Deadly Curiosities

by Gail Z. Martin

  Valerie passed me with a carriage load of tourists. I waved to her and all of her passengers waved back. A trip to the post office went off without a hitch. I made a quick call to the work crew about my floor as I walked, and was thrilled to discover that despite the muggy weather, the floors were done and almost dry, so Baxter and I should be able to move home the next day. We might have to keep the windows open to deal with the smell, but at least we’d be home.

  That last news gave my mood a huge boost, and I decided to celebrate with a walk through the Charleston City Market. It’s a top tourist attraction in Charleston, filled with lovely crafts and art, as well as fresh produce and baked goods, and I feel lucky to have it within easy walking distance. It’s a wonderful place to people watch. I found myself smiling as I mingled with the locals and tourists, making my way through the rows of crowded stalls. Fresh vegetables tempted me on one side, while hand made soaps and lotions seduced from the other. The smell of sweetgrass from the basket weavers at the entrance mingled with the scent of freshly baked cookies.

  “How are things going, Niella?” I asked one of the women with the sweetgrass baskets.

  Niella and her mother were a fixture at the market, setting up their spot by the outside of the lower doorway in the shade every morning just after dawn for nearly twenty years. Watching their fingers fly as they twisted and wove the narrow strands of grass made it look easy, but I knew it was a craft passed down from parent to child for generations within the Gullah people, and that Niella and her mom were two of the best.

  Niella gave an expressive shrug. “Today won’t be scorching hot, so there should be more tourists. That makes me happy.” Her fingers never stopped moving, and I knew it took decades of practice to be able to weave the complicated designs without looking.

  I knew what she meant about tourists making her happy. More tourists equaled more income for most of Charleston. If the weather became stifling hot, even by Charleston standards, people stayed in air conditioned hotels or went to tour historic homes and plantations instead of wandering the Market and the downtown streets.

  “You get your floors done yet?” Niella’s mother asked. I had to think for a moment, because I didn’t remember telling Niella or her mom about the refinishing. Then again, Mrs. Teller was a root woman with a way of knowing things. I was pleased that something as trivial as my floors popped up on her sixth sense radar.

  “They’ll be done tomorrow. Thanks for asking,” I said. “I’ve had to put Baxter in a dog spa and I miss him.” In the evenings, I often brought Baxter for a walk along the outside stalls of the Market, and he was a favorite of both Niella and her mother.

  Mrs. Teller nodded. “Good. Good you’re not staying long. Nice place for other people, not so nice for you.” She was looking down at her basket, so she didn’t see me startle. “But last night, you were safe.

  Very safe.” Her voice was thick as roux and sweet as cane syrup, heavy with the song-like Gullah accent.

  Sorren had made sure of that I was safe, but how Mrs. Teller knew, I wasn’t going to ask.

  “Yes, I slept well,” I stammered.

  Mrs. Teller nodded. “Good.”

  Niella rolled her eyes. “Mama’s telling stories out of school again, isn’t she?” she chided, but her voice was fond.

  Mrs. Teller gave her daughter a dismissive look. “When the Good Lord and the Old Ones speak to me, I gotta say something,” she said, as her fingers moved at lightning speed.

  “Thank you,” I said. I’d had enough dealings with Mrs. Teller that I trusted her instincts. And if she suspected what kind of business I really ran and who my ‘night watchman’ really was, it didn’t seem to run afoul for her by either the Old Ones or the Good Lord, for which I was grateful.

  “I’m playing hooky,” I said with a conspiratorial grin. “But I’d better make my rounds and get back to the shop before Teag figures out I’m truant.”

  Niella laughed. “I hear you, girlfriend. Get going. Time’s a wastin’.” I waved good-bye and headed into the market.

  Over the time since I’d moved back to Charleston, I’d been such a regular at the Market that I counted many of the vendors as friends. That meant that a visit wasn’t just about shopping, it was a time to catch up on news, gossip and the latest jokes. It made for a very pleasant outing.

  I lingered for a moment at a stall selling silver jewelry, and stopped to finger a nice pashmina shawl in another booth. Ruth, one of the produce vendors, recognized me as a regular customer and let me know what she had brought fresh today. A quick glance at my watch told me I needed to pick up the pace, and I scouted the rest of the market in record time, managing not to get snarled in other conversations. I had one more stop before I headed back to the shop, and I didn’t want anything to get in the way of a fresh latte at Honeysuckle Café.

  “See you soon!” I called to Niella and her mother as I walked out of the market.

  I walked down the street and turned the corner, looking forward to my coffee. I was about halfway down the block before I realized that the alley was unusually quiet for this time of day. I caught a glimpse of a reflection in an office building window and spun on my heel. Coming up fast behind me was the man with the withered face. Corban Moran?

  “Stop following me!” My voice had more bravado than I felt. It was daylight, but there was no one around, no one to interfere.

  His broad-brimmed hat shaded most of his features, but even at a distance, my magic was screaming warnings, telling me to run. I glanced around. This side street was flanked by office buildings whose front doors faced the main thoroughfare. Short of running through a plate glass window, there was no doorway to duck into.

  I crossed the street, putting a patch of torn up sidewalk between us, using the barricades and rocky patch of dirt as a buffer zone. “Who are you?” I asked. “What do you want?”

  He didn’t answer me, but the cold smile told me more than I wanted to know. I eyed the distance to the next main street. I might be able to make it if I ran, but that depended on whether my pursuer was fast, or not quite human. One hand went to the agate necklace, but I didn’t know whether man with the withered-skin was supernatural. Creepy as hell, yes.

  Hat Man was closing fast. I decided to swallow my pride and run. He hurdled the sidewalk barrier, ran through the mud and caught up to me in the shadow of a tall office building, grabbing me by the arm. I swung around, ready with an arm block and a low kick, but he didn’t flinch. I shoved him, hard with the flat of my right hand, getting a staggering mental image from the touch.

  “Stay out of my business,” he warned.

  “Let go of me!” I was still reeling from the brief vision I’d gotten from touching his clothing, but I was scared and angry enough to fight. My training should have enabled me to take down someone bigger and stronger than I am, and that told me something I didn’t want to know. Moran wasn’t entirely mortal.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Mrs. Teller shouted from behind us. She and Niella stood with hands on hips in the middle of the side street. Niella was holding up a small flannel pouch, something I recognized as a mojo bag, a conjure amulet.

  But my attention was on Mrs. Teller. A glow surrounded her entire form, faint at first, but growing brighter. “You let go of her right now!” Mrs. Teller commanded.

  I took the momentary distraction to land a sharp kick between Moran’s legs and wrench free. He fell back several steps. Even immortals are tender in the stones, it seems. I ran toward Niella and Mrs.

  Teller, although I wasn’t sure what magic Hat Man could muster or whether anything Mrs. Teller could do would be enough to keep all of us from getting killed, especially if Moran had anything to do with those flayed bodies showing up all over town.

  Mrs. Teller’s glow was as bright as if she had a spotlight behind her. She gathered some of the light in the palm of her hand and hurled it down the shadowed alley at Moran, who vanished in the blink of an eye.

  “Thank you,”
I said, still jumbled from the vision and from seeing Mrs. Teller in a whole new way.

  “Humph,” Mrs. Teller said, lifting her chin. “The nerve of some people. Niella and I saw him hanging around the marketplace, and when he followed you, I knew he was no good.”

  “I wanted to call the police,” Niella said dryly.

  Mrs. Teller shook her head. “Police ain’t going to do anything about his kind,” she said, and I knew immediately what she meant. His kind. Magic.

  I had more questions, but Mrs. Teller was already heading for the place where the sidewalk was missing. The barricades had gotten knocked over, and in the middle of the red clay dirt was a clear impression of a man’s boot. Not much to tell the police there, other than his shoe size.

  I was surprised when Mrs. Teller squatted down by the patch of dirt and dug in a woven cloth bag she wore on a strap across her body. She took out a small pouch and sprinkled some gray, odd-smelling dust into the shoe print.

  “What’s that?” I asked, bending down to see.

  “Kufwa dust,” she said without looking up.

  “Folks around here call it ‘goofer’ dust,” Niella replied. I had heard of that. Part of a root worker’s tools, especially if that practitioner also ventured into what some called ‘conjure’ or ‘hoodoo.’ Mrs. Teller took a knife out of her pocket and a small glass bottle from her bag. She mixed the dust into the shoe print, then scraped some of the dirt into the glass bottle and put a stopper in it.

  “Here,” she said as she rose and handed me the vial. “Up to you what you do next. Keep it in the bottle, and that man’ll get mighty sick. Bury in a graveyard, he’ll die. Throw that bottle into a crossroads, and he’ll leave town.” She gave me a pointed look. “He’s bad news.”

  I closed my hand around the bottle. “Thank you,” I said, looking from Mrs. Teller to Niella. “Thank you very much.”

  I was surprised when Mrs. Teller suddenly grabbed my hand. “Bad things comin’,” she said, meeting my gaze earnestly. “Watch yourself. Something’s riled the dead, and there’ll be problems ’till they’re quiet. Even your shadow friend, he best take care.”

  In all the time I had known Niella and her mother, Mrs. Teller had never spoken at such length to me, and certainly not about danger and ghosts. Niella must have misinterpreted my moment of stunned silence, because she gave her mother a look of warning. “Now Mama, you’re going to scare Cassidy,”

  she said.

  I gave Mrs. Teller’s hand a light squeeze. “No, really, it’s okay. Thank you. I’ll be careful.”

  Mrs. Teller gave a curt nod without looking up. “Best you take care. Someone’s gonna die again real soon.”

  I got to Honeysuckle Café wishing I dared order an Irish coffee instead of a latte. A wee bit of whiskey would probably help my nerves, and by now, I was wide awake. With a sigh, I decided to be a good girl and stuck with the espresso double shot. I treated myself to an extra vanilla flavoring, just because.

  Rick was the barista on call today, working at the bar for Trina, who owned the café. In a world of twenty-something hipster baristas, Rick was a pleasant anomaly. He was probably in his forties, and carried himself like a man who has seen a lot of living. He had deep brown eyes and a long, hound-like face which seemed to elicit instant trust from his customers. He played it up by favoring vintage jackets, old-time casual wear and fedoras, and he’d hung a sign that proclaimed ‘Rick’s Place’ over the coffee bar, making the nod to Casablanca complete.

  “Hi Rick,” I said. “Got the exit papers?” It was our little joke, homage to our favorite Bogart movie.

  “No, but I’m about to get carpal tunnel from pulling espressos if this keeps up. This is the quietest it’s been all morning.”

  I looked around. While the Charleston City Market had been emptier than usual, I could tell from the detritus of cups, napkins and stir sticks that Trina and the bus boy were clearing that the café had been slammed. “Get hit by a tourist bus?”

  He shook his head. “Nope. Cops.”

  Mrs. Teller’s warning echoed in my mind. “Traffic problems?” I hoped for the best, but I had the sinking feeling that my optimism was misplaced.

  Rick shook his head, expertly manipulating the huge brass espresso machine like an artist. “No such luck. They found another dead guy out by the old Navy yard.”

  Crap. My good mood plummeted. “Any juicy gossip?”

  Rick was the kind of guy who should have been slinging booze in a one of the dark-paneled cigar bars that poured expensive scotch and sold the finest smokes north of Havana. I had the impression that Rick had done a stint like that and moved on. Like his namesake, I suspected Rick had lived many lives.

  He shrugged. “You know the boys in blue. They talk a lot when they think it’s just among themselves.”

  I took his meaning right away. Most people forgot that waiters, bartenders, and baristas weren’t just part of the scenery.

  “And?” I figured Rick had his secrets. We all do. And I figured he kept secrets for others. But this was likely to make the evening news, so it wasn’t exactly like hacking into the Pentagon. I left that to Teag.

  Rick glanced around the café, checking to make sure we didn’t have an audience. “They’re worried,”

  he said quietly. “All the murders have been men, all homeless or vagrants, and they don’t seem to have a break in the case yet.” He paused. “Bad for business if it gets out. Tourists don’t like vacationing where there are unsolved crimes.”

  I nodded. Tourists are skittish. All it took was a rumor of a flu outbreak or a rash of muggings and people would cancel reservations or decide to take their daytrips elsewhere. And both alternatives were a bottom-line hit for merchants who had nothing to do with the problem and no way to fix it.

  “Anything else?”

  Rick frowned. “Well, there are several theories floating around. I’m not sure which is worse. Some of the cops think it might be a serial killer. The others think it could be some weird cult thing, or maybe black magic.”

  Uh-oh. “What makes them think that?” I asked, hoping I sounded curious but not too interested.

  Rick’s gaze darted around the room once more. “The cops all seemed to know the same stuff, so they didn’t spell it out, but I got the feeling that all the bodies were ‘done to’ pretty bad, cut up, that sort of thing.”

  He gave an expressive shrug. “One cop said something about ‘the way they looked’ and the others all nodded, then started jibing each other about who threw up when they saw the bodies.”

  Whoo-boy. That spelled trouble. “Well, let’s hope they find a solution soon,” I said, trying to sound disinterested. “I’m sure people are looking into it.” People that included Sorren, Teag, and me.

  I WAS PLEASANTLY surprised to find the shop busy when I got back. Teag flashed me a grateful grin to welcome me, and I went behind the counter, happy to see customers shopping and buying. I pushed my worries aside for the next few hours, glad I’d gotten a jolt of energy from my latte.

  The afternoon was almost gone by the time the last of the influx finally left, laden with packages.

  Between the sales I’d made and what I’d seen Teag close, it was going to be a very good day, which was welcome after how slow it had been.

  Just wait until word of a serial killer gets out if you want to see slow, a little voice nagged in my head, but I resolutely ignored it.

  “How was the Charleston City Market?” Teag asked with a knowing glance. I sighed. He knows me too well. “Who says I went to the Market?” I bluffed.

  Teag cocked his head and rolled his eyes. “I know what your errands are like. They include a stroll through the Charleston City Market and a visit to Honeysuckle Café.”

  “Guilty as charged,” I said with a sigh. I had bolstered my morning latte with several cups of coffee from the coffee maker in the back room, but the last of my cup was cold. “I did pick up some info, so it almost counts as work.”

  I filled Tea
g in on what I’d heard from Rick, and then told him about Hat Man and Mrs. Teller. Then I pulled the bottle with the kufwa dust and clay dirt in it and held it up. “I don’t know if Sorren and his friends can make anything out of this, but Mrs. Teller thought we could jinx him at least.”

  “I’m more interested in what you saw when you touched him,” Teag said with a pointed glance.

  I had been avoiding thinking about that. “Nothing good,” I replied, sipping the last of my now-cold latte. “Not right,” I said slowly, trying to wrap words around the images in my mind. “Polluted. Foul. Not really dead but… putrefying on the inside, if that makes any sense.”

  “Have you ever gotten a read from Sorren? How did it compare since Sorren is, well, dead.”

  Undead. “I’ve only had a couple of glimpses of Sorren, and it’s not the same at all. He doesn’t feel dead, not like a real dead person,” I said, feeling like the English language was not built for this. “He feels ancient, sad. I get bits of stories jumbled together.” I shook my head. “Moran was more like rotting meat.”

  “Yuck,” Teag said with a grimace. “I’ve got Anthony doing some digging and he promised to call when he wraps up work.” He gave a nervous grin. “And I’m flexing my Weaver talents to see what I can shake loose from the Internet.”

  I nodded. “And whenever Sorren surfaces, we’ve got some news for him that he isn’t going to like.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief when we finally closed up for the night. Teag walked me to the bank to make the deposit. At first glance, he may look like a skateboarder, but I knew he had just won a national competition in Capoeira, a Brazilian style of fighting, after already mastering several other mixed martial arts. He’d competed at the international tournament level for Eskrima, a weapons-based Filipino fighting style, and he was also an instructor in several forms, which is where we met. Teag was my instructor before he became my assistant manager.

  Teag told me once that he had been bullied in school for being gay and decided he wasn’t going to take another thrashing. I was sorry for his reason to want self-defense skills, but knowing how to defend himself was one more way he seemed perfect for the job.