Pushing Up Daisies

CHAPTER 23

When I got home, I found O’Malley on my doorstep. Given my recent, unauthorized exploration of the Peacock house and the book I’d snatched, I thought he was there to read me my rights. Then I noticed the grocery bag, a plastic bag from Shep’s Wines and Liquors, and a ten- pound bag of charcoal leaning against the door.

“At the risk of sounding inhospitable, why are you here?”

“You didn’t strike me as a gas grill person.”

“You must be a detective. Let me take something.” I reached for the charcoal, but he handed me the smaller bag.

“Salmon okay? Wild, not farmed.”

“Is this an official call?”

“Officials have to eat, too.”

Upstairs, he unloaded everything onto the island in the kitchen. I dumped my stuff in the bedroom, buried the book under my pillows, and went back to see what Mike was up to. I watched silently while he made himself at home, unpacking bags and whipping up a respectable sesame- soy- ginger marinade for the salmon. He stuck it in the fridge, then opened the wine, picked up the charcoal, and started for the deck.

“I’m a sucker for anyone who wants to cook for me, but is there a legitimate reason for this visit?”

“Got a laptop?” he asked.

“Do bears go in the woods?”

“Get it. I’ll start the fire and meet you back here in ten minutes. And bring your candy notes.”

Uncharacteristically, I did as I was told, retrieving my laptop from my office, and clearing a spot for it on the kitchen counter. Mike came back with a flash drive and a detailed picture log, presumably so I wouldn’t have to look at any of the more graphic shots.

“Candy, little girl?”

Instantly, a picture of the crumpled candy wrapper appeared. “Okay, you’re on,” he said.

Even at 500 percent magnification, it was impossible to see a date on the package, but we were able to see one thing clearly: Cadbury. I shuffled through my research.

“Okay, Cadbury merged with Schweppes in 1969, so this package predates that.”

“Can you make out the name on the bar?”

It was difficult to read; the wrapper had spent the last few de cades crumpled in a box, and the cops’ efforts to flatten it out only served to hasten its disintegration.

“I don’t know,” I said. “It looks like one word, starting with a P. “

“Does it say Paula?” he asked, leaning in.

“Idiot. It probably says Picnic. If the package says Picnic, and doesn’t say Cadbury Schweppes, it was made and buried sometime between 1958 and 1969. If the mother was a teenager when she gave birth…” I noodled with my next calculation.

“Let’s say, for the sake of argument, the childbear-ing years are fifteen to forty, all we have to do is look for a woman who was born between 1918 and 1953. Your candy wrapper may tell us who isn’t the mother, but it doesn’t tell us who is.”

He did the math so fast it made my head spin.

“If the child was buried in 1958,” he explained, “and the mother was forty, she would have been born in 1918. If the body was buried in 1968, and the mother was only fifteen, she could have been born as late at 1953. Too large a group. Why are you smiling?”

“Nothing. My aunt Jo used to say, ‘and if my Grandma had wheels she’d be a trolley,’ or something like that.”

“There’s a rude version of that.”

“Aunt Jo knew that one, too. So virtually every woman in Fairfield County over the age of forty- five is a candidate. That narrows things down.” I tried to sound optimistic. No one’s as optimistic as a gardener.

“And why limit it to Fairfield County?” he said. “She might have moved. She might be dead. Look, it’s an interesting exercise but it doesn’t prove anything.”

“Someone once said that when you have eliminated the impossible, what ever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

“Was that Aunt Jo again?” he asked.

“I think it was Arthur Conan Doyle-Sherlock Holmes, wise guy. Any ideas about the other stuff?” I asked.

“More annoying than dangerous. Anna’s encounter could have been a prank. And bunking down in the green house isn’t life threatening, even if it isn’t fun.”

No, but it could have been, I thought.

“What is it? Has something else happened?”

“No, no.” If O’Malley knew about my near miss with Felix, he did a good job of hiding it.

“We don’t know that your incidents are remotely connected to the body. It could be a business rival or someone who’s ticked off at you.”

O’Malley might have had something there. I didn’t think there were a lot of people who wanted to see me dead, but there was no shortage of people I’d pissed off. Once a year they all met in Yankee Stadium.

“Too large a group,” I mimicked.

“What about the ex?” he asked, for the first time venturing into personal territory.

“Not that crazy. Look, maybe we should take a break,” I said, steering him away from the subject. “Didn’t you promise me a gourmet meal?”

“I did indeed.”

After dinner, we sat on the deck. Mike fiddled with the grill’s dying fire, and then settled in across from me on an old rattan loveseat.

“You haven’t talked much about yourself. All I know is you were some big television honcho, and now you’re in the garden business. How did you come to be a gardener? Don’t most city folk have one house plant they either neglect or overwater?”

“Hardly a honcho, just a cog in the machine. But I’ve been a gardener since grade school. One day my second- grade teacher had us bring in avocado pits for a class project. I didn’t even know what an avocado was- they were not on my mother’s shopping list. She cooked vegetables no one in my class ever heard of-escarole, broccoli rabe, fennel, stuff like that.”

“Holliday isn’t a very Italian name.”

“You are a detective. I’m half- Italian, on my mother’s side. It was strictly an Italian menu, except for corned beef and cabbage once a year.”

“I should have let you cook.”

“I’ll ignore that. Anyway, we planted the avocado pits in cut- off milk containers, and I checked them every morning for signs of life. I’ve been hooked ever since.”

“Are you good at it?”

“That’s an astute question. A good gardener,” I answered slowly, “knows what to put where. And not just aesthetically-it’s the zone, the microclimate, the soil, a lot of things. So, yes, by those standards, I am a good gardener.”

“Ever married?”

“That’s a switch. Nope.”

“Not interested?”

“Bad timing, mostly. I was in a relationship that ended a few months ago. We met cute and parted ugly.”

“Sorry.”

“That’s okay. What about you?”

Mike was single. That helped him avoid the twin occupational hazards lots of cops succumbed to, alcoholism and divorce. He spent most of his spare time kayaking and renovating a cabin in northern Connecticut. Dad was a cop, uncle was a cop, most of his friends were cops. I got the picture.

“Dad and I are a couple of grizzled old bachelors. I thought he might remarry after my mum passed, but it never happened. We live just a few blocks apart. Some nights he cooks, some nights I do. I just stopped smoking-eighteen months ago; so mostly I’m battling the weight I put on. Walking the dog helps, but I need to get back in the gym.”

“What do you have?”

“A border collie. Her name’s Jessie. Guzman looks after her while I’m on duty.”

Guzman again. Were they a couple? Then what the hell was he doing here with me? And what the hell was I doing? For the second night in a week, I was sitting in the dark, getting cozy with a man I barely knew. Either I was lonelier than I thought or hornier. And he’s apologizing for his weight, which means he’s somewhat interested.

A blast of music from the other side of the woods ripped through the night, nondescript rock, the kind you’d get on a cheap drugstore party CD.

“The noisy neighbor, I presume?”

“Comes with the springtime; all the slugs come out. He hasn’t been too bad lately. At least there aren’t any squealing bimbos frolicking in the hot tub.”

“Still, it is late for a school night,” Mike said, glancing at his watch.

I used it as a cue to end the evening-before bachelor number two decided to make his move. “Excellent point,” I said, standing up. “I don’t know about you, but I have a full day tomorrow.” I walked him down to his car, and watched him pull away in the direction of the music. Heh, heh, heh, that’ll teach my noisy neighbor.