Blood Orange: A China Bayles Mystery

by Susan Wittig Albert

  I thought of Ramona, the other woman, and remembered once again that I was her alibi for the time of Kelly’s car wreck. But I wasn’t going to say a word about that to Lara. I sat back in the seat, thinking quickly.

  Lara’s sad news, clad in the utter finality of death, changed things substantially. The records I had on my computer were Kelly’s, the documentation for a whistle-blower case that had the potential of a substantial reward, if she had prevailed. But it might also be important evidence in a criminal case. That’s where this thing seemed headed now.

  I said, “Listen, Lara, I wonder if we could put our heads together for ten or fifteen minutes. There’s something I want to show you. I’m headed home, but I could stop at the hospital, if you’re going to be there. It’s on my way.”

  “I’ll be here until Kelly’s mother is ready to leave,” she said. Then, more hopefully, “What do you want to show me? Have you learned something?”

  “You’ll understand when you see it,” I said. At least, I hoped she would. “Where can we meet?”

  “Kelly is in Intensive Care, in the first floor wing. I told her mother I’d wait for her in the lounge at the south end of the main corridor. Do you know where that is?”

  “I do,” I said. “I’ll see you there in about ten minutes.” I clicked off the call and sat there, thinking of Kelly, remembering the last time I had seen her, bright and full of life. And now—

  I turned the key in the ignition. And now that lovely young woman was dead, and the thought that her death might profit a killer was like sharp, hot acid at the back of my throat.

  Chapter Twelve

  The familiar marigold (Tagetes sp.) has a rich history. The original wild marigolds of Mexico (T. erecta, often called African marigolds) grow three to four feet high, with large orange flowers streaked with red. For the Aztecs, who practiced ritual human sacrifice, the orange marigold was flor de muerto, the flower of death. The streaks of red in the blossoms symbolized blood, while the brilliant orange color represented the House of the Sun, where sacrificial victims spent the afterlife.

  In today’s Mexico, the marigold is a central symbol in the Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). In the rituals of this ancient celebration, the scent of the flower and its bright orange color are thought to guide the spirits of the dead to the family’s altar, where they can rejoin the living.

  China Bayles

  “The Dia de los Muertos”

  Pecan Springs Enterprise

  The Adams County Hospital is in the process of adding a new wing. The project has been under construction for the past six months or so, and a big section of the main parking lot is closed off. I managed to find a space within walking distance, shouldered my laptop case and my purse, and set off.

  The two-story hospital is built of red brick and set back from the street behind a sweeping lawn and a row of beautiful old live oaks. Located just a half block from the Pecan River, the old building has a mannerly, gracious look about it, the way hospitals used to look in decades past. For a while, there was talk of constructing a shiny new hospital on I-35, complete with every gizmo known to modern medicine. But as medical facilities in Austin and San Antonio expanded, competing with them began to seem less like a good idea, and wiser heads prevailed. The hospital board compromised by adding a second wing on the west side of the main building to match the utilitarian, one-story wing that angles off to the east. There will be enough beds to suit the community’s needs without going broke in the process.

  I stopped at the nurses’ station at the entrance to the wing. Helen Berger, a friend and fellow member of the herb guild, was on duty, in maroon scrubs with her hair pinned up. She looked up from her work and saw me.

  “Hello, China. Haven’t seen you here for quite a while.”

  “Since Caitie had her tonsils out last summer,” I replied, with a little smile. “Thanks for being so sweet to her.” Caitie had been kept overnight, and with Helen’s help, we’d made a little party for her with balloons, party hats, and ice cream.

  “Caitie’s a lovely little girl. And so talented—her violin, I mean. My daughter tells me that my grandson, Kevin, has quite a crush on her.”

  A boy has a crush on my Caitie? I wanted to whimper, “Oh, no, I’m not ready for this!” But I managed to gulp back the words, and say, “Kevin is your grandson?” in something like well-behaved surprise. “Congratulations to him, by the way,” I added. “Caitie tells me that he’s been promoted to concertmaster.”

  “Yes, for now, at least. He’s afraid Caitie will snatch it back.” Helen chuckled. “Actually, I was glad to hear that. Kevin is inclined to be lazy. A little competition from Caitie might push him to try harder—test himself. Kids need that sometimes.” She glanced at the clock. “Visiting hours are just ending. Did you want to see one of our patients?”

  “I’m meeting a friend of Kelly Kaufman’s in the lounge. Lara Metcalf.” I gave her a crooked smile, and added, lightly, “Do I need a hall pass?”

  Helen lifted an eyebrow, and said, “Of course not.” Then she added soberly, “Such a terrible, terrible thing, Kelly’s accident. She was a wonderful nurse, you know. Everyone who’s had any experience with the hospice speaks very highly of her. We’re all in a state of shock.”

  I heard the past tense and regretted my flip question about the hall pass. “Kelly’s . . . gone, then?” I asked hesitantly.

  Helen nodded, pressing her lips together. “She was removed from life support just a few moments ago. I’m afraid there was never any question, China. Her injuries were just too severe.”

  “Thank you,” I said, and turned away. There was nothing more I could say.

  The overhead fluorescents cast an unfriendly glare on the polished floor of the long, gray-painted hallway. Since visiting hours were over, it was deserted, and most of the doors were closed. And then, halfway down the hall, one of them opened and a woman came out, turned, and began walking toward me. I didn’t recognize her until we were almost face-to-face. It was Marla Blake, whom I hadn’t seen since we worked together on a couple of projects for the Friends of the Library.

  “China Bayles, isn’t it?” she said, stopping. She was dressed in a chic gray jogging suit, with a nifty little University of Texas emblem on the zipper top and the word Longhorns striped vertically on her right leg, expensive-looking orange-and-white running shoes, and a fanny pack. She was wearing her dark hair differently—a sleek, short bob with bangs that looked almost like a wig—and she’d lost quite a lot of weight since I last saw her. Her eyes were dark and shadowed and her cheekbones were even more clearly defined in her angular face, and there was a gaunt look about her. I wondered if she had been ill. But she still held her mouth with the firm determination I remembered from our time together, and she wore the same impatient expression, as though she were on her way somewhere, on some sort of important mission, and disliked being interrupted before she got there. She had always been wound tight with a nervous energy. Tonight, she seemed wound even tighter.

  “Yes, it’s China,” I said. “Hello, Marla.”

  “Goodness, how long has it been since we’ve seen each other?” she asked, wrinkling her forehead as if she were checking an internal calendar. “A year? Two?”

  “Three,” I replied, “since Friends of the Library.” I added the first thing that came to my mind. “You stopped in to see Kelly Kaufman?”

  An almost imperceptible shadow crossed her face, and she nodded shortly. “I walk along the river in the evenings, so I dropped in for a moment to speak to her mother and her husband. You’re a friend?” She didn’t wait for my answer. “Such a sad, sad thing. Kelly worked for me at the hospice, as I’m sure you know. She was an excellent nurse. We all just loved her.”

  “That’s what I’ve heard,” I replied, remembering that Janet Parker had told me that the staff was dismayed when Kelly left—or was let go. Which was it? “But sh
e had left the hospice, hadn’t she? I heard that she was working at the Madison Clinic.”

  Marla’s mouth tightened, and she slid me a glance that let me know that I was speaking out of turn. “Well, everyone needs to grow and move forward,” she said briskly. “She saw an opportunity and took it, and I wished her well.” She gave a heavy sigh. “And now this terrible accident, ending such a promising life . . .” Her voice trailed away and she shook her head. “We’ll all miss her.”

  “Yes,” I said. “We will.” And then there was nothing more to say. Awkwardly, I pointed to the lounge at the end of the hall, where I could see Lara waiting. “Excuse me, but I’m meeting someone. Lara Metcalf,” I added, and then, a half breath later, “She used to work at the hospice too, I understand.”

  An unreadable expression flickered across Marla’s face. “Oh, yes. Lara.” Her tone was just short of dismissive, but she managed a brittle smile. “Give her my best. So nice to have seen you, China.”

  “Yes, nice,” I replied. I went forward down the long corridor to the lounge, wondering what Lara had done to get crosswise of Marla. I was also thinking of the files on the laptop I carried over my shoulder and wondering how and where Marla might fit into the picture that was beginning to emerge.

  The lounge was filled with furniture as utilitarian as the wing itself. A row of windows looked out across a curving bed of rosemary and salvia, interplanted with various species of marigolds. In the gathering dusk, their bright orange and yellow blossoms were like coins of fallen sunshine. A cheerful assemblage of children’s crayon drawings was taped to one plaster wall over a lighted aquarium filled with colorful fish swimming lazily through an underwater jungle of green plants. A coffeemaker and cups sat on a shelf, a soft-drink machine hummed busily in one corner, and a large-screen TV set, muted, displayed a CNN news feature.

  Lara was slumped on one of the plastic couches facing the television set, a tissue clutched in one hand. She was dressed in jeans, a blue-and-white striped top, and a blue knitted cardigan. Her eyes were red and swollen.

  “Hello, China.” She sounded weary. “I saw you talking to Marla Blake just now. Did she tell you that Kelly was taken off life support a little bit ago?”

  “Helen Berger told me,” I said. “I’m very sorry.” I began to swing my laptop case off my shoulder, then stopped. “This has been awfully rough on you, Lara. Maybe you don’t feel like talking right now, or you’d rather go back to Kelly’s room. We can put this off until tomorrow if you like.”

  She sighed. “Thank you, but no. Rich and her mother are still with her, and that’s as it should be. And I need to wait until Kelly’s mom is ready to go. I’m taking her to her motel. So let’s do it now. What’s on your mind?”

  I sat down beside Lara, unzipped the case, and took out my laptop. “You know that thumb drive you gave me this afternoon?” I booted up the computer. “I’d like you to see what’s on it and tell me what you think.”

  She fished in her purse, found another tissue, and blew her nose. “Sure, if I can. I’m curious, anyway.”

  Kelly’s folders came up on the laptop monitor, and I turned it so that Lara could see. “These computer files were created last Saturday night,” I said. “They appear to be patient records for the Pecan Springs Community Hospice, for all three locations: Pecan Springs, Lufkin, and Seguin.”

  “Really?” Lara said. “Gosh. I wonder how Kelly got these. And why.”

  “Good question,” I said, and opened the Pecan Springs file.

  “I recognize the format,” Lara said thoughtfully. “It’s the system that Marla Blake set up after she took over the hospice. It wasn’t operating very efficiently at the time, and the old records were on an obsolete machine in a format that couldn’t be upgraded easily. All of us knew something had to be done. We were glad when Marla got the new system up and running.”

  “And that was when?”

  “She bought the hospice about three years ago, I think.” She paused, frowning. “Yes. Three years. We used the old system for a year or so, until she set up her records.” She tilted her head, frowning. “Hey, wait a minute, China. Did you say that these files were created last Saturday night? That can’t be right. Are you sure?”

  I clicked on the “File” tab, then “Info,” and brought up “Properties.” I pointed to the entry marked “Created.” “See? Saturday, 11:42 p.m.”

  “Gosh,” Lara said in a wondering tone. “That is weird.”

  “Yes. Not exactly office hours. So, first off, I’m wondering how Kelly managed to get these records. Could she have logged into the hospice records from a remote location outside the office?” As I asked that question, I realized that Kelly had rented my cottage on Friday, so her “remote location” would have been my B&B.

  But Lara was shaking her head. “I don’t think so, China. Marla made a big thing about setting up her record system on an office computer that wasn’t tied to the Internet. She was really freaky about security—somebody hacking into the system and stealing patient identities. So if Kelly actually created these files on Saturday night, she would have to have been there. In the office, I mean. Working on the office computer.” She shook her head. “Which doesn’t exactly make sense. I mean, the office has an alarm. She had to let herself in, disarm it, and work in the dark.” She shivered. “It’s creepy.”

  “Do you know if she had a key to the office?”

  “Well, sure,” Lara said. “When she was working there, she had a key. All the nurses had keys. There’s a supply room stocked with anything the patients might need—saline solution, catheter irrigation kits, test strips for the blood tests for people on blood thinners, that sort of thing. Patients don’t get charged for supplies or equipment, since the hospice reimbursement from Medicare and insurance is supposed to include that cost. Big things like electric beds and commodes and oxygen equipment and wheelchairs—we had a contract with a supplier in Dallas for stuff like that.”

  “What about drugs?”

  She looked uncomfortable. “Oh, yes, drugs. Well, most of the time, the docs prescribed what was necessary, and the pharmacy delivered it to the patient. Whatever we had at the office was kept in a locked drawer in the supply room. Mostly what we had was lorazepam, for anxiety. And maybe morphine, for pain.”

  “Morphine? But that’s a controlled substance.”

  “Well, yes.” She shifted, frowning. “We weren’t supposed to have drugs. We would let the doc know when a patient ran out of something. The doc wrote the prescription and faxed it to the pharmacy for the family to pick up. But sometimes the family didn’t tell us they were running out, so to make sure we could help our patients in an emergency, we kept a small stash in a locked drawer in the supply room at the office.” She chuckled. “Kelly and I used to joke that what we really needed was medical marijuana, which is so much better than prescription drugs and painkillers. Last I heard, it was legal in twenty-three states.” She made a face. “But not in Texas, of course.”

  “There’s actually quite a bit of underground support for it,” I said. “A bill to legalize medical cannabis was introduced a couple of years ago. But it’s stuck in legislative committee—it’ll probably be there for a long time.”

  She nodded. “Well, even Texas will approve it eventually. When it does, you should go into the business.”

  I winced at the thought of all the red tape the state legislature would tie around the use of medical pot. Much better left to people who deal only in marijuana, I thought.

  “But back to the keys,” I said. “Did you turn yours in when you quit working at the hospice?”

  “Yes, I did. Marla Blake was pretty strict about that.” She slid me a half-guilty glance. “But most of the nurses made copies, in case we lost the ones Marla gave us. I kept mine. I’ll bet Kelly did, too.”

  That made sense. One more question. “Are the on-call staff on the premises at night?�
�

  “No.” She shook her head. “The office opens at eight and closes at five. After hours and on weekends, the phone is picked up by an answering service. If one of the patients or a family member phones in with an urgent need for help or some sort of special care, the service pages the on-call triage nurse. She makes whatever arrangements are necessary.”

  I nodded. “Okay. So let’s assume for the moment that Kelly kept a key, and that she let herself into the hospice office late Saturday night, when no one was there. She sat down at the office computer and copied the patient records onto a thumb drive.” I pointed to the screen, which still displayed the properties. “According to the ‘Last Modified’ date and time, she worked on the file on Sunday, at 10:11 a.m. That must have been when she color coded some of the entries.”

  “Color coded?” Lara scrolled down the page. “Oh, yes, I see. Pink, blue, yellow. I wonder what it means.”

  “There’s a key in the “Notes” file. She used pink to mark the records of patients who were in hospice care for longer than six months. She used yellow for ‘potentially unqualified patients,’ and blue for patients who got general inpatient care when she didn’t think it was necessary.”

  “I see,” Lara said slowly, still scrolling through the file, frowning in concentration. “You know, I’ve glanced at these records in the office, when one of the girls had the system up and I happened to walk past the desk. But I’ve never actually looked at them. As nurses, we didn’t have access to them. It wasn’t part of our job.”

  “You must have kept some sort of record of your visits, though. Didn’t you?”

  “Oh, sure. Paper-pencil reports on each visit.” She put her finger on one of the columns. “We used codes like these, for patient condition and treatment. We had to turn in our reports at the end of the week. They’re filed in folders labeled with the patients’ names. Eventually, somebody on the clerical staff got around to transcribing our paper-pencil records into the computer. I suggested that the nurses should have iPads, so we could update the records automatically. But Marla said there wasn’t enough money for that.”