THE HERBALIST (Books 1-5) Read online

  THE HERBALIST

  The Herbalist, Book 1-5

  L E S L I E L E I G H

  Copyright © 2015

  All Rights Reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  MURDER and MOONFLOWERS

  NARCISSUS and NIGHTSHADE

  OBLIVION and OLEANDER

  FOXGLOVE and FUNERALS

  ELLEGIES and ELDERBERRIES

  MURDER and MOONFLOWERS

  Chapter 1

  Melissa opened her eyes and stretched, listening to the conversations of the finches and sparrows filtering in through her open window. April had dawned unseasonably cool, but in the desert that meant temperatures in the seventies—the perfect temperature, as far as she was concerned.

  She loved the quiet of little Catalonia, the small town in the Santa Rita mountains where she had grown up. She had spent five years in Seattle in college and an internship, and although she found Seattle exhilarating, she was glad to be home in Arizona once more.

  She got up and made her way to the kitchen where she put on a pot of water for her Sencha tea. Her cat, Sweet Pea, mewed while Melissa prepared her morning daub of wet food and gave her a scoop of dry kibble.

  The tea kettle whistled, and Melissa poured it over the tea at the bottom of the glass pot. While it steeped, Melissa opened the back door to her favorite sight in her corner of the world—her herb and butterfly garden. Blue and purple lupine, shocking pink four o’clocks, orange poppies, and sunny-yellow damiana greeted her, still shaded by the fig tree on the east side of the garden.

  She stepped out into the clean, cool air, wandering through the garden and examining some of the herbs to see what might be ready to harvest so she could dry or infuse them for the shop. She reminded herself that she needed to order more jojoba oil for some of her floral infusions.

  Back in her cottage, Melissa opened her laptop and sat down. Sweet Pea immediately jumped into her lap for what Melissa referred to as her morning gratitude session. Some people postulated that a cat rarely interacted with humans unless they wanted something, but Melissa didn’t agree. Every morning, once her belly was full, Sweet Pea jumped into Melissa’s lap nuzzling her and purring. Immediately after, she would lay down to nap while Melissa caught up on her email.

  A chatty mail from her mother popped up, catching Melissa up on her latest tours, encounters, and possible boyfriends. Once their children were grown and out of the house, her parents had downsized, selling the family home and moving up into the Sierra Nevada foothills between Yosemite and South Lake Tahoe.

  Her father, who was fifteen years older than her mother, had died suddenly just before Melissa graduated from college. Her mother had chosen to remain in California because she had good friends there and was having the time of her life. Even though she was much younger than most of the people in their retirement community—having been raised by Melissa's great-grandparents and then marrying an older man—she was very comfortable in that element. It hadn’t taken long for the eligible men to start vying for her younger and ever-attractive mother, apparently to the chagrin of some of the older ladies.

  Melissa was only in her second year of college when they had sold the house in Catalonia. When they had asked her about it, she couldn’t conceive of ever moving back to Arizona. Her parents had polled all three children—Melissa and her two brothers—who had given them their blessing to sell.

  She was a bit sad about the house now, but as much as she loved it, she also adored Dr. Mercer’s family, who had bought it when they moved into the community. They invited her for dinners and parties from time to time, knowing that she always loved seeing the place again.

  After graduation, she thought she knew what she wanted to do, but one day, in a nostalgic mood, she had looked on Craigslist to see what was happening in Catalonia. She had come upon two listings which lit a fire under her. The first was her cottage, and the second was the building which now housed her market and shop.

  She thought about how very nice it could be to serve the families she had grown up with and to be part of the neighborhood businesses. Catalonia was an artsy little community with all sorts of talent: musicians, visual artists, fiber, metal, and jewelry artists, writers, photographers—even history seemed like an art in this town.

  She was thoroughly familiar with the little cottage, as she had taken piano lessons from the woman who had lived there while Melissa was growing up. She knew how cute and quaint it was and could quickly envision how she would decorate it.

  Her mother had shared a large portion of her father’s estate with each child, stating that her needs were small, while they were just getting a start on life. Melissa had used part of what she received to purchase the cottage and begin the business.

  She smiled now as she sat back in her chair and looked at her surroundings. She had turned the cottage into a fusion of Mediterranean and Desert Southwest décor, inside and out. She loved the azure and terracotta painted walls. She had added an extra layer of stucco inside for more insulation which, with the help of her friend Maya, had given her the chance to create little alcoves and niches in the walls. Some were filled and some were empty, waiting for her to find the perfect piece.

  She turned back to her laptop to see a newly arrived email from one of her customers who had developed a deep chest cough of late, and to whom she had recommended an elderberry cough syrup.

  The email read:

  Melissa,

  How much of this elderberry syrup do I need to take? It doesn’t seem to be doing a damned thing for my cough.

  Lauryl

  Melissa prodded Sweet Pea to move over a bit, so that she could respond to the message without bumping the cat's head with her elbow every two seconds.

  Lauryl,

  The most you should take is one tablespoon every four hours up to four times per day.

  Give it some time to work. Besides just helping the cough, it is an antiviral which needs at least a day to work. If you are not getting any relief, or if you feel worse by tomorrow, come and see me at the shop. Perhaps some elderflower tincture would be more direct, but I want to see you, so I can make sure there is nothing else going on.

  For today, just drink that tea I gave you and rest. I know that it’s hard for you to rearrange your schedule to take a day off, but I really think you need to.

  Be well!

  Melissa

  There were other things she wanted to say, but she needed to maintain that fine line allowed her within the law. There was no such thing as a licensed herbalist, no matter how educated she was, or what other degrees she had. She was luckier than some in her class, at least Arizona allowed herbalists to hang out their shingle.

  She put the laptop away, showered, and then headed to her meditation room. Just as her garden was her favorite place on the property, her meditation room was her favorite spot in the house. She could feel the peace emanating from it as she entered.

  She found it comforting the way residual energy built up in the room from her meditation and small rituals. It was the same anywhere, really; whatever was cultivated in a place, indoors or out, was what remained. Because she cultivated peace there, peace reigned.

  She had always been able to sense when someone entered her space whose life was filled with chaos and anger. No matter how they acted in the moment, the residual energy hovered around them. It was one of the reasons she also cultivated an aura of peace in her store, hoping that those peo
ple felt the difference and were comforted by it.

  Chapter 2

  Melissa liked being able to just walk down the street to get to work instead of having to fight traffic. People were out in their yards, or sitting on their porches, and she greeted each one, stopping to talk here and there along the way.

  She turned the key in the lock at her shop precisely at eight, turned over the closed sign, and opened the window shades. Carl, her head gardener and sometime helper, was right behind her.

  “Morning, Melissa,” he said.

  “Hey, Carl,” she greeted him.

  “I’m going right out to the garden, Missy, unless you have anything else for me first.”

  “If you don’t mind, you can put out the winter apples with a sale sign for seventy-nine cents a pound this morning. Other than that, I’m easy.”

  Melissa had a huge garden full of flowers, vegetables and fruit trees behind the shop. Carl managed it, and a lot of volunteers pitched in to do the work. Carl had been a gardener and nurseryman in Tucson until he retired in Catalonia with his wife.

  When Melissa had first opened the store, he took an interest in everything she did. When she would go to Willcox to get vegetables, he told her that he could save her a lot of money by creating a market garden out behind the shop.

  He was genuinely eager, he appeared to be bored with retirement, and she was happy to have his expertise. It had become a community garden. Everyone, except Carl, had told her it would never work, that people would take what they wanted, and she would never have anything left to sell.

  It hadn’t been that way at all; in fact, quite the opposite. The regular volunteers, and anyone else who worked, got whatever they needed. The volunteers also saw to it that those who were elderly, ill, or without visible support got plenty, and Melissa still sold a lot throughout the week to those who were too busy or who preferred to buy over working the plot.

  Carl kept expanding the garden, and when the property behind the shop had been put up for sale, he advised her to buy it.

  After that, it had become a full-blown operation with Carl putting up greenhouses, expanding the plots, and putting in the fruit trees. Melissa couldn’t possibly fit all of Carl’s wondrous bounty into her shop, so they had a Farmer’s Market on Saturday mornings, and people came from as far as Elgin and even Green Valley to buy Carl’s fare.

  He brought in an armload of spring posies, laying them on the counter for Melissa to bunch or arrange. Melissa got her scissors and set to work trimming the stems, creating bunches and bouquets. There were a few Gerbera daisies now, and Melissa knew that they would be in profusion, just in time for May Day.

  The door opened and Melissa knew who it was without looking up. Ada Mason was her first customer every morning. She would want a cup of English Breakfast tea, and one of Flora’s morning muffins, or one of Melissa’s Chelsea buns, depending on whose baking day it was. Somehow, every morning she managed to have a new tidbit of information about someone around town and was dying to share it with Melissa, or with anyone who would listen.

  “Is the water hot yet, Melissa?” Ada asked.

  “It should be. Why don’t you help yourself to a cup? You know where I keep your tea.”

  “Why, yes, I do. Thank you.”

  It was the same exchange every morning, but Miss Ada was too polite to just help herself, even though they had repeated the same conversation every weekday morning for five years now.

  “Where is everybody this morning?” Ada asked.

  “Who?”

  “Well, there’s always a crowd on Chelsea bun day.”

  “Chelsea buns tomorrow, Miss Ada.” Melissa put down her scissors and washed her hands to serve up a muffin for the woman. When she set it on the table, Ada looked awry at the muffin.

  “I thought this was Chelsea bun day. You know I love those Chelsea buns. Did you change your schedule or something?”

  “No, it’s always muffins on Tuesdays. Chelsea buns on Wednesdays and Saturdays.”

  Ada huffed and fussed a bit, but then tucked into the muffin.

  “You know,” Ada said between bites, “that no good Nash Evans has been at Lauryl Taylor’s door already this morning.”

  “No good?”

  “Yes—shiftless. He hasn’t been able to hold a job for two years now.”

  “He does handy work for people, doesn’t he?”

  “Well, that’s not a real job, at least not the way he does it. He’ll come and do something for you, but the next time you need him, he won’t show up.”

  Melissa didn’t say anything. She knew that Nash had separated from the Army at Fort Huachuca, after three tours in Iraq and Pakistan. He was quite taken with Lauryl, who was probably 15 years his senior. A lot of people were scandalized by the age difference, and some thought he was after Lauryl’s money, although Melissa doubted that she had much. When Melissa had observed them from time to time, though, there seemed to be genuine affection between them.

  “I don’t think he’s really well, Miss Ada.”

  “Hmph. He looks able-bodied enough.”

  Melissa didn’t respond. She knew that no matter what she said, it wasn’t going to change Ada’s opinion, at least not by the end of the conversation. To her credit, she did seem to think things over and come around after a while, but there was no use arguing with her in the moment.

  Vivian, Melissa’s part-time counter person and general help, came through from the back room.

  “Good Morning, everyone,” she said in a little sing-song voice that amused Melissa. Vivian was always cheerful and never critical of anyone; she just accepted people for who they were, no matter what that meant.

  “Vivian,” Ada said, in a conspiratorial whisper, “was Nash Evans’ bike still at Lauryl’s when you came by?”

  “I didn’t really notice,” Vivian said.

  Melissa thought that Vivian probably had noticed, but she wasn’t going to give Ada the satisfaction of corroborating her gossip.

  “Maya should be bringing eggs first thing,” Vivian said, “so I’ll clear a space and handle the stock from yesterday.”

  “Sounds good,” Melissa said. She went back to finish her flower bundles. She had found some lavender paper last week, which had seemed very spring-like, so she used it to wrap the bundled stems.

  Maya brought her eggs, and Ada asked the same question about Nash Evans. Maya glanced at Melissa who simply gave her a knowing look.

  “I think I saw him heading out of town as I was coming in, Miss Ada,” Maya said.

  “Oh, well then, maybe he got what he wanted,” Ada said.

  Maya handed the eggs to Vivian, and helped herself to a cup of tea as well. That was part of their exchange. Maya gave the eggs to Melissa to sell in exchange for goods in the store. Melissa loved the barter system, and several of her vendors had in-kind agreements with her.

  When nobody responded, Miss Ada finished her cup of tea, and purchased some organic Red Flame raisins and some brown sugar.

  “Good choice, Miss Ada. What are you going to make with these?”

  “I’m going to make my own Chelsea buns. Then I won’t have to worry about what day of the week it is,” she said, turning her nose a bit in the air.

  Melissa smiled. “Do you have your bag with you?” Melissa asked as she rang her up.

  “I do,” she said as she pulled it out of her purse.

  “Did you know they have that thing in Bisbee where you have to pay ten cents if you want to use one of those plastic grocery bags?” Ada asked.

  “Yes, that’s been in place for several years now.”

  “Well, I don’t like it.”

  “Why? You always bring your own bag anyway,” Melissa said.

  “Well, people should have a choice. They shouldn’t be forced to pay.”

  “They do have a choice: to bring their own bag or pay for the bag.”

  “But ten cents every time?”

  Melissa smiled at her. “It helps defray the cost of dea
ling with the litter that the bags create,” she said.

  “Well,” she said, “if you say so, but people shouldn’t be charged to clean up after folks who are capable of doing it themselves.”

  As Ada was going out the door, Cindy, Lauryl Taylor’s niece, was coming in.

  Ada stopped in her tracks. “Have you talked to your aunt this morning, Cindy?”

  Cindy eyed her suspiciously. “No, why?”

  “I’m sure you’ll find out soon enough.” Ada bustled on through the door, and Cindy stood looking after her.

  “Anybody know what that was about?” Cindy asked after Ada was out of earshot.

  “Apparently, Nash was at Lauryl’s this morning, and, for some reason, Ada is fussing about it,” Vivian said.

  “Oh,” Cindy laughed. “Well, it’s good for Ada to get her hot gossip tip so early in the morning. If Lauryl and Nash are on the grill, it means the rest of the town is likely safe for the day.”

  Melissa just smiled.

  Chapter 3

  Later that afternoon, Lauryl came into the shop.

  “How’s the cough?” Melissa asked.

  Lauryl shook her head. “Not good. Not good at all,” she said, punctuating her sentence with a chest-wracking cough. She approached the counter where Melissa stood, and paused to look at a display of natural candies.

  Melissa thought Lauryl looked thinner than the last time she had seen her, and her eyes were red-rimmed.

  “Is the elderberry syrup the only thing you’re taking for your cough?” Melissa asked.

  Lauryl waved her hand, indicating she couldn’t talk right then, and broke into another round of deep coughing. Melissa could tell it was making her other customers nervous, so she guided Lauryl to a table, and made her a cup of tea with honey and lemon to soothe her throat and to calm the coughing. Then she went down the herbal remedy aisle, plucking a bottle from a shelf.

  “I want to put a few drops of this tincture into your tea, if I may,” Melissa said.