Death in the Orchid Garden

by Ann Ripley

  Randy Hau restrained a big sigh. “It’s worth a try. I’m telling you, these are difficult cases. Outside of re-interviewing people, we have little else to focus on—that and John Batchelder. When Mr. Batchelder comes out of his pain medication stupor, I’m hoping he can tell us something.”

  “Which brings me to the question: When can we visit him? Has he arrived yet?”

  He raised his wrist and consulted a bulky wristwatch. “That’s all planned. It’s almost noon, so chances are that he’s arrived and they’re getting him settled in. I’m going to drive you and the Corbins there; it takes a half hour.” He smiled briefly. “Less, if I run the siren.”

  His brown eyes stared at her. “Mrs. Eldridge—”

  “You might as well call me Louise.”

  “Louise, as of early this morning, John Batchelder was still out of it. You people are John’s good friends.” When he said this, she felt a twinge of guilt in her chest. Had she been a good friend to John?

  Hau continued: “I’m counting on you to help pull him back, so he can tell us what happened.” He shook his head again. “He’s one of my best hopes.”

  She recognized the haunted look in the policeman’s eyes; she’d seen it before in the eyes of Fairfax County Sheriff’s Department Detective Mike Geraghty. It was the look of a law officer who feared he was going to end up with an unsolved murder on his hands. In this case, it was two unsolved murders.

  37

  Monday noon

  Louise wished she’d had the nerve to jump in the front passenger seat of Police Chief Randy Hau’s car. Instead, she sat stiffly between Marty and Steffi Corbin in the backseat. Since she still had not forgiven her producer for being a money-grubbing opportunist, she exchanged little conversation with him. Nevertheless, they made progress in other ways. As they traveled to the hospital in Lihue, Louise, the chief, and the Corbins mapped out plans for the evening. The hotel would foot the bill for a dinner and entertainment in the Lanai Room, an open porch for private parties adjacent to the hotel dining room.

  Before they left to go to the hospital, the chief had had Lieutenant Payne search out Melanie Sando, who contacted Joan Clayton. He soon had a call back from his assistant saying the deal had been made. The singer, who’d been found in a massage room in the Final Redoubt Spa, agreed to make a brief appearance in the Lanai Room for this special group of under-surveillance hotel guests.

  After a few songs from Clayton, Marty would stand up and MC a spontaneous little program. Steffi was enthusiastic about it. “Who knows what you might learn about people?” she said. She was in charge of contacting the eight people. The list would include the whole crew: resident scientists Tom Schoonover and Henry Hilaeo, as well as the visiting scientists, Christopher Bailey, Anne Lansing, George Wyant, Charles Reuter, Nate Bernstein, and Ralph Pinsky.

  “Hell,” grunted Marty, “getting a free dinner from the hotel isn’t going to change things. It’s like George Wyant said, we’re under house arrest.”

  Randy Hau glanced back at him for an instant. “I prefer not to think that, Mr. Corbin, but in a sense it’s correct. We can’t afford to endanger anyone else’s life.”

  Marty turned to Louise and in a quiet voice said, “Lou, you and I have gotta make up, despite the fact that you disapprove of me for being crassly commercial.”

  “I guess we do,” she agreed.

  Marty sealed the reconciliation by leaning over and giving her a little peck on her cheek. “And whatever happens tonight, I gotta take care of you. I had a phone call from Bill and naturally I had to tell him the cops think both Flynn and Bouting were murdered. Understandably, your old man is worried. He’s given me my marching orders—wants me to see that you stay out of trouble.”

  “So he called you.” Louise smiled. She liked the fact that her husband wanted to protect her long distance.

  At that moment, the chief smoothly turned the wheel and everyone in the car fell silent. They passed through one of Kauai’s most enchanting sights, the famous Tunnel of Trees, a stand of roughbark Eucalyptus robustus whose branches overarched the road. Again, Louise felt the resonance of Kauai’s ancient history, for these trees probably had stood here for a century or more.

  Once at the hospital, a middle-aged, brown-eyed nurse with dark, wavy hair ushered them into John’s room, apologizing that the doctor had been called away. Louise was not as surprised as Marty and Steffi at the voluminous dressings that swathed the left side of John’s body and head.

  “My God!” whispered Steffi, turning her eyes away as she sought the comfort of her husband’s arms.

  Marty Corbin looked over Steffi’s head at John and said, “Thank heavens he didn’t get it too bad in the face. But by God, he’s out like a light.”

  John was laid out as if dead, his tanned face serene, his eyes with their long black lashes closed against whatever the world had to offer. He looks as if he’d be willing to sleep forever, thought Louise. And no wonder, she thought, since only the night before, he had ended up in a veritable hellhole filled with lethal fumes and flowing orange lava. She shuddered at the memory.

  Chief Hau looked her in the eye. “Louise, why don’t you go to his bedside—the nurse tells me it will be all right. See if you can rouse him.” The policeman hauled a chair up close to the right side of the bed for her.

  “Thank you,” she said and sat down and took John’s hand. There was no reaction. She gently squeezed it and said, “John, it’s Louise. Can you wake up? Try to wake up and talk to us. Marty’s here and Steffi’s here. And the police chief wants to talk to you, too.”

  Her colleague’s head moved slightly in her direction and he moaned. What she’d not been able to picture sufficiently was the pain he must be in, pain controlled with heavy doses of morphine, according to the nurse.

  The woman stepped up next to Louise and bent down over the patient. “Now, John,” she said, in a clear voice, “your friends are here and they want to talk to you. Can you wake up?”

  His answer was another moan. The nurse looked at them and said, “I believe you’d better go. He’s due for more pain medication and he’s indicating pretty clearly that he needs it. So please step away from the bed while I do my job.” When they did, she swept the privacy curtain around the bed. They heard her murmuring to him and he moaned back, as if in reply. Then there was silence.

  Opening the curtain again, the nurse said, “This man isn’t quite ready to talk to you. He’s emerging from a very bad place, but he hasn’t quite come up yet.”

  “When do you think he can talk?” asked the chief. “He has information we need badly.”

  The dark-haired nurse cocked her head to one side and looked at him, as if deciding what she thought of Chief Hau. They looked at each other, recognizing that both were natives, he with more Hawaiian blood, she with more European, possibly Portuguese, blood. Evidently she decided he met her standards, for she smiled and said, “I’ll tell you what, Mister Police Chief, you give me your card and I’ll phone you up the minute that he decides he can put two words together. How’s that?”

  Hau nodded gravely. “I like that. I’ll be anxious to hear from you.”

  38

  Monday afternoon

  Louise and Steffi stood at the elevator, negotiating with the man. But the man wasn’t giving an inch.

  “Going shopping again?” growled Marty Corbin, running an exasperated hand through his dark, wavy hair. “You went shopping four days ago and wiped out a half a week’s salary. How about going to our room and getting a little shut-eye instead? It’s much cheaper.”

  Steffi gave Louise a look, shrugged her ample shoulders, and hit the elevator button. “I guess you’re on your own, Louise.”

  Louise gave them a quick wave good-bye and turned down the hall in the direction of Kauai-by-the-Sea’s cluster of upscale shops. It was amazing, she thought, the effect that violence had had on this hotel. The number of guests seemed much diminished and she realized some had checked out following Matthew Fl
ynn’s demise. She could only guess that Dr. Bouting’s death, even though a hundred miles away, must have further discomforted the hotel’s clientele. Right now, for instance, she walked down a huge hall totally by herself; a clever purse snatcher could take her bag and get away with no trouble. A rapist could come along and drag her into an empty conference room. Where were all those police that Chief Hau had talked about?

  She walked a little more briskly. She didn’t need clothes, but she did feel a need for a particular article of clothing. Maybe it was Tom Schoonover’s warnings, but she was beginning to run scared. She intended to be ready for trouble.

  She entered what seemed to be the larger of two clothing stores, Clothing-by-the-Sea, whose front racks were filled with skirts and slacks and dresses in the most brilliant patterns that Louise had ever seen. A tall, young saleswoman appeared. She was dressed in a black lace top with a low-cut bustier underneath that showed a good third of her breasts. Below this she wore a black silk skirt with an uneven hemline. A bit dressy for daytime sales work, but with her long, swinging brown hair and a well made-up youthful face, the saleswoman pulled it off. Louise thought of her as wearing a costume that represented the ultimate in what an unfashionable customer might attain if she listened to the counsel of this wise young woman.

  “Aloha,” the woman said. “How can I help you?”

  Louise looked around dubiously into the sea of flowers, birds, and palms that swam before her eyes. “Do you have anything plain colored? I need a top with lots of pockets in it. And it has to be something in olive or tan.” Louise noticed she was veering toward neutrals these days and supposed that in a decade or two she’d be wearing no bright colors at all—only olives and tans, the color of tree bark and autumn grass.

  The young woman didn’t pause an instant. “I believe we have just what you need.” She led Louise to the back of the store, a whole new world. One corner featured slinky cocktail clothes in the mode of the saleswoman’s outfit. In another corner there were racks of designer sports clothes in solid colors. She pulled out a high-fashion pullover with lots of pocket detail and held it up for Louise to view. “What do you think of this, for instance?”

  “I’m amazed,” said Louise. “This is just what I want.”

  “We aim to please,” she said, flashing a wide, perfect smile. She took several garments off the rack for Louise to try on and led her to the dressing rooms.

  As Louise approached the door of one of the cubicles, the adjacent door opened and out walked a woman in black. It took a moment to recognize the striking, handsome figure.

  “Anne, hello.”

  “Hi, Louise,” said Anne Lansing. She was wearing a long-sleeved black top and matching slacks cut in fashionable ankle length.

  “A lovely outfit,” commented Louise.

  “And it’s off-season, so it’s on sale,” said Anne. Since she was as tall as Louise, Anne’s green eyes gazed straight into hers. “I intend to wear it to Dr. Bouting’s funeral back in Philadelphia. Frankly, I don’t usually wear black. I can’t get used to myself in black. But there’ll be hundreds of people at his funeral and they’ll expect the company’s ‘heirs’”—she put up two fingers of each hand, to indicate quotation marks—“to be in mourning. So I intend to do it right. This outfit, plus black Manolos and a veil with a black rim.”

  “I know how much Dr. Bouting thought of both you and Christopher Bailey. He obviously groomed you two to take over.”

  Anne gave a sad little sigh. “It will be a bit of a strain, but the two of us definitely are slated to manage the company now. Though his grown children, you know, will be here tomorrow to claim his personal possessions.” She shook her head and Louise noted tears forming in her eyes. “Yes, we’ll manage the company. But it’s such a terrible way to be promoted, you have no idea.”

  What could Louise say? “I know how sad it is for you and Christopher. But still, I hope the two of you come tonight to the dinner.” She showed her the pile of clothes in her arms. “One of these will be my fashion statement, just a sporty thing.”

  Anne said, “I don’t particularly want to come to a dinner with the other captives, but I will.”

  “It’ll be very nice and low-key, I hear. Joan Clayton’s going to sing. That alone should make it worthwhile.”

  Anne’s expression brightened. “I love Clayton’s music, though it will probably make me cry. Excuse me now while I talk to the salesgirl about this outfit.”

  Louise was about to go into her own dressing room, but paused to peek into Anne’s, since the door was ajar. She had neatly folded her shorts and blouse and placed them on a chair, then hung her belt on the back of the chair. Suspended from the belt was the usual plant explorer’s rig. That’s okay, thought Louise, these plant hunters have nothing on me. I’m doing that myself tonight, carrying around my own equipment.

  The sight of the garden clippers on the belt piqued her interest. She looked across the store, where Anne Lansing was being fussed over by the modish saleswoman. She stepped into the dressing room, took the tool from its plastic case, opened the blades, and casually put a finger against the two-inch-long rounded “business” blade.

  “Ow,” she moaned, as she saw blood appear on the finger. She’d cut herself on the razor-sharp edge. It was the right hand she’d scraped the night Matthew Flynn died and was still was festooned with a small bandage. Cupping her left hand under her right to catch the blood, she quickly locked the blades and returned the shears to their case. She withdrew from the room and slipped into the adjoining one. In her purse, fortunately, was the red bandanna left over from the preceding day’s visit to the Big Island. She twisted it around the wound, then turned her attention to the clothes she was to try on.

  She was delighted to find that the first pullover she put on was lightweight and voluminous, yet good-looking. That was the thing about designer sports clothes, she reflected. They had that extra pocket or zipper or fashionable cut so that they rose far above the level of the casual clothes Louise usually wore.

  When she exited the room, her newly cut hand hidden under the pile of pullovers, there was Anne, looking at herself in a mirror and holding up to herself a simple black linen dress the saleswoman had selected for her. “Are you taking these?” Louise asked her. “They’re very attractive.”

  Anne nodded. “I think so. I need black outfits almost as soon as I get back to the East Coast.”

  Louise couldn’t help noting the ring on her hand that stood out against the black fabric, gold set with an opal. “What a beautiful ring.”

  Anne slowly extended the hand toward Louise. “It is beautiful, isn’t it? It’s my engagement ring, except we hadn’t announced it yet. So I sometimes wear it on my right hand.” Her eyes suddenly filled with tears, which overflowed down her cheeks and onto the black top.

  Louise put a hand on her upper arm. “I am so sorry to bring this up.”

  Anne shook her head, sobbing now. “No, no, I shouldn’t wear it if I don’t want people to notice it. It’s just that now, with Dr. Bouting’s death, I don’t know that I will go ahead with my engagement.”

  “Oh, my goodness.” Louise was about to advise Anne that she had to go on with her life, but bit her tongue. This was private business. The woman would have to work things out on her own. “Again, I’m sorry.”

  Anne Lansing stretched a hand out and touched Louise’s forearm. “Louise, if it turns out that Dr. Bouting was killed, well, will you have a chance to do anything?” There was such hurt in those yellow-green eyes that Louise felt the tears begin to rise in her own eyes. “The police seem so clueless, though I did hear a rumor that they found a machete in the water off the cliff.”

  “I heard that, too,” said Louise. She started to tell Anne that she’d visited John Batchelder and saw signs that he might be able to talk. Then Louise remembered something her older daughter Martha had taught her: Don’t disclose anything to people who are involved in a murder inquiry. “I don’t know much about what the po
lice are doing, except they’re certainly keeping an eye on us.” She smiled and bid Anne good-bye.

  As she left Clothing-by-the-Sea and made her way down the hall toward Island Rest, she wondered if she should make a stop back at the public relations office. Police Chief Hau undoubtedly was still conducting interviews. As a veteran gardener and a TV garden show host, Louise was dismayed at this new way of looking at an everyday garden tool, but she now knew that each of the scientists carried a lethal weapon on his or her person—a sharp-bladed garden clippers. She would not bother Police Chief Hau with this information; he had eyes to see, just as she did. They were carrying their lethal weapons in plain sight.

  She went into the sundries store and purchased a package of small bandages of various sizes and a couple of other items for the evening. She opened one of the bandages and put it on her new wound. The old wound, she noted, was healing nicely enough for her to ignore doctor’s orders and get it wet. Forced to stay at this posh hotel for an extra day at the very minimum, she wasn’t going to be denied its finest treasure, the saltwater lagoon.

  39

  Louise felt a little guilty going off swimming, but she had no real obligation to return Charlie Hurd’s phone calls. When she returned to her room, she’d washed the blood out of her bandanna, then listened to Charlie’s messages. By the time she’d played the sixth one, she was exhausted.

  “Louise, it’s your old pal Charlie. Look, if you call me soon, I can still get your story in the late edition of the Post. And I know you have a story there—I bet you’re right in the middle of it. Your husband acknowledged as much. And I know your sidekick got burned last night. Now, Louise, for old time’s sake and for John Batchelder’s sake and because we need one another, you and I, you should call me back and pronto! Aloha, now, or whatever good-bye is in Hawaiian, and I really hope you’ll call. Here’s the number in case you’ve forgotten . . .”