The Murder of a Queen Bee (18 page)

“Holy chicken feathers! But who made it for her?” Abby's thoughts zeroed in on the obvious. “Premalatha?”

“Not if we're to believe what she told us,” said Kat. “She called Fiona and briefly spoke with her around the time of the murder and, therefore, couldn't have been there. She told us in retrospect that she was shocked at how normal Fiona sounded. Cell phone records back up her story.”

Wondering if she should tell Kat that the day before Fiona died, Abby had delivered farmette herbs to Smooth Your Groove, Abby decided to shift the focus of her questions. “So, Kat, no customers of the shop have become ill from consuming the new versions of the smoothies, have they?”

“Matter of fact, they have. Nettie cross-checked the logs of the ambulance company calls with the hospital,” said Kat. “She found out that the EMTs have responded three times in the past two months to transport people with stomach pains. All three said they'd had smoothies within half an hour of feeling ill.”

Abby thought about that for a moment. Her brow furrowed in concentration. “Except the morning she died, she hadn't gone to the Smooth Your Groove shop, right?”

“Right.”

“But someone could have delivered a smoothie to her that morning.”

“With Fiona's body having such high alkaloid levels of aconitine, you've got to wonder how she got that poison in her system. In that respect, ingesting a smoothie with the poison in it makes a lot of sense,” said Kat.

Abby took a deep breath. Her thoughts free-associated at a dizzying speed as she considered the horrific death aconitine poisoning could cause. Suddenly, the warning Abby had received from the two women in the bathroom about not eating at Smooth Your Groove flashed through her mind. Abby turned and looked directly at Kat. “I overheard something in Zazi's powder room, I think you should know.”

Chapter 13

Noxious weeds are like unsavory people: even
in the most convivial company of flowers and
herbs, they emerge to sow seeds of ugliness.

 

 

 

“I
t was an old nudist camp back in the day,” said Abby. She pointed to the sign at the commune's entrance as she steered the Jeep toward the wide metal gate and braked.

“Tarweed Lodge,” Jack read aloud. “Nudist camp, you say. Do we have to disrobe to go in?”

Abby wrinkled her nose. “Good heavens, no.” She pointed to a large chain and padlock and the wooden sign wired to the gate. White painted letters provided visitor instructions:
BUZZ THREE TIMES FOR AN ATTENDANT
.

Jack jumped out of the Jeep. “I've got this.”

As she watched Jack tap the buzzer, Abby's thoughts turned to the locked gate, and she searched her recent memory for a time when the gate had ever been closed, much less locked. Abby leaned out her driver's side window. The scent of pine and juniper permeated the hot mountain air. She searched to see where the buzzer wires, secured to a branch of a nearby juniper tree and looped to a pole, led. It appeared that the wires had been strung to other trees all the way up the gravel driveway, until they disappeared behind a roof strut of the first of several rustic cabins. Her gaze swept back to rest on Jack.

He stood with his backside to Abby. He had plunged his hands into his cargo shorts pockets and was shifting from one foot to the other while he waited. Someone had to let them in. When no one showed, Jack strolled back to the car and stood by Abby's car window. “You might as well cut the engine,” he said. “I don't see Tom or, for that matter, anybody. We could be here awhile.” He slipped off one of his tribal-colored sandals and shook out a small stone. “Definitely the wrong shoes to wear in the woods,” he muttered.

Abby turned off the ignition and left the keys in place. After leaving the Jeep, she strolled into deep shade, curled a thumb into the hem of her white cotton shirt, and pulled it from where it stuck to her damp waist and back. “I'm wilting, even here in the shade. Tom said he would meet us at the gate, didn't he?”

Jack's brows knitted. “Yes. But maybe he had to get permission or something. I'm not exactly sure how commune protocol works.”

“Well, it seems to have evolved into more of a cult than a commune, with a bunch of new rules and restrictions,” said Abby. She wondered how much access to the place they would be given. When previously she had come here with Fiona, the gate had never locked, and the buzzer hadn't worked. “Listen, Jack, once we're inside, take your time talking with Tom. And don't mind me if I disappear for a few minutes.”

Jack looked at her askance. “Why? Abby, what are you planning?” Before she could reply, he said, “Don't make me have to track you down. I'll be worried.”

“See? That's what I mean. You needn't worry about me. I'll be fine. I just need a little time to nose around. There's been a lot of speculation about what goes on up here.”

A male voice called out to them, and Abby glanced over her shoulder toward the driveway. Down the packed dirt path strolled two men and Tom, dressed in a surfer shirt, jeans, and well-worn construction boots.

“You found me,” said Tom. “Hello, Abby. Last time I saw you here was a couple of months back, with Fiona.” He managed a weak smile, and Abby returned it. He appeared hollow-eyed and haggard as he waited behind the gate while his sandy-haired companion and the other man, who had a gray goatee, proceeded to open it.

“Two people to open a farm gate?” asked Jack.

“Rules,” said Tom.

The man with the goatee pulled a rolled-up flyer from his back pocket and handed it to Abby, but Abby was watching Jack size up Tom. After a moment, Jack opened his arms and drew his bereaved brother-in-law into a bear hug.

Glancing at the flyer, Abby skimmed past the image of a basket of vegetables to the address of their local farmers' market and a booth number, where the commune sold its vegetables and herbs. It also listed Smooth Your Groove's address under the image of a cornucopia of berries and other fruits. The rest of the page featured quotes from satisfied customers. Abby smiled as she realized no surnames were used, and the given names listed appeared to be those of commune residents. It just seemed bizarre that some marketing genius at the commune had thought up the idea of flyers for visitors and potential customers, whom they now locked out.

Following Jack and Tom up the incline, Abby stayed out of their conversation and wondered how she was going to slip away for some serious snooping. After weighing a couple of options, she finally surmised that it would just be easiest to wait for an opportunity.

“You okay?” Jack asked Tom when the men were a few yards from the fork in the path. Abby knew the right side of the fork led to Tom's van. After a few more steps, she spotted it parked roughly sixty feet away, in the shade of a mixed grove of pine, redwood, and oak trees.

Tom shrugged. “I've seen better days.”

Jack put his hand on his brother-in-law's shoulder and said softly, “Then why stay here? Fiona told me how much the commune had changed from the cooperative community it used to be. And even Abby here thinks it's become a cult.”

Tom didn't reply. He thrust his hands into his jeans pockets and kept walking toward the fork.

When they reached the split and turned right, Tom's commune companions parted company with them, taking the left side of the fork. Abby stared at them as they marched in lockstep like mechanized soldiers toward a long barnlike structure, which she recognized as the commune's meeting hall. She wondered if they might even be former military.

Her worries that the staff might not respect Jack's right to talk privately with Tom were unfounded. Soon the trio arrived at Tom's rainbow-painted van. The giant driver's door sported a faded peace symbol that hearkened back to the hippie counterculture movement of an era long past. The vehicle had been positioned on a platform of railroad ties and concrete blocks. A thick layer of pine needles covered the van and the two folding chairs positioned next to a stump near the van's rear bumper. Abby surmised that during hot evenings, here in the dappled shade, Tom perhaps quietly enjoyed the cordial company of a friend. Or maybe not. She'd heard the group's leader expected everyone to work long hours. Upon being paid, residents turned over their wages to the commune manager. She used the funds for the support and welfare of their small community.

Jack offered her one of the chairs. Abby declined.

“No, thanks. I want to see the garden. I know the way,” said Abby.

“You can't do that,” Tom said.

“No worries.” Abby played it off lightly. “I've been here before.” She wasn't about to hang around and argue. She walked away as quickly as possible to the garden, which was surrounded by cyclone fencing to keep out the deer and other wild animals. She gauged the time to be roughly two thirty, so they were approaching the hottest hours of the day. She certainly felt it. Panting and perspiring, she glanced back at Jack and Tom. She could see their lips moving but couldn't hear a word. Elsewhere, the grounds remained eerily quiet. Even Tom's escorts had disappeared. Where was everyone?

Abby sprinted along the length of the garden fence to the weather-beaten garden shed and peered around the corner. About a dozen men and an equal number of women were filing into the long building into which the other two men had gone. Abby recalled Fiona had once described the meeting hall as a place where the community held biblical lectures, meditation sessions, and initiations. Abby judged the distance from where she stood at the shed to the nearest window in the rear wall of the meeting hall to be about ten feet. Dodging the sight lines of people wouldn't be all that difficult, because there were trees and bushes, but dogs were another matter. Still, she had neither heard barking since their arrival nor seen any tail waggers running around. Everyone had entered the hall now, except for one bull-sized, muscular man in a gray, sleeveless shirt. She couldn't see his face. Abby took a deep breath. It was now or never. She sprinted through the stand of trees into a clearing.

Her heart raced. She crouched amid tall blue-blooming ceanothus and the yellow-flowering flannel bushes that grew up against the back of the building, hoping no one had seen her. She wished she'd worn a dark top with her navy crop pants. Hands against the wall, she rose from a squat to an upright position next to the window. Layers of dust had created a dense film on the glass. Blowing hard on the glass set off a cloud of dust, but the thick layer remained. The window probably hadn't been washed in years. The opacity might have suited the nudists who hung out here back in the day, but if cleanliness was truly next to godliness, why hadn't the windows been washed by these God-fearing, utopian-minded people?

Using the heel of her hand, Abby gently rubbed away the dirt from the bottom corner of the window and peered in. She spotted Hayden Marks approaching the dais at the front of the room. He wore a plain white kurta tunic with an ochre-colored clergy scarf and loose pajama-type pants over his tall, thin frame. He stopped short of the dais stairs, folded his hands in a prayerful
pranam
greeting before those gathered, and bowed slightly. He then strolled up the carpeted wooden stairs of the dais and assumed a seated position on a red-cushioned divan at the center. He looked out over the room and straight toward the back window. In a panic, Abby pushed back from the window. She dropped to a crouch. Could he see her? Did he see her? Had bright light streamed through the peek hole she'd made?

After a minute, she mustered enough courage to look in again. Hayden Marks's eyes were closed, while eight women in four pairs placed before him flowers, a platter of fruits, a wooden bowl of coconuts, and a black tray with a bolt of white fabric. They also laid before him a stack of currency tied in a red ribbon, prayer beads, colored stones, and crystals. There was a board with backing to make it stand. On the board's eight hooks hung silver figure-eight necklaces. For his part, Hayden remained still as a statue, with his hands resting in his lap. Behind him were pedestals holding sacred images from the Bible. The pedestal nearest him held a canvas painted with the image of an Old Testament king surrounded by eight women.
So that's how old Hayden convinces women to do his bidding . . . by making it a biblical tradition.
He would be the first cult leader to reinterpret Scripture to serve his purpose. She was pushing the heel of her hand against the window to enlarge the peek hole when she became aware of the scent of patchouli.

A female voice behind her hissed, “What are you doing?”

Abby spun around. Premalatha glared at her. Abby's stomach churned. She struggled to think of what to say. “I . . . uh . . . was just curious. What's that all about . . . ? Some kind of initiation?”

Premalatha, who was wearing a long-sleeve tunic and a mid-calf skirt, adjusted her scarf—similar to the one Hayden Marks was wearing—and as she did, the patchouli scent intensified. She glared at Abby with a steely-eyed stare. “That's none of your business. You can't just waltz in here anymore like your friend the queen bee, who used to be the teacher's pet. Her teacher is gone, now she's gone, we've got a new teacher, and I'm his pet. So get out.”

Abby pushed past the shrubbery. Standing in the open, she gestured toward the garden. “I've been here before with Fiona. Many times. I just wanted to see how all the herbs and veggies were coming along. What's with the new restrictions?”

“None of your business.”

“I have every right to be here. I've driven Jack Sullivan here. Tom Dodge's brother-in-law.”

“I know who Jack Sullivan is. He had the good sense to call. We gave him permission to be on the property. We haven't extended that permission to you. We've posted signs. You are not welcome.”

“Well, that seems a little harsh for a peace-loving community. You commune folks used to welcome people to come see the garden and to learn about your way of life.”

Her expression hardened. “Now we don't. We hand out flyers.” She pointed back toward the gate.

Abby pushed back. “Are you all afraid the murderer might enter the grounds? That the killer might come for you, as he did for Fiona?”

Premalatha slid her hands into the pockets of her paisley-patterned skirt. “Why should I care? We voted Fiona out. I say good riddance to that troublemaker. Somebody just did us all a favor.”

“It's bad luck to speak ill of the dead. I've heard the wheels of karma grind exceedingly fine.”

“Our power comes from a visionary leader who receives messages from on high.” Premalatha's expression seemed flat; her eyes empty.

“I see,” said Abby. “You mean like establishing a bunch of rules, locking down your facility, and taking the hard-earned wages of every worker here?”

Premalatha stared at her. “What do you know?”

“That's just it. I don't know. But I see Hayden Marks is right there inside the hall.” Abby jerked her thumb toward the meeting hall door. “I'd just as soon get answers to my questions from him.”

“He's busy . . . and you're leaving.”

Abby's lips tightened into a thin line. “Did you kill Fiona?”

Premalatha snorted. “You're not the police. Just some farm chick who sticks her nose where it doesn't belong. Just like Fiona, who isn't going to be missed.”

“That's not true,” Abby said hotly. “Her brother is grieving, and her husband looks like a broken man.”