The Secret Ingredient Murders: A Eugenia Potter Mystery Read online

  In the greenhouse, Jason felt like crying.

  Yeah, who knew? Who knew the old coot would become his best friend, even better than his sister. It was because of Aunt Genia that Parker had come after him. Aunt Genia had talked to the old man about Jason’s trouble with the cops, about the marijuana, because Parker knew about that, too.

  Oh, yeah, he knew all about that.

  Great-aunt Genia also told Mr. Parker about how Jason had worked on her ranch two summers ago, and she must have said he did an okay job down there, or else why would the old man have hired him? Jason thought that working on the ranch was the best thing he had ever done, until this summer when he got introduced to growing plants instead of cows.

  So what did the old man do that first day but haul Jason out of the pizza place—under the hostile stare of his twin sister—and feed him a bowl of the best chili Jason had ever tasted. “Your aunt’s recipe,” the old man had told him. “Twenty-seven damn ingredients, believe it or not.” And then he had offered Jason humongous bucks for daily help in the greenhouse and outside gardens. And all he had to do was tend the plants and care for the herb garden, and Mr. Parker would show him how. Well, there were a few more delicate details about the job that would have to be explained, the old man said that day. And then Jason would have to decide …

  Midway through the watering, Jason half smiled at the way Mr. Parker had presented his real proposition: completely businesslike, in that great deep voice of his that Jason had grown to find as comforting as a big warm blanket on a cold New England night. Hell, Jason had thought that day, he’d be rich by the end of the summer with pay like that, plus Aunt Genia’s hefty checks for helping her out when he wasn’t at the Castle. So he’d signed up, “lock, stock, and a barrel of water,” as Mr. Parker had called it. He’d done what the old man asked, everything he’d asked, even kept the old man’s secret locked up inside of him.

  His mom said he didn’t have any loyalty in him. She said because he used drugs and got caught that meant he was disloyal to her and his dad, to their whole family, and that he didn’t care about anything or anybody except himself.

  She said the only welfare he cared about was his own.

  But that wasn’t true, and he’d already proved it, and if he had to, he’d keep on proving it, whatever the cost to himself. He hadn’t even tried to defend himself to his dad. He couldn’t. He’d sworn to Old Man Parker that he’d never tell anybody, ever.

  At first, he hadn’t liked it when Mr. Parker came around the greenhouse and watched him work, asked questions, eased himself into his life. A job was one thing. Being subjected to the Great Inquisitor was another. But almost before he realized it had happened, he began to look forward to the company of his scary employer. The old guy was a hoot. He cussed around Jason, and didn’t mind if Jason did, too, and he said hilarious, sarcastic things about grown-ups Jason had known all his life, people who hadn’t necessarily been very nice to him or his sister when he got into trouble. Man, what Jason knew now about this town that he’d never ever suspected before! He could write a book.

  Jason found he missed Parker’s company when there was a meeting of the arts council, or the bank, or when Parker went to work on the cookbook he was doing with Aunt Genia. She was somebody Mr. Parker never said anything bad about. Of course, Jason would have had to knock his block off if he had, ’cause his aunt was the greatest, a real relief after living with his mom. Aunt Genia and Mr. Parker actually seemed to like kids. Incredible. Jason found he could talk to the old guy, maybe because Parker had his own pain, and he understood Jason’s because of that. He never seemed to judge Jason, although he could lecture like a teacher when he got going on something. And if he thought Jason was making a stupid decision, he’d say so in no uncertain terms.

  Mostly, though, he just listened, nodding that big white head of his, and accepted whatever the hell came out of Jason’s mouth. Except for Aunt Genia, and except for his dad sometimes, he’d never met an adult who acted that way around kids. Sometimes the two of them—old man and boy—just sat on tall greenhouse stools in total silence. “Watch these plants grow,” Parker had instructed him. “Smell ’em, taste them, listen to them. You might surprise yourself and actually learn something. And then when you’ve got a real feel for plants, then we’ll get started on cooking. You don’t want to depend on women all your life to do the things for you that a man ought to be able to enjoy for himself.”

  Jason had been surprised, all right, at what he’d learned.

  But he had felt safe here, anyway, and accepted for whatever he was, whatever he was worth. Parker sometimes talked with him about things like college, about business. “You’ve got a green thumb,” he’d said a lot of times. Even told Jason he could see him running “a whole damn string of greenhouses” someday. That made sense in Rhode Island where nurseries were a major industry. The dream had stuck, and they kept it between themselves, a dream hung out there to think about and stretch himself toward each day.

  Jason turned off the hose and hung it up.

  He wandered into the tiny supply area tucked into a corner of the greenhouse. They kept a small refrigerator there, filled with soft drinks for Jason and bottled water, wine, and beer for Mr. Parker. That’s one thing the old man never let him do—drink alcohol or smoke. “Cussing won’t kill you, unless you cuss out the wrong man,” Parker had claimed, “but drinking and smoking will do you in.”

  In the refrigerator, there was always food.

  Peering inside, Jason realized he hadn’t eaten for a long time.

  He pulled out a thick hunk of pale cheese and a loaf of Mill Hollow bread that Mr. Parker had baked just a day ago—a lifetime ago—and placed them on a high pine table where the two of them had sat to eat, and to argue about baseball.

  They had a running argument about the longest game ever played in professional baseball history. It happened right there in Rhode Island, when the Pawtucket Red Sox—the Boston Red Sox’s farm team—beat the Rochester Red Wings 3–2 after thirty-three innings played over three days. The game had begun on April 18, 1981, and been temporarily called at four A.M. the next morning when the score was 2–2. It didn’t get finished until two months later, on July 23, on a Marty Barrett single with the bases loaded. Wade Boggs had been there, playing for the Pawsox.

  Stanley Parker had watched the second half from the stands, but he was a purist who claimed that the feats of farm clubs didn’t belong in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. Jason had just as vehemently argued that they did, because they were also professionals, after all.

  Guess I win, Jason thought disconsolately.

  The old man had promised to take him to a game sometime.

  He rubbed a thumb absently along the rough edge of the table which was worn from long use, and thought of the hours he’d spent here watching the old man get red in the face about the designated hitter rule, and also learning about Mr. Parker’s early life as a banker, about his wife and his daughter, his devotion to the arts, his respect for the work of Jason’s own father.

  That had felt good, to hear the old man say that.

  But the last week their conversation had turned strange.

  Mr. Parker had seemed troubled, distracted, and people kept coming and going up at the Castle, always somebody new coming over for lunch, a different one every day, and always just one of them at a time. Jason had recognized all of them. Ms. Hutchinson. Mr. Graham. Randy Dixon, alone. Then Nikki on another day. Mrs. Wright, without her husband. Even the mayor. Even his own mom, and then later in the week, Jason’s dad. Old Man Parker had been busy entertaining all those people, and so he hadn’t come out to the greenhouse as much as he usually did. When he did come by, Jason had listened for once, instead of doing so much of the talking. The old man had said weird things then, about how people weren’t always as nice as they seemed, that they could be phonies and fakes, and they could do terrible things, and nobody would know it was them.

  Jason felt sure he, h
imself, would know.

  He’d just know who was good, and who was bad.

  Mr. Parker was one of the good ones. So was Aunt Genia.

  He finished off the cheese and two thick pieces of Mr. Parker’s bread, and then put the leftovers back in the refrigerator, thinking, I’ll never have any of his homemade bread again. He grabbed the plastic container where the old man usually kept cookies and found three double-chocolate ones inside, and wolfed them down, one after the other.

  Mr. Parker also made great cookies.

  As he gobbled the cookies, he wandered up and down the rows, saying good-bye to the plants, while cookie crumbs fell to the floor.

  He wondered what would happen to this place now.

  Nobody else cared about it like him and Mr. Parker.

  Well, he’d better get it over with, what he’d really come to do.

  It didn’t take ten minutes, but he hated every hypocritical moment of the job. Stupid drug laws. When he was done, he came back inside the greenhouse. He fingered a new leaf on a coleus plant, unfurling in a multitude of dark colors. In Hawaii, Mr. Parker had told him, this same plant might grow as big as a bush. He’d like to see that. They seemed kind of puny and dull here. But plants were so cool. Jason squeezed his eyes shut and tried to stop the painful sting behind his lids.

  The damp air, the smells of growth and earth and young flowers folded around him. He didn’t think he could stand it that the old man was gone. It was like losing a grandfather, only worse, because he’d had him for such a short time.

  For the first time in his life, he’d felt needed.

  “I need you, kid. To tend my plants.”

  That’s how it all began. His job was so simple. To water the plants … and … and …

  “Oh, and, kid, there’s this other part of the job, but you’ll have to think about it long and hard before you say yes. I’m probably a wicked old man to ask this, but I’m a powerful old codger, too, and if we get into trouble, I’ll buy us out of it. May not be the best lesson in the world to teach a young man, but at this point, I don’t have a choice.”

  Jason had agreed to do it. Done it willingly, proudly.

  “This may be the worst mistake I ever made,” the old man had said. “I hope you don’t live to regret what I’m asking of you. I may be a selfish old bastard, and maybe you ought to tell me to go to hell.”

  Jason hadn’t done any such thing.

  He slumped to the floor, wrapped his arms around his knees, and bent his head, and cried. He’d do it all again, even if his father found out all over again. And how the hell did his dad find out? Even if it pissed off his dad, and got him in trouble, and nobody understood why he’d done it, he’d still do it all over again. And he’d never tell the truth about it. Never. He’d show his mom, he’d show everybody. He could be as loyal as a goddamned dog. He could be committed to something and somebody, all the way to death and past. Let them think what they wanted, he didn’t care. Screw ’em. He’d made a promise to Parker, and he’d keep it, or die trying.

  9

  SHOPPING LIST

  Genia had fallen in love with downtown Devon the first time she laid eyes on it. On this lovely, sunny afternoon, only hours after she’d learned that Stanley had been murdered, the colorful, cheerful bustle of its quaint streets and the sight of its neat little harbor felt immensely comforting to her.

  She had come to shop for Randy and Nikki Dixon.

  As she parked her leased car, she felt glad to have a purpose for the next few hours to distract her from the reason for this shopping trip. But everywhere she turned she found yet another memory of Stanley Parker.

  Genia had learned that during Larry Averill’s long tenure in civic offices Larry had cajoled, bargained, and twisted Devon’s collective arm to get it to clean itself up from its early fishing port days. Now it was quite the tourist attraction and as quaint as a New England seacoast village ought to be.

  “If it were any cuter,” Stanley had once grumbled to her, “I couldn’t stand it.”

  It seemed as if his forceful presence was abroad in town on this first morning after his death … his murder. Everywhere she went, people were excitedly talking about it, about him, and about who might have killed him and why.

  “I knew it was no accident, I’ll tell you that much.”

  The owner of Stella’s Bakery looked knowing as she handed over to Genia a white paper bag full of plain cake donuts and a box of gingerbread. Genia had learned that Rhode Islanders loved donuts, preferring them crisp on the outside, dense on the inside, and more cakelike than airy in texture. Instantly upon eating one, she had become a devotee.

  The air inside the shop was warm and moist, redolent of sugar and dough.

  Beneath Genia’s feet, old wooden planks creaked when she moved down the counter to the cash register to pay.

  As good as the donuts were, and the malassadas (fried sweet bread dough), the real specialty at Stella’s was the gingerbread, made from a famous old Rhode Island recipe. In Devon, they called it “Stella’s Gingerbread,” even though every order of it came with a little printed card that gave all the credit to one Stephen Green, baker of Little Rest, circa 1826. The only ingredients were milk, molasses, butter, ginger, salt, and “saleratus,” the old-fashioned word for baking soda. Mixed all together by Stella’s deft hand, it was nothing short of ambrosia, and with a little homemade whipped cream on top, it rivaled anything heaven had to offer, in Genia’s opinion.

  Stanley, she thought as she counted out her money and listened to other people talk about him, I hope you find something in paradise that’s even better than this gingerbread, though I doubt that’s possible.

  Of course, they had planned to put it in their cookbook.

  “Now, I’m not saying a word against the mayor,” the shop’s owner continued in a confiding air that all seven customers in the shop could easily hear, “but I know for a fact that he and Mr. Parker hated one another like vinegar hates oil. If one of them came in a room, the other one left, and that’s the God’s honest truth. I’ve seen it happen.”

  “Where was that, Stella?” a man in back asked her.

  “Town council meetings,” she replied without a moment’s hesitation. “I was there the night Stanley brought up that idea for the art festival, and the mayor latched on to it like a bee on a trash can. He said this was something the town council ought to take up, not the arts council, and I thought Stanley Parker was going to have a conniption fit. Got up out of his chair and left the room, plain as you please.”

  I’ll bet Stanley was just going to the men’s room, Genia thought. She didn’t think it her place, as an outsider, to say it out loud, but it did bother her to hear Stanley’s relationship with Larry Averill so terribly misrepresented. Stanley had never described Larry as the brightest bulb in the political spotlight, but he had seemed to like the mayor personally.

  With donuts and gingerbread in hand, she moved down the sidewalk toward the Red Rooster Deli, which advertised itself with a painted wood carving of a Rhode Island Red rooster. The distinctive sign, which hung from a black wrought-iron arrow, reminded her that Stanley had only recently called Larry Averill “dumb as a rooster.” But still, to say the two men hated each other?

  Genia didn’t believe that for one minute.

  She couldn’t quite remember why Stanley had referred to the mayor in that insulting way, but she thought it had something to do with Celeste, and how it had appeared to Stanley as if Larry had pined his life away for her. But Larry hasn’t wasted his life, Stanley, Genia argued in her mind with his spirit. No man has wasted his life who has accomplished so much for his hometown. Larry’s just a devoted kind of man, that’s all. She could almost hear Stanley’s retort: “Yeah, like a dog.”

  Even preoccupied as she was, she couldn’t help but enjoy Devon’s quaint downtown and credit the mayor for its fine state of preservation. Along the west side of Main Street where she walked, the architecture was all of a kind: red brick attached
buildings in Federal style, with glassed-in display cases bowing out toward the street, showing off regional ware such as Peter Pots pottery with its distinctive blue or brown glazes, and Stone Bridge dishes. The east side of the street looked charmingly eclectic, architecturally speaking: There were Victorians, next to Georgian revivals, abutting colonials with white picket fences, and even Gothic revivals. Four centuries of architecture were represented. The centuries before the Europeans came were also represented in a small museum that housed artifacts of native tribes: Narragansett, Patuxet, Wampanoag, and a dozen others.

  On the way to the deli she passed The Independent Man, which she knew was not an expression of male chauvinism, but rather a bookstore named for one of the founders of Rhode Island, Roger Williams. This was a state whose early history gave it a right to pride itself on tolerance, civil dissent, and independent thinking. Stanley had seemed to Genia the very model of a Rhode Island “independent man,” even if tolerance might not have been one of his stronger traits.

  She walked past a New York System Wiener Stand, where the grillman was lining up little spicy-hot red wieners in their buns along his forearm, in the approved Rhode Island way. He had three customers waiting for their wieners to grill. Genia’s niece had told her that the mayor pushed through the idea that when their town gussied itself up for tourists they should concentrate heavily on the favorite foods and famous history of their locality.

  It had proved to be a commercial windfall for many people.

  Larry Averill was predicting that the Devon art festival could be a local windfall, too, not only for artists, but also for all who might profit from an annual tourist attraction.

  As Genia entered the Red Rooster, she made up her mind that quahog chowder would be just right to take up to Nikki and Randy at the Castle, along with the baked goods and a few other things. “Quahog”—pronounced co-hog—was the local word for the hard-shell clams that were devoured every which way, from steamed to fried to boiled, and even stuffed, with their own special appellation: “stuffies.”