolve that Kona Blue Party issue from this morning. Do you mind covering for a little bit? We’ll be back in less than an hour, and Hamlet will help you keep an eye on things.”

  Hearing his name, the cat yawned and stretched from his post atop the front counter. His catnip high had long since worn off, but he’d made up for it with extra naps through
out the day. Now he scrambled to his feet, looking ready for action.

  “Sorry, Hammy,” she told him. “I checked outside, and it’s too hot for you to go walking this afternoon, after all. You’re going to have to play bodyguard another time.”

  The cat gave her a sour look but settled back onto the counter again. Then, with Robert’s assurances that all would be well in their absence, Darla and James headed out.

  Traffic, both pedestrian and auto, was relatively light on this day before a major holiday. Most of the shops already flaunted festive red, white, and blue in preparation for the block party—which was appropriate, given that the day had turned out to be hot as a firecracker, Darla thought with an inner sigh.

  If anything, the afternoon had grown steamier since lunch, so that even in her cropped pants and polo shirt she now felt overly dressed for the weather. James’s only concession to the heat, however, was to roll up the sleeves of his crisp white dress shirt and to dab at his forehead with his starched handkerchief. And since she had never once seen him break a sweat before, she knew that the day was hot, indeed.

  With luck, maybe the weather gods will shave a few degrees off the temperature tomorrow, she thought with a hopeful sigh.

  “So, how was the new Italian place last night?” Darla asked James as they waited on a passing car to cross the street.

  “The chef is actually from Brooklyn but apparently attended culinary school in the Piemonte region for a time,” he replied. “The specialty last night was a prosciutto Alfredo dish that was more than adequate. As for the wine list, it was a bit lacking, but their reasonable prices made up for the stingy selection.”

  “And what about Martha? Did she think the food stacked up to Saucy’s menu?” Darla asked as they stepped off the curb, naming a local Italian place that she knew was Martha’s favorite.

  “She appeared to enjoy her meal, as well.”

  His tone was uncharacteristically glum, and she shot him a concerned look. “James, what’s wrong? Martha didn’t break up with you, did she?”