Murder & Spice Read online

  “Well, it’s certainly a good idea to discuss it.” Cassy smiled at Mrs. Hamswell. “I’ll be at the town hall tonight.”

  With a sudden and unexpected familiarity, Mrs. Hamswell took Cassy’s hand and shook it. Defying the laws of physics, she held onto her posters.

  “God bless you, Miss Dean. It’s the little businesses like this one that always suffer when they move in, you know. Thank you for your support.” She left just as she’d entered, in a whirl of paper and deep, labored breaths. She paused before exiting and turned back one last time. “Remember, coffee and cookies.”

  And then she was gone.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Hamswell!” Patty hollered enthusiastically. It was impossible for Cassy to tell if Patty was being sarcastic or not; the girl appeared to be so full of joy and life; she had to give her the benefit of the doubt.

  The Spicery’s other employee, Dorothy McGuiness, appeared out of nowhere, having successfully avoided not only the slowly dwindling line of customers, but also the encounter with Mrs. Hamswell.

  “What did she want?” Dot asked.

  “Another one of her crusades. Last year it was all about fishing licenses, and before that it was something about a bypass road that never came to be.” Cassy said.

  “Coffee and cookies?” mused Dot, looking over the poster. “We should go.”

  “Can I leave the shop in your capable hands?” Cassy inquired.

  “Lunch break?” Dot smiled.

  “I’m thinking of trying out that new place across the street.”

  “Get them to make you a pesto melt. I promise, you will not recover.”

  “That good, huh?”

  Chapter Three

  Leaving the shop when it was so busy felt like cheating, but Cassy was the boss. She’d been working since early morning, way before the store opened for the day. Besides, her stomach was complaining. If she left it any longer, the rumbling might scare away the customers. Before the start of the summer season, it was rare to get so much business.

  “Coffee and More” read the no-nonsense sign above the café. A husband and wife team had just opened the Paris-style establishment a month before. Already it was looking a little empty. Cassy remembered the Spicery’s first week in the corner of Havenholm called Nether Edge. She’d barely kept up with demand, despite her suspicion that people came to investigate and possibly mock her when they found out what kind of store it was. But, the store had done well and she believed she and her shop had become an established part of town. With its ornate wooden storefront, the Spicery became a landmark people used as a meeting point.

  Cassy ordered a spiced pumpkin latte, impossible to resist, even though it was hardly the right season. Above the counter there were two of Mrs. Hamswell’s crude yet effective posters.

  The diminutive woman who worked the coffee machine noticed Cassy’s wandering eyes. “Are you going tonight?”

  “Do you buy all this conspiracy stuff?” Cassy handed over exact change. “I mean, people coming in and taking over the town?”

  The look the woman gave her, coupled with the fact that not one but two posters had been proudly displayed, should have tipped Cassy off.

  “You know Bob’s Hypermarket closed down? No warning. It just happened last night. They say he sold out to whoever it is knocking down that Langdon place.”

  A one-time high school sweetheart of Cassy’s (for all of two weeks), Bob Mayweather had gone to France and discovered Hyper-marchés. He’d brought the concept home with him, seemingly oblivious that it just sounded dumb in English.

  The drugstore within the market had also closed, which explained why the Spicery was so busy that morning. Much of what he sold could be found on their shelves, too, or at least some organic equivalent.

  “Yeah, but it’s not like they’re going to knock everything down and not do anything with the land. It’ll bring money to the area, right?” But the barista gave her a withering look and asked if she wanted anything to eat. Cassy excused herself.

  Unable to shake the thought that something bad was happening to Havenholm, Cassy ordered a pesto melt. She was delighted when the most appetizing thing she’d seen in a while was delivered to her. It smelled divine.

  While she passed one occupied table after another, Sheriff Noyce and a tall young man in a deputy’s uniform approached her. As Dot had promised, he was an attractive, albeit youngish man.

  “Ah, Mrs. Dean!” the Sheriff greeted. “We’re just doing the rounds of all the local businesses. You were next on our list, but two stones and all that.”

  “Two birds.” She desperately wanted to correct Mrs. to Miss, especially as the new recruit had turned out to be a lot more attractive than she’d imagined. “I heard through the grapevine that we had a new deputy.”

  Cassy approached and stretched out her hand to the young deputy. He received it with a firm grip, large hands, and soft skin. His eyes were striking and displayed what Cassy knew as heterochromia. One was the most piercing blue, the other a deep, luscious, woodland brown. From her time studying occult texts she knew this to be a sign of either imbalance or harmony. (No one ever said ancient occult texts were any use.)

  “James,” he said, his voice soft yet heavily accented. She couldn’t place exactly where, but deep south for certain. When they’d looked outside Havenholm, they looked far. “James Jones.”

  The name went well with the drawl.

  “Pleased to meet you, James,” Cassy said with a squeak. She swallowed hard to clear her throat. “Can I get you a drink? I mean are you getting a drink?”

  “Just familiarizing myself with the community, ma’am.” Ma’am! “Having the grand tour as it were. Yours is the one with the big old-fashioned sign out front, right? The Spicery?”

  “That’s the one. All mine. My business, which I own. Independent woman and all that.” She could feel herself blushing, a fixed grimace on her face. She did her best to conceal her weak-at-the-knees schoolgirl ditziness. “Not that independent, though. It’s not like I don’t need a man in my life.” Sometimes, Cassy wished there were a spell to shut her mouth.

  “Don’t we all?” said Deputy James. All the color drained from Cassy’s face. Surely not… not the square jawed, quirky-eyed Texan? “Well, I mean having a partner, that is.”

  With the color now flushing back into her cheeks, Cassy felt a little light-headed. For a minute, she thought Dot had misjudged the situation. Before she could embarrass herself further, Cassy turned the conversation to more serious matters. “Are you going to the town hall later?” she asked the sheriff.

  He took off his wide-brimmed hat and rubbed his slightly balding head. “You know what? Yes, I am going, just for security. Naming no names, but a few of our residents have taken a dim view of recent events. Things are getting a little heated, and of course I get sucked into the middle of it all.”

  “It’s not all bad, is it?” Cassy questioned, trying to have her own concerns squashed.

  “You know how it is with small places like this. We’re stubborn. Stuck in our ways. I’d say it’s a good thing trying to preserve what we have, but we can’t stop progress, now can we? Say, did you know that when you opened your store I had several complaints?”

  “My little shop? It’s just about the most small-town place I can imagine. We sell nothing more offensive than ginger!”

  “Well… naming no names.” The sheriff winked.

  And there it was. Mrs. Hamswell strikes again. Somehow this put Cassy at ease. If the town naysayer could get her underwear in a twist over something as innocent as the Spicery (if you discounted all the magic) then maybe there wasn’t anything to worry about when the big boys came in.

  “I’m sure it’ll be just fine.” Cassy glanced at her watch. With the hypermarket out of business, they could expect increased traffic throughout the day, and she had to hold down the fort. She bid the sheriff and his new deputy a good day, turned to leave, and then paused.

  “Are you going, too, Deputy Jones
? Tonight, I mean, to the town hall?”

  “Like the boss said, we’re there for security more than anything. Some lawyers for the firm doing the renovations are coming down, and well, we wanted to show some hospitality.”

  That changed everything. If the buyers would be represented at the meeting, then everything suddenly got a lot more serious. Cassy’s concerns had been stifled, but now they’d flared up again. Maybe there was a concerted effort to turn Havenholm into the next tourist town. It had the scenery and the history—now all it needed were the hotels, arcades, and malls and…

  Half lost in thought, Cassy crossed the street to her store. She had almost reached the door when she felt a tap on her shoulder. Expecting it to be Deputy James, Cassy turned with her cutest smile ready. It was not the deputy, however, but Sheriff Noyce.

  “I called to you but you must not have heard me,” he said, puffing. The short run from the café had taken its toll on his old body.

  “I’m sorry. How can I help you?”

  “Cakes.”

  “Cakes?”

  “I need to make a cake for someone.” He looked around, almost ashamed someone might hear him admitting to such a thing. “I don’t really know what I’m doing. I mean, I’ve got the recipes, and I can work an oven. I’m not dumb. It can’t be that hard, right?”

  “You have to bake a cake?”

  “Yeah, it’s for someone,” he said, sheepishly. “What do I put in it? Raisins? You sell cakey things, don’t you?”

  “I guess we do. Well, follow me. I have everything you need inside.”

  The Spicery was still busy, but Patty had things under control, and Dot was restocking the shelves in a languid sort of way that emphasized just how infrequently they’d had to do it over the winter months.

  “What about ginger?” asked the sheriff, browsing through open boxes of ingredients. He found a ginger root and smelled it. The tart sting made his eyes water. “That’s potent.” He coughed. “How do you girls do it? I mean you spend all day in here with all these smells—it’s overwhelming. I feel like I’m in a market in Morocco or somewhere, you know what I mean?”

  Cassy breathed in deeply, filling her nostrils with the strong aromas from the myriad of herbs and spices. Lavender hung from the ceiling and barrels were filled with rosemary, dried licorice and vanilla pods, each giving a fragrant, sweet smell. Then there were the more bitter odors like nettle, clove, horseradish and exotic types such as orris and salep. It all mingled together in the air like ingredients in a big cauldron. It was exhilarating.

  “It’s quite something, isn’t it?” Cassie smiled proudly.

  “Sure is,” the sheriff agreed. “Why don’t you get a few things for me, and I’ll find the recipe that matches.”

  “Sounds like a good idea,” Cassy replied, then called to Dot, “Please rustle up some things for the sheriff. Aniseed, vanilla, nutmeg, maybe even some spearmint.” Then, to Noyce, “That should keep you going.”

  “I reckon so,” the sheriff said.

  “Say Phil,” Dot interrupted, with the habit of calling everyone by their first name, status be damned. “Where’s that lovely young man gone? I thought you might introduce him to our Cassy.”

  “Oh, it’s like that, is it?” he said, turning to Cassy with a grin. “I thought I detected a little something back there. You have your eye on our new recruit, Mrs. Dean?”

  “It’s Miss,” corrected Dot, who arrived with a bag of choice ingredients. “Here’s a selection of things. I’ve labeled each one individually so you can distinguish your ginger from your aniseed.”

  “Oh, of course. ‘Miss.’” Sherriff Noyce took the bag and held it to his face. He breathed deep and coughed. “My, my,” he spluttered, “how much do I owe you?”

  Nothing. It’s on the house, Cassy was going to say until Dot interrupted.

  “All it’ll take is a good word from you to the young deputy,” Dot said. Cassy rolled her eyes but didn’t protest.

  “I’ll see what I can do, ladies. Goodbye,” he said, then called across the room, “Goodbye to you too, Patty.”

  Patty waved back, just happy to be included in the conversation at last.

  Chapter Four

  The town hall was a grand thing with a string of lights highlighting it after nightfall. It was an old building, built to last and it dwarfed most of the surrounding buildings. Only the silos on the outskirts of town bested it.

  It had more than enough capacity to accommodate the 200 or so people who had shown up that night. They crowded the steps leading to the main entrance and spilled onto the street, preventing cars from passing. Havenholm was a small town, barely large enough to be called a town, though it encompassed a few remoter areas that made up the numbers. New England was dotted with similar places, relics from colonial days that had barely changed since Europeans set foot on the shores of the New World. The only real downside of living in such an idyllic place was the slow broadband, something that Patty was always complaining about.

  As they approached the crowd, Cassy was glad she’d asked Patty and Dot to come along. She wasn’t sure if she’d be able to cope with such an unexpectedly large group of people. It wasn’t social anxiety so much as claustrophobia that beset Cassy in situations like this. She’d never been one for large crowds and always felt trapped, say, when she was shopping in an out-of-town mall. With the Spicery trio together she was a lot more confident.

  “Wow, I’ve never seen so many people out like this before!” Patty exclaimed. “Where did they all come from?”

  “If people think that the place they call home is in trouble, you can guarantee they’ll want to be heard,” Dot responded. It wasn’t cold, but Dorothy had come out wearing a huge, puffy coat that looked odd on her tall, slight frame. Cassy couldn’t get the image of a hotdog out of her mind, but she kept it to herself.

  “It’s mob mentality,” Cassy observed. “Until this meeting, I guarantee half of these people didn’t care either way if there were plans to develop in Havenholm.”

  “Don’t be so quick to judge, Cassandra,” Dot retorted. “There’s a lot of pride in this town.”

  “Well, as far as I can tell it’s a good thing what they’re doing,” Patty added, then lowered her voice when she realized that she was probably in the minority. “We could do with a little injection of the modern world around here. There’s only so many times a girl can go bowling, you know.”

  * * *

  Soon everyone had squeezed into the main hall. Although there were fold-out chairs provided, many were left to sit in the aisles or stand at the edges. The two exits had been left open and were packed with latecomers unable to get into the room. Mrs. Hamswell was one, which, considering she was the main instigator for tonight’s meeting, seemed like an oversight. She forced her way through, and despite being on the smaller side, got in without too much trouble. Cassy stifled a laugh at the woman heaving and panting, her cheeks bright red with effort. She was no doubt putting up posters until the last minute and might have missed the event itself had she not run out of them.

  “So, we have her to thank for all this, do we?” said Dot, indicating Mrs. Hamswell.

  “When she gets a notion in her head, nothing stops her, that’s for sure,” Cassy replied, searching for an empty chair. “I think she did a good thing. We need to talk about what’s happening in our town.”

  Dot mumbled something under her breath and then spoke up. “We’ll not hear the end of it now, though. This is enough to fuel her for the rest of the year. I swear, sometimes the only reason she’s got to poke her nose into other people’s affairs is because her life is so dreadfully dull. She has nothing to gain or lose if Havenholm gets redeveloped. The only thing she needs is a cause to fill her life.” Cassy raised an eyebrow at Dot, but undeterred, she continued. “I don’t care if you think I’m talking behind her back. The truth is that she’s a bore. You know she spoke to me for two hours straight about the junior high school play? The blasted thing only lasted f
orty minutes, and she doesn’t even have a kid.”

  Being someone with little standing in the community—and indeed it was little, she was merely a shop owner—Cassy was mercifully given a chair. She wasn’t sure if she would have survived had she been forced to stand. An older gentleman gave up his seat to Dot, and Patty happily sat on the floor next to Cassy. The gentleman, however, kept asking Cassy what was happening on stage, as he didn’t have the best view from where he was.

  The raised stage at the far end of the hall was often used for local productions—amateur renditions of Shakespeare plays, or one-woman shows written by the town’s prolific but underachieving resident dramatist. Occasionally larger acts would pass through, no doubt through some error in booking, but not even they could attract the numbers present on that night.

  Earlier, when they’d first arrived at the town hall, Cassy had spotted an unusual car parked in the lot reserved for officials. It no doubt belonged to the woman in the expensive black suit who now stepped onto the stage and sat at a folding table. It had enough seats for four other people. One of those was Havenholm’s mayor, Mr. Brustwick; a large man with a baldhead that shone under the strip lights. To his right was the out-of-town woman, and she was joined by a man who Cassy guessed was an associate; they shared the same look of being there out of a sense of duty rather than any need or desire. Completing the panel was Donald Saint-John, a local developer with a run of failed projects, but who remained a vital force in Havenholm. That was until money from outside came in. A hush descended over the room as if a concert were about to begin, and Mayor Brustwick addressed the audience.

  “Thank you all for coming. I’d like to thank various concerned citizens for arranging tonight’s Q&A—there will be a chance for you to ask the panel questions after the initial presentation. Now, I’d like to introduce the guests we have here tonight.” He mopped his brow with a monogrammed handkerchief. “You all know me, so I’ll move right on. To my right, Mr. Saint-John owns Biggs Bowling Alley—”