Brownies and Broomsticks: A Magical Bakery Mystery (17 page)

Bianca stared at me. I couldn’t blame her. I’d more or
less invited a possible murderer to come work on my house. Even told him right where I lived.

Dumb move, Katie.

Pullman shuffled his feet. “That was nice of Margie. Redding’s a good buddy of mine, one of the few who didn’t pay any attention to that whole hullabaloo.”

“You mean losing your job?”

He froze. Then his eyes flicked up to meet mine. “What did Margie tell you?”

“Not much.”

“Good.”

“I’d like to know what happened, though. If I’m going to hire you, I mean.”

“I thought you believed Margie.”

“Well, I do, of course. As far as that goes, but she didn’t know any details. I’d at least like to understand who I might be working with.”

Bianca stirred behind me.

Frank’s head swung back and forth in an exaggerated negative. “Sorry, lady. That old bat ruined my entire life, and I’m not inclined to revisit the details. I’m planning to move in with my sister over in Pooler, anyway. My brother-in-law may have a line on some work for me there.”

Margie had mentioned a wife and daughter. Where were they?

Bianca stepped up next to me. “Mr. Pullman, painful as the entire situation must have been, surely you don’t mind telling Katie a few details in exchange for paid work. After all, Mavis Templeton is dead now.”

He froze, searching her face. His attention returned to me. “Dead? How?”

Watching his reaction carefully, I said, “She was murdered.”

Pullman blinked. He seemed more stunned than anything else.

“I’m surprised you haven’t heard,” Bianca said. “It’s been all over the news.”

“I’ve had too much on my mind to read the paper. And my wife took the television when she left with Ellie.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” I said.

Distracted, he ran his hand over the smooth wood of the railing. “After I lost my job, I couldn’t get regular work anywhere in town. Someone—either Templeton herself or someone doing it for her—contacted all the companies who hire specialty carpenters like me and told them not to. Hire me, I mean. I found a few projects here and there, but most people wouldn’t even talk to me. All in all, it wasn’t enough to make the house payments. And when we were served with the foreclosure notice, my wife had had enough. She took my little girl and went to live with her parents in Atlanta.”

“Mrs. Templeton really had that kind of power?” I asked.

He ran a shaky hand over his face. “She did. Oh, my, yes, she did.”

“Why on earth was she so angry with you?” Bianca asked. Blunt, but effective.

“She said I left too much of a mess when I was done fixing a big fancy stair railing in that old house of hers.”

“A mess,” I repeated in a flat tone.

“Well, there might have been some sawdust, but
that’s all. She refused to pay for the work, even though it had taken me two days to refit and fix that banister. When it was finished, you couldn’t even tell it had been restored. But that wasn’t good enough for her. I think she was just too cheap to pay for my skill.”

“Sawdust on the floor,” I said. “Surely that’s not enough to ruin someone’s life over.”

“I sure didn’t think so.”

“Why would anyone listen to her?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. Everyone did, though.” Slowly, his expression brightened. “But you say she’s dead now. Really gone?”

Bianca and I nodded.

A huge grin of relief split his face. “That’s great!”

Bianca’s eyebrows knitted.

Suddenly, Frank Pullman let loose a big
whoop!
and leaped over the railing. We watched slack-jawed as he raced to the truck and climbed inside. The engine roared to life and he sped away.

I wondered how long it would take him to realize he’d left his suitcase on the porch.

Bianca let out a whoosh of air. “Well, he certainly seemed surprised by the news.”

Still somewhat stunned by his reaction, I said, “Yes. And, uh, gleeful.”

“Do you think he could have been faking it?” she asked.

“That seemed like a heartfelt, if utterly inappropriate, reaction.”

Our eyes met, and we struggled not to laugh.

“Come on. Let’s go back and let the others know Frank Pullman, though he might have liked to murder
Mrs. Templeton, doesn’t appear to have done so,” she said.

“Well, let’s not count him out entirely,” I said.

“Why?”

“Wouldn’t you say he and Uncle Ben look awfully similar, what with the beards and the glasses?”

Her eyes widened. “Now that you mention it, they look very much alike if those things are all you’re paying attention to.”

“Beards and glasses stick out. A witness might not notice much else.”

And perhaps Mr. Pullman was a very good actor indeed.

On the way back to the Honeybee I asked Bianca if she had used any magic to get Pullman to talk to us.

“Of course not!” She looked scandalized. My confusion must have shown on my face, because she continued. “Good witches never use magic to infringe on the rights of other people. We don’t make people do anything.”

“But Cookie—” I stopped myself.

Bianca blew a very unladylike raspberry. “Cookie Rios does not take the Rule of Three seriously. Did she do something to make Ethan Ridge talk?”

“Um. Yeah. She used her Voice.”

“Katie, I want you to know right now that you should question any instruction you receive from Cookie. She’s a member of our coven, but her magical background is, frankly, a little sketchy. And she sees the line between white and black as being a little more flexible than you or I might.”

Be careful what you wish for.
That was what Daddy had said after I’d inadvertently used what must have been my own nine-year-old Voice on the playground during fourth-grade recess. We were climbing the monkey bars, and Monty Night had asked if Daddy was an Indian chief. The question hadn’t been mean, and it hadn’t been inaccurate, either. Daddy was part Shawnee, after all, and there actually were a few chiefs among his ancestors.

But another kid had heard Monty and yelled, “Katie Lightfoot thinks she’s an Indian princess!”

I’d bristled. “Do not!”

But I found myself standing in the middle of the playground with a dozen kids circling me, dancing and whooping that Hollywood Indian “Woo woo woo woo,” fingers returning to their pursed lips over and over. I’d laughed at first, thinking it silly fun.

But then it felt scary, and not so fun at all.

“Stop it,” I said. But no one listened, not even Monty, who joined the others. His eyes held laughter and affection. He’d have loved it if I’d really been an Indian princess.

“Please. Stop,” I begged, searching the playground for the teacher. She leaned against the school’s brick facade, smoking a cigarette and watching us. I waved her over.

She waved back and took another drag.

Woo woo woo woo. Woo woo woo woo.

“Leave me alone!” I’d yelled. Only it had been more than a yell.

It had been a Command. And the other children responded immediately. They left me alone. From then
on. None of them spoke to me again unless it was absolutely necessary. They avoided me completely, throughout my entire school career. No hostility. No nothing. It was as if, for those people, I had ceased to exist.

Even Monty, who had been my best friend until then.

My parents had never told me about the Voice, or what it could do. And now that I thought about it, that incident may have confirmed Mama’s decision to discourage and hide any hint of my magic.

Well, now I was going to learn everything I could. “Tell me about the Rule of Three.”

“It’s a Wiccan thing,” Bianca said. “But most light witches believe in the truth of it. It’s simply the belief that whatever you do, whether for good or ill, will come back to you threefold.”

“Talk about a carrot and a stick.”

Her eyes widened behind her oversized designer sunglasses. “Ha! I guess it is. Do good to attract good, don’t do evil and avoid it in your own life.”

“What other rules are there?”

“Well, not rules so much as … tenets. The Rule of Three is more or less the same as the Golden Rule found all over the world: Treat others as you would want to be treated.”

“Only on steroids, with that whole threefold return thing.”

“Right. It’s part of the Wiccan Rede. That’s a kind of poem that outlines all the basic Wiccan beliefs. Another part of it that guides my magic—and my whole life, for that matter—is the last line: And harm you none, do what you will.”

“Cookie isn’t Wiccan, though?”

“Cookie picks and chooses what’s convenient for her, including some of the old voodoo ways—more than she tells us, perhaps. A lot of voodoo is white magic, though, and Cookie is good—good at heart and good for the spellbook club. She keeps us on our toes and enriches our workings. Please don’t think I have any serious problem with her. I just want you to learn about your magic from a positive and joyful perspective.”

“I’m still amazed at the things I’m willing to believe since Lucy told me about my family only a few days ago. But it makes so much sense when I think back on things that have happened to me.”

“You’ll get used to it. And to us. When Lucy told us she wanted to bring you into the spellbook club without our ever meeting you, I had my doubts. That kind of thing isn’t usually done. And the murder hastened her revelation considerably. But in one brief week I already know she was right to invite you. You belong here with us, Katie.”

Belong
. It was a word I’d never known the true meaning of before.

Now I did.

“Looks like the gang’s all here,” I said upon entering the Honeybee.

Lucy and Ben sat with their arms around each other on one of the brocade sofas. He looked more rested, so I assumed he’d managed a nap. Jaida sat on the sofa opposite them, and next to her Cookie flipped through a magazine. Teetering on a stepstool, Mimsey fussed with one of five ivy plants hanging above. I still couldn’t believe she was seventy-eight. Today she was dressed in sherbet yellow.

Light classical music played softly from a hidden speaker, and the ivies added a final touch of atmosphere. Add the good baking smells and the chatter of happy customers, and it would be the perfect place to draw people back again and again.

Lucky me, to be able to spend my days there.

As long as Albert Hill didn’t mess things up.

“What did you find out?” Jaida asked.

I grabbed a couple of coffees while Bianca pulled a table over. I joined her, and we took turns relating
Frank Pullman’s revelations. Lucy frowned when she heard his joyous reaction to Mrs. Templeton’s death.

“He never asked for details about her murder. Perhaps he wouldn’t have been so cavalier if he’d known,” I said. “His story was pretty strange, too. If all he did was leave a bit of sawdust behind after restoring some woodwork in her home, why would she set out to systematically ruin him? I mean, she had to convince his boss to fire him, and a lot of other people not to hire him. There had to be more to it than some fictional mess.”

“Not necessarily,” Cookie chimed in, tossing her magazine on the low table between the sofas. “The condition of her apartment building makes it obvious that she was a woman who pinched her pennies until they squealed.”

“Hmm. Maybe,” I said. “But why would everyone else go along with it?”

“They were frightened of her,” Lucy said. “You saw how she threatened Ben. Threatened us all.”

“But a threat isn’t the same as having actual power. Yet she was able to ruin Frank Pullman’s life, and she kept Ethan Ridge working at a job he hated and paid him next to nothing. He used the word
power
to describe her influence in Savannah as well.”

Jaida’s eyes narrowed, and she looked around at the others. “Katie’s right. Do you think perhaps Mrs. Templeton possessed real power?”

My jaw slackened. “You mean that old witch was a … witch?” The last word came out as a squeak. Someone that mean and bitter with real magical power
scared the bejesus out of me—even after she was dead. But it certainly would explain a lot.

Lucy wrinkled her nose and dusted off her hands as if she’d been handling something distasteful. “Well, it doesn’t matter now. We still have to find out what happened to her so the police will leave Ben alone.”

Finished fussing with the plants, Mimsey climbed down from her stepstool. As she joined Bianca and me, she grimaced. “It might matter, Lucille. What if she cast spells to protect herself? Or to keep her secrets?”

“If she cast a spell to protect herself, it sure didn’t work very well,” I pointed out.

“All I’m saying is that if she had real power, we might run into vestiges of it in the course of trying to find out what happened to her. She wasn’t close to anyone, as far as we know, not even Albert. So some of her wards may never have been breached.”

“But if she’s dead …” Lucy trailed off.

Cookie’s chin jerked up. “It may not matter, especially if she was strong in black magic. In fact, her own magic may be why the police are having such difficulty finding the real murderer.”

We looked around at each other.

My uncle stood. “That’s enough. You need to stop this … this … whatever it is you’re doing. I won’t put any of you in danger. This problem is mine and mine alone.”

“That’s not entirely true, Ben.” I regretted the words as soon as they left my mouth.

“She’s right,” Lucy said. “Anything that happens to
you affects us. Katie, the Honeybee, and most especially me. You are not going to prison for a crime you didn’t commit, and that’s that.”

My aunt and uncle glared at each other for a long moment.

Appalled at the rift between them, I said, “Please, don’t fight. Please. We’ll figure it all out, and no one will get hurt. Uncle Ben, you just have to trust us.”

“Of course I trust you. But I most certainly don’t trust the people you’ve been talking to.”

It was almost seven when Mungo and I got home. His dish was still full of kibble, but after a quick sniff he turned his back on it.

“Fine. If you want some of the chicken salad I’m planning for supper, you’re welcome to it.”