by Mark Treble
When a deacon from the A.M.E. crowd was accidentally knocked to the floor his friend, an Alderman from the Episcopal group, punched the offending brawler in the face. A general scuffle ensued, the police were called, and an hour and a half later a very sheepish group of men held hands and sang Kumbaya – literally – in the holding cell. They were let go when Reverend Percy vouched for the Episcopalians and Father Swain vouched for the Methodists.
Anyway, the two congregations met for a soup supper right before the service. Young adults from both congregations had prepared the meal and served the group. Joel had talked Nursing Student Meritt into joining him as a volunteer. An agnostic, she didn’t mind at all, just saw no point in most of the pageantry. But Joel said he did, and so did his Aunt Carol.
Diners had their choice of barley or cabbage soup. Most were served barley, with only about thirty of the hundred being served cabbage. Reverend Percy opened with an invocation, and at the end of the meal invited all to the sanctuary for the service.
Denise Gallworth was the first to show symptoms. She vomited and collapsed between the fellowship hall and the sanctuary. Veronica Meritt did not get involved, in part because she was washing dishes with Joel at the time. Also, the A.M.E. church’s parish nurse was there and handled the immediate issues. An ambulance was called, and the service started only a few minutes late.
They never got to the imposition of the ashes. The Episcopalians’ parish nurse was working and the Methodists’ was at the hospital with poor Denise. During the second verse of “All People That On Earth Do Dwell” the vomiting started. They never got to the third verse.
Veronica organized triage and had Joel determine which soup the stricken worshipers had eaten. At least until Joel himself collapsed. All but three of the victims had eaten the cabbage soup. The other three seemed to be sympathetic sufferers, people who show symptoms when other people do the same.
In all thirty-two people went to local hospitals. Veronica had prescribed copious water and induced vomiting for those who had not yet lost their suppers. That was probably all that could be done on the spot. Ambulances carried two or three at a time. Veronica got an EMT to confirm each of her conclusions about which were already dead and could wait. The EMT agreed with all but one, and that was his cousin. The cousin was DOA at the hospital.
Thirty-two people were stricken. Desmonda Gray (called “Battleship Gray” behind her back), three hundred forty pound anchor of the Martyrs Choir alto section, had eaten cabbage soup and not become ill. Otherwise, three sympathetic sufferers, nineteen dead and ten hospitalized. Four of the survivors, including Joel Vanderveer, were at St Swithin’s where a toxicologist took a calculated gamble and ordered treatment with activated charcoal. It worked, because this was aconitum poisoning. The activated charcoal failed to help a ninety-year old man. Unfortunate but understandable.
Someone had introduced what was probably wolf’s bane into the soup at some point. This was mass murder of the worst kind, and the Mayor vowed to get to the bottom of it. Autopsies pointed to aconitum poisoning in the dead and lab tests pointed to it in the survivors. That was informative, just not yet helpful. City and state poison control professionals found aconitum in discarded cabbage leaves and concluded that the poison had been introduced before cooking. It could have happened almost anywhere at almost any time.
Food inspectors seized all cabbage at the market where it had been bought for the supper, but all they got was fresh cabbage because the old had been replaced that morning and was in a landfill. A public service announcement warned residents to be careful of eating cabbage and to be sure to wash it carefully before eating. Local cabbage growers lost money, because Louisiana’s per capital consumption of cabbage dropped from nine pounds the previous year to four in the Year of the Poisoned Soup.
Police had two conflicting clues. One was blatant and in-your-face. A picture of the church with a red X drawn over it in nail polish was tacked to the priests’ office door. So, maybe it’s the church after all. And, fourteen of the nineteen dead were MAPTA tontine members. Maybe it was both.
Veronica and Joel’s Aunt Carol both had barley soup. Veronica was in training at St. Swithin’s and visited Joel, who had been held overnight for observation. She also helped Joel’s aunt take meals to the victims’ families. Rabbi Levi Bar Hayim and the local orthodox Jewish congregation organized the effort with help from Joel Silverstein and others. So many dead, so many sick, and for what?
Chapter Twenty-Three
Detective Silverstein interviewed as many of the survivors of the poisoned dinner as he could and put together a list of attendees. He compared that list to the passenger manifest for Josh Breckenridge’s last cruise. There were five names on both lists.
The accomplice had to be among them. One of the five had died in the poisoning, so that left four. Joel Vanderveer had been on the cruise with his aunt, but he was barely fifteen at the time. And, he had been poisoned. That left three: Helen Talbot, Eddie Franklin and Barnaby Crawford. One of them almost had to be the accomplice. That is, in case Gregory-of-many-names didn’t turn out to be the one. That was still up in the air.
“What do we have on Franklin and Crawford?” Silverstein asked Goldberg. They had plenty, none of which made them look like serial murderers.
“They’re both in their late seventies,” Goldberg responded. “Neither is in particularly good health. Crawford recently had heart bypass surgery, and Franklin’s second stroke had left him largely housebound. Ray and Faye Copeland had begun their serial killing when he was about seventy-two and she was about sixty-five, so it’s possible, just unlikely.”
Danny joined the conversation. “Isn’t Carol Talbot the youngest surviving member of the tontine?” Goldberg confirmed his estimate.
“Yeah, she’s just fifty two. But, she’d have been in her early forties when the murders began. A woman in her early forties should have little difficulty overpowering a man or woman twenty-five or more years older than she.”
“OK, how about the deaths that might look suspicious?” Danny looked to Goldberg for answers, and she had one pretty damning one.
“The first victim in the series of heart attacks was her husband, George. Carol Vanderveer had been the HR manager at one of Talbot’s companies when the first Mrs. Talbot died in a motor vehicle accident. A year after his wife’s death George began dating Carol. A year after that they married. Five years later his death left her wealthy.”
From one hundred at its inception the MAPTA tontine now numbered in the mid-twenties. At this point Talbot’s chances of inheriting the whole thing looked pretty good. An actuary said that the remainder of the surviving members – other than Talbot – should be dead in less than twenty years. Inheriting the whole thing at about seventy-two had always been in the cards. “Maybe she just didn’t want to wait,” Danny opined.
Another fact came to light. A group of four, two from each congregation, had bought the food for the supper. Carol Talbot was one of Martyrs’ two shoppers.
Three more cruise lines were asked for passenger manifests for cruises in past years. It took a couple weeks, but Carol Talbot had been on the three cruises where other tontine members had disappeared. It was time to talk with Carol Talbot, and Danny put it on his calendar for first thing the next morning.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Officer Damion Wilson responded to the prowler report. Joel Vanderveer said he had heard glass shattering and jumped from the bed he was sharing with Veronica Meritt. He slipped on a pair of jeans and ran barefoot to the main house. A large window at the back of the residence had been broken and shards of glass littered areas both inside and outside the home. No one was around, and Joel heard no sounds indicating another person might be in the vicinity.
“What can you tell me about what happened?” Officer Wilson had taken Mike Allison’s training and knew that direct questions were usually the best.
“I was asleep and heard glass shatter.” Vanderveer was speaking calmly,
something that Officer Wilson found of interest. The young African-American’s powers of observation were average; his powers of thought were far beyond that. “I ran to the house and found the window shattered. I went back and checked on Aunt Carol, then I called 911.”
Wilson called in his report and suggested that Detective Flint be called to the scene. The home belonged to Carol Talbot, and Wilson knew she was a potential victim in the Martyrs murders. He made the call before he found the photo of Martyrs Church lying twenty feet from the window, behind a corner arm chair. There was no X on the photo, perhaps because none of Mrs. Talbot’s blood had yet been spilled.
Damion Wilson did not have a good feeling about this. Simple breaking and entering was probably attempted murder. Danny Flint concurred.
Wilson was the senior patrol officer on site, and helped direct crime scene technicians to likely locations. He had turned on the back yard flood lights immediately on his arrival and, without trampling over the evidence, visually followed the trail of footsteps from the point of entry back to a magnolia tree, where it seemed from a distance of six or seven yards that someone had been standing or pacing for a while.
“Detective, why would somebody throw a rock from twenty feet away and then walk up to the window? The footsteps seem too close together for running, and the perp never seems to have left the dining room. What gives?” Wilson was genuinely puzzled, and so was Flint.
“Officer – Wilson, right? - I don’t know. Breaking the glass from twenty feet away might make sense if the guy ran up to the house once the window was broken. But you’re right, walking is bullshit. I’ll get the techs to do all the tech crap and figure it out. Good observation. Thanks.” Danny recalled that Mike Allison had praise for a young black officer named Wilson. He was beginning to see why.
Detective Melvin Brown showed up right before the crime scene folks. He talked with Carol Talbot and with Veronica Meritt. Danny had had a good deal of interaction with Talbot already and appreciated a fresh perspective. And, through Cheryl, he knew Meritt personally. Best to keep this completely professional.
Almost four hours after Joel had placed the 911 call the scene began winding down. Veronica had examined Joel’s feet and found that he had somehow avoided the broken glass. She checked Carol Talbot’s vitals and comforted the older woman. Otherwise she had little to contribute.
“Joel and I were sleeping when the window broke. I didn’t hear it myself, but woke up when all the commotion started.” She paused for a moment. “That’s unusual because Joel usually sleeps more soundly than I do.
“Joel was missing, so I grabbed a robe and come to the main house. I went to check on Carol, who had no idea what was up.” That was the bulk of her statement.
Joel repeated his story four times, once to Wilson, twice to Flint and once to Brown. It never changed. He had heard glass shattering, run to the house, found the broken window, checked on Carol and called 911. When Officer Wilson arrived he had cooperated fully. He had class in the morning and, if there was nothing else, he’d be going back to bed.
Brown, Wilson and Flint left at the same time. Brown and Wilson were exchanging glances as though there were some kind of secret they shared, unknown to Flint.
“OK, guys, is my fly open or something? What’s up?” Flint hadn’t noticed whatever had them occupied; Brown voiced the issue first.
“Vanderveer shook your hand, but not mine. He shook hands with every member of the crime scene crew, but not Officer Wilson’s. White police get handshakes, black police don’t. I don’t look for signs of racism, but I am sensitive to indicators.” Flint nodded his head, embarrassed that he hadn’t noticed the same thing.
“That doesn’t concern me as much as the other thing.” That was Damion Wilson. “Detective, I heard Vanderveer give you the same story he gave me. Hear the glass, run to the house, see the window, check on his aunt, call 911, and then wait on police. But Ms. Meritt said that when she went to check on Carol the older woman knew nothing of what had happened.”
“Holy fuck. Officer Wilson, if High Profile Crimes asks for you to be put on temporary duty with the squad, will you object?” Danny had heard about Wilson from Mike Allison. “Put the guy on fast track to detective.” This was the second time he’d interacted with the patrol officer, and he knew a barn-burner when he met one.
“Detective, my District Commander is going to have to OK this. District Three is pretty low-crime, but most of the Martyrs murders have happened here.” Wilson assumed that the Detective wouldn’t have asked if he weren’t serious. Flint was smart enough to know that an obscure patrol officer wouldn’t dream of turning down the assignment.
Melvin Brown knew how to nail this one to the wall. “Third’s Deputy Commander is Marcia Blackford, an old friend. And her boss will jump at the chance to have an official District liaison assigned, once Marcia mentions the “liaison” part to him. Only one problem.” Brown fixed Wilson with a fierce gaze.
“I’m grown accustomed to being the team’s only token. Don’t get any ideas. Boy.” Brown broke into a grin and the two police officers shook hands. Danny clapped both men on the back.
They retired to an all-night café. It was too late to get any sleep, and Wilson’s shift had been over for several hours already. They ordered pie and coffee; Danny changed his order to sugar-free frozen yogurt and coffee. That discussion with Cheryl about old people’s hearts had not been forgotten.
“Sir, you’re the Deputy Commander of HPC.” Wilson was being polite, as his mother had raised him. And, even if she hadn’t, the Police Academy would have beaten it into him anyway.
Melvin Brown laughed. “Yeah, Sir, Lord High Deputy Commander of the HPC, your geriatric elderliness.” Flint wadded up his napkin and threw it at his old friend. Brown threw it right back.
“It’s Danny. The only people who call me sir are perps and youngsters trying to make me feel old. Which category are you, Wilson?” Danny fixed the younger police officer to his seat with a fierce stare.
Wilson broke first and laughed out loud. “I get it, Danny. And, it’s Damion. If that’s OK with you, your antediluvian antiquityness?” Brown was howling.
“Damion, Detective Brown is older than I am. And he may not get much older if he doesn’t cut the shit.” Flint was actually in a good mood, perhaps the best mood he’d been in for weeks.
Wilson was bright and brought the gift of ignorance. He didn’t know what assumptions had been made and discarded that perhaps should have been kept. Danny had a good feeling about Damion Wilson.
“So, your Lordship, how did you become Deputy Commander?” Wilson was genuinely interested. Brown looked at Flint who looked at Brown, who gestured to Flint.
“I got lucky.” Damion looked as though he was going to protest, but Melvin Brown confirmed it.
“He had to take credit for uncovering a huge clue in a big investigation last year. If he didn’t, heads were going to roll because the young kid who actually found the link wasn’t supposed to see the files.” Brown and Flint were both chuckling.
“Everybody on the squad knows the story. Alex DeLauder, Dana’s son, had been kidnapped. Except he hadn’t been. But we didn’t know that, and I started looking into his kidnapping and some others.
“After Alex got home his stepfather, Ethan McQuade, fucked up. Seeing as how he was already familiar with the case, Ethan was the national pool reporter with the FBI for their investigation. He left some files on the dining room table and Alex got curious. The kid wasn’t supposed to see the files, but put together a link that had escaped everybody up to that point.” Danny paused for a few seconds and looked to Melvin. The older detective nodded assent.
“Publicizing the real source of the lead would get a whole lot of people in trouble. So, everyone agreed that I had cracked the case. The FBI gave me an award, and the Chief of Police moved me up to deputy commander of the High Profile Case Squad. I’m qualified for the job, but in large organizations qualifications are nice, and luck is ni
cer. Melvin is better qualified than I and everyone knows it. Luck.”
By the next day Damion Wilson was the newly-named Third District Liaison Officer to the High Profile Crimes Unit. Careers had been made on far less.
The next afternoon Detectives Flint and Brown followed up at the Talbot residence. Carol Talbot was doing well, just a bit shaken by the affair. She said that the first she had known of it was when Veronica had come to her room to check on her.
Joel returned home from Tulane Law School while they were there, and they told him they just had a few more questions. He repeated his story, and Danny asked what happened when he went to check on his aunt.