A Killer Kebab

by Susannah Hardy

  Dolly grew quiet. When I glanced over, I saw that she’d closed her eyes. That was good. She needed all the rest she could get.

  Fifteen minutes later, we arrived at the medical offices. When the car stopped, she woke up.

  “We’re here. You ready?” I asked.

  “Let’s get this over with.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  We let the nurse at the window know Dolly was here, then sat down in the waiting room chairs. I picked up a magazine but wasn’t interested in any of the articles so I set it back down. Dolly watched the fish tank. I guess the movement and the colorful fish were supposed to keep us calm. I was nervous for Dolly. I couldn’t imagine how she herself must be feeling.

  Finally, a nurse with a clipboard in her hand appeared at the inner door. “Mrs. Riley? The doctor is ready for you.”

  We made our way through the door and down an interior hallway to an examining room. “You staying?” the nurse asked me.

  I looked at Dolly. She nodded.

  “Yes,” I said. I rubbed Dolly’s upper arm, hoping to give her moral support.

  “Strip from the waist up,” she said to Dolly, “and put on the johnny. We’ll be back in a couple of minutes.” She shut the door, and I could hear the clipboard being slid into place in its holder outside.

  I turned away while Dolly undressed. She got herself covered up with the johnny, and I helped her climb up onto the paper-covered examining table, then folded her clothes neatly and set them on one of the chairs.

  Dr. Phelps came in, reading Dolly’s chart. He looked at me oddly. Maybe it was strange for someone who wasn’t a relative to attend a patient’s examination. But I didn’t care. Dolly was family.

  “How are you feeling, Dolly?” he asked.

  “Better,” she said. “Less coughing. More energy.”

  “Good, good. Let’s have a listen.” He placed his stethoscope on her chest, just inside the thin cotton garment. “Deep breath. Or deep as you can.” He moved the stethoscope to a new position on her chest and repeated the order, then moved to her back. He closed his eyes, listening.

  “Very good. You’re not clear yet, but you’re definitely on the mend. We’ll get you another chest x-ray to completely rule out pneumonia before you leave.” He wrote something on the clipboard.

  Dolly looked at me. Her brave front had crumbled, just a little. Ask him, she mouthed to me.

  I nodded. There weren’t a whole lot of people I would do this for, but Dolly was one of them. “Uh, Doctor? Did the prior x-ray show . . . anything else?”

  He looked at us, then reviewed his chart. He must have already known the answer, but I was grateful that he was double-checking.

  The doctor gave Dolly a smile. “No. Your lungs aren’t perfect, but as long as you’re asymptomatic, we’ll just monitor you. I’ll expect you in here for a physical every year for the duration.”

  Dr. Phelps’s duration was probably quite a bit shorter than Dolly’s. But I was so relieved, I could have kissed him.

  “Your blood pressure and cholesterol are a little high. We’ll talk about that when you come in next week for your final recheck.”

  Dolly’s face creased into a huge smile that showed all her dentures to perfection. “Okay, Doc,” she said.

  Dr. Phelps wrote something else on his clipboard, then turned to me. “Mrs. Nik—”

  “Nikolopatos. And yes?” I still hadn’t decided if I was keeping my married name when I was no longer married, or going back to my maiden name, Bartlett. I hadn’t been Georgiana Gertrude Bartlett in a lot of years. And I was pretty sure I wasn’t that person anymore. Nor was I Georgiana Nikolopatos, except on paper.

  “Let’s leave Mrs. Riley to get dressed. I’d like to talk to you.”

  I looked at Dolly, who said, “Go on. I’ll meet you in the waiting room.”

  Dr. Phelps led me to his office and asked me to sit. My heart was in my throat. Why would he want to speak to me privately?

  “First of all, what happened to you? That’s quite a bruise you have on your cheek.”

  “I, uh, took a tumble. It looks worse than it is.” I wasn’t sure if I should reveal anything, now that there was an active police investigation. He looked at me pointedly, no doubt assessing whether I needed some kind of battered woman intervention. And I was sure he knew that I’d found Jim MacNamara’s body, and that Franco Riccardi had been sent to the ER from my restaurant. So whatever suspicions he had, well, there was probably a grain—or more—of truth to them.

  “I’ll advise you to get yourself checked out. Now, for the second thing. You know I went out to Castle Grant to examine your mother, her assistant, and Liza Grant?”

  “Yes, and I want to thank you for that, and for arranging for the nurse. It’s a load off my mind knowing they’re being cared for.”

  The wrinkles on the doctor’s face got deeper, if that were possible. “You also know I’m bound by patient confidentiality. However, when your mother was here a few weeks ago with her gunshot wound, she signed a release authorizing you to receive any and all information about her health care.”

  She had? I was her next of kin, of course, but I might have expected that honor to go to Caitlyn Black. “Okay,” I said, waiting for whatever he was about to tell me.

  “So you understand that I’m only speaking about your mother, and not about either of the other two ladies, right?” His eyes bored into mine.

  A finger of dread poked around in my gut. “Okay,” I repeated.

  “When I examined your mother, my initial diagnosis was food poisoning.”

  “That’s what I understood.” Initial diagnosis? Was there another one?

  “I sent out some samples for testing. I was going to call you with the results, but you’ve saved me the trouble. The preliminary results are in.”

  The lump in my throat was the size of a grapefruit. I looked him in the eye. “And?” It came out as barely a whisper.

  He held my gaze. “Your mother has been poisoned.”

  “Right. Food poisoning.” Why the need for the dramatic statement? We knew that.

  “Not food poisoning. Poison was put into her food, systematically over a course of days. It’s a good thing Ms. Grant called when she did.”

  I was gobsmacked. “You mean, poison as in Lucretia Borgia and old-fashioned crime novels, and Arsenic and Old Lace? Are you certain?”

  He nodded. “Unfortunately, yes. We’re still determining the exact chemical makeup of the poison. There are traces of a sedative in her samples as well.”

  Poison. The doctor could only talk to me about Melanie. But it was clear Caitlyn and Liza were suffering from the same thing. “The nurse I sent has been instructed to keep them on clear liquids from sealed bottles. She understands the situation.”

  “Did you call the police? Are they going to be all right?”

  Dr. Phelps’s face was neutral. He’d had fifty or so years of practice calming patients and families. “I do have a call in to the state police. And as long as your mother doesn’t ingest any more of the toxin, I believe she’ll be all right.”

  “I need to get them off that island. Bring them back where I can look after them. Can I move them?”

  Dr. Phelps looked grim. “Normally, I’d say yes, though your mother will likely get even more nauseous from the boat ride. But have you seen the weather forecast? There’s a storm coming in this afternoon. You know how the river gets in late fall and winter. I wouldn’t risk it.”

  “But someone’s doing this to them—her. I’m sure your nurse is very good, but she’s not law enforcement.” And she’s not me.

  “My suggestion is to call the police. Tell them you need help and see what they offer. Maybe they can get an emergency boat out there. Or call the Coast Guard.”

  His words were like a punch to the gut. Where was Jack when I needed him? But
I knew I wasn’t being fair. He was doing his job, and our relationship was very new.

  “I still think leaving them where they are, at least until the storm passes, is your best bet.”

  “Thanks, Doctor. I should go now. Dolly’s waiting.” Dr. Phelps was right. Until the weather was better, I shouldn’t try to move them. If we got into any kind of trouble, if the waves were bad or the boat took on water, they would be too weak to help themselves. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t go to them. Make sure that they weren’t administered anything else. Try to figure out who was behind this. And that was what I meant to do. But first I had some wheels to set in motion.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  While Dolly used the restroom at the doctor’s office, I went out into the hall and used the time to make another phone call. Fortunately Marielle Riccardi was between classes, so she was able to speak immediately. Marielle had known about her father’s recipe, but had not considered it as a cause for his attack, or the attack on me. She didn’t know where the recipe was, but she agreed with my idea on her father’s behalf. My asking was merely a courtesy. Franco had told me what his intention was with regard to the recipe days ago, and I could not imagine him going back on that. This was the quickest way I knew to bring at least this part of the problems in Bonaparte Bay to a head.

  I called Kim Galbraith and asked her to call Alice Getz, the new reporter for the Bay Blurb. If all went according to plan, Alice would immediately start posting teasers on the Blurb’s social media pages.

  When Dolly finally came out, I helped her into her coat and took her home. I quickly made sure she had lunch and didn’t need me to do anything else for her. And then I peeled out and raced back to town.

  The promised storm had not yet hit, but appeared to be imminent, based on the dull metal gray of the sky and the darker gray of the clouds. This would be lake effect snow, and chances were good there’d be a lot of it. When storm winds blew across Lake Ontario, they picked up water, which would then crystallize and fall as snow when the air hit land. Bonaparte Bay got its share of snow over the long North Country winters. But just a few miles south, snowfall amounts increased a lot. By January, it was nothing for snowfall amounts to reach three feet or more, and surface air temperatures to reach into the minus twenties, even lower.

  But the forecast for today was for high winds and only a few inches of snow. To get me to Valentine Island and Castle Grant, I needed a boat and someone who knew what she was doing. I dialed Brenda Jones.

  Brenda, bless her, didn’t ask any questions. I was in luck, because she hadn’t yet pulled her boat from the water. This would be the last excursion she would make, she said, until spring, and she’d need to pull the boat immediately after. We agreed to meet at the docks in an hour. “Dress warm,” she said, and rang off.

  As anxious as I was to get to the castle, I forced myself to slow down and think. I let myself into the Bonaparte House, locked the door behind me, then set about gathering my winter gear. I didn’t participate in any winter sports—unless you counted Staying Warm, Deciding Whether to Drink Wine or Eat Chocolate, and Reading Historical Romance Novels, all of which would make excellent Winter Olympics events, in my opinion. But I did have all the basic gear—waterproof boots, parka, hat, and gloves. And Cal, who was a skier, had some bibs in her closet. They would probably be too small, but I only needed to stay dry for a few minutes as we crossed the water.

  I set about gathering up what I needed. I had my phone and a charger in case it decided to croak on me, as well as a little pistol that Sophie’s cousin Marina had given me. I’d never fired it, and it wasn’t even loaded—I’d had Dolly check it for me one day. But I could bluff or scare someone with it. Maybe.

  It took most of the half hour, but I finally had all my stuff assembled. I thought about calling to let Liza or the nurse know I was coming, but my gut told me it would be better to surprise them. If, by some chance, the poisoner was still on the island—and there were plenty of places someone could hide—why take a chance on tipping him off?

  I suited up. The bibs were too small, as I’d anticipated, but by not zipping the front and by sitting gently so as not to rip out the seat, I thought they’d be all right. Certainly better than nothing. I put on the boots, then layered on the parka and the rest. I was already too warm. And I probably looked like the puffy guy in those tire commercials. But I was no fashion plate, never had been, and wasn’t about to start now.

  Before I left for the dock, there was one more thing I had to do. I pulled up the Bay Blurb’s social media page on my phone and felt like cheering. The accountant and the reporter had come through. Pinned to the top of the page was the following post:

  TI Mystery Solved. First Clue: 1 Cup Mayonnaise. Stay tuned.

  Every hour for the next five hours, Alice would release another ingredient until all six had been revealed. And in two days’ time, a feature story would appear on the front page of the Blurb, giving the mixing instructions as well as the history of the recipe and a scan of the original in May Irwin’s handwriting, which Alice would try to verify if she was able to find another sample.

  There were already some comments. None of them correct. But once the next clue, ½ Cup Ketchup, came out, people would begin to understand. Then there would be no stopping it. The recipe would belong to the people of the Thousand Islands, which was as it should be. I hoped Sophia LaLonde and May Irwin would approve.

  I zipped up, just as my phone rang. The display read MacNamara and MacNamara. I connected the call.

  “Georgie? It’s Lydia at the law office. Ben wants to see you. Can you drop by now for a couple of minutes? He says it’s urgent.” Her tone said she didn’t quite believe him.

  “I’ve got twenty minutes before I need to be somewhere. I’m on my way.”

  Had Ben heard about the Blurb social media page already? It was entirely possible, though the one clue posted so far was fairly obscure. Just how valuable was this licensing or trademarking thing anyway?

  When I reached the office, I took off and hung up my parka, but left the bibs and boots on. They were too hard to get into and out of. Lydia said, under her breath, “Sorry. I don’t know what’s going on with him today.”

  I shrugged. I was pretty sure I’d forced his hand, and now I wanted to see what cards he had on the table. Lydia pressed a button on her phone and told Junior I was here.

  “Send her in now,” I heard him say.

  Since his father died, Ben had moved into his father’s larger, swankier office. “Sit,” he commanded. I chose the chair in front of the desk. I remembered what Lydia had said. Even bundled up as I was, there was no way I was sitting on that couch.

  “What is it?” I said. “I have to be somewhere in fifteen minutes, so can we make this quick?” I knew I was needling him and didn’t care. Lydia was right outside the door. If she was anything like me, she’d be listening in.

  “We can make it very quick,” he said. “If you just give me the copy of the recipe you have and tell me who else you gave it to. I know you’ve got something.” His face was tinged with red. “The recipe. The one you almost found yesterday, until I got there before you did. I saw that post on the Blurb page. You’re releasing it in pieces.”

  “Where’s yours? And how do you even know I’ve got the right one? Of course, in about four hours, you’ll know for sure. But then it will be too late. It’ll already be out there.”

  “I’ve got mine. I want to know where you got yours.”

  “What are you planning to do with it anyway? There’s a rumor going around town that you’re working on some trademarking deal for Angela Wainwright. The version she uses isn’t the same as the Sophia LaLonde recipe, you know.”

  “Client. Confidentiality,” he ground out.

  “You got some kind of trademarking, or licensing deal? Who’s it with, that it’s worth this much potential grief? Because I know it was you who
shoved me into a dumbwaiter and cut the rope. I could have been paralyzed. Even died.” No reaction from the Boy Wonder. I had started out bluffing, but the more I thought about it, the more I thought I was right. “How’d you know I was at the Casa anyway?”

  “Shut. Up. You are not calling the shots, you understand?” His face got redder. If he hadn’t been so young, I would have been afraid his blood pressure was out of control.

  “If you say so. What were you, watching the parking lot to see who went in? Did you leave some evidence there you didn’t want the cops, or anyone else to find from when you beat up poor Franco?” I had no idea if he’d done the beating himself, or if he’d hired someone to do it. He was just as guilty either way.

  “You’re ruining everything!” he said.

  That was a bold statement. Everything? I felt almost proud of myself, as though I were some supervillain in a comic book.

  “Yeah, well, sorry. Getting beat up has that effect on me. How’d you get into the locked building anyway?”

  He said nothing. Then I remembered. Franco had said, what seemed like eons ago, that Ben had worked for him at the Casa. “There must be another way in. Maybe through one of the adjoining buildings?” I’d lived over the restaurant too and hadn’t known about any other entrance, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t true.

  I stood.

  Ben came around the desk, lightning fast, and grabbed me by the suspenders of the bib overalls. I nearly went down, but managed to stay upright by spinning around hard. I gave a shove to his chest and Ben fell. I started to run for the office door, but he grabbed my ankles and pulled me to the ground with him. I fell on my face. The side without the bruise. So now I’d have a matched set. The rest of my body was fairly well padded by all the winter clothing.