The Pickled Piper (3 page)

Piper blanked out on the rest of Ben's report as her mind struggled with the awful scene in front of her. Her thoughts swirled until, at Ben's final words, her attention suddenly snapped back.

“Yes, sir. And, Sheriff, if you don't mind me saying? You might want to send someone to check on the whereabouts of Nate Purdy.”

P
iper watched the bustling activities of the sheriff's department from behind the crime scene tape, where she'd been politely but firmly moved after a brief questioning. A large area around her booth had been cordoned off, although the rest of the fair, after some discussion with frazzled fair officials, was allowed to carry on. From her position, all Piper could see were crime scene technicians moving about and department vehicles with flashing red lights.

Not that she really wanted to see Alan Rosemont's body—for it had been identified as his—any closer than she already had. But much of her shop's merchandise remained in the midst of that barely fathomable scene, and though she couldn't move any of her jars or pickling spices out of harm's way, remaining within watching distance made her feel she was somehow keeping them safe. Which, at the same time, made her feel horrible. A man was dead and she was worrying about her pickles? The only rationalization she could come up with was that she knew her pickles much better than the man.

“So, someone did Pinky in?” A voice behind her made her turn.

“Pinky?”

“Yeah, you know, Rosemont.” The speaker was a denim-clad, grizzled man whose earthy aroma signaled he'd wandered over from the livestock barn. “We all called him Pinky. Not to his face, though.”

“Why?”

“Because he would have punched you out if you did. The man had a temper.”

“No, I mean why Pinky.”

“Oh.” The man scratched at his day's growth of beard. “Well, first it was Rosey, from his name, you know? But then that library business turned it into Pinky.”

“Sorry to sound so out of it—I'm fairly new around here—but what library business?” Piper asked.

Her companion seemed more than happy to fill her in. “A few months ago, the library needed a new paint job, and the town council had to approve it. Councilman Rosemont, there, didn't want to put a lot of money into things like that. From what I heard he was looking into installing new, fancy streetlights on the block where his antique shop is. So he cut the cost of redoing the library by buying a paint called Azalea Bloom, some color that they were practically giving away. Once it was on, we could see why. It made the library look like a great big bottle of Pepto-Bismol.” The man chuckled for a moment, then added, “Lyella Pfiefle was fit to be tied.”

“Lyella—?”

“The head librarian.”

“Oh.”

“So Rosey became Pinky.”

“Ah.” Piper couldn't help a lip twitch or two, first from picturing the library, then from imagining that in-your-face, belligerent man being called Pinky and how he would have reacted if he'd ever learned of it. A movement near her booth caught her eye, sobering her. They'd started setting up privacy shields around the crime scene.

Her informative companion moved on, to be replaced by clumps of other curious spectators. The sun, having had to fight its way through an overcast sky, had yet to burn off the early morning chill, and Piper rubbed at her arms and thought about scaring up a cup of coffee. As she glanced around, she spotted a woman charging her way: Charlotte Hosch, owner of Charlotte's Chocolates and Confections, whose booth was next to Piper's. The confectioner's flying hair and steely expression gave Piper an uh-oh feeling, and she braced herself.

“No one can get anywhere near my booth,” Charlotte shouted once she got within whites-of-her-eyes distance.

Unsure what Charlotte expected her to do about that, Piper said, “I'm sorry, Charlotte.”

“You're sorry? What happened at your booth is ruining my business! How could you let that man drown in your pickle barrel?”

“I didn't
let
anything happen, Charlotte.”

“Don't you lock your things up like the rest of us do? You can't just leave traps of that sort for people to fall into.”

Piper took a deep breath. Charlotte could probably guess that pickle barrels didn't come with locks—combination, padlock, or otherwise. And Piper didn't feel the need to explain, as she had to Sheriff Carlyle, that she'd firmly clamped her barrel lid closed before leaving the night before. Besides which, Piper was pretty sure Alan Rosemont didn't die because he'd decided to go diving in her pickle brine. Before being shuffled away from the crime scene, she'd overheard comments about head trauma, which told her he most certainly had been dead before he ended up where he did. If whoever killed Rosemont hadn't deposited him in her barrel, his body would likely have been found lying somewhere nearby, and this entire area would still have been blocked off.

But Charlotte Hosch was a fellow businesswoman whose shop was within walking distance of Piper's Picklings. It was best to stay at least on speaking terms with someone she'd likely have to deal with for years to come.

“I don't think it will be much longer, Charlotte. You don't sell much candy before lunchtime, anyway, do you?”

Charlotte huffed but pursed her lips. Piper pressed on. “You know, once the crew there finishes up, they're going to be famished. I'd get your fudge ready and extra bags of those fruit and nut mixes you have lined up if I were you.”

Piper could see Charlotte's mind clicking as she calculated what she had on hand and what she could expect to unload. For a woman surrounded daily by highly fattening foods, Charlotte kept herself amazingly slim, and Piper expected a lot of that came from the energy she used getting upset with everything and anything around her. She'd heard comments from others, though, about the number of calories Charlotte probably burned up counting her money. Either way, the confectioner's anger seemed to be deflected away from Piper for the moment, though she had a parting volley.

“Nothing like this ever happened around here before you showed up with your pickling shop.”

And a nice day to you, too, Charlotte!

As Charlotte tramped off, a voice from behind said, “Awful woman, isn't she?”

Piper turned to see Tina Carson, proprietor of the coffee shop. “Not the easiest to get along with,” Piper agreed.

She looked more closely at Tina. When she'd first met the woman several weeks ago, Piper had judged her to be in her late forties, with a pretty face and wavy brown hair offsetting the twenty or so extra pounds on her frame. Tina usually wore a cheery smile, but that morning dark shadows under her eyes gave her a somber look.

“Are you okay?” Piper asked.

Tina shrugged. “Just a headache. I'll be better once the aspirin kicks in.”

“I hope so. Was that why you were closed this morning? I stopped by with those jars of chutney you asked for.”

“Oh, I'm sorry I missed you! I probably could have opened up, even with this dumb headache, but business has been sluggish because of the fair and I figured I'd take the day off. But then I heard sirens heading out here. Nobody on the street seemed to know what was going on, so I came to find out for myself.”

Piper gestured grimly toward the crime scene, still bustling with technicians. “Alan Rosemont was killed here last night.”

“Oh my gosh!” Tina's hand flew to her mouth. “The poor man. I'm really sorry to hear that, even though he's the one who caused me all that hassle about regulations and inspections when I was trying to set up my shop.”

“He caused a lot of people a lot of problems,” put in a large man who'd just walked up. He took a bite from the cone of cotton candy he held. “But someone got even with him, and not just by doing him in but by how they left him.”

“What do you mean?” Tina asked.

“Didn't she tell you?” the man asked, indicating Piper. “Rosemont's body was dumped in her pickle barrel!”

Piper grimaced, wishing fervently, first of all, that it hadn't happened, but next that that particular information could somehow have been kept quiet. Impossible, of course, but—

“Tina!” Piper cried, realizing that the coffee shop owner had turned white as a turnip. Tina started sinking down, and Piper grabbed on to her. “Give her some room, please,” Piper begged, waving people back and bracing Tina as she eased to a sitting position on the ground. “Does anyone have water?”

A nearby woman passed over a bottle, and Piper twisted the cap off. Tina took a sip, then followed it soon with a longer gulp, and Piper was relieved to see color gradually return to her face.

“Should I call someone from first aid?” the man asked.

“No!” Tina cried, waving. “I'm fine. I'm fine.”

“Maybe you should let them check you out,” Piper said.

But Tina had struggled to her feet. “I'm okay, really.”

The woman who'd handed over her water bottle said, “Pete and I were just about to leave. Why don't we drive you home?”

“I think that's a great idea,” Piper said.

Tina, after some hesitation, nodded agreement, and after a few more sips of water and apologies for the trouble, she took off with the couple.

Piper felt terrible for springing the news about Alan Rosemont on Tina as she had, though, of course, she'd had no idea Tina would react so strongly. She made a mental note to be much more careful in the future.

Aunt Judy came bustling up. “Oh, thank goodness. I was just making my way over here when I saw the commotion. I worried it might be you.” She gave Piper a hug. “What a terrible thing to happen,” she said, looking toward Piper's covered-up booth. “Are you okay?”

“Not too bad,” Piper said. “Better than some, I suppose.”

“That poor man,” Judy said. “Who could have done such a thing? He wasn't the easiest person to get along with, but still . . .”

Her aunt's question reminded Piper of Ben Schaeffer's advice to the sheriff, that he check the whereabouts of Nate Purdy. Surely that hadn't been taken seriously, had it?

Just then Amy ran up, her red hair loose and flying. “I just heard! How awful! And your poor pickle barrel! Will you ever be able to use it again?”

That was something Piper didn't want to think about yet. “Amy, have you spoken to Nate lately?” she asked.

“Nate? Not since he took off from A La Carte yesterday with his guitar. Why?”

At that point, Sheriff Carlyle came up, his face all seriousness. “Amy, where have you been? I've been trying to reach you.”

Amy looked puzzled but pulled her cell phone out to check it. “I guess I forgot to turn it on. Why? What did you want? I told you I was stopping at Megan's on my way here.”

The sheriff looked relieved. “That's right. I forgot. Look, we're trying to find Nate Purdy. He's not at his place. Do you know where he is?”

“Nate?” Amy searched her father's face. “Why are you . . . ?” She glanced toward the booth. “Daddy! You can't be thinking—!”

“We just need to talk to him, honey. Now, do you know where he is?”

Just then, Aunt Judy made a soft “Oh!” sound, and Piper turned to follow her stare. Nate strolled at a distance, hands in his pockets and looking as if he didn't have a care. Then he stopped, apparently spotting the gathered crowd and official vehicles and several pairs of eyes on him.

“There he is!” Ben Schaeffer shouted. Two deputies took off to intercept the startled-looking musician.

“Daddy, you can't do this!”

“Honey, this is police business. Please go home. I mean now!”

“No, Daddy! This is all wrong!” But Amy's pleas fell on empty air as her father left to join his deputies.

She turned to Piper. “This can't be happening!”

“It must be just routine, Amy.” But as all three watched Nate being led to a waiting squad car, Piper began to share some of Amy's worries, especially as Ben Schaeffer walked closely beside Sheriff Carlyle, speaking steadily in his ear. She knew Ben's bias against Nate, and she'd picked up the sheriff's leanings toward Ben as a suitor for his daughter. The question was, how much trouble did that spell for Nate?

• • •

“D
addy won't tell me a thing!” Amy cried, looking distraught as she entered Piper's Picklings that afternoon.

Piper sat at her shop table behind a large bowl. She'd begun putting together a batch of mixed pickling spices, lining up large-mouthed jars of spices on her table along with measuring cups and spoons. The blend of aromas arising from cloves, ginger, dill seeds, nutmeg, and more was wonderful, making it one of her favorite parts of the job. But that afternoon she'd tackled it mainly to keep her mind off what she'd seen that morning.

The sheriff's men had promised to let her know when her booth and all its contents would be released, so she'd reluctantly given up her vigil of staring at the privacy shields and headed back to the shop. But Amy's distress took precedence over spice blending at the moment, so Piper set her scoop down.

“My guess is that he can't tell you anything. That your father would be way out of line if he did.”

“I know, I know. That's what he always says. But this is Nate!” Amy started pacing the length of Piper's worktable. After two or three brisk passes, she looked down. “Want me to crush those cinnamon sticks?”

“Sure!” Besides being a help, Piper hoped it might work off some of Amy's frustration. She pushed a mortar and pestle Amy's way, then got up and switched on the shop radio, searching for soothing music. The classical music station came up with the goods.

They worked together silently for a while, Piper measuring and Amy pulverizing—at first with such energy that Piper feared her cinnamon sticks might not be just crushed but liquefied. But gradually her assistant's white-knuckled grip on the pestle loosened and Amy's voice calmed.

“Daddy probably took Nate in simply to check him off the list,” she said as much to herself as to Piper. “Nate had that argument with Rosemont—did you know a lot of people called him Pinky?” she asked, looking up. Piper nodded, and she went on. “But Nate wasn't the only one to ever fight with that man. Not by a long shot. He just happened to be one of the latest, and unfortunately it was out in public. It's fresh on everyone's minds, so of course Nate's the first person they think of. They'll talk to him and find he was at his place all night. He was practicing his guitar, for goodness' sake! The whole neighborhood can probably verify it.”