Killing Cassidy (11 page)

The ankle. I exchanged a look with Alan.

“However, the patient apparently had no idea how he'd contracted pneumonia, and you're right. Certain kinds of falls, or prolonged bed rest, especially in the elderly, can lead to pulmonary edema. Fluid in the lungs,” he added in concession to laymen. “So I had him X-rayed pretty completely. I did find a couple of cracks and chips here and there—no broken bones, and no real indication of how old the other injuries were. By the time I thought of asking him, he was in a coma.” He shrugged. “Not that it made a nickel's worth of difference, really, how he contracted the disease. It's just neater if we know.”

“Yes, I can see that.” I was ready to ask a few questions now. “What about any other diseases? Flu, or anything like that? I got the idea from one of his neighbors that he didn't go out much, so I wondered if he'd bothered about a flu shot.”

“Not that I know. But it would be in his record, and of course that's still in Foley's office. What does it matter to you, anyway?”

“I just find it hard to understand how such an active, healthy man could get sick and die so quickly, that's all.” I held up my hand. “And no, I'm
not
blaming you. It's a kind of denial, I guess. Did he—did he suffer at all?”

Dr. Boland relaxed at last. “No. You can rest assured about that. Pneumonia is one of the easiest ways for the old to go. They just slip into a coma and eventually stop breathing. Pneumonia is sometimes called ‘the old man's friend,' you know.”

“I know. That, at least, makes me feel better.” I signaled to Alan with my eyes. We stood. “Thank you for your time, Doctor. I'm sorry we upset you.”

“No, it was my fault. I've gotten used to taking offense when none is intended. I shouldn't have blown my top.”

With mutual assurances that it didn't matter a bit, Alan and I slipped out of the office. But once we were well out of earshot, he murmured, “Another one who's belligerent.”

T
HE
great-niece,” I said as we drove away. “She's the last one on the list, until we get to his friends. And maybe we can get a lead on some of the closest of them tonight. Did I remember to tell you we're going out to dinner?”

“No. Who is it this time? Another suspect?”

“No, this is the night for Frank's old dean. He is, of course, in the biology department, so he could be a part of that conspiracy you talked about earlier.”

“Ah, yes. Perhaps I should go prepared to make a citizen's arrest. Except for the minor detail that I am not a citizen. Meanwhile, how are we to find the great-niece? Do we even know her name?”

“No, but I know how to find out.” I steered the car to a parking space. “I'll be back in a minute.”

It took a little longer than that, but I came back triumphant. “Mary Alice Harrison, 702 North Maple.”

“Very well, I am duly impressed. Do you explain your magic tricks, or leave your audience baffled?”

“This is the newspaper office. The
Hillsburg Herald
. I looked up Kevin's obituary in the morgue. Small-town newspapers are obliging, and their obituaries are very complete, with addresses and everything. They have to fill up the paper somehow.”

“Unfair! Your local knowledge gives you too much of an advantage over Inspector Plod.”

I found the house without much trouble. Alan was right; the residential areas had changed much less than the business districts. Maple Street flaunted its name in a gorgeous display of reds and golds.

“There are,” Alan said admiringly, “some things that you Yanks do better than we do. Our autumn is a drab affair by comparison.”

“The color is early this year. They must have had a cold summer and a very early frost.”

I had worried that we might not find Mrs. Harrison at home, but the shrill cries of children at play in the backyard reassured me. The house was nice enough, a sort of neo-Colonial, but it wasn't the sort where one would expect to find a nanny. Mom was certainly at home. I rang the bell.

And rang it again. Alan raised his eyebrows. “Shall we try the back garden?”

“Oh, of course, she's probably out playing with the kids.”

Sure enough, when we moved to the fence at the side of the house, we could see a woman of about thirty sitting in a lawn chair, keeping an eye on two children of about three and five who were playing on an elaborate wooden swing set. She looked tired. She also looked very pregnant.

I tapped on the gate. “Mrs. Harrison?”

She frowned. “Sort of.” The younger child—boy?—fell off the swing and started to wail. “You're okay, Jackie. Come on over here, and I'll kiss it well.”

The toddler clambered into her lap. “Oof. Careful, kid. Skeezix here doesn't like being kicked. He'd rather do the kicking himself. There, now, is that better?” She kissed the little boy's elbow and cuddled him fondly. He tucked his head into her shoulder, put a thumb in his mouth, and gazed at us. His sister, jealous or uneasy, ran over and hugged her mother's arm, also gazing steadily.

“Something I can do for you?”

I hesitated. “It looks as if you have your hands full there. I wanted to talk to you about your uncle. You don't know me, but Kevin and I were great friends. But maybe I should come back another time—”

Something in the woman's face hardened. The little boy started to wail again. “Sue, why don't you take Jackie in the house and give him some juice?”

“Can I have some, too? And a cookie?”

At the magic word, Jackie sat up, injuries forgotten. Mrs. Harrison sighed. “Yes, but only one. I'm trusting you, now.”

“Okay, Mommy. Here, Jackie.” Full of self-importance, Sue held out her hand to her little brother and led him into the house.

At a gesture from Mrs. Harrison we opened the gate and went into the backyard. She didn't invite us to sit down. “Okay. We've only got a minute. They can deal with a cookie in less time than it takes a vacuum cleaner. What do you want?”

Her voice was as tired as her face.

“Are you sure you don't want us to come back later? Maybe when your husband's home to help with the kids?”

“My husband won't be home. He's decided he'd rather be married to a piece of fluff from his office who doesn't want kids. So say what you want to say and have done with it.”

What I wanted to say after that little outburst was good-bye. I could have kicked myself. I'd forgotten Jerry's scuttlebutt about Mrs. Harrison's marital problems, and now I'd destroyed any chance for friendliness. But we were here. I might as well stick it out, and then maybe I wouldn't have to invade this bitter woman's privacy again.

“It isn't all that important, really, and I'm sorry to bother you. I've just been trying to talk to people, his neighbors and so on, who were close to your uncle in his last weeks. It makes me feel less guilty about not keeping in close touch.”

“I know who you are,” said Mrs. Harrison slowly. “You talk kind of English. You're that woman who moved away, the one he left his money to, aren't you?”

“Umm—he did leave me a small bequest, yes, but—”

“Well, it's more than he did for me. I went to his lawyer and asked. I needed money, and I thought maybe I could get an advance from my inheritance. That's when I found out there wasn't any inheritance. So why should I care about making you feel better?”

“Mrs. Harrison, I'm sorry that you resent me. I never meant to do you any harm, and if I can lend you—”

“Don't call me Mrs. Harrison! I'm taking my own name back. And don't patronize me. My husband's left me, I'm almost due, and I've lost my job. They called it ‘downsizing,' but I know it was because I've got kids. They figured I'd miss too much work. So now I've got to try to find something else, and nobody'll even talk to me until after the baby's born. My dear ex doesn't pay his child support, and I could have used that money he gave you, but forget it. It's a drop in the bucket, anyway.”

“But surely, Mrs.—umm—surely if you needed money that badly, you could have asked your uncle.”

“He was my great-uncle. Not all that close. Anyway, he'd already given me money, and I felt bad about asking for more. Loans, he called them. He was a great guy, don't get me wrong, and I was sorry when he died. But he'd been so generous when he was alive. … I knew he didn't have much left, but I thought he might've left me something, and I could've taken it, now that it wouldn't leave him short.”

The children reappeared, squabbling fiercely. Sue had a bright red stain on her pink T-shirt. “Mommy, Jackie squirted his juice at me! He did it on purpose, too!”

Mrs. Harrison, or whatever she was calling herself now, went back to mothering, her voice gentle again as she dealt with her children.

I looked at Alan. He nodded. We went back to the car and drove off. I doubt if mother and children even noticed.

We barely had time to change clothes and make it to the dean's house a fashionable fifteen minutes late. There was no time to compare ideas or write down the information we had gained.

“A lot to think about” was Alan's only comment.

“We'll sleep on it and get back to work tomorrow.”

Dean Elliot and his wife were charming people, but a good deal more formal than the Foleys. We chatted about inconsequentials over dinner. Kevin's name didn't come up until we were sipping brandy in the elegant living room.

“I'd like to make a toast,” said the dean. “Or perhaps two of them. First, to friends, old and new.” He lifted his glass and nodded gracefully, first to me, then to Alan. “And second, to two very fine scientists and valued colleagues, Frank Martin and Kevin Cassidy.”

If I hadn't suspected what was coming, I'd have disgraced myself with tears. Frank's name, heard unexpectedly, could still do that to me. Fortunately, I'd heard the dean do this sort of thing before, so I was able to lift my glass composedly and join in the toast. I felt Alan's glance, though, and knew that he knew what I was thinking. He usually did.

“How well did you know Kevin, Dean?” I asked when I had put my glass down. I'd had more than enough to drink.

“Not well, really, except by reputation. He'd retired before I came to Randolph, but of course he continued his experimental work until the last few years of his life, so I came across him now and again in the labs. A truly brilliant microbiologist.”

“Frank always said Kevin had the finest mind he'd ever come across. I don't know a lot about the technical aspects of microbiology, of course, but I do know that Kevin could argue circles around anybody, on almost any subject, and leave his opponents laughing when he'd finished demolishing them. We used to have some wonderful parties in the old days, when he was at the top of his form.”

“That, I always think,” said Helen Elliot, “is one of the saddest things about growing old. Kevin was still sharp as a tack, right up to the end, but he'd gotten out of the habit of going places. He used to come to our parties, too, years ago, but I hadn't seen him in, oh, two or three years, I expect. I think his best friends had died off, one by one, and he didn't make new ones once he left the university.”

“The isolation of age,” said Alan, nodding. “I imagine that's what killed him, in the end. He became ill, and there was no one to get him to a doctor in time. Although we have been hearing about some accidents that might have caused the pneumonia.”

“Accidents? How could an accident cause pneumonia?” Helen asked.

“Staying in bed too much, I expect, dear,” said the dean. “Not good for anyone, and very bad for the elderly, whose lungs don't work too efficiently anyway. But I never heard that Kevin was prone to accidents.”

“We'd lost touch, both of us,” said Helen, shaking her head. “I felt so badly about it when it was too late.”

We commiserated with each other over our mutual feelings of guilt, and then changed the subject to something more cheerful. I drank some more brandy, against my better judgment, and let Alan drive us home.

We slept late the next morning under the influence partly of the brandy and partly of the weather. The beautiful spell we'd been having had broken during the night. We woke to dismal clouds and steady rain, and went back to sleep again.

When I finally roused myself, I took a couple of aspirin for my headache and made coffee in the little appliance provided by a thoughtful management. I poured a cup for Alan and handed it to him in bed.

“Here. Restorative.”

Alan, thank heaven, is not the chatty sort first thing in the morning. I surface slowly, myself, and cannot abide bright cheeriness until I've had at least one cup of coffee.

“Not a very pleasant day” was Alan's first comment, when we had both ingested sufficient caffeine to be more or less human.

“No.” I yawned hugely. “I'm sorely tempted to crawl back into bed.”

“We-ell …,” said Alan, patting the pillow next to him and giving his best imitation of a leer.

“Not this morning, love, I've got a headache.”

And then I heard what I'd said, and we broke into giggles at the stale old line, and by the time we recovered, we were both wide awake.

“Very well, what
shall
we do today? I categorically refuse to go out. And I may say, by the way, that I am sorely disappointed by this rain. You, my dear, quite clearly gave me to understand that the weather in America is always fine.”

“Almost always. Except in the fall, of course. And the spring. And sometimes in summer. And then of course in winter we get some snow, and a fair amount of sleet. But most of the time, it's beautiful.”

“Anything you say, dear. To get back to the subject at hand—”

“I think it's time to put what we've got in logical order and see if there's a pattern. We've been running around talking to everybody we can think of. Let's see if we've accomplished anything.”