Page 49 of Garden of Lies

“Stay where you are.” Rosemont edged back toward the door. “Don’t move. I swear I will kill you where you stand. You very likely noticed that I do not have many neighbors, certainly none that will pay any attention to a gunshot. A guarantee of privacy was the reason I established my business here.”

The gun was shaking in his hand. That was probably not a good sign. Rosemont was a desperate, unnerved man. He was so jittery now that it was possible he would pull the trigger accidentally.

“Very well,” she said, trying for a calm tone. “I will do as you say.” The only practical strategy that came to mind was to keep Rosemont talking. “Are you aware that Anne Clifton is dead?”

“I assumed that was quite likely when you said you wanted to know about her visits to this shop.”

“Did you kill her?”

“What?No. Why would I murder her? Things were going quite well. But I feared the arrangement would not last forever. Bargains with devils and all that. That is why I made plans for an eventuality such as this.”

“What plans would those be, Mr. Rosemont?” she asked.

He ignored the question. “Who are you?”

“My name is Mrs. Kern. I was Anne’s employer.”

“I see. Well, you were a fool to get involved in this affair, madam.”

“What affair? What is going on, Mr. Rosemont? I think you owe me some explanation.”

“I owe you nothing but I will tell you this much—I rue the day I agreed to make that damned ambrosia drug. The money was excellent but it did not compensate me for the risks I have taken.”

Rosemont stepped quickly back into the adjoining room and slammed the door shut. She heard the clank of a heavy, old-fashioned iron key in the lock.

“Scream for help if you like,” Rosemont called through the door. His muffled voice was barely audible. “No one will hear you. Not that you’ll be screaming for long. This will all be over quite soon, I assure you.”

TWENTY-ONE

For a moment she stood very still, her heart pounding in a drumbeat of near panic. The squeak and groan of the floorboards told her that Rosemont was moving around in the shop. There was no way to know what he planned to do next. Perhaps he meant to starve her to death. That didn’t make sense, though. He had told her that it would all be over quite soon.

She shivered, drew a deep breath, collected her nerve and took stock of her surroundings.

There was a second door that probably opened onto an alley. Not surprisingly, it was locked. There was no key in the lock. Next she checked the window. The boards that covered the glass panes were securely attached to the walls but she thought she might be able to loosen them given time and an object that could serve as a pry bar.

She began to search the room for a useful tool. Large ceramic containers were lined up against one wall. She lifted the lid of one of the pots very carefully—and quickly replaced it when choking fumes wafted out.

She spotted a long iron rod standing in one corner and decided it would work. But Rosemont was still moving around in the outer rooms of the shop. Prying the boards off the windows would be a noisy and time-consuming process. She did not want to attract his attention. He had indicated that he would soon be leaving. She decided to wait to tackle the boarded-up windows until he left the premises.

She looked at the sacks in the corner. Judging by the odor, they contained the same herbs that were in the packages stacked in the shipping crate.

One of the sacks was open. Reaching inside, she plucked out a handful of dried plant material. She took a hankie out of her satchel, wrapped up a sample and secured it with a knot.

The floorboards groaned again. She thought she heard the faint thud of an outer door closing. A great silence descended. She was quite certain that she was now alone.

She dropped the little bundle of dried herbs into her satchel and rushed to the door that opened onto the back room. With luck Rosemont had left the key in the lock out of sheer force of habit. He had, after all, been very nervous. In her other life she had learned a thing or two about keys. A woman on her own could not be too careful.

She heard a muffled whoosh just as she knelt in front of the doorknob. The faint scent of smoke wafted under the door.

A fresh dose of fear iced her spine. She had assumed that once Rosemont left the shop she would have time to work out an escape. She was wrong. The perfume maker had set fire to the premises on his way out the door.

The shock stole her breath and threatened to paralyze her. The building was going to burn down around her.

The smoke wafting under the door was stronger now. It carried a strong herbal odor. Rosemont had ignited the fire in the crate of dried plant materials. The stuff was no doubt highly flammable. The wall and the thick door that stood between the laboratory and the back room would buy her some time but not much.

She peered into the keyhole. Relief jittered through her when she saw that the key was, indeed, still in the lock.

She rose and rushed back to where her satchel stood on the workbench. She grabbed her stenography notebook, opened it and tore out two pages. Rushing back to the door, she crouched and pushed the pages under the bottom edge. She could only hope that the fire would not reach them before she finished what she intended to do.

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