Murder in G Major (A Gethsemane Brown Mystery Book 1)

by Alexia Gordon

  “I, uh, found the bottle of Waddell and Dobb used to poison Eamon.”

  “You found the bottle. Care to tell me where?”

  “Not especially.”

  Kildare raised a hand to cover a grin.

  O’Reilly raised an eyebrow. “Go on.”

  “Long story short, Eamon and Oisin were both poisoned with digitalis.”

  O’Reilly set the toxicology report on his desk. “This is when I mention ‘chain of custody.’ How many hands did this bottle pass through before you ‘found’ it?”

  “Um…”

  “That many. Which means—”

  Gethsemane raised a hand. “I know, I know. You can’t use the evidence because the bottle could have been tampered with. It wasn’t but it could have been.”

  “You’re learning.”

  Kildare picked up the report. “Hmm. Let’s assume the lady’s right—”

  Gethsemane smiled and bobbed her head. “Yes, let’s.”

  Kildare continued. “The same poison killed both Ardmore and McCarthy.”

  “Years apart,” O’Reilly said.

  “True. But what if your—our—murderer figured he’d gotten away with one digitalis murder so why not stick with the tried and true? Any connection between the murdered men?”

  “Yeah,” O’Reilly said. “Half the village. Ardmore hailed from Dunmullach.”

  “Oisin was murdered in his dorm room wasn’t he?” Gethsemane asked. “Whoever killed him had to have access to his dorm.”

  “My nephew’s finishing his first year at uni,” Kildare said. “I visited him once. His lodging was like a bloody train depot. Always people in and out. Not always people he knew.”

  “Maybe our poisoner’s not a ‘he,’ Donny.”

  “What’re you thinking?”

  “Not to get too detailed in mixed company,” O’Reilly nodded at Gethsemane, “but let’s be honest, Donny. When you and I were at university we had our fair share of people in and out of our lodgings.”

  “And?”

  “And more than a few of them were of the fairer sex.”

  Eamon materialized in the entryway as soon as Gethsemane opened the door.

  “Where the hell have you been?”

  “Hello to you too. You know I went to the police station.”

  “For this long? I thought the killer had finished what he started up on Golgotha.”

  “I stopped to see O’Reilly. He introduced me to his buddy, Inspector Kildare. He’s with the Cork An Garda Síochána cold case unit.”

  “Don’t talk to me about O’Reilly.” Eamon glowed blue. “Feckin’ eejit wouldn’t suss a murder if it happened on his front porch.”

  “He believes.”

  “What?”

  “O’Reilly believes. He believes you and Orla were murdered. He’s reopened your case.”

  “Holy Mary, Mother of—Whoo hoo!” A bright red aura replaced the blue and the full spectrum of his cologne—leather, oakmoss, fern, pepper, hay—permeated the room. “I’ve waited twenty-five years for that. Thank you, darlin’, thank you. How’d you change his mind?”

  “By being knocked unconscious and nearly immolated.”

  Eamon, a somber yellow, hugged Gethsemane and kissed her forehead. Her skin buzzed where his melded into hers. “I am sorry for that, darlin’. I’d rather roam the earth until three days after doomsday than see you come to harm.”

  “Hey—” Gethsemane’s voice cracked. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Takes more than a desperate serial killer to stop Gethsemane Brown.” She tapped her bandage. “There’s more. Kildare thinks whoever poisoned Oisin Ardmore also poisoned you. I agree with him. Question is, who hated both of you enough to kill you?”

  “No one,” Eamon said. “Not that I can think of. Oisin and I weren’t close.”

  “You must have had a common enemy. Someone who you both knew. Think, Irish.”

  “I am thinking. There’s no—” Eamon vanished then reappeared by the window. Gethsemane could see through his chest out the window to the distant cliffs. “There’s no one I can think of. No one in common.”

  “Did you know your aura turns gray when you lie?”

  “I’m not lying. I can’t think of anyone who’d want to kill us.”

  “Hurt you, then. Make you sick. Or make Oisin sick and kill you. Or make you sick and kill Oisin. I doubt digitalis poisoning is an exact science. Who disliked one or both of you enough to be willing to risk killing you to punish you?”

  “No. One. No one, I tell you.”

  “Who are you protecting, Eamon? The man or woman who killed your wife? The person who followed Orla up to the cliffs, put their hands on her back, and pushed—”

  “Stop it! Just—stop.” Eamon pointed at a bookcase. A slim volume of Orla’s poetry floated down and fell open to a photograph tucked between the pages. “Orla loved this snap. The four of us home from university, Orla and me from Trinity and Peg and Oisin from Cork. Peg convinced us to sign up for the Michaelmas Festival field games. We were happy, Peg, Orla, and I. Even Oisin seemed—well, he’d left the drugs alone. We had a grand time. Orla wrote one of her earliest published poems about that day.”

  Gethsemane examined the photo. A young Orla and Pegeen stood arm-in-arm, flanked by equally youthful Eamon and Oisin. Bows and arrow-filled quivers lay at the boys’ feet. Trophies stood at Pegeen and Orla’s. Trophies like the one Headmaster Riordan held in the newspaper photo in the library’s Dispatch archives. “Archery trophies.”

  “Aye. Peg and Orla took first and second in the women’s division.” Eamon laughed and glowed brighter. “Orla’s win was a fluke. She hit home with her poetry, but when it came to sports her aim was as accurate as a clock without hands. Peg came by her win honest, though. She was captain of the women’s archery team at University College.”

  Gethsemane placed the photo back in the book and closed it. She traced the title—Poems of Love and Friendship—with her finger before she spoke. “Eamon, you said Pegeen and Oisin dated for a while. Why’d they break up?”

  “Dunno. No particular reason. Just one of those college romances that burns bright like an ember and flames out just as fast.”

  “Just one of those things.” She recalled Shakespearean levels of drama during her Vassar days when college romances ended. “Who dumped whom?”

  “Didn’t pay much attention. Oisin, I think.”

  “Your best friend gets her heart broken and you don’t pay attention?”

  “I thought she was worlds better off without Oisin. I told you I didn’t much care for him. I’m pretty sure I told Peg so. She’d have confided in Orla.”

  “Why are men so clueless?”

  “It wasn’t a big deal. Peg grieved for a week or so then never brought it up again.”

  “She didn’t try to kill herself?”

  “No, of course not. Why would she?”

  “For the same reason she tried to kill herself when you married Orla. That is why she missed your wedding, isn’t it? I saw the newspaper coverage of the day. All those photos and Pegeen’s not in a single one. I’m not crazy about weddings, but I wouldn’t miss my two best friends’ big day without a good reason. Like being on suicide watch in a mental health facility.”

  “How do you know Peg tried to kill herself?”

  “St. Dymphna’s. I read some charts before I got clobbered. Pegeen’s. Nuala’s. Their mother’s. Yours.”

  “You neglected to tell me.”

  “We’re even. You neglected to tell me you’d been committed to St. Dymphna’s.”

  “Voluntarily admitted. I was exhausted. I needed a rest. No big deal. Nothing sinister.”

  “Pegeen’s admission was anything but voluntary. She didn’t check herself in
for a ‘rest.’ I’m a psychiatrist’s daughter. I know what prompts involuntary commitment. A doctor or a judge determines a patient is a danger to self or others.”

  “That was ages ago. Ancient history. What’s it matter now?”

  “It matters your best friend attempted suicide on your wedding day. We’re not talking got drunk and threw up on the bride. We’re talking almost ended her own life. Something triggered her. Something drastic.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t know or won’t say?”

  “Don’t know. She never told me why she tried to kill herself. I didn’t even find out until after I returned from my honeymoon. Nuala had gotten into some trouble in Limerick. I thought Peg had gone to fetch her.”

  “Guess, then.”

  “I can’t guess. I can’t fathom why she’d want to end her own life.”

  “I’ll guess. I guess you and Pegeen had an affair. I guess you broke it off to marry Orla. I guess Pegeen doesn’t handle rejection well, that she takes after her mother in that respect. She—”

  “Shut up! Don’t you say such things.” Eamon vanished, replaced by a blue-white orb which glowed like the Holy Spirit on the apostles at Pentecost. The orb hovered an inch from Gethsemane’s nose, sizzling and popping. The smell of burnt leather blasted her full in the face. She fell back on the sofa and shielded herself with her arm.

  “Okay, I’m sorry, I take it back. You never had an affair with Pegeen. Calm down.”

  Eamon re-materialized but remained blue. “I never had an affair with anyone. You know I’d have died before I’d cheated on Orla. Pegeen and I were only friends and never more than that. Could never be anything more than friends.”

  “Did Pegeen know that?”

  Eamon looked at the bar. “God, I wish I could have a drink.”

  “What happened on your wedding day, Eamon?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Eamon, what happened?”

  “Not on my wedding day.” Eamon’s shoulders slumped. “On the eve of my wedding. I spent the day up at the lighthouse, hiding from Orla’s wedding-happy female relations. When I came home that evening I found Peg waiting for me. In my bed. Starkers.”

  “Naked in your bed meant she wanted out of the friend zone. Then what happened?”

  “Then I made her put her clothes on and I took her home. Nothing more. I swear by all that’s holy, I took her home and left her there.”

  “And the next morning she poisons herself.”

  “I didn’t know what she was going to do, did I? If I’d had any idea—”

  “Damn.” Gethsemane ran to the bookcase. “Stupid, stupid girl.” She scanned the shelves.

  “What’re you doing?” Eamon asked.

  “Looking for—” Gethsemane pulled a heavy volume down and flipped through pages.

  Eamon appeared next to her. “A dictionary?”

  Gethsemane kept flipping pages. “Pegeen drank foxglove tea.” She ran her finger along a page. “Here it is. Foxglove. A plant belonging to the genus digitalis, principally Digitalis purpurea. Chemical constituents include digitoxin, digitonin, digitalin…It’s digitalis in plant form.” Gethsemane closed the book. “Pegeen attempted suicide by overdosing on digitalis, the same drug used to poison both you and Oisin Ardmore. Nuala tried to tell me with her tea party stunt. The foxglove in the sandwiches tasted the same as the digitalis in your bourbon—bitter and slightly spicy—because they were the same thing.”

  Eamon went back to the window. “I don’t like where this is going.”

  “Pegeen was a champion archer,” Gethsemane said. “Siobhan was killed with an arrow.”

  “Could be a coincidence. Bashing in a skull with a cricket bat requires no special skill. Neither does pushing a woman off a cliff.”

  “Which means Pegeen could have done both.” Gethsemane spoke more to herself than Eamon, “But what about the pharmacy?”

  Eamon kept his face to the window. Gethsemane strained to hear his whisper.

  “Peg worked at Fitzgerald’s over summers to earn money for school. That’s where she met Oisin.”

  Gethsemane smacked her forehead. “Nuala, again. She didn’t care what Agatha Christie did in the war. She ratted on her sister. She wanted me to know Pegeen worked as a pharmacy assistant. That’s how she learned about poisons. It’s also how she got easy access to drugs. I bet Aoife’s logbooks would have shown Pegeen was the assistant on duty when the drugs went missing from inventory.”

  “I wish you’d stop saying those things. Pegeen was my friend. Orla’s too.”

  “Your friend was in love with you and humiliated herself trying to make you love her. You rejected her.”

  Eamon protested.

  Gethsemane held up a hand. “I don’t mean you deliberately tried to hurt her. You did her a favor. But in her mind you rejected her. Oisin rejected her. Her father rejected her. Her mother responded to rejection with homicidal violence. Pegeen took a page from mom’s playbook.”

  Eamon said nothing.

  Gethsemane paced and chewed her thumbnail. “But how’d she manage the explosion?”

  “Her father,” Eamon said.

  “Her father?”

  “Joe Sullivan used pyrotechnics in his magic shows. Eileen’s father supplied them. Whenever Joe performed in town, Pegeen and Nuala would help him set up his shows. It was the only way they could spend time with him.”

  “Meaning Pegeen knew how to shut Aoife up and at the same time keep anyone from ever seeing the evidence against her. Poor Teague was just collateral damage.”

  “Peg hated Teague. He said some ugly things about Nuala once. Peg never forgave him.”

  “Or a bonus.” Gethsemane slammed her fist into her palm. “Damn. I bet a first class ticket to Boston Pegeen used her own records as kindling for that fire she started at St. Dymphna’s. She destroyed all hard evidence linking her to digitalis, in pill and plant form. Everything else is just circumstantial.”

  “Don’t you sound the right legal eagle?”

  “My eldest sister married a judge.” Gethsemane resumed pacing. “Pegeen Sullivan has gotten away with murder for forty years. There’s got to be something to use against her, some way to stop her.”

  “There is. Let O’Reilly do his job.”

  “I don’t even know if O’Reilly considers Pegeen a suspect. We didn’t until just now. Of course, I’ll tell O’Reilly Pegeen’s the killer…”

  Eamon’s aura turned blue-yellow. “Stop it. Stop talking.”

  “But I need something to show him. He definitely falls into the seeing is believing category.”

  Eamon materialized in front of Gethsemane so close she walked through him. Her skin sizzled. Her head spun.

  “Please stop,” Eamon said. “Please. Just. Stop. Talking. I’ve known Pegeen Sullivan her whole life, I counted her among my closest friends. Now to find out—to think she—just…Stop.” Eamon vanished.

  “Eamon?”

  No answer. Silence. No cologne, no orbs. Gethsemane picked up the photograph of Eamon, Orla, Oisin, and their killer. They stood close, beaming at the camera, carefree, with no idea that three of them would die at the hands of the fourth.

  “Why’d she wait ten years?”

  Gethsemane yelped and dropped the photo.

  Eamon appeared in front of her. “Orla and I were married for ten years. If my rejection of her and marriage to Orla drove Pegeen to kill me and my wife, why’d she wait ten years to do it?”

  “She was hospitalized after her suicide attempt.”

  “For weeks, not years.”

  Gethsemane snapped her fingers. “Maybe the hospital she went to for medical stabilization before being transferred to St. Dymphna’s would still have the records. The lab reports would show
a high digitalis level in her blood. How long do they keep records at non-psychiatric hospitals in Ireland?”

  “Don’t change the subject.”

  “I’m not changing the subject. I don’t know why she waited. I’m not privy to the inner workings of the jealous serial murdering mind.”

  “Explain the gap. If Pegeen killed out of jealousy, why’d she wait so long?”

  “Revenge is a dish best served cold?”

  Eamon shook his head.

  “Tell you what. I’ll ask her.”

  “The feck you will.” Blue surrounded Eamon’s head. “Not two minutes ago you tell me my oldest friend is a deranged killer who murdered me, my wife, and a string of others. Then you say you’ll ask her if she did it as calmly as asking to borrow the sugar? Have her over for a cuppa and ask if there’s anything she wants to get off her chest? Are you not the full bloody shilling?”

  “I’m all twelve pence, thanks.”

  “Stay away from Pegeen.”

  “I’ll stay away from Pegeen if I can figure out how to get her to confess without going near her.”

  “Bloody hell, woman.” Eamon threw up his hands.

  “Face it, Irish, we have to get Pegeen to confess. She’s destroyed the evidence against her. A confession is the only way to stop her.”

  “Oh, no.” Eamon waved a finger. “Don’t you go ‘we’-ing. I’ll have no part of this.”

  “You’re skeptical of Pegeen’s guilt and you’re one of the people she murdered. As hard as it is to convince you, how much harder will it be to convince a jury? A half competent lawyer might have her dancing a jig down Main Street in less time than it took to bring the case to trial.”

  “So let the garda get a confession.”

  “Sure. After I convince O’Reilly to suspect her and after he gathers enough evidence—oh yeah, there isn’t any left—to get an arrest warrant and after he arrests her and she lawyers up and blah, blah, blah. She could have killed a dozen people by then. Confession first, then O’Reilly.”

  “She doesn’t need to kill a dozen people, she only needs to kill you. If you’re right about her—and I’ll reluctantly admit you probably—”