A Late Frost Page 14

  “I suppose ‘just because they could’ or ‘they wanted to see what happened’ wouldn’t work?” Meg said.

  Art sat back in his chair to look at her. “You don’t think much of our local population, do you?”

  “Sorry. I have no reason to believe any of them are murderers, or even up for pulling a prank that went wrong. But if Monica was killed by a stranger, how do you—or Marcus—investigate?”

  “I won’t say it’s easy. Family and locals are always the first people to look at.” Art slapped both hands on the table. “Listen, folks, I want to get home before my dinner gets cold. Let me think about this overnight, and decide if and how to approach Marcus with it. Maybe I could tell him he should take a harder look at agricultural chemicals, since there’s no shortage of those in Granford, but this one of yours is pretty obscure, so that might not help. Maybe there’s some secret manual that matches symptoms to drugs, but we’ve already agreed that Monica’s symptoms were pretty ordinary, except that they came on real fast and then killed her. Maybe her doctor—if we can find him or her—will tell us Monica had a previous condition that was aggravated by something she ate, and we’re barking up the wrong tree. But I think it can wait until tomorrow. Will that satisfy you?”

  Christopher stood up. “That’s all I ask, Art, and I appreciate your taking the time to listen to us. I would be more than happy if this death turned out to be no more than an unfortunate accident—perhaps Monica grabbed the wrong medication—and we can put this all behind us. Meg, Seth, I’ll take my leave now as well, but we should keep in touch if there are any new developments.”

  “You got it, Christopher. Meg, Seth—try not to call me again tonight, unless something really big happens.”

  “We’ll do our best, Art,” Meg told him.

  After Art and Christopher had left, Meg and Seth faced each other in the kitchen. “Well,” Meg began.

  “Exactly,” Seth answered.

  “Christopher just dropped by, you know. I didn’t invite him.”

  “I know. We both know Christopher, and we know he is scrupulously honest. And precise. In this case he’s torn between two goals: finding out whether this colchicine is the poison—if there even was a poison—and protecting Larry, who he seems to feel rather paternal about. And that troubles him.”

  “Of course it does.”

  “Now that we don’t have an audience, what’s your gut feeling about Larry?”

  “I certainly don’t see him as a killer, especially of someone he doesn’t even know. And I can’t see how he could have had access to anything Monica ate or touched.”

  “Maybe she’s his long-lost mother or something.”

  “According to Christopher, he had a mother and father.”

  “Maybe she gave him up for adoption when he was an infant,” Seth countered.

  “And in between managing his parents’ orchard and getting a college degree, he tracked her down and plotted his revenge?”

  “I’m not serious, you know.”

  “I know. Still, just because he has no apparent reason doesn’t mean there isn’t one. But I understand why Christopher doesn’t want to set Marcus on him. I need a glass of wine.”

  “I’ll join you. Are we eating dinner or just grazing?”

  “Let’s see what the fridge is hiding.”

  Over a patchy meal, Meg asked, “Okay, you’re a guy, and you’re not his employer. What’s your take on Larry?”

  “Mostly I feel sorry for him. He definitely has skills, but he’s not good with people. It’s understandable based on what Christopher’s told us about his background, but I’m not sure there’s much to be done to fix him, so to speak. Is he more comfortable with you, as a woman?”

  “I haven’t seen him comfortable with anyone yet. He says he’s staying with friends, so I hope he actually has some and isn’t just living out of his car. But it’s early days yet, and I haven’t spent a lot of time with him. He seemed enthusiastic about your tiny house idea—more than I’ve seen before.”

  “He did,” Seth agreed. “Maybe we can spend some quality time together over that. Dessert?”

  “I think there’s cake somewhere in there.”

  Later, after they were settled in bed, each with a book, fighting to keep their eyes open, Meg said, “If no one finds the killer, what happens?”

  “Maybe we should back up and ask if there really was a killer. Maybe she died of a heart attack brought on by something else, and it was a natural death.”

  “Do you really think that’s true?” Meg asked.

  “I’d like to. But the medical examiner seems to think otherwise.”

  “Seth Chapin, you just ducked my question. Go back to the start: was Monica Whitman murdered?”

  “Meg, I really don’t know. It may still prove to have been an accidental overdose of something. Or suicide.”

  “Fair enough. What happens to Douglas Whitman now?”

  “If there are no relatives to be found? That might depend on what kind of money he’s got. Well, first somebody would have to appoint an executor for Monica’s estate, and see if there’s a will. If she was aware of his condition—and it would be hard not to be—and if she’d updated her will recently, maybe she made provisions for his long-term care.”

  “They don’t have poorhouses anymore, do they?” Meg asked, settling herself closer to Seth.

  “Not lately. And if Douglas has a work history, he should get Social Security and Medicare. He may have a pension from his prior employer. And there’s the house.”

  “We don’t know if it’s mortgaged. Poor Monica—she was trying so hard. She didn’t deserve to die, no matter how it happened.”

  Meg’s last comment was greeted by Seth’s snore, so Meg turned off her light.

  She’d thought it would be easy to sleep, but it wasn’t. Part of that was the lack of physical exertion, since she hadn’t been doing her usual orchard chores. She probed her wandering mind to figure out what was bothering her. She’d finished most of the number crunching she needed to do for taxes and for planning for the coming year, and they’d turned out better than she’d expected. She knew now she could afford a few investments in new equipment. Or at least upgrades. Like an up-to-date irrigation system. Nothing in the house needed fixing urgently.

  Which left Monica’s death and Larry to worry about. It was a peculiar situation all around. Nobody had known Monica well, and she hadn’t had time to find her place in the community. It was oddly frustrating, because over the past couple of years Meg had become accustomed to knowing something about the background and connections of her Granford neighbors. With Monica she had no connections, which could prove helpful in determining why she had died. Coming upon her husband, Douglas, was disturbing, because the poor man clearly wasn’t able to function on his own, but there was nobody obvious to turn to for help for him. Which led Meg to realize she did want to help him, but she had no experience in anything resembling eldercare.

  Meg was pretty sure Monica had been murdered. Ninety percent, anyway. But she had no way of knowing why. There was no clear reason for anyone to want Monica dead. The woman might have been overexcitable, but that was no reason to kill her. It seemed unlikely that Douglas could have done it, although he might have wanted silence from her, just for a bit, and he’d found a way to silence her permanently, whether or not he meant to.

  And to suspect Larry was pretty close to laughable. Meg didn’t pretend even to herself that she was a perceptive judge of character, but she couldn’t see Larry as a killer—and she’d made the acquaintance of more than one over the past couple of years. Shy, awkward, clumsy Larry might be, but homicidal? She was not ready to believe that, not without convincing proof.

  Then, who? She fell asleep with that question bouncing slowly around her head, like an ancient game of Pong, which she used to see when she was a child . . .
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  It was the middle of the night when Meg woke from a sound sleep and sat bolt upright, with questions ringing in her head: What if Monica wasn’t the target? What if her death was a mistake? What if somebody else was the intended victim and was still in danger?

  18

  Meg slept fitfully the rest of the night. When she finally admitted she wasn’t going to get any more sleep, the sky outside was already graying with morning. She lay in bed, staring at the ceiling and wondering if she’d hit on something important or had merely lost her mind in the middle of the night.

  There was no proof that Monica had been murdered. Sure, the chronology of her final illness was a little suspicious, but it wasn’t impossible to attribute it to natural causes.

  On the other hand, Meg—and Seth and Art—couldn’t come up with a single credible candidate who had any murderous hostility toward Monica.

  Back to Hand One: Could Douglas have done it, having had his fill of her endless prattle, and was he now faking his illness? As far as Meg knew, there were no physical tests to confirm Alzheimer’s or dementia, so how could anyone prove it, yes or no? And she had read that people suffering from either condition could have moments when they were “themselves” again, if only briefly. Could he have done something in such a moment?

  Why was Seth so strongly affected by Monica’s death? Sure, he was a selectman, and he had always felt a degree of responsibility for the affairs of the town, which was admirable. But for some reason Monica’s death had hit him hard. Maybe that was her fault. Since she’d arrived, and after they’d become a couple, the local death rate, or at least the crime rate, had risen dramatically. And it followed her—witness what had happened at her parents’ home. Had Seth simply reached a tipping point with all this crime? Was he blaming her? Was she cursed?

  Oh, stop it, Meg! she told herself firmly. This was not her responsibility. She had listened to Christopher and given him her opinion, and it was up to him and Art and Detective Marcus to decide what the next step would be. She was involved only at arm’s length because she was Larry’s employer, but all things willing the investigation would never reach him. Right now she had plans to make for the orchard, and a well pump to find. Oh, and a new husband to coddle.

  She snorted at that image, and Seth said, “You’re awake.”

  “Well, yes. I was running through my to-do list and I reached the item ‘coddle husband’ and I laughed.”

  “Do you know how to coddle?”

  “Are you questioning my wide range of abilities? Of course I do. Would you like breakfast in bed? A back rub? You know, we really need to find something to do—leisure is apparently wasted on us.”

  “That’s exactly what I thought,” Seth replied. “You can help me find that well pump you need.”

  “In that case, I’ll make you breakfast in the kitchen.”

  “Deal.”

  While Seth showered, Meg went downstairs and assembled the ingredients for pancakes. She might as well indulge in cooking while she had the time. At least she had plenty of maple syrup on hand. Seth ambled down after a few minutes. “Will there be bacon?”

  “Your wish is my command,” Meg said, and extricated the package of bacon from the fridge.

  “Coffee?” he asked next.

  “Wow, you really are needy! If you want breakfast before lunch, you can pour yourself a cup. I’m busy.”

  “Well, the coddling was nice while it lasted. Do I have time to walk Max?” At the sound of his name, Max looked up and wagged his tail enthusiastically.

  “Go for it,” Meg told him.

  Seth pulled on a jacket and opened the door, and Max bounded past him. No leash for him. He and Seth set off toward the back of the property, while Meg whisked eggs for the batter. The goats had wandered over to their fence and watched as Seth and Max passed them, and Meg made a mental note to make sure she had enough goat feed on hand. She could pick some up when she went out to look at well pumps—wherever that was. She’d better take Seth along—he knew a heck of a lot more about plumbing than she did. Maybe it was sexist of her to need a big strong man to do the talking for her under circumstances like these, but it would probably be more effective in the long run. One more reason a husband was handy to have around.

  The landline rang, and Meg put down the bowl of batter to answer it. “Hey, Art, what’s up?”

  “I got to thinking about what we talked about yesterday, and, well, I kind of decided to take things into my own hands rather than pass it up the line for now. I’ve got a buddy at the state lab, so I called in a favor and asked him to check Monica’s blood for colchicine.”

  “Oh. Well, thank you—that’s above and beyond the call of duty. How long will it take until he—or she?—has results?”

  “Probably by the end of the day, since he’s working on those blood tests today anyway.”

  “That’s fast. Did he say whether the state police had asked for anything special?”

  “I didn’t want to pry, but I think he said something about checking a standard drug panel. All we’ll get is a yes or no, and maybe how large the dose might have been.”

  “Again, thank you. You shouldn’t get yourself in trouble, or waste all your favors, on this long-shot theory of ours. I’ll wait to hear from you, okay?”

  “I’ll call when I know anything. Pass this on to Seth, will you?”

  “Of course.”

  When she’d hung up the phone, Meg tried to figure out how she felt about that. If it had been impossible to get Monica’s blood tested, that would have been the end of it—they had no clout, no way to make the state police pay attention to them. Meg wasn’t sure what would happen if the test came back positive for colchicine, but they’d cross that road when they came to it. Right now she needed to make a batch of pancakes. First things first.

  Seth and Max came back about ten minutes later, looking windblown and pleased with themselves. “Where’s my breakfast, woman?” Seth demanded.

  “Take a seat and I will serve you, sir.”

  Meg waited until they’d each finished their first stack before mentioning, “Art called while you were gone.”

  Seth set down his fork and looked at her. “And?”

  “He took what we said seriously enough to get in touch with a friend of his at the lab and ask him to run the tests for colchicine, off the books.”

  “Ah. And how is he going to explain this to Marcus?”

  “Maybe he won’t have to. But if the test is positive, that opens up a whole new can of worms. Wow—nobody is going to be happy with us. Want to leave town again?”

  “That’s not exactly a solution. Was there something else you wanted to do today, apart from waiting for a phone call?”

  “I told you, I need to take a serious look at well pumps. Can you help?”

  “So you did, and that’s why you’ve been softening me up with pancakes. Sure, no problem. Just give me the specs.”

  “I don’t have the specs because I don’t know what I need. We know the acreage and the number of trees, and we know we have a natural spring, but that’s the end of my expertise. Besides, this is just an exploratory mission. I don’t plan to buy one today.”

  “Got it. You’re just using me.”

  “Exactly. For your vast plumbing knowledge and your undeniable charm.”

  “How can I say no?”

  “You can’t. Was there something you needed to get done today?”

  “I’ve got a shopping list for stuff I’m out of, so I’ll need to check the barn to see if I’ve missed anything. But my supply stores overlap your supply stores, so that all works out. There might be an ad hoc selectman’s meeting, but I’d rather wait until we know more about Monica’s death before we schedule that.”

  “I can be ready in fifteen minutes. Just tell me when you want to go.”

  • • •

 
Meg had never expected that talking about flow velocity and pipe diameters could be fun, but she found herself entertained by their quest for the perfect pump. Seth clearly knew everybody in western Massachusetts, although she should have realized that he’d followed in his father’s footsteps as a local businessman. And he was an elected town official. And he was an all-around nice guy and even paid his bills on time. So of course he’d be an asset in getting what she needed for her orchard. She even enjoyed following him around supersized stores that sold tools, half of which she couldn’t even recognize. Seth assembled a cart of basic construction supplies, which they loaded into his van. They stopped by the feed store near town and bought a couple of large bags of goat feed before heading home.

  “I’m going to put this stuff in the barn,” Seth said as they pulled up at the back of the driveway.

  “Need help?” Meg asked as she climbed down from her seat.

  “Can you handle the bags of feed?”

  “Surely you jest. I am a farmer—of course I can handle fifty-pound bags.”

  “Go for it, then.”

  Once the van was empty, Seth said, “You want to walk up to the wellhead?”

  “What, you think we haven’t had enough exercise today?”

  “No, that’s not it. I just wondered if you’d like to see where your fabulous new pump will be going, now that you’ve seen a few.”

  “Sure, why not?”

  They walked companionably up the hill to where the spring emerged from the ground, halfway up the orchard. It was capped for now. There were two buildings that had served it over time, one older and crumbling, the newer one sagging. “Are you going to build me a new well house?” Meg asked Seth.

  “Of course. Who else? Any requests?”

  “Like, do I want pink gingerbread? I’ll trust your taste—it’s just a functional building, but it should be sturdy. When can we start?”

  “The pump can’t really go in before the ground thaws. Let’s see how the weather goes.” Seth fell silent, turning to study the lay of the land. The house he had occupied when Meg had first arrived in Granford was visible over the crest of the hill.