Authors: Kerry Greenwood
‘I reckon we’d be better leaving the old bloke to sleep it off,’ he told me.
‘And we’d better get back to Insula before everyone misses us.’ I sat up. ‘What’s the time?’
‘Gone seven thirty,’ he said. I wrote a note, leaving my phone number. Jason put the Berocca on the clean kitchen bench with a glass next to it and we took our leave of our slumbering colleague.
Daniel was waiting at the front door of Hebe when I came up in the lift.
‘Ah, Corinna,’ he said airily, concealing what I thought might have been a sigh of relief. ‘There you are.’
‘Here I am,’ I said. ‘I went out on an errand of mercy to rescue a fellow baker from delirium tremens,’ I explained.
‘I thought it might be something like that,’ said Daniel. ‘I assumed that Jason was with you.’
‘He was, and he ate a breakfast which would have stunned a Gorgon. Sorry, I should have left you a note. Have you eaten?’
‘Yes, and I have to go and see to a few errands myself. A box was delivered, I left it on the coffee table. Back for lunch,’ he said, kissed me, and went.
The box contained a gorgeous florist’s arrangement of flaming parrot tulips. The note said ‘Sweet Corinna, let’s go a-Maying’. More cavalier poets. Darling Daniel. He must have put in a weekly order and not wanted to stop it even though we were reconciled. I placed the tulips on the coffee table and they glowed in the early sun, slashed with scarlet and white like medieval doublets.
I was feeling so relieved that I didn’t even jump when Senior Constable Bray and her offsider Constable Vickery rang the bell and demanded entry. Helen Vickery was instantly mobbed by the Mouse Police, who had fond memories of her ear-scratching ability. She dropped to her heels and began to demonstrate it to massed purring.
‘Sit down, have some coffee, maybe a piece of apple pie?’ I asked.
‘Nice,’ said Ms Bray approvingly. ‘Do you want the good news or the bad news?’
‘Both,’ I said. ‘Tell me the bad news first.’
‘Traces of ergot detected in spilt flour on a bakery floor,’ she said crisply, accepting a cup of coffee and a fork. I put two plates of pie and the pot of cream on the coffee table. Constable Vickery helped herself, and allowed Heckle and then Jekyll to lick a glob of cream off the end of her forefinger.
‘And the good news?’
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‘It’s in Best Fresh. Nothing in yours at all. Earthly Delights came out as clean as a whistle, except for some cat fur. About which you might get a stiff note.’
‘Oof.’ I let out a breath abruptly.
‘As you say,’ agreed Senior Constable Bray. ‘This is good pie. Your apprentice?’
‘He’s a good boy,’ I said proudly.
‘But he used to be a bad boy,’ said Ms Bray.
‘I know. He was a junkie.’
‘And a thief,’ she said keenly.
‘As you say.’
‘This doesn’t worry you?’
‘No,’ I said with perfect truth. I got up and fetched myself some pie and a new cup of coffee. ‘If he steals from me I’ll sack him and bang goes his career. He goes to a drug counsellor every Saturday.’
‘Yes, I know.’
Horatio had awoken and was requesting a dab of cream. Ms Bray looked at him coolly. He looked back. I wondered who would win. There was a pause. Then she dipped a finger into the cream on her plate and offered it to him. In a formal, marked manner, Horatio condescended to lick it. Honour was satisfied. Ms Bray and Horatio then withdrew their mutual regard. Horatio sat down for a wash. Ms Bray returned to her subject. ‘I suppose if he hasn’t got back on the gear with all this upset, he’s not going to. Where’s Daniel?’
‘He went out to do some errands. He said he’d be back for lunch.’
‘Patrol said you were carrying Best Fresh’s Vincent Wyatt back to his flat this morning. How is he?’
‘About now, he is waking to the hangover of the century,’ I replied.
‘What did you learn about him? You were in his flat for hours and Jason went out to buy food.’
‘Ms Bray, do you know everything about me?’ I demanded, trying to be offended and not really succeeding.
‘Most things,’ she chuckled. ‘But not all. Bit vague on your shoe size. And the situation still has enough puzzles to stop us getting bored. For instance, I don’t know what connection this soul cake thing has with this magic convention which hit town at the same time as the cakes did, which may be a coincidence or may not.’
‘So they are definitely cakes?’ I said. This information exchange was going to work both ways if I had anything to do with it.
‘Yes, every person examined had cake in their insides, and the path lab managed to find the ergot actually in some of it. Massive doses, massive.’
‘What else was in the mix?’
She stared at me. Horatio nudged her very gently and she began to stroke him, almost without noticing. He has the best subliminal moves of any cat I have ever met.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean, was there fruit, cinnamon, was it yeast dough or made with baking powder?’
‘I don’t know. Why would it help to know?’
‘Well, the traditional soul cake which the witches require is made of bread dough with extra sugar and dried fruit and spices. Jason made some up from an old recipe written in Middle English. It would be interesting to know whether whoever made the lethal ones was using that recipe and might be a witch, or was just making poisonous rock cakes.’
‘I see. We can ask. Make a note, Helen.’
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Ms Vickery found her notebook, which was under Heckle, and made a note. Then she spoke for the first time.
‘You were asking about Mr Wyatt,’ she reminded Ms Bray.
‘So I was. Helen is my memory. What did you find out about him?’
‘Not a lot.’ I detailed what I had discovered. Ms Bray smiled. She had a hidden dimple, which flashed when she was pleased. She was very attractive when she smiled.
‘That’s a bundle,’ she said admiringly.
‘And what do you know about him?’
There was a pause, in which Ms Bray realised that she was stroking a cat, stopped, and continued to stroke. ‘It was an amicable divorce, as divorces go,’ she told me. ‘Wife happy with new bloke and not asking for too much in settlement. Little daughter, Tamsin, aged seven. He has access every weekend and half the school holidays. They stay in the Templestowe house. No criminal record. Six driving offences in twenty years, all speeding. Did a bread-making course at RMIT, passed top of the class. Ordinary sort of bloke, really.’
‘What about his employees?’ I pressed my luck. Ms Bray put down her empty plate and sipped her coffee, looking at her own notebook.
‘Edward Ramsgate. Aged nineteen. Born in Kent, England. Parents came here when he was a baby. Father went off ten years ago. Didn’t finish Year Eleven. Dim lad, works the night shift. Not a mental case, just not too bright. Couple of children’s court offences, no ticket on a train, drunk in a public place and minor with.’
I looked at her. Jargon was jargon the world over. She dimpled again and explained.
‘Sorry, minor in possession of intoxicating liquor. Got a bond. They all do in the children’s court for anything short of arson or murder. No further offending. Lives with his mum in Abbotsford. She’s on the pension. Two sisters, both younger, still at school, nothing on LEAP. This is his first job.’
‘Nothing there connected to witches or drugs?’
‘No,’ she said sadly. ‘Janelle Richards, aged eighteen. Eldest daughter in a family of five. Child of complete losers. Mother an alcoholic. Every child has a different father and only one of them pays any child support. They manage in transitional housing on benefits. Every now and again Mum goes on the booze and the children get sent to foster homes. Janelle’s supposed to be the most stable of all of them according to her social worker. Mum’s a shrew, suspected of beating the kids, always gets into violent relationships and has to keep running away from awful partners.’
‘Thus the transitional housing,’ I commented.
‘Yeah, they’ve worn out several social service agencies. The only one which keeps on trying is the Salvos and they’re supported by God.’
‘Poor Janelle,’ I said.
‘Yeah, life’s tough sometimes,’ said Ms Bray without noticeable sympathy. ‘Some religious sect is looking after them at the moment. The whole family’s moved out to Bendigo, staying on some sort of communal farm. Lots of prayer and good country food. They’re safe for the time. Until Mum fucks up again and they get thrown out for moral turpitude.’
‘So is Janelle travelling from Bendigo every day? Surely not.’
‘No, I’ve got an address for her. She’s staying in Carlton. She might have a chance if she ditches her family. Nothing known, by the way. So that’s the state of play at the moment. Quarantine has cleared your bakery and you’re free to start trading whenever you like.’
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‘I think I might leave it for the rest of the week.’ I had considered this. ‘I haven’t had any time off since I started Earthly Delights. Until we find out what’s going on with the soul cakes. No point in starting up and having to stop again.’
‘And give the punters time to forget about those headlines,’ said Ms Bray. ‘Well, better get on. Say farewell to your puddy-tats, Helen. We have to talk to Corinna’s witch. She’ll probably turn us into frogs.’
‘I think she does toads,’ I told her. ‘Just loose Ms Vickery on Belladonna and Meroe will be fine. She trusts Belladonna’s judgment.’
‘So, who’s Belladonna?’ asked Ms Bray, getting up and brushing cat fur and crumbs off her blue skirt.
‘Her cat,’ I said, a little surprised. ‘Her black cat.’
I shut the door on her astonished face and went to have a bath. I hoped Meroe wouldn’t find it necessary to turn Ms Bray into a toad. I liked her.
When your day is not planned, it structures itself around tasks and meals, I found. I hadn’t had a holiday since I opened the shop, and now that I was free of suspicion, I was elated and felt like doing something just for fun. I rang Jason and told him we were clean.
He whooped. He was going to be employed assembling Mrs Dawson’s flat-pack bookcase. ‘I’ve got my own allen keys,’ he said proudly. I just hoped that by the end of the day he would still have (1) all his fingers and (2) his temper intact.
I bathed in lush vanilla foam. I washed my hair. I sat out on the balcony to dry it as the day warmed towards summery temperatures. The tall green indestructible plants which Trudi had put into the blue glazed pots appeared to be thriving. The city hummed around me, busy and self absorbed. People went into Heavenly Pleasures, the chocolate shop, and came out with tiny wrapped parcels full of delight. I reminded myself that I must buy a small selection of their treasure. Daniel came in just as I was thinking that I ought to go for a nice brisk walk to make room for lunch.
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‘Ketschele,’ he said, kissing the top of my head. ‘I love the scent of your hair.’
‘Darling,’ I replied, ‘thank you for the flowers.’
‘Flowers?’
‘The tulips. They are beautiful.’
‘They are beautiful,’ he agreed, ‘but they aren’t from me.’
‘No?’
‘No.’
‘Or the croissants?’
‘Not them either. It seems,’ said Daniel, with a gratifying edge to his voice, ‘that you have a secret admirer.’
‘And one who knows me very well,’ I said. I could not feel threatened by parrot tulips. ‘I have good news. Earthly Delights has been inspected and declared free of any contam
inant whatsoever.’
‘Wonderful!’ Daniel hugged me.
‘And I am taking the rest of the week off, because I’ve not had a holiday, and because the soul cake mystery still isn’t solved,’ I told him. ‘Now, how about you?’
‘When I woke and found you gone without a note,’ he said, ‘I feared that something awful had happened. I was just going to scour the city for you when you came home.’
‘Yes,’ I said, and explained. He listened intelligently.
‘I see,’ he replied. ‘And you took Mr Wyatt home. That was kind of you.’
‘Not entirely,’ I said, and detailed what I had found out about him, and for good measure threw in all of Ms Bray’s information. Which was what the techno geeks call an info dump, and had to be digested slowly, with a bracing pot of chai and a few biscotti. While he was thinking about it, he produced from his pocket the jewelled plate I had last seen in Barnabas’s hands and gave it to me.
‘
Ephod
means “shield”,’ he said. He had unshipped his laptop and was typing into it, recording all this new information.
I examined the ephod. It was beautiful. Solid. Studded with all the stones which the Bible had required. I could see that it was meant to hang in the middle of someone’s chest, suspended by heavy chains from both top corners. It felt very old, though possibly not as old as Mrs Dawson’s Mycenaean brooch. I turned it over and found that Hebrew letters had been engraved on the back, which was otherwise unfigured.
‘What does this say?’ I asked Daniel
‘
Rechoosho Shel Beit Kneset Kal Yashan
,’ he said, still typing.
‘Which means?’
‘Property of the Kal Yashan Synagogue.’
‘And the Kal Yashan Synagogue was in Salonika?’
‘Yes,
metuka
.’
‘What does
metuka
mean?’
‘Sweetheart.’
He kept typing. I thought about it. Chrysoula’s chain, extorted from a Greek family in Thessaloniki. The ephod, stolen from a synagogue in Thessaloniki. Both stolen by the Nazi administrator, Max Mertens. In, as it happened, Thessaloniki. What had happened to the treasure subsequently? Old Spiro had been Mertens’ translator, the old beast. If he knew, it was too late to ask him without a specially equipped fireproof medium. What had Max Mertens done with his treasure? Had it been stolen from him? Had Chrysoula indeed seen him in sailor’s clothes, near her home village late in the war?
As if in answer Daniel, still typing with one hand, reached into his pocket with the other and gave me a small bundle of