Prodigal Son

by Danielle Steel

  “Well, just be careful,” Peter said, sounding worried. “I don’t want them shooting you.”

  “They won’t,” Michael said, laughing. “I move too fast. And the police chief is my friend. He’ll take care of me.”

  “Lock your doors tonight,” Peter warned him.

  “Thank you, brother,” Michael said, smiling, and Peter shook his head when he hung up the phone. The man who had come to see him had really unnerved him. And Michael was right. He looked nuts. Poor Michael, that was all he needed, Peter thought, being accused of murdering a patient. But like Michael, Peter knew the accusation would go nowhere. Michael really was a saint. He would never do a thing like that. The man’s accusations weren’t worth a second thought. He just hoped that Michael would be careful for a while, until the lunatic calmed down.

  Chapter 13

  Peter didn’t go into town again for a few days, and when he did, he stopped at the diner for lunch and saw Vi. She was a kindly, motherly presence in his life, and insisted he have a slice of fresh apple pie. It was delicious. She was busy and didn’t have time to chat, and after lunch Peter stopped at the hardware store to pick up some things. He was replacing all the old screens before the summer. The house was looking better every day, and he wanted to finish all his little projects before the boys arrived. When he saw Walt, he was about to tell him about the irate man who had showed up at the lake, when Walt stopped him in his tracks with what he said.

  “I’m sorry to hear about your sister-in-law,” he said, looking sad. Everybody had loved Maggie since she was a child. Peter’s blood ran cold at the words. If something had happened to her, surely Michael would have called him. He was suddenly terrified that she’d died, and she had looked so well the last time he saw her, on the new medication Michael had started her on.

  “What do you mean?” Peter asked tersely, ready to grab Walt by the throat and choke it out of him. Peter stood looking tense as he waited for Walt to explain.

  “I hear she’s in the hospital, real bad. Pneumonia. She went in last night.” It was a small town, and everyone knew what went on. Vi must not have heard it yet or she would have said something to him at lunch and she hadn’t. And Peter knew just how serious pneumonia would be for Maggie. He literally ran out of the hardware store and called Michael from his truck. But the call went straight to voicemail. He drove to St. Mary’s Hospital instead to see what was going on. And when he checked at the desk, they told him she was there. She was in a private room as a courtesy to Michael. And Peter went straight upstairs. Michael was sitting next to her bed, and Maggie had an oxygen mask on her face and her eyes were closed.

  “What happened?” Peter asked him in a hoarse whisper. His brother looked devastated. Her face was gray, and she was either unconscious or asleep. It reminded Peter instantly of when he’d visited her after her skating accident and she was in a coma. She looked almost as bad as that now.

  “She had a reaction to the medication we tried,” Michael said in a whisper. “It paralyzed her breathing system. She did great on it for a few days. And now this.” Peter looked grim as he listened, and his brother looked worse than his wife. Peter reached out and squeezed his shoulder and sat with him for a long time. Michael checked her vital signs regularly. The head nurse stuck her head in the door, but she knew Michael was with Maggie, so she left immediately. Maggie was getting the best care she could, with Michael attending to her. It was a long time before she stirred and opened her eyes. She smiled when she saw both of them and looked groggy. She was sedated, and they had a breathing tube standing by in case she needed it.

  “What are you two doing here?” she whispered weakly.

  “Just hanging out, we had nothing else to do,” Peter said with a lopsided grin. “How do you feel?” He tried to look less worried about her than he felt. But all their fear was in Michael’s eyes.

  “I feel weird. Sleepy.” She had taken the mask off to talk to them, and Michael gently put it back. She needed the oxygen, and there was a clip on her finger to check the oxygen level in her blood. It had been frighteningly low the night before. He had called an ambulance at midnight. He didn’t want to drive her himself in case her heart stopped on the way there. She had been in dire straits and barely able to breathe, which was hard on her heart. And her heart had been delicate for years. Lisa had been panicked when they left, but Michael hadn’t wanted her to come. It was too upsetting for her.

  Maggie went back to sleep then, and at seven o’clock Peter looked at his watch and whispered to his brother, “Do you want to get something to eat?” Michael hesitated, glanced at Maggie, and nodded. He had called in a young doctor from Warren to cover his patients all day. He had used him a few times before, but it was rare for Michael to take a day off. He had been at Maggie’s side since midnight the night before, and only had some soup the nurses had given him. And he thought Maggie was stable enough for them to leave her for a short time now. And he knew Lisa was at a friend’s. He followed Peter out of the room, and they walked the few blocks to the diner. Vi saw them as soon as they walked in. She had heard that Maggie was in the hospital by then, and asked how she was. The look on Michael’s face said it all.

  Michael’s friend Jack Nelson, the chief of police, was there too, having dinner with one of his deputies. Michael stopped to say hello to him on their way to a booth. Jack looked instantly sorry. He stood up and shook Peter’s hand when Michael introduced them.

  “I heard about Maggie,” he said with a look of concern. “How’s she doing?”

  “She’s holding on for now,” Michael said with a hopeful look. He was visibly exhausted. “I think we got her to the hospital in time.” They lived from one crisis to the next, and Jack Nelson felt sorry for him. Peter thought he looked like a nice man, and he seemed genuinely fond of Michael and Maggie.

  “Let me know if there’s anything I can do,” the chief offered. “I’ll have the boys keep an eye on the house.” He knew Lisa would be there alone. “Tell Lisa to call if she needs anything, even a pizza.”

  “Thanks, Jack. She’s staying with a friend,” Michael said gratefully, and then he and Peter went to their booth. Vi poured them each a cup of steaming coffee the moment they sat down, as they both slowly started to unwind.

  They both ordered the daily special at Vi’s suggestion. She said it was good, and happened to be meat loaf and mashed potatoes that night. Peter figured Michael needed the food, and he was hungry too.

  “If Maggie’s lungs give out, we’ll lose her,” Michael said, looking desperate. “The Parkinson’s complicates everything and is our worst enemy now. We have to wait and see how she does in the next day or two.”

  “Have you called Bill?” Peter asked, and Michael shook his head. “I wanted to see how she did today. I don’t want to bring him home for a false alarm.”

  Peter nodded. “I’ll sit with her if you want, so you can go home and get some sleep.” Michael had already told him that Lisa couldn’t come to the hospital because she had a cold, and they couldn’t take the risk.

  “I don’t want to leave her,” Michael said wearily. “They can set up a cot in the room. I want to keep an eye on her.” Peter understood, and he was suddenly reminded of his conversation in London with Bill. It was insane to think that this man would kill his wife. He looked like he was ready to give his own heart or lungs to save her life. He would have if he could. Peter could see that now.

  They went back to the hospital after they ate, and Vi gave them a bag of snacks to take with them and a Thermos of coffee. Peter left him around eleven that night, with the admonition to call him if anything happened. Michael promised that he would. And then Peter drove back to the lake. It had been an interminable day, for everyone. At least Peter had slept the night before, Michael hadn’t and looked it.

  He got back to the lake house at eleven-thirty, and checked his computer for e-mails. He saw that he had one from Bill in London and sat down to read it. He almost cried when he did, after the day they’
d just been through. His nephew was insane. He had sent an article about a weed killer named paraquat, which, when ingested in minute quantities in liquid form, mimicked the symptoms of Parkinson’s, and all of Maggie’s other symptoms. It was used in underdeveloped countries for suicides. There were a few reports of poisonings, most of them fatal. It was sold in liquid form in the States with dye in it and a severe odor and vomiting agent added as safeguards, but in Canada and Europe it was sold without the additives, in pure form, with no color, taste, or smell. It was lethal if used in even small doses, and in minuscule doses, you could kill someone slowly over a long period of time. The accompanying message said that Bill was wondering if his father was using it on his mother. Peter didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. His e-mail was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever seen, and reeked of paranoia.

  He was asleep when Bill called him the next morning and woke him up.

  “Did you see my e-mail?” were his first words, and Peter groaned. He was still half asleep, but Michael hadn’t called him during the night with bad news, which was a good sign.

  “Yes, I did,” Peter said slowly. “Bill, you have to give this up. Your father isn’t using weed killer to kill your mother. He’s a doctor, for chrissake. If he wanted to kill her, which he doesn’t, he’d use something a lot simpler than a weed killer he’d have to go over the Canadian border to buy. You have to let go of this.” He had watched Michael’s desperation to save Maggie the day before, which made Bill’s suspicions seem even crazier now. Peter sat up in bed then and looked at the clock. It was seven o’clock in the morning, noon in London. Bill said he had been researching it for days, and the weed killer he’d found had to be it. All the symptoms described were his mother’s. “Are you listening to me?” Bill shouted at him. And then he lowered his voice again.

  “Your mom’s sick, by the way. She’s in the hospital,” Peter interrupted. He hated to be the one to tell him, but he thought he might as well know. Peter had lost all patience with him and his insane delusions about his father.

  “With what?” Bill sounded panicked about his mother.

  “She had a reaction to a drug she was taking, for the Parkinson’s. It did something to her lungs. Your dad is afraid it’s pneumonia. But she’s hanging in so far. I was with them all day yesterday until late last night. Believe me, he’s not killing her. He’s doing everything he can to save her. No one could do more.”

  “If he’s been poisoning her all along, all he has to do now is sit there and cry and watch it happen. That’s the best alibi he’s got.”

  “You need therapy,” Peter said seriously. “Or drugs. You’re hallucinating.”

  “I know this is it. I know every poison on the Internet. I’ve been researching it for months. He’s poisoning her, I know it. This stuff has been used before.”

  “Not by doctors on their wives,” Peter said, feeling desperate. He couldn’t get Bill to calm down. “Your mom’s been sick since she was twenty. You have to face that, no matter how hard it is. She may not live through this. And if she does, there will be other times like this in the future. Bill, you have to grow up.”

  “You have to listen to me!” his nephew shouted back at him. “I know him. He’s a sociopath. He’s crazy. He has no conscience or morals.”

  “I know my brother. He’s not as crazy as you think,” Peter said, fighting to sound calm, although he wasn’t. “He can be a jerk. I hated him just like you do. But I swear, he loves your mother. He’d give his life for her.”

  “My father doesn’t give a shit about anyone. For all you know, he killed your parents, for their money.”

  “It wasn’t enough to matter,” Peter said quietly.

  “My grandfather left her ten million dollars. Believe me, he would do it for that. If she leaves him half of it, that’s enough. I swear he only married her for what he knew my grandfather would leave her. In the condition she was in then, no one else would have married her. She was an annuity for him.”

  “That’s a cruel thing to say about your mother.”

  “I want you to do something for me.” Bill sounded frantic, and Peter was sorry he’d ever met him. The last thing he needed was a lunatic on his hands. Now he thought he understood why Maggie had said it was better he’d gone to live in London. He was crazy, and she knew it. “I found a toxicology lab in Boston, from the Internet. They test for rare poisons. I called them yesterday. They said that if we can get them a few hairs from her head, they can tell us if this toxic agent is present. After that I’ll leave you alone, I swear.” Peter closed his eyes and shuddered as he listened. How was he going to get rid of Bill now? And Peter realized, listening to him, that Bill would go insane if his mother died. He might even try to kill his father, for a crime he had never committed and Bill had only imagined.

  “Look, I’m not going to go in there, in front of your father, who looks worse than she does, and rip a bunch of hairs off her head, and drive them into Boston to some quack you found on the Internet, so he can find out if your father is putting weed killer in her soup. Bill, you have to get real here.”

  “I’m begging you,” Bill said, and Peter could hear that he was crying. He was about to cry too, out of sheer frustration. And Maggie might not even live long enough for him to do what Bill wanted. “I’ll never call you again. I promise. Just do this one thing for me. For my mother’s sake, if you care about her at all.”

  “I love her. And my brother.” That was true now, he realized. He had formed a bond to his twin that he’d never had before, and it was important to him. “And I care about you. But I don’t want to go on a wild-goose chase.”

  “Why not? What if I’m right and you save her life?” Peter sat staring into space as he thought about it. Bill was right, at worst he’d look like a fool taking three hairs to a lab in Boston to find out what kind of hair spray she used. And if what Bill said was true?… But it couldn’t be. The whole idea was just too insane. The product of a sick mind, far sicker than the one he was accusing his father of having. There had been silence on the phone for a minute while Peter was thinking. It gave Bill hope when Peter didn’t answer. “Will you do it? Just this one thing. For my mother. It won’t hurt anyone if I’m wrong … and if I’m right, we’ll save her. There could be permanent damage from this poison, but if he kept the doses low enough, she could recover, unless he’s stepping up the doses now to kill her. Just tell me you’ll do it. We may not have much time.” Peter felt as though he were being sucked into the nightmare with him.

  “I don’t know why I’m doing this for you. But if you’re wrong, I want you to swear you’ll find a psychiatrist in London, and never call me again. Your mother is a very sick woman, and you’ll just have to face that.”

  “I promise you, I will.”

  “E-mail me the name and address of the lab. I must be as crazy as you are.”

  “I sent it before I called you,” Bill said, sounding relieved, and then thanked his uncle profusely.

  “And how am I supposed to rip three hairs off her head without your father thinking I’m deranged?”

  “Stroke her head or something. I know you can do it.”

  “I just want you to know that I think you’re wrong on this. A hundred percent wrong. My brother is not a killer.”

  “Just do it,” Bill said tensely.

  “I told you I would. But I know you’re wrong.”

  “Maybe I should come home today,” Bill said, sounding pensive.

  “Ask your father. But she doesn’t look good to me.”

  “Let me know what the lab says.”

  “Whatever. I’ll call you,” Peter said, and was furious at himself for agreeing to do it. He hung up then, and an hour later he was at the hospital. Michael was dozing in a chair next to Maggie, who was sleeping soundly. Peter felt ridiculous when he remembered his mission. He walked over and stroked her hair, and without Michael noticing, he gently tugged a few hairs from her head. They came away easily, and he dug his hand into his pocket
and clutched them. He left the room a minute later, before either of them woke up, and put the hair in an envelope he had brought with him. He was sure that no one saw him. And then he walked back into the room and sat down next to Michael. His brother stirred and smiled at Peter.

  “How is she?” Peter whispered.

  “About the same. She’s running a low fever.” They both knew that wasn’t good either. But she was still hanging on. “As long as her lungs don’t get paralyzed, we have a fighting chance.” She had the beginnings of pneumonia.

  “I have to go into Boston today, to take care of some banking problems,” Peter said, looking embarrassed, and feeling as demented as his nephew.

  “Anything I can help you with?” Michael asked him with a look of concern. He was wondering if his brother was running out of money.

  “No, I’m fine. You’ve got bigger problems here. I’ll be back in about four or five hours. Call me if you need me.” Michael nodded, the two brothers exchanged a smile, and Peter left the room as soundlessly as he had entered, and hurried to the parking lot, with the envelope in his pocket. He wondered if the lab in Boston even existed.

  It took him an hour and a half to get to Boston. And he felt like a traitor all the way there. He was signing on for his nephew’s fantasy, that his father was trying to murder his mother. Peter knew there was no way that could be true, but at least after this maybe his nephew would accept the truth, that his mother was dying. Peter didn’t like it either, but it appeared to be reality. Maggie was holding on by a thread now. Her weak heart, kidneys, and liver combined with the Parkinson’s and her earlier infirmities were more than any human could survive. Peter wondered if it was only a matter of days now, or worse, maybe hours.