What the Night Knows

24

HAVING RETURNED TO THE CITY FROM THE STATE HOSPITAL, John parked in front of a store on Fourth Avenue. Above the entrance, silver script on the sign matched the script on the green box that contained the calla-lily bells: Piper’s Gallery.

These two blocks of quaint brick buildings offered specialty shops of many kinds. The caliber of the vehicles snugged against the curbs suggested an upscale clientele.

Shagbark hickories lined the street, trunks gray and flaking. Their dark-green leaves would be deep yellow in a few weeks, and when they shed, the pavement would appear to be paved with gold.

Three customers were browsing in the store, two forty-something women in stylish pantsuits and a young man whose face seemed to be set in a perpetual dreamy smile.

John expected a gift shop, and it was that, but it was something else as well—though he could not quite define its retail niche. The merchandise seemed to be an incoherent mix, yet he suspected that a theme must connect each line of goods to the others. Although the regular customers appeared to understand that leitmotif, to John it became increasingly elusive the more he browsed through the store.

The items on the display tables were of high quality. Exquisite crystal animals: bears, elephants, horses. Coiled crystal snakes, lizards, tortoises. Cats outnumbered other mammals. There were many owls, as well. Goats, foxes, wolves. Another table presented clear and colored crystal forms: obelisks, pyramids, spheres, octagons.…

Past a table of magnificent geodes stood a collection of gold-plated and silver bells, small and superbly detailed. All were shaped as flowers, not just calla lilies but also tulips, foxgloves, fuchsias, daffodils.… Some were single bells, others triune, and the foxglove was a seven-bloom spill along a gracefully curved stem.

There were soaps, candles, oils of numerous scents, and the walls were lined with shelves holding thousands of small green jars of dried herbs. Angelica, arrowroot, caraway, basil, borage. Figwort and fever root. Marjoram and mayapple. Rosemary, sage, sweet cicely. Some jars contained powdered weeds: burdock, creeping buttercup, fireweed, nettle, shepherd’s purse, and thistle. Others had stranger names: wonder of the world, High John the Conqueror, mombin franc.

As he familiarized himself with the store, he became aware that the two women in pantsuits were intrigued by him and curious about what items attracted him. They watched surreptitiously, conversing in murmurs and whispers, not realizing he was alert to their interest.

He was not a man whose looks turned women’s heads. Furthermore, he lacked the aura of authority and the air of perpetual suspicion that made so many cops recognizable to one another and that common citizens often perceived at least unconsciously. His ordinariness in fact gave him an advantage as a detective, especially if he needed to conduct surveillance.

When John looked up from a display of silver jewelry featuring animals, he saw the young man watching him from another aisle, that abiding half-smile reminiscent of a porpoise.

He supposed Piper’s Gallery might be one of those stores that fostered a sense of community among its regular customers. Certain specialty merchants had a knack for making their patrons feel like members of an extended family. In which case, these three sensed that he was unfamiliar with the store, and like any group of insiders in a world of outsiders, they were entertained by his reactions.

After circling the premises, he came to a cashier’s station at the back, opposite the front door, where a clerk sat on a stool. She was reading a slim volume of poetry, and she finished a quatrain before closing the book and smiling at him. “May I help you?”

An attractive, freckle-faced brunette of about fifty, she wore no makeup. Her lustrous hair was drawn into a ponytail that looked as if it might reach to her waist. Hanging on a short chain, a silver ring encircling a silver sphere nestled in the hollow of her throat.

Police ID usually elicited a subtle reaction that John could read as easily as a newspaper headline. In this case, he could tell nothing from the woman’s response; she seemed as indifferent to the sight of a badge as she might have been to a library card.

“Is Mr. or Mrs. Piper available? Or is Piper a first name?”

Her smile was as fresh and wholesome as her appearance. But John thought he detected smugness in it, a faint trace of haughtiness, a discreet disdain closer to pity than to dislike.

Or perhaps his paranoid mood shaded her smile with a quality it did not contain. To have any success as a detective, he must remember that what was perceived was not always what had been seen, that an observer was part of the scene he observed. Only a perfect lens did not distort, and no human being could achieve perfection.

“Piper,” said the clerk, “isn’t anyone’s name in this case. It’s a title. I’m Annalena Waters. I own the place.”

From a coat pocket, John produced the box containing the calla-lily bells. He had cleaned the blood from the silver stem, though the tarnish remained.

“I see by the display, it’s a regular item in your inventory. Do you sell many of it?”

“Quite a few of the entire line, but not that many of any one flower. There are seventeen different kinds. And the calla lily is the most expensive.”

“If you sold a set of bells like these to someone recently, might you be able to describe him?”

“This is about the Lucases, isn’t it?” asked Annalena Waters.

“Then you recognize this particular set? The bells were found in the girl’s room. I believe the boy carried them with him from murder to murder.”

Her face seemed unaccustomed to a frown and aged with the strain of it. “How strange. Why do you believe he did such a thing?”

“I’m not free to discuss evidence in the case. But you do recall selling these bells to him?”

“Not to him. To Sandy. His mother.”

John had assumed the boy bought the bells under the influence of Blackwood’s invading spirit. They had been circumstantial evidence of a supernatural aspect to the case. Now they were just bells.

Annalena said, “Sandy was my customer ever since the accident that put her in the wheelchair. She was such a lovely person. What happened to the family—it’s too awful to think about.”

“Were you surprised that Billy could do such a thing?”

“I’m still not sure he did.”

“He confessed.”

“But he was such a kind and thoughtful boy. There wasn’t any violence in him, not any anger. He usually came with his mother. He was so attentive to her, so caring. He adored her.”

“When did she buy the bells? Recently?”

“Oh, no. Maybe two, three months ago.”

Returning the bells to the box, John said, “Why would Sandra Lucas buy a set of bells?”

“For one thing, they’re beautiful. The artist does fine work. And they produce such a sweet sound. Some people call them fairy bells. We call them reminder bells. They remind us that Nature is beautiful and sweet, that life will be more beautiful and that we will be healthier when we live in harmony with her.”

“The dried herbs, weeds,” John said, “are they for homeopathic remedies?”

“Not primarily homeopathic,” Annalena said. “They’re useful in all forms of alternative medicine.”

“That’s what the store is about, huh? Alternative medicine.”

“Natural therapies,” she explained. “Fill your home—your life—with the beauty, the aromas, the sights and sounds of nature, and you will prosper in all ways. Or is that too New Age for you, Detective?”

“I keep an open mind, Ms. Waters. I keep a wide-open mind.”

In spite of the sincerity of his answer, he thought he saw again that most gentle arrogance in her smile, that disdain akin to pity.

Outside, as John opened the driver’s door of his car, he looked at the shop and, through the large windows, saw the women customers and the young man with the dreamy smile gathered at the cashier’s station, not as if lined up to make purchases, but as if consulting with Annalena Waters.

The rain clouds had mostly unraveled. The sun ruled the sky, but shadows gathered under the shagbark hickories, and the afternoon seemed darker than it was.