Spiced to Death

by Peter King

  Such exhibitions are tiring but I set out again on a tour of some of the other attractions. I admired a replica of a Hong Kong riverboat restaurant with a menu that would take as long to read as it did to eat. The Napa Valley vineyards had a big spread and I browsed and chatted. Morocco’s stand was a brilliantly decorated affair and the food looked and smelled so good that I almost wished I had waited.

  By now, it was late afternoon. The crowds were thicker still. Many were eating and drinking as they walked between stands. One speaker was trickling out the dainty music of Schubert’s “Trout” Quintet while another across the way had the Ink Spots singing “The Java Jive.” Aromas were now becoming indistinguishable as I found a phone booth and called Don.

  He sounded strangely uncommunicative.

  “Is something wrong?” I asked.

  “No, no, everything’s fine,” he said quickly.

  “A problem with the business?”

  “No, it’s not that …”

  “Is someone with you and you can’t talk? I can call you later.”

  I would have thought he would want to discuss the theft of the Ko Feng, in fact, be anxious to do so. Between us perhaps we could conceive some approach for finding out where it was and what the thief’s intentions were.

  “No, there’s no one here.”

  “I was thinking of coming over.”

  “Look,” he said hurriedly. “Could you come over in the morning?”

  “Sure. I’m anxious to see your warehouse and we can—”

  “Okay,” he cut in. “See you in the morning.”

  I plunged back into the throng, puzzling over what could be the problem. Was it something connected with the Ko Feng? That was the uppermost subject in my mind and it must be in Don’s too. But it looked as if I had to wait until tomorrow to find out what it was.

  I took a cab back to the Framingham Hotel, stopping to buy some essential supplies. I watched television for a few minutes while drinking a vodka and tonic. A hair salon was advertising “follicle nutrition” with panther urine and on the news, a man was perched on the ledge of a tall building in Manhattan threatening to jump if the Mets didn’t end their eleven-game losing streak. I fell asleep during a Doris Day movie and it was ten o’clock before I awoke. I made smoked salmon sandwiches, ate them accompanied by another vodka and tonic and went back to sleep.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE SPICE WAREHOUSE WAS a place of spectacular aromas. Some could be isolated but the mingling of so many different herbs and spices resulted in an exotic atmosphere that was both heady and mysterious.

  Both the retail and the wholesale were catered for and it looked like a botanical wonderland. I couldn’t see either Don or Peggy so I picked up a current copy of the newsletter from the stack of literature by the door and looked around.

  It had really been a warehouse and had high ceilings with air vents and windows, ideal conditions for its present purpose. The retail section was laid out like a supermarket with herbs and spices in open boxes and trays—each marked with its country of origin and giving a description of its uses and characteristics.

  Chervil from Belgium, poppy seeds from Poland, nutmeg from Grenada, juniper berries from Italy—the extent of the stock was amazing. Glamorous names from all over the globe sprang out everywhere—Madagascar, Cyprus, Zanzibar, Bahamas, Ecuador, Egypt … It was like walking through a minijungle.

  Peggy was just concluding the sale of some lemon grass when I found her.

  “Don’s in his office talking to somebody,” she said. “I don’t know how long he’ll be.”

  “That’s all right,” I said. “I could browse here for hours. Wonderful place you’ve got—you must be very proud of what you’ve done here.”

  Her face lit up. “We are. So glad you like it.”

  “Is Don okay?” I asked casually, examining some sage, the herb whose smoke was used to protect against the black plague.

  “Yes,” she said and looked at me quickly.

  “He sounded preoccupied, worried even, when I phoned yesterday. I thought maybe something was wrong.”

  Alarm was beginning to show in her eyes and I hastened to placate her. “It was probably just worry about this Ko Feng business.”

  “He is very concerned about it. It’s the strangest thing … I could hardly believe it when he told me …”

  We discussed it for a few minutes, then an assistant in a trim green uniform came over to ask her help.

  “Go ahead and browse,” she told me. “I’ve got a perplexed customer here.”

  A pile of ugly, dirty-brown plants that looked like knobby clubs caught my eye. They were stacked high on a shelf and I went to take a closer look. I was reaching for one of them to feel its texture when a hand touched mine. A very attractive woman in a light blue wool suit turned to smile at me.

  “Sorry,” she said. “You were first.”

  “No, go ahead. I’m only looking.”

  “So am I. It’s a curious plant, isn’t it?”

  “It is. A lover of ginger, are you?”

  She looked at me perplexed, then at the label.

  “Yes,” I said, “ginger, that’s what it is.”

  She examined the unpleasant-looking sticks with a look of surprise on her face. Finely chiseled features, light chestnut-brown hair and a pretty smile made her well worth looking at and there was a firmness in her brown eyes that gave her character and suggested plenty of determination.

  “I’ve seen it before but never in such large pieces.”

  “It’s probably African,” I said, searching for the tag. “Yes, it is. Most people consider the Jamaican variety as the best but recently, more and more has been coming from Africa. It’s much larger and many like the flavor even better.”

  “I must admit I usually use the shaker,” she said, tilting her head to one side in a charming gesture.

  “A lot of people like to chop the plant. They find the taste of the fresh ginger different from that of the dried powder. You need two to three times as much of it, though—when it’s dried, the taste becomes really concentrated.”

  “You sound as if you know a lot about it.”

  “Don Renshaw’s the man to talk to. He owns this place. He can tell you all about any of these spices and herbs.”

  “You know him well?” she asked.

  “We’ve done a little business together over the years.”

  “You’re English, aren’t you?” Her brown eyes appraised me frankly.

  “Yes. So’s Don. I knew him in England, then he came over here to expand his business. He decided he liked it so much he wanted to stay.”

  “It’s a fascinating business. I had no idea that so many of these herbs and spices came from so far away.”

  “The history of spice trading was written in blood a few hundred years ago. Nations went to war with each other for control of the pepper trade. The price of pepper was the standard for trade in all commodities. Like the way we’re on the gold standard today, it was the pepper standard then.”

  Her brown eyes widened. “That’s amazing.”

  “Perhaps we could have lunch together. We can talk spices and eat spices.”

  She frowned. “Lunch is usually difficult …”

  “Dinner, then?”

  “I’d better tell you—I’m here to talk to Mr. Renshaw.”

  “Really?” I put an inflexion on the word that invited further explanation.

  “But I have a scheduling problem. I wanted to talk to him but he’s tied up and now I’m running late for another appointment. I’ll have to come back.”

  “I hope I’m here—” was all I could get out before she was hurrying away.

  “I do too,” she tossed over her shoulder.

  I went in search of Peggy and was in time to catch her coming from another section of the building. She waved when she saw me.

  “Those are our storage rooms,” she said. “We have a lot of our own stock in there and we store herbs, spices, plant
s, aromatics for others. This was a very expensive installation for us. It has control of temperature, humidity, particle size of foreign bodies, and it kills insects and bugs of all kinds. There are separate compartments for items that are sensitive to other aromas.”

  “You’re really well equipped” I said admiringly. “You and Don have done a terrific job here.”

  “Like to take a look inside?”

  “I certainly would.”

  “Let me get the keys—” She broke off as a woman in jodhpurs approached her asking where she could find pomegranate seeds.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” Peggy said and led the woman across the floor.

  I wandered around, looking at rare and bizarre plants, unusual herbs and strange-looking spices. Peggy finally came back.

  “I can’t imagine why Don’s taking so long,” she said. “He knows you’re here. Let’s go see how much longer he’s going to be.”

  We walked across to a small office with a glass-paneled door. Inside, the phone was ringing. Peggy rapped on the glass panel. There was no answer. She rapped again.

  “That’s funny,” she said. “Why doesn’t he answer it?”

  The phone continued to ring. She rapped a third time, then opened the door.

  She let out a gasp of horror and I pushed the door farther open.

  Don lay there on the floor. He was on his back and blood was dribbling from a hole in his chest. I put my fingertips against his left carotid artery.

  I could feel nothing. He was dead.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  IN RESPONSE TO MY call, Lieutenant Gaines and Sergeant Rossini arrived together, siren shrieking. I had had Peggy lock the front door and had asked the customers to remain for just a few minutes. They grumbled and protested but I was lucky. I expected New Yorkers to be more vociferous in their demands to be allowed to leave but maybe eating spices made people meeker. Certainly, none of them objected very strongly and one or two expressed interest as to what would happen next, possibly seeing themselves as playing supporting roles in a cops and robbers TV drama.

  One customer, a very pleasant elderly lady from Queens, was a regular and knew Peggy. She said she was with a support group and although I wasn’t sure what that meant, it evidently was something to do with people who banded together to battle a common misfortune. This lady had a lot of experience with this organization and was consoling Peggy.

  Gaines’s face was screwed up as if he was in agony. The pretty Italian sergeant was moderately friendly but her attitude clearly said that a murder right after a major theft was too much. Gaines didn’t wait for me to read his attitude. He let me have it right between the eyes.

  “How come you’re always on the scene when these things happen?” he growled.

  “Lieutenant, I know this looks bad but I had nothing to do with it. Not with the theft either, for that matter.”

  He hit me with a barrage of questions. I answered them with what seemed to me straight responses.

  “As for an alibi, I was standing talking to a woman just before Peggy and I went to the office,” I added.

  “What makes you think you need an alibi?” he asked accusingly.

  “Well, the questions you’re asking—”

  “Which woman is it who’ll alibi you?”

  “She—er, she isn’t here.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He squinted at me in disbelief. “You call that an alibi? You could have shot Renshaw any time and then come out here and pretend to find the body. Nobody heard a shot—the gun was obviously silenced.”

  “No,” I protested. “Whoever was with him must have shot him and then gone out of the other door from the office—the door that goes directly out into the parking lot.”

  “How long have you been here?” the sergeant asked, her voice calm.

  “About forty, forty-five minutes.”

  “Did you talk to anyone else besides this woman?”

  “No.”

  “Why did you talk to her?”

  “We were both at the ginger stand. We talked about ginger.”

  The lieutenant’s eyes were on me while she was asking the questions and I could see his skeptical look. Talking about ginger was not a credible action in his book.

  “Tell us again what she said.”

  I did. Technicians began to come in and there was a steady flow of men and women, cameras, plastic bags and various pieces of equipment.

  The sergeant turned to me. “You say you had no idea who was with Renshaw in his office?”

  “No. I called him yesterday to ask if it was all right to come over but he said it was better to make it this morning. His wife said there was someone with him but she didn’t know who it was and I didn’t either. The woman I was talking to said she had an appointment to talk to him but couldn’t wait.”

  “I don’t need to state the obvious,” Gaines growled. “This must have some connection with that pepper of yours …”

  “I can’t imagine what connection but I have to admit it seems likely.”

  “Tell me somep’n—when you both tested the stuff at JFK, you said it was genuine …” He let the rest of his sentence trail away in an uncertain manner that was not typical of him.

  “To the best of our knowledge, it was.”

  “Both of you?” he pressed.

  “Yes.”

  “Stuff’s worth more’n a million, you say? If it’s genuine?”

  “That’s right.”

  “What’s it worth if it’s phony?”

  He rapped it out fast before I could see where he was going.

  “Well, nothing … but it can’t be phony … we both—” I broke off. “Ah, I see what you’re saying. Don Renshaw and I could be in cahoots.”

  I didn’t know if the word was still current but it was expressive. The lieutenant seemed to have no trouble recognizing it. His nod suggested that he not only recognized it but approved of it—the very word he wanted.

  “Is there another variable?” the winsome sergeant asked. “Could the spice have been phony and you said it was genuine?” She no longer looked quite as winsome.

  “I suppose we could come up with handfuls of theories if we tried hard enough,” I said bitterly. “The truth is that we both considered the Ko Feng to be genuine and we declared it genuine.”

  The sergeant scribbled in her notebook. Gaines looked skeptical although the look was nearly lost in some facial contortions.

  “By the way,” I added, “Don Renshaw had a theory.”

  Neither of them showed any interest. I wasn’t invited to contribute to the pool of ideas but I went ahead anyway. When I had finished, Gaines chewed it over, then shook his head.

  “Ransom, yeah, we thought about that but it doesn’t show up very high on our hit parade.”

  A sallow young man with hair in what looked suspiciously like braids came up and said something to the lieutenant, who nodded.

  “We’re fingerprinting. Got most of the people here, we need yours. Any objection?” His tone suggested that he hoped I did object.

  “None at all,” I said promptly.

  “Also, we need you to stop by the station—the sergeant will give you the address.”

  “You’ll want a statement. All right.”

  “And we’ll want you to leave your passport.”

  “I’ve got to stay?”

  The shock of the crime had occupied my mind to the extent that I hadn’t considered this possibility. The lieutenant nodded, his face muscles moving as if he were chewing invisible gum.

  “Yeah, you gotta stay. It was a major theft before—now it’s murder. You gotta stay, all right.”

  Now that the idea had sunk in, I didn’t mind. In fact, I wanted to stay. I had to clear myself, find out who stole the Ko Feng and who killed Don Renshaw, and get the Celestial Spice back. It was an ambitious program.

  I didn’t imagine that Gaines and the sergeant would look too kindly on the i
dea of my investigating the two crimes but that was what I was going to do whether they liked it or not. I hoped I could convince them that I was only doing my duty and helping them.

  I put on a look of annoyed aggravation.

  “Well, if I have to stay …” I said with all the reluctance I could muster.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  I HAD PLENTY TO think about on the cab ride back to the Framingham Hotel. I had talked briefly with Peggy. She was distraught but controlled. The very helpful support lady said that the full significance of Don’s murder hadn’t hit Peggy yet. Her sister-in-law was on the way over and though the Spice Warehouse would remain closed for the rest of the day, Peggy was determined that she would open tomorrow as usual. The support lady said she would come by and she agreed that it was best for Peggy to have a lot of work to do.

  I changed my mind about going directly to the hotel and told the driver to drop me at a good Irish pub. I wasn’t that hungry but it would be better to eat now so I had a corned beef sandwich on rye bread and a bottle of Guinness. Nowhere in the world are there such delicious corned beef sandwiches as in the Irish pubs in New York.

  I was able to spot a few sights on the ride from the pub to the hotel although my heart wasn’t in it. But then the Empire State Building loomed up on the right. I remembered that it had been unchallenged as the tallest building in the world when I had first seen it. The cabby was staying to the west of Broadway, presumably to avoid the thicker traffic. We went by the newly opened Woody Allen Theater and, in the next block, the massive billboard advertising the latest Sondheim-Lloyd Webber blockbuster musical about World War I—Trenches. Soon after we passed Lincoln Center we were at the Framingham.