A Late Frost Read online

  Lydia smiled sadly. “I think you’re right. But what can we do?”

  “That’s what I can’t figure out. All I know is that I don’t want anyone to suffer under suspicion—I’ve tried it, and I didn’t like it.”

  “If I may interrupt,” Christopher said, “you—we—need to know what, if anything, the police have found at Ginny’s and Douglas’s homes, and I’ll assume the state police won’t share that information. Which means you have to drag poor Art into it again. They owe it to him to keep him up to speed since this death occurred in his town. Or if not, he can get that information for you from his friend.”

  “I think you’re right.”

  “And I agree,” Seth said. “But can we wait until morning? Give the poor guy a break?”

  “Of course. There’s little to be gained by telling him now.”

  “Actually, I’m more worried about his wife. We’re not high on her friends list right now.”

  “So what have we decided?” Meg asked. “Art knows about the pills. Now we want him to find out how many it would have taken to kill Monica? And which variety of the chemical it might have been? And also find out whether Art has given the information to the state police.”

  “I think that sums it up,” Seth said firmly. “Now, can we enjoy dessert?”

  The talk around the table turned away from murder and mayhem to more pleasant items, and the rest of the evening passed quickly. It was close to ten when Christopher pushed back his chair and stretched. “Much as I enjoy such delightful company, I should escort this lovely lady home.”

  “You want a ride?” Seth volunteered.

  Christopher glanced at Lydia, then shook his head. “I think we’d rather walk. It’s not far, as you well know.”

  Seth looked briefly at Meg. “Give our regards to Larry, then. I think it’s better that he knows that we know, if you know what I mean. Any more lies and evasions and we’ll never sort this out. But you can keep him under wraps for now.”

  “I concur,” Christopher said, then drained his coffee. He got up to collect his coat and Lydia’s, then helped Lydia put hers on. “Thank you for an . . . interesting evening. We’ll be sure to share any new information we might come across, and I hope you’ll do the same.”

  “We will. We’re on the same side, you know.”

  Meg and Seth stood in the doorway and watched as Christopher’s flashlight bobbed up the hill, then disappeared over the crest. Then Meg went to retrieve the dessert dishes and washed them while Seth took Max out for one last ramble. He was back in five minutes, just as Meg was washing down the countertops. “So you and Mom took care of everything?”

  “No. Mainly we decided that you and I need to talk to Art again.”

  Seth groaned. “He won’t be happy.”

  “I know, but this is a murder. Hard to believe that Monica’s death was less than a week ago.”

  “It is. Remind me why we need to see Art?”

  “So we can find out if the state police have told him if they’ve searched Ginny’s and Monica’s homes, and what they’ve found.”

  “Because they won’t tell us,” Seth said flatly.

  “Exactly. They may not even have told Art, although they should. Lydia thinks Marcus must know that Art is a conduit to and from us.”

  “That doesn’t sound very flattering to Art.”

  “I don’t mean to put him down. He’s certainly capable of thinking for himself, and he knows this town well. It’s just that sometimes you and I seem to think outside the box. Now and then that produces some good ideas.”

  “Tomorrow is time enough to bother him?”

  “I’m pretty sure it is. You have some ideas for the rest of the evening?”

  “What’s left of it. Turn out the lights, and let’s go upstairs.”

  26

  Over coffee the next morning Meg asked, “Whose turn is it to call Art?”

  “Seriously?” Seth asked.

  “Why, you don’t think we should talk to him, after sleeping on it?”

  “No,” he said reluctantly, “we need to talk to him. But his patience is wearing thin.”

  “Blame the killer, not me. We give him any new information we get, and he can decide what to do with it. I’m not claiming we do things faster or better than any of the police involved, but we might be better at putting unrelated pieces together to get a full picture, and we know Granford. You don’t think we’re just meddling, do you?”

  “I guess not. My turn, I suppose. But when his wife whacks him over the head with a shovel, I’ll point to you as the cause.”

  He finished his coffee, picked up his phone, and went out the back door, followed by Max once again. Meg refilled her cup and eyed Lolly, dozing on top of the refrigerator. “You get off easy, you know that? Your whole life is made up of eating, sleeping, and keeping warm, with an occasional mouse chase. I want your life, at least for a while.” Lolly ignored her.

  Seth came back ten minutes later. “He’s on his way.”

  Fifteen minutes later Art’s car pulled into the driveway. As he came in the back door he said, “Much more of this and I’ll block your calls.”

  “I apologize, Art,” Meg was quick to say. “But you know we don’t bother you frivolously.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know. Is there more coffee?”

  “Always.” Meg filled a cup and passed it to him, then she sat down again at the table.

  “Okay, what’s so important?”

  “We keep coming back to the colchicine,” Seth told him.

  “Yeah. So?”

  “There seems to be an awful lot of it around in Granford,” Seth added.

  “What’s a lot?”

  “Larry’s a minor expert, sort of. Ginny’s handing it out like candy. Before you get hot and bothered, we all know that it’s legally obtained over the counter, for a variety of illnesses and complaints.”

  “Yes, I know that. What have you got that’s new?”

  “You told us that the lab confirmed that there was colchicine in Monica’s body and that’s what killed her. But how big was the dose she took? Did your pal tell you? Or did Marcus?”

  Art shook his head, but then he said, “You two sure do know the right questions to ask. The lab says there was enough of that stuff in her blood to kill a horse.”

  “What?” Meg said, incredulous. “I thought it acted pretty fast.”

  “Well, that kind of depends on who’s taking it. It can act in hours, or it can drag on. We went over this, remember? The vomiting and so on comes on early, but then the victim might feel better for a while—until his or her kidneys shut down. Unpredictable stuff.”

  “Wow,” Meg said. “So we know Monica was all right through the afternoon of the fair—goodness, was that really only a week ago? She got sick, with those first symptoms, that night and went to the hospital, and then she died the following day. Is that fast for that drug?”

  “Yeah, relatively,” Art said. “But she had a pretty big dose in her.”

  “When would she have taken it?” Seth asked.

  “Probably no later than a few hours before she got really sick,” Art told him. “I’m told it could be as little as two hours, although usually it’s longer. The fair shut down at three, right? It would be getting dark soon, and we wanted to give people time to break down their booths and such, and pack up, so most people were still there until about four. I don’t recall if she hung around for that, but I would have expected her to stay on for a bit to enjoy what she had accomplished, so say she was home by five. It’s possible she took the stuff before she left the fair or after she got home. She called an ambulance around eleven that night.”

  “She called? Not her husband?” Seth asked.

  “Yup. Her husband seemed kind of out of it. He doesn’t drive anymore, but the EMTs let him ride along to the hospita
l with his wife.”

  Meg tried to work out the timeline. “So, she could have eaten or drunk something at the fair, toward the end. Or she could have purchased something for later and taken it home with her. Douglas didn’t ever show any symptoms, right?”

  “Nope, he was fine. What’re you getting at?”

  “I’m trying to figure out when that happened. If Ginny happened to give her some of her pills, she might have taken them after she got home—she must have been exhausted by then, and Ginny would have told her they were good for aches and pains. Then she started feeling bad, and it kept getting worse, and finally she called for the ambulance. Does that fit so far?”

  “Yeah. But there’s one thing you need to know: there was more than one package of colchicine tablets in her house.”

  Meg was stunned, and it was several seconds before she could speak. “Okay, let me get this straight. There were two different packages of colchicine in her house?”

  “Yup,” Art said, then waited.

  “Was one from Ginny? Wait—did Marcus and his minions talk to Ginny?”

  “Of course they did.”

  “But you didn’t even know the whole story until yesterday!” Meg protested.

  “I talked to Marcus. He followed up and got back to me. Ginny says she orders the stuff in bulk. All nice and legal. She says she gave Monica a full package, back when she stopped by a week or two before she died. Monica thanked her and took them home with her. One of the packages at her house is the same brand as Ginny’s. That box has Ginny’s fingerprints on it. The logical assumption is that the other package was Monica’s, but she didn’t mention to Ginny that she was already taking colchicine. Or so Ginny says.”

  “Okay.” Meg was beginning to wonder if they were playing a game like Twenty Questions, and she had to choose the right questions to ask. When would Art get fed up and cut her off? “How many tablets were missing from the box Ginny gave her?”

  “Maybe six or eight? It wasn’t full, but it wasn’t empty, either. And before you ask, we can’t say when she might have taken those. Could have been over several days, or could have been all at once.”

  “And the second box?” Seth asked.

  “Different brand, same dosage. Also partially used. Her fingerprints were on the other box.”

  “Were the boxes found in different parts of the house?” Meg asked.

  “One in the bathroom, one in a cabinet in the kitchen. The kitchen box was the one Ginny gave her.”

  “Hidden or in plain sight?”

  “Not hidden, but not just lying around, either. Next question? Come on, you two—this is almost fun, but Monica is dead and we want answers.”

  Meg thought hard. “Say she had consumed all the missing tablets at once. Would that have been enough to kill her?”

  “Nope,” Art said triumphantly. “As she had way more in her bloodstream than that many pills would account for.”

  “That doesn’t make sense . . .” Meg said to no one in particular. “Was there an empty package in the trash somewhere?”

  “No. Not unless you came across one with your clean-up and brought it home with you.”

  “If I’d found an empty package when I was there—which I didn’t—I would have tossed it in the trash,” Meg replied tartly. “I wouldn’t have known what it was. Was the trash still there in the house?”

  “Yes. Douglas is not exactly into housecleaning, as you may have noticed. The trash was still in the kitchen. The state police took it with them.”

  “And they didn’t find any trace of another box?”

  “Nope. Now you want three boxes?”

  “Well, you did say that the amount missing from the boxes the state police did find was still less than what was found in Monica.”

  “You want to take a shot at stating the obvious conclusions?” Art challenged.

  “Absent another box, we can rule out suicide, right?” Seth said. “She hadn’t taken enough of the stuff in the house.”

  “I think we can,” Art said, “although that’s not conclusive. Still, she could have taken every pill she could lay her hands on and hidden the evidence. Burned it, buried it, whatever.”

  “Then why some of the boxes but not all? Oh—maybe she didn’t want it to look like suicide,” Meg offered. “Do we know anything about her will, or any insurance policies? Maybe there was a clause that nullified the insurance if she died by her own hand, and she was worried about what her husband would live on if he didn’t get any insurance.”

  “The state police are looking into that, as well as the Whitmans’ finances. Doug’s no help.” Art looked at each of them in turn. “Come on, guys, there are more possibilities.”

  “You’ve had time to think about this, haven’t you?” Seth protested. “You just threw this at us. Okay, say it wasn’t suicide. No sign that Ginny slipped her something? I mean, was the original packaging tampered with?”

  “Not that I know of, but the state guys might not have told me. I assume they’re looking into that. Still, those packages are hard to mess with deliberately. It probably would have been obvious if somebody had switched pills. You suggesting that Ginny might have given Monica a bigger dose than she could handle? If so, why?”

  “It does seem unlikely,” Meg said cautiously. “Okay, I know Ginny had means and opportunity, but she had no reason to kill someone she barely knew. What threat could Monica have been to her?”

  “Maybe Monica dropped by and caught Ginny spraying pesticides on everything,” Art suggested. “Could Monica have been blackmailing her?”

  “Wrong time of year for spraying,” Meg said absently. “From what little I know about Ginny, I think she is a true believer in organic farming. She’s worked hard to bring the orchard back, and she’s proud of what she’s done.”

  “But her farm was struggling, and she had a family to feed,” Art pointed out. “Maybe she strayed.”

  Seth seemed to be getting impatient. “Fine, keep Ginny on the possibles list. Who else have we got?”

  Meg said slowly, “Let’s say there was nothing out of the ordinary about the pills Monica had at home—she already knew about them and was taking them anyway, for the same reason Ginny was—basic aches and pains. She accepted Ginny’s pills just to be polite. Could someone at the fair have slipped some others to her?”

  Art shook his head. “Seriously, a third source for the pills? You’re thinking of a homicidal joker? Unlikely. Nobody else got sick. It would have been hard to give Monica something she’d be sure to consume. And the timing’s wrong. Odds are if she ate or drank something at the fair earlier in the day, she would have gotten sicker faster.”

  “So who’s left?” Seth asked. “We’re running out of suspects. What are the state police thinking?”

  Art shook his head. “You and I have talked about them wanting to arrest someone, anyone, for this, and even if that wasn’t true at the beginning, it’s true now. It’s been a week since Monica died. They’re not happy campers. They’ve even asked me if I might have some insights, but I can’t offer them anything new, so now they’re mad at me, too.”

  “Are they going to put this on the shelf, or are they going to haul someone in, just so they look like they’re doing something?” Seth demanded.

  “I can’t speak for them,” Art said, “but if I had to guess, I’d say Ginny is the obvious target. They’ll look harder at her.”

  Meg got up and started pacing around the room. “But that’s ridiculous! Ginny had no reason to harm Monica! She gave her the pills because she wanted to help. She’d taken them herself, and she must have believed they were safe.”

  “I agree, Meg,” Art said. “But the truth is, somebody killed Monica. And it’s our job to figure out who. By ‘our’ I mean the state and local police—not you two.”

  “I know, I know,” Meg said. “And I don’t have any
better ideas. It’s hard to meddle when you have no idea what you’re looking for.”

  “Don’t beat yourself up, Meg,” Art told her. “It’s a small town, which means there aren’t a whole lot of suspects.”

  “Tell me about it. So what happens now, Art?”

  Art shrugged. “I really can’t say, and I’m not just blowing smoke. I’d guess they’ll question Ginny again, but I doubt they’ll find anything, or not enough to hold her. And then the well runs dry, as far as suspects go.” Art stood up. “Guys, it’s Saturday, and my wife has a to-do list as long as my arm. I have nothing more to share with you. And I hope you’ll tell me if you find anything new.” He headed for the door and pulled on his coat, but before he left he turned to Seth. “Oh, by the way—you wouldn’t happen to know where Larry is now, would you?”

  “I think I can safely say he hasn’t left town,” Seth said with a straight face.

  Art nodded once. “That’s what I figured. Next time you call, you’d better have something solid for me.”

  “Thanks for coming, Art,” Meg said.

  After he’d left and they shut the door, Meg said, “I hate this.”

  “Which part?” Seth asked.

  “All of it. Monica shouldn’t have died. I don’t want anyone in town to have killed her. Why are we in the middle of the whole mess—again?”

  “Karma,” Seth said.

  “I don’t believe in karma. Or maybe I mean I refuse to accept that I have lousy karma, despite the evidence. This is ridiculous, and it’s made worse because I don’t have any real work to keep me busy and distract me, so I can’t stop thinking about it. Maybe we should get together with Larry again, and you two can talk some more about the tiny house idea? I’ll be happy to help with the construction. I can use a hammer and a drill, but I don’t like power saws.”