A Spicy Secret (9 page)

“Just as I figured, they were no help,” Ian told her. “We have files going back decades on big orders, but I couldn’t find anything about selling or cutting just one or two pieces of lumber. I guess they’d just put the money in the till and go on. Most of our work in recent years has been for major contractors. We haven’t sold directly to many individuals in a long time.”

“Well, you were sweet to look. Thank you,” Annie said. “By the way, I keep meaning to ask you about your cat, Banana.”

“Banana? How do you know about him?” Ian looked startled, and dropped his crochet hook on the floor.

As he bent down to pick it up, Annie laughed. “Oh, I just found Banana’s file in with a bunch of my grandfather’s paperwork. Why did you name your cat ‘Banana’? And why did you keep doing things to make him sick?”

Ian grinned wryly and shrugged. “What can I say? I wasn’t the brightest young lad. Now you know why I have a dog.”

They went back to crocheting. “Wow,” Ian said after completing a yard-long chain and then a row of single crochet. “I’m not doing too badly, am I?”

Annie smiled. “Pretty cool, huh? Making something out of nothing. Well, not nothing, out of yarn, but … you know what I mean.”

He laughed. “I do indeed. Very satisfying, this crochet thing. Like knitting, but obviously different.” He glanced at his watch. “It’s after seven. Shall we go?”

“Yes, absolutely!” Annie beamed. “Let me just get you a bag for the yarn and the hook, so you can take it with you and practice.” She rummaged in the kitchen for a moment and returned with a brown paper sack. “And here’s a reminder sheet about the stitches,” she added, putting in the pages she’d copied out of one of Betsy’s old pattern books.

Ian helped her on with her coat, put on his own, and then escorted her to his car.

9

Peggy sat next to Annie at the next Hook and Needle Club meeting. She leaned over and asked, “Did you have fun at Sweet Nell’s?” Once again, Alice had baked one of the recipes, and once again, everyone raved about how good it tasted. But at the mention of the karaoke restaurant, everyone quit talking and swiveled their heads to stare at Annie. They started firing questions at her all at once, so much so that she had no idea who had said what.

“When did you go to Sweet Nell’s?”

“Who’d you go with?”

“Did Ian take you?”

“Did you have fun?”

“I want to go there sometime. Is the food good?”

“You had a date with Ian, didn’t you?”

The cacophony ceased when the bell rang as the door opened and shut.

“Am I interrupting something?” Ian asked in the sudden silence, taking off his parka and hanging it on the rack next to Alice’s leopard-print coat. When no one answered, but a smattering of snickering ensued, he looked bemused and asked, “OK. What?”

Mary Beth regained her composure first.

“Ladies of the Hook and Needle Club, I meant to mention this before our esteemed mayor arrived, but Annie and Peggy have drafted Mr. Ian Butler as a temporary member of our club, in order to help us meet our goal of a hundred and twenty blankets.”

“And so, maybe, we can get on TV,” Peggy said. “Annie promised to contact all the stations in the area. I for one would love to be on TV … I never have been!”

“And yes, so we can get on TV,” Mary Beth said, giving Peggy a look. “But mainly so we can help those poor orphans in Haiti and assist Reverend Wallace and the volunteers with their mission trip.”

“I could hardly say no to such persuasive arguments,” Ian said.

“How wonderful of you, Ian,” Stella said, her knitting needles never slowing. “You are very kind to help us with our little project. Have one of Alice’s fudge bars. It’s from one of those recipes she found in the carriage house, you know.”

“Don’t mind if I do,” he answered, taking a piece from the proffered container. “And yes, Annie told me about the recipes. Of course, the fact that the hole was covered by a different kind of wood interested me. I thought maybe I could help solve the mystery by looking through records at the sawmill, but unfortunately, I didn’t find anything.”

“I didn’t even think about looking at that plank!” Alice exclaimed.

“I’m sorry that it was a dead end,” Ian said. He turned to Peggy and said, “Would you mind terribly if I sat next to Annie? She’s begun teaching me how to crochet, and I’d like to continue the lessons with her, if you don’t mind.”

“Oh, no, not at all, Mr. Mayor.” Peggy blushed a little, gathered her things, and moved to a chair next to Mary Beth.

“Thank you ever so much, dear Peggy,” he said, bowing.

The blush gone, the young woman retorted, “Now don’t you start with that again. You remember what happened the last time you tried that snobby stuff with me.”

“Indeed I do, as I’m sure does everyone who dined at The Cup & Saucer that hallowed day.”

“Which was what exactly?” Mary Beth asked.

“Come on, Peggy, help me out,” Annie said impulsively. “Let’s reenact it for them.”

The two acted out the scene, with great embellishment of course, much to the ladies’ amusement. Ian found himself laughing as well, especially when, in this version, the chowder actually
did
get dumped on him.

After their performance, Annie and Peggy bowed to the assembled ladies and took their seats.

“Now that we’re all settled—” Kate began to say once the laughter had died down. She was interrupted by the bell over the door and the appearance of Mike Malone. “Now what? Are you here to join the Hook and Needle Club too?” she asked.

Mike look startled. “Why? Am I supposed to? No, Annie just asked me to get a picture of Ian crocheting for
The Point
. You know, to help publicize Blanket Haiti. Great name, by the way.”

“Oh, thank you,” Kate replied. “My daughter and her best friend came up with it.”

“Nice,” he said, barely glancing her way. “Sorry I have to rush, but I gotta get back to the store. Ian, Annie, would you mind looking this way please?”

The next few minutes were filled with “Ian, please turn your head to the right” and “Annie, hold up your crochet a little higher” until Mike felt certain he’d gotten a good photograph.

“Thanks for your time,” he said, grabbing three of Alice’s fudge bars on the way out the door. Kate watched him go and then turned back to the assembled group.

“As I was
trying
to say,” she began, “we need to talk about our project. First of all, thank you to everyone who put flyers up around town. I think I’ve made more copies in the past week than I’ve made in my entire life. There’s a stack on the register counter if you need more. And don’t be shy about handing them to everyone you encounter.”

She paused dramatically. “And thanks to Gordon Richards—our office supply salesman—his company is donating
ten cases
of paper to the church so we can make as many flyers as we need.”

The ladies burst into applause.

Kate was determined to stay on track, so she continued. “Secondly, I’m pleased to announce that we’ve received our first blanket donations from the community. Valerie Duffy, our very own librarian, stopped by the store last week to buy a few things, and on Friday, she brought us three cotton blankets. That means Valerie had the honor of being the first person to color in one of the blankets on our poster.”

She pointed to it—all the ladies turned their heads to see that the blanket on the bottom had been colored a bright green, with Valerie’s neat signature in the middle.

“And Stony Point’s favorite postal clerk, Miss Norma, brought in
five
hand-knitted blankets yesterday. She said she’d had them for a while because she ran out of people to give them to, but kept making more. I had no idea she could even knit. So, as you can see, she got to fill in the next blanket on the poster.”

Norma had used rainbow colors on her one and two-thirds blankets, but hadn’t signed her name.

“That means we are up to a grand total of eight blankets; we still have one hundred and twelve to go. Can we go around the circle and share our progress on our own projects, please? Stella, would you mind going first?”

Ian leaned over to Annie. “When did Kate become such a taskmaster?” he whispered, making her stifle giggles.

Stella sniffed at the pair. With a flourish, she snipped yellow yarn with a small pair of antique silver scissors, tied the yarn into her blanket, and held it up with a flourish.

“Mine is complete,” she said, to the oohs and aahs of the group.

“Beautiful, Stella! That means we’re up to nine blankets!” Kate walked over and took the piece from the older lady. Bending down, she kissed Stella on the cheek and whispered, “Thank you.” She then colored in the final third of the blanket that Norma had started.

“Voilà! Only thirty-seven more blankets to fill in it.”

“You are quite welcome, my dear,” Stella replied. “Ian’s presence here has given me the idea to recruit Jason to our cause. He also knows how to knit, and unless I need him to run errands for me, he might as well sit in on the meetings as well.”

Everyone looked surprised—Jason? Stella’s New York born-and-bred driver, Jason? He could knit?

“Goodness. Don’t look so shocked, everyone. I taught him years ago as a way for him to pass the time when waiting on me. These days we do it together in the evenings while watching the news and before we both retire for the night. He might even have some blankets already made that he’d be willing to part with.”

“How wonderful, Stella,” Kate managed to say. “OK, who’s next?”

Each member talked about their works in progress: Alice neared completion on a pink-and-blue crocheted afghan; Mary Beth had only a few rows of purple left to knit; Peggy’s green-and-white cotton quilt just needed the edges bound, so she’d started cutting squares for a blue-and-white quilt; and Gwen needed to add white edging to her yellow knitted blanket.

“Annie?” Peggy asked.

Annie held up a few rows she’d crocheted in a shell pattern with green yarn. “I’m starting my next afghan—I completed all of the squares for the previous one, and I meant to sew it together this weekend but …” She blushed and then continued, “I ran out of time.”

“Ian?”

The mayor held up his yard-long practice piece, to which he’d added a number of rows in single-crochet. It was starting to get lopsided, a common error for those learning the craft.

“Almost done!”

Everyone laughed.

“And what about you, Kate?” Annie asked. “What are you working on?”

“I just finished
this!
” Kate went behind the register and pulled out an exquisitely crocheted blanket in rainbow hues.

“Why, it’s beautiful!” Gwen exclaimed, looking over the top of her chic tortoiseshell glasses. “I’d love to have one just like it for myself!”

Kate laughed. “This is probably the easiest piece I’ve made in years. I wrote down the pattern for the crocheters if you’d like to try it.”

Her statement was met with silence; Alice especially felt certain such a feat was beyond her skill.

Then Ian spoke in a serious tone. “I would like a copy. It looks easy, and I’m sure I’ll have my blanket done by the next meeting.”

“Thank you, Ian,” Kate said grandly as the ladies laughed. She handed him the photocopied pattern. “It actually is a very easy stitch that only looks difficult.”

“OK, fine. Hand one over here,” Alice said. “I’d hate for the mayor to do better than an official Hook and Needle Club member.”

“I’ll take one, too, of course,” said Annie. She glanced sideways. “You know, just in case Ian needs some help.”

Kate winked and handed Annie her copy. “I’ll have extra copies here on the register if anyone wants one.

“Oh, and I almost forgot—Vanessa, Mackenzie, Lily, and some of their classmates are starting a Teen Hook and Needle Club, and they’ll be meeting here every Tuesday afternoon at four o’clock. If any of you have time and would like to stop by today and help out, feel free.”

“I would love to, but of course I’ll still be working,” said Peggy. She looked a little wistful.

“Not to worry, Peggy. I believe my Tuesday afternoons are free, and I’ll be happy to assist,” Gwen said.

“Thank you so much, Gwen,” Kate said, clapping her hands together. “Now, back to work!”

The ladies—and Ian—bent over their projects for the next fifteen minutes or so, talking quietly and munching on the fudge bars Alice had brought. Stella started a new blanket, and Ian continued with his practice piece. Suddenly, Peggy sat up, quilt squares falling to the floor.

“Hey! What about our mystery? Here we’ve been eating these fudge bars and haven’t talked about the recipes hardly at all! And I don’t think we talked about it last week, either.”

“Thanks for reminding me,” Alice said. “Annie and I made a list of what we know for sure. Annie, did you bring the notebook?”

Annie dug around in her tote, flipped to the right page and handed it over.

“OK. One—we found the items in a hole under a floorboard in the upstairs spare bedroom of the carriage house.” Alice summarized the most important part of each clue, figuring that they would be there all day if she read every single word Annie had written down. “Two—the floorboard was a different wood than the rest, and no one noticed it all this time.” She looked up at Ian. “Our kind mayor has let us know that the lumber difference won’t help us solve the mystery. Three—that means the rug over it has probably been there for awhile.

“Four—we found a bunch of recipes in a mason jar, with a square of fabric, a spatula, a knife, and a bottle of spices. Five—most of the recipes are handwritten, and some of them are unreadable. They may have been first or second drafts of recipes. Six—a cook probably hid the recipes. Seven—the first recipe I attempted turned out terrible, even though the second one was delicious. And, finally, eight—Annie found the plans from when Betsy and Charles renovated the carriage house, and it turns out my spare room was the original bedroom, so our cook could have lived there as far back as Captain Grey’s time.”

“But not necessarily,” said Mary Beth.

“No, not necessarily,” Alice agreed. “Unfortunately it means we can’t use that to narrow down the possible time frame. Nor can we use the recipes themselves, as they are all handwritten and none of them are dated.”

“How many recipes are there?” Gwen asked, brushing off her navy blue pants.

Alice and Annie looked at each other.

“Honestly, I have no idea,” said Alice.

“Since they are handwritten, and some are illegible, I don’t think we ever thought to count them!” Annie added.

“You said they are handwritten. Is the handwriting the same on all of them?” Gwen asked.

“I hadn’t thought of that either,” Alice admitted. “Why do you ask?”

“Well, John told me about a fraud case they’re working on.” Gwen’s husband, John Palmer, served as president of Stony Point Savings Bank. “Now, I can’t tell you exact details—nor could he tell me—but apparently a customer had some checks stolen, and the thief did a remarkable job forging the signature. The customer swore he hadn’t written the checks, and so the authorities brought in a handwriting analyst who could prove that the checks had been forged. The analyst even determined some characteristics of the forger that should help them find the criminal.”

“Wow, that’s really wild,” said Peggy.

“I’ve seen specials on TV about stuff like that,” Mary Beth said excitedly. “You know, where they look at a historical document and try to determine if it’s real or fake from the handwriting and whatnot, like, copies of the Declaration of Independence. Maybe you should have the recipes examined!”

“I guess I could ask John who he used and find out how much the analyst would charge,” Alice said.

“I’ve been thinking about this,” Mary Beth said, putting her project on her lap, “and if I remember correctly, the Swanns enjoyed holding parties. The Swanns were
very
odd, and they served odd things at their parties. If you got an invite, you knew to eat before you went so you wouldn’t starve to death—we called their parties ‘culinary adventures.’ So maybe the recipes you’re making are theirs.”