Violet Tendencies, page 17
part #2 of Rose City Mystery Series
Thank goodness. A wave of relief washed over me. I hadn’t realized that I had been clenching every muscle in my body.
“Tomo, how are you?” I threw my arms around him when he made it to me.
He patted my back. “Careful, I’m a mess.”
“It’s okay. I’m soaked. I’m just so glad that you’re okay.”
“A couple bruises and some buzzing in my ears, but otherwise I’m good.” He brushed thick, wet soot from his uniform.
“What about the other residents?”
“The building was clear except for a dog, and fortunately the fire crew was able to make a rescue. It could have been so much worse, Britta. If a resident hadn’t called in the smell of gas, we could be talking about multiple casualties.”
I gulped. “What about my friend Gloria? Any news on her?”
Tomo shook his head. “No. She could be at the hospital. The ambulance transported three residents before the blast.”
“Do they know what caused the explosion?”
“It’s too early to say what the cause of ignition was. Officially it’s a gas leak, but one of my colleagues said that the fire inspector thinks it’s arson. That’s not public info, okay? The fire chief said it’s a miracle that no one was killed, and he’s never seen anything like this in his twenty-eight years. The two explosions were only thirty seconds apart. The device they use to measure gas didn’t indicate that an explosion was imminent. The fire chief is asking for anyone who might have caught an image of the blast on their phone to come forward. They’ll start reviewing surveillance cameras in the area. They’re not officially saying it’s arson yet, but, Britta, I’m sure this was intentional.”
I wanted to ask Tomo about a potential connection to Dark Fusion, but he got called back to the scene. The smoke was giving me a headache. I didn’t want to stand around in the rain breathing in the fumes, so I decided to head over to the hospital to see if Gloria was one of the residents taken by ambulance.
The hospital was located at the top of Portland’s southwest hills. It was too far to walk, but if I returned to the waterfront I knew that I could take the sky tram. I had a hard time catching my breath as I wound my way through the ever-growing crowd. Parade-goers who had been camped out on the surrounding streets had gathered to get a look at the action.
I felt like I was a fish swimming upstream. Everyone was racing toward the blast zone as I was hurrying away. I made it to the tram in record time, and climbed on board. The view from the sky gave me a greater appreciation for the danger I’d been in, and how right Tomo was that the explosion could have been disastrous. Smoke fanned out in a quarter mile radius. Plumes still rose in the air near the site of blast, like an erupting volcano. I caught a brief glimpse of what was left of the complex—which looked like nothing. Brick rubble and exposed cottages had been reduced to nothing. I couldn’t imagine that the residents would find anything left of their valuables and possessions once they were able to return.
When the tram arrived at the top of the hill, I went in search of the emergency department. At the nurses’ station I asked if Gloria had been admitted. A young nurse stared at me. “Are you family?”
Without thinking, I nodded. “I’m her granddaughter.”
Yet another lie. What was wrong with me?
The nurse typed something into her computer. “Yes, she has been admitted, but I can’t let you see her.”
“Do you know if she’s okay?”
The nurse looked at the computer again. “You’ll have to wait to speak with the doctor, but she is in stable condition.”
I figured pretending to be family with Gloria’s doctor might be pressing my luck, so instead I asked the nurse if I could leave her a note. Then I wrote a brief note telling Gloria that I was sending her healing vibes and that I would be back later to check on her. I had to get to the float barn to meet the afternoon crew.
Word of the gas leak had already spread. Nicki ran over to me. Twigs and branches stuck out from her frazzled hair. Her khaki pants were stained with dirty splotches and her white tennis shoes looked as if they had been dipped into a vat of mud.
“What happened to you? Did one of the volunteers accidentally mistake you for part of a float?”
She wasn’t amused. She ignored my questions and folded her arms across her chest. “Where have you been? I’ve been searching everywhere for you. You have ten volunteers waiting and no crew chief. I had to pull the crew chief from the Royal Court’s float to oversee work on the Blomma float.”
It wasn’t as if Gloria’s disappearance was my fault. I glanced to the Royal Court float, which was in the next stall. The simple tiered design was nearly finished. Volunteers were trimming red, pink, and white roses to add to tin buckets lining each side of the float.
“Thanks for sending over extra help.” I wanted to point out that I thought that was Nicki’s job as float barn director anyway. Not to mention that every decorator had offered their services after our float was destroyed. “It wasn’t as if I was off taking carnival rides. I was visiting Gloria at the hospital.” I went on to explain how I had seen Gloria’s cottage explode, but Nicki stopped me in midsentence.
“Yes, yes. I know. We’ve heard the news and it’s terrible, but I can’t think about that for the moment. There is way too much work to do.” She scolded me like a child, pointing her index finger at me and then to the back of the float barn. The tip of her finger was stained black. “They need you at Blomma, like forever ago.”
She shoved me toward the Blomma float stall. Come to think of it, how did Nicki know about Gloria? I stopped and turned around. She had set her sights on a poor volunteer who was holding a pair of shears upside down. I watched as she snatched them from the unsuspecting volunteer’s hands and stormed away.
Had she finally snapped?
I tried to put her out of my head as I met with our new crew chief and examined a strand of violets. They had been done perfectly. The buttery white and purple leaves offered a soft, springlike compliment to the rustic trees. I set my things in the pigpen, rolled up my sleeves, and climbed onto the ancient scaffolding. It buckled as I lifted one knee, then the next, onto the top level. The view was spectacular. Floats that had been patchy and full of empty, blank sections were now flush with color. The camel’s mane looked so real, I wanted to run my fingers through it. The flamenco dancers appeared larger than life, swirling in beautiful bluebells, yellow daisies, and pure red roses.
I set to work twisting strings of violets in between branches and through the Japanese maple leaves. I wanted it to look natural, as if the violets were wild vines, and yet I needed them to hold. It was a tedious and slightly scary job. I had to balance with one foot on the scaffolding while reaching above my head to secure the flowers onto the tops of the trees. We found a rhythm after a while. As soon as the volunteers finished a new strand of violets, one of them would climb onto the first level of scaffolding and place it at my feet. I clipped a plastic tub of twist ties, twine, and scissors to my waist so that I didn’t have to keep climbing up and down the rickety steps every time I needed supplies.
We had to repeat the process around the entire float. It took the majority of the afternoon. Twice I spotted Nicki sneaking into the warehouse. Both times, she unlocked the door and glanced around skittishly before opening it. Pete had assured me that there was no bomb tucked away in the cavernous space, but that didn’t explain Nicki’s actions. What was she doing?
And where were Dark Fusion? Again they were eerily absent. Not that I wanted the rioters protesting outside, but I couldn’t believe that they had just given up. The odds were slim to none that they had decided to go quietly into the night. There had to be a connection with Gloria’s housing-complex explosion and whatever Nicki was doing in the barn. I knew I was missing something, but I couldn’t figure out what.
As the afternoon wore into the evening, volunteers trickled out. Every float except for Blomma’s was complete and ready to roll out. A handful of volunteers agreed to stay late and help me finish hanging the violets. My fingers were raw with tiny cuts and sticky with sap when we wrapped the final strand around the base of the last tree. I climbed down from the scaffolding to survey the float. If I never had to use the sketchy ladder system again, that would be absolutely fine by me.
We gathered together and appraised our work. The float took my breath away. It felt like something from the pages of a fairy tale, with its towering forest landscape and wispy, iridescent violet vines. They shimmered like magical pixie dust from every handcrafted branch. I thanked the volunteers profusely for giving up their Friday night to help me finish. There was a sense of accomplishment and relief in the air.
I wanted to get into the warehouse, but Nicki ushered everyone out, claiming that the police had insisted the float barn be locked up by midnight. I wasn’t sure I entirely believed her, but she escorted us to the parking lot and yanked the door shut behind her.
Oh well. I was exhausted. A hot cup of tea and a handful of Elin’s cookies were calling my name. Before returning home I stopped by Blomma to get my things, and grabbed Gloria’s scrapbooks too. I doubted that I would be able to sleep knowing that the parade was first thing in the morning, so I decided that I might as well keep looking for any clue that Portland’s past parades might offer.
Elin called to check in on me. She had heard about the explosion and gotten my message. I assured her that I was okay, and made her promise to enjoy her time with Eric. Once he returned to London, we would have plenty of time to hash out the last few days’ events. I made sure to downplay how close I had been to the explosion, and tried to keep my tone upbeat.
After we hung up, I took a long, hot shower, then I made myself a strong pot of tea and returned to my search. Thankfully, Gloria had been meticulous in her organization of each year’s Grand Floral Parade scrapbook. I went decade my decade, scrutinizing each photo and newspaper article for anything that might shed light on this year’s debacle.
I was about to call it a night, when I flipped to a full-page feature story about Queen Priscilla. The article detailed Priscilla’s coronation. It quoted some of Priscilla’s classmates, and talked about her plans for studying design in college. There were grainy photos of Priscilla with her royal court, and then one with her date to the coronation. I almost dropped the scrapbook on the floor when I read the caption under the photo: Queen Priscilla and her date, Steven Sham.
Sham? Steven Sham?
I took a closer a look. Priscilla’s date had a younger, clean-shaven face, and wore much less black, but he was unmistakably none other than Dark Fusion’s slain leader—Sham.
Priscilla had dated Sham? I couldn’t believe it. Why hadn’t she said anything? She had acted like she didn’t know him. That was an obvious lie.
Could she have killed him? But why? Maybe she was so intent in maintaining her pristine appearance that she didn’t want her past tainting her reputation? What would the princesses whom she was trying to mold into dignified young ladies think if they learned she had once dated an anarchist?
I tried to make sense of the photo. Were Priscilla’s tears more than a response to spring allergies? Had she been heartbroken about Sham’s death or had she been the culprit? I wasn’t sure, but I knew that she was going to be the first person I found in the morning.
Chapter Twenty
Unfortunately, I didn’t have a chance the next morning to speak with Priscilla. There was too much to do to get our float out of the float barn and rolling along Portland’s streets. I momentarily forgot about Sham’s murder and my suspicions that Priscilla could be connected, as I made my way through crowds of parade-goers pushing across the Hawthorne Bridge on their way to the parade route. I felt like a fish swimming upstream.
The weather gods had spared Portland from a soggy parade. Sun rained down on the Rose City. The atmosphere was electric. People chatted merrily as they toted blankets, picnic baskets, and pulled children in red wagons across the bridge. Police officers mixed in with the throngs of families, passing out shiny gold stickers cut in the shape of police badges and keeping a watchful eye on the festivities.
When I arrived at the float barn, the vibe was equally upbeat. Marching bands, cheerleaders, drill teams, clowns on unicycles, and stilt-walkers were packed in the parking lot, awaiting their marching orders. Juggling balls flew through the air. The sound of trombones warming up hit my ears. There was a heavy police presence here as well. Officers lined the waterfront pathway and had been positioned at every warehouse door.
Elin was waiting for me at the Blomma float. She wore one of our custom T-shirts, a black V-neck with our Blomma logo in the center. The logo, hand-sketched by Elin, was simple yet elegant. Blomma was written in a pale mint-green modern scroll, like a whimsical ivy vine. We had agreed to wear matching shirts for the parade. Mine was the same, only in cream instead of black.
“Darling, the float is a vision!” Elin greeted me with a firm hug and then kissed each cheek. “You’ve done a wonderful job. Simply wonderful.”
“I wasn’t sure it was going to come together until the last minute. Let’s just hope the trees hold.”
She looked up at our forestscape. “They’ll hold. Not to worry.”
We didn’t have time to worry. Nicki shouted out commands on the bullhorn, running between float stalls to make sure everyone was ready to proceed to the route. We had the honor of hosting Oregon’s most senior senator and congressional representative. Ted made grand introductions, bowing to both of them and gifting them with golden rose sabers. The politicians were humble and praised our float design.
Elin squeezed my hand as we climbed to our spot on the back of the float. Nerves welled in my stomach. It felt like a hundred bees were buzzing through my entire body. I was excited about finally having a chance to show off our hard work, but equally nervous about Dark Fusion’s earlier threats of violence and disruption. Did having a senator and congressional representative make us a bigger target?
Relax, Britta, there are police everywhere. I clutched a handle carefully hidden under grapevines as the engine revved up and we slowly drove out of the float barn.
Sure enough, our trees didn’t budge as we bumped over the gravel parking lot and turned onto Burnside, which led to the drawbridge that would take us over the Willamette. I felt my jaw drop as I took in the magnitude of spectators. People had crushed onto the sidewalks on either side of the open bridge. As far as my eye could see there were cheering mobs of happy Portlanders and visiting tourists.
Children screamed with delight as we tossed rose-shaped candies from the back of the float. People cheered and snapped photos of the Blomma float. Elin beamed with pride when we passed the grandstand, where Eric stood waving two miniature American flags. He was flanked on each side by Nora and Jon. In honor of the occasion, Nora had ditched her black leather for skintight red leather pants and a matching jacket. A band of red leather with sparkly rhinestones, tucked in her platinum hair, completed the look. Jon had opted for a more classic style—tailored black slacks and a burgundy button-down shirt.
Nora waved and hollered at us as we inched by. In hindsight I probably shouldn’t have spent so much time worrying about the structure and whether our new design would hold. The parade was slow moving. We had to stop multiple times to allow the high school marching band in front of us to finish an upbeat piece—“Louie Louie” on constant rotation—and for the pooper-scoopers to sweep the streets. It was a thrill to the see the blur of color in the crowd, the happy mobs of people, and the expressions of awe at our float.
“We love your violets!” a group of older women wearing matching rose hats shouted. “You get our vote for very best float!”
Elin beamed with pride. “I think they like it, Britta.”
“They love it,” I replied, tossing a handful of candy to three little girls dancing to the beat of “Louie Louie.”
The truth was, I loved every second of the parade, the jugglers on unicycles, the mounted horse patrol with swags of roses draped from their saddles, the sounds of tubas, the ethereal scent of flowers in the air. It was impossible not to get caught up in the energy of our city coming together in celebration of all things floral. I felt like a kid again as I grinned and waved with both hands. I didn’t even care that my arms were probably going to feel like wet noodles tomorrow.
Priscilla stood at the helm of the queen’s float, three spots in front of us. Every once in a while, I would catch a glimpse of her regal wave over the marching band and the horses. I knew that we were behind them from the trail of single-stemmed red roses that the princesses were tossing to bystanders. Beautiful, dainty, red, white, and pink petals littered the streets like confetti.
Even if I had wanted to talk to Elin about what had happened last night, it would have been impossible over the sound of the bands and the clapping crowds. I pushed all thoughts of Sham’s murder to the back of my head and smiled broader as we chugged down the streets.
The sun warmed my shoulders. My arms grew heavier and heavier, but I couldn’t stop waving.
“This is a once in a lifetime, Britta! Soak in every moment,” Elin said, tossing a piece of candy to a little girl in pigtails.
“I am!” I turned to face the other direction and my eyes landed on Pete Fletcher. He and Tomo were positioned at one of the barricades, making sure that traffic didn’t interrupt the parade route. He caught my eye and winked. I felt the familiar tingle of a warm blush creep up my cheeks. Tomo didn’t notice me. His jaw was tight. He methodically scanned one side of the block and then the other.
I knew they were keeping a careful eye out for any Dark Fusion action. Knowing that the police were out in force relieved some of my anxiety. Thus far there had been no sign of the militant group. I hadn’t seen a single black mask or the sound of any protests. Maybe Sham’s death had put an end to their attempt to disrupt the parade, or maybe the sheer number of officers patrolling the streets had kept them in check. Had all my worry and fear been for nothing? It seemed strange that the anarchists had opted to disappear, but thank goodness for small miracles.
