A Little More Dead

by Jordaina Sydney Robinson

  “I believe that’s who you refer to as Ginger Curls,” Mendall said, checking the file in front of him.

  “Did you have to give a statement to the police?”

  Mendall nodded. “I was inside the maze the same as you. I had to tell them what I saw the same as you.”

  “What did you see?”

  “Unfortunately, nothing. How about you tell me what you saw?”

  I shook my head. “I didn’t see anything either.”

  “Did you manage to see who gave you that bruise?” Mendall gestured to my neck.

  “It was accidental,” I said adjusting my jumpsuit to cover it.

  Mendall pressed his lips together and nodded. “Accidental?”

  I made a non-committal noise and sipped some more of that damn tea. I doubted Alex would be good at taking rejection. Maybe this had nothing to do with Lily’s death, after all. Maybe these were two separate instances and we had just assumed they were related. Maybe Lily and Timothy’s affair was one thing. Timothy had killed her before she could out him and that had been that. And Katie suspected. Timothy had said something before Katie escaped to incriminate himself and Katie had found him and killed him in retaliation for killing her friend. Then, completely unrelated, Alex had killed Katie for rejecting him. I could almost buy it. Almost. But I just couldn’t get behind Alex as the murderer. He couldn’t even shoot me when he was convinced I’d killed Bertha. And he’d been genuinely in love with Bertha.

  “I can see you’re working that through, but you owe me a name.”

  “A name for what?” I asked.

  “The housemate that could possibly have trashed your room.”

  “Oh. Lucy.”

  “Okay.” Mendall smiled at me and gave me a small nod as though he considered that progress. He got up and briefly turned his back on me and opened the bottom drawer of his filing cabinet. I took the opportunity to pour the ghastly tea into his potted plant. The aftertaste alone would keep me up all night. I wished non-tea drinkers wouldn’t try to make tea. He turned back with a notepad and sat back at his desk, taking a sip of his coffee. “Now, I want to delve into your life, your alive life. I’m aware from observing you on the tour that you have some issues with authority. I’d like to go all the way back and talk about your relationship with your parents.”

  “Seriously?” I asked. “You want to talk about my childhood?”

  Mendall smiled a self-deprecating smile. “It’s cliched, I know, but those years are our most impressionable. We learn how we form relationships, what’s acceptable, what’s expected, it informs how we act as adults.”

  “Uh-huh, yeah, are you actually qualified for this?” I asked. “What did you do in life?”

  “I was a psychiatrist with an interest in cognitive and behavioural therapy.” Mendall gestured to the certifications on the walls. “Examine them. I’m fully qualified to ask you about your childhood.” There was humour in his voice.

  I pushed myself to my feet and headed over to examine his certificates. “I’ve been to therapy before. Turned out she was an actor in real life.”

  “Interesting that you determine your alive life as your ‘real’ life,” Mendall commented.

  “Wow, Oxford, hey?” I pointed to the first certificate and moved along the wall of qualifications. “Degree. Degree. Degree. Master’s. Master’s.” I turned back to him. “How old are you? Like mid-forties? You died before you paid off your student debts, right?”

  “Long before. But I died very qualified,” Mendall said.

  “You did,” I agreed and turned back to examine the certificate in front of me to see what year it was issued. If it was in the early nineteen hundreds I was retracting that statement. I was pretty sure they still used leeches to draw out the demonic presence that supposedly caused epilepsy back then.

  “Will you answer my questions about your childhood now you’re satisfied I’m eminently qualified?”

  I nodded and was about to turn back and sit down when something on the certificate caught my eye. I leaned in closer to make sure I’d read it right. All of the pieces and confusing nuggets of information reshuffled in my head and then fell neatly into place.

  “Bridget?” Mendall asked and I turned around.

  “Your first name’s Galen.”

  He nodded. “My mother had some Irish ancestry.”

  “That’s nice,” I said and backed up as casually as possible to put the desk and my chair between us.

  Despite my attempt at casual, all of Mendall’s degrees in recognising behaviour paid off. He watched as I stood behind my chair. He looked from his achievement wall and back to me. “What just happened?”

  “Nothing,” I said, making my eyes as wide and innocent as possible.

  Mendall pointed to the wall. “I thought we’d just determined I was qualified.”

  “Uh-huh. Yep. You’re definitely qualified.”

  “Then why don’t you—” Before Mendall finished his proposal someone knocked at the door. He called for them to come in.

  Burt stuck his head around the door. “Sorry to interrupt but you’re needed in the common room.”

  “Urgently?” Mendall asked, his tone clearly explaining he was unhappy at the interruption.

  Burt nodded. “Sorry.”

  Mendall sighed but stood. He walked around the side of his desk and I edged around the opposite side of my chair, keeping something in between us. Mendall watched me.

  “Burt, will you stay here with Bridget until I return, please?”

  “Sure thing.” Burt nodded and stepped into the room as Mendall stepped out.

  Mendall reached to close the door after him, and focused on me for a long moment before turning to Burt. “It’s important she stays here until I return,” he said, to which Burt nodded, and then closed the door.

  Burt dropped into the chair next to the one I was using as a shield. “That felt intense. I didn’t think holdover interviews were that in-depth.”

  “Yeah.” I moved a little closer to the door and strained to hear Mendall’s footsteps tapping away along the corridor. “Burt, can you get me out of here?”

  Burt laughed. “It’s a forty-eight-hour hold, Bridget. You’ll be out of here before you know it.”

  I tore my attention from the door and sat down in the chair next to him. “I think Mendall killed everyone.”

  Burt searched my face and then laughed. “Bridget. It’s forty-eight hours! Two days. That’s all. But if anyone else hears you making those accusations it might be a lot longer.”

  “I’m serious, Burt.”

  “Bridget, come on. Alex was the one killing everyone. The police have arrested him. They have evidence. It’s all over. You’re safe here.”

  “What evidence?” I asked.

  “They didn’t share that information with me but since they’ve arrested him it must be pretty solid.”

  “Yeah, like the evidence against Crazy Katie,” I retorted.

  Burt narrowed his eyes at me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  I was getting no help from this quarter. It was time to try a different tactic. I rubbed my eyes and slouched in my seat. “You know, you’re right. It probably was Alex. I’m just tired and used to suspecting everyone.”

  Burt’s expression softened. “Sounds like two days’ rest in here would do you some good.”

  “I guess. But you know what would help me settle in here?”

  “Ice cream? We have chocolate.”

  Yes, because chocolate ice cream would stop the homicidal doctor from murdering me in my sleep. Although there were worse ways to go than with a tummy full of chocolate ice cream.

  “It would help me if I could hear it’s only a forty-eight hour hold from my parole officer.”

  “I’m sorry, Bridget, I can’t do that. This is an isolation hold.”

  “Okay.” I leaned back in my chair and scanned the room for something I could use to incapacitate Burt. I liked him and didn’t want to permanently damage h
im, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t above knocking him out to escape a murderer. I turned back to find Burt watching me.

  “You’re looking for something to knock me out with so you can escape?” he asked.

  “No. I—”

  Burt shushed me. “You’re not the first patient we’ve had on a forty-eight-hour isolation hold who doesn’t want to be here. I can read the signs.” He sighed and then relaxed back in the chair and motioned with his hand for me to speak. “Okay, let’s work it through. Why did Dr Mendall kill all these people?”

  Did I trust Burt enough to tell him? I’d already told him Mendall was the killer – what difference did explaining how I’d gotten there make? And I had to get out of this place before Mendall came back. What were my other options? Maybe I could convince him? Or maybe, as soon as he got back, he’d tell Mendall I was delusional. Mendall would drug me and I’d have some sort of mortal accident. Would it still be a “mortal” accident if I was already dead?

  “Bridget?”

  “We found Lily’s diary. She was having an affair with someone she referred to as Gal. We thought, because she wrote in uppercase, that meant G A L. As in her Ghostly Acclimatisation Leader, but I think it meant Gal as in Galen. Galen Mendall.” I pointed to the certificates on the wall.

  “Mendall killed Lily to silence her and the two other members of her GA group, either because they saw something or he suspected they knew something. Katie suspected it was him and Mendall thought that she might go to Timothy for help so killed him before she could.”

  Burt nodded slowly, as if he was processing the information. “So what about Jason? Gary? The other guy in the maze?”

  “Maybe they all saw something too?” I suggested.

  Burt’s attention made a circuit of the room as he looked like he was working that back through. “So what you’re saying is Mendall killed the person he was having an affair with and then another” – Burt paused to count the tally on his fingers – “seven people to cover it up?”

  “In for a penny …” I said with a shrug, though it did seem like quite a high number. But, then, what price could you put on freedom?

  “Is it not more reasonable that Katie killed Lily and the two other members of her GA group? And attempted to murder her housemate? Then, separately, Alex killed Jason, Gary, Timothy, Katie and the other guy for his own reasons?”

  “But why would he kill any of them? Including Katie?” I asked.

  “Well, Katie wasn’t the most stable of people either. The police said they fought.”

  I frowned at him. “The police told you that?”

  “Not specifically but they did ask about Katie’s temper. About how she and Alex got along.” Burt leaned forward in the chair. “Look, Bridget, I know you don’t want to believe it was Alex, but remember he tried to kill you once already. Really, you should be grateful he didn’t try again. Although, from the bruise on your neck, maybe he did try.”

  I opened my mouth to defend Alex but closed it again without saying anything. I hadn’t won Burt over. Maybe it wasn’t Mendall. Maybe I’d gotten the whole thing wrong. All I was sure of was that it wasn’t Alex. Admittedly, he had tried to kill me twice but something in my gut just told me it wasn’t him. Burt wasn’t going to trust my gut. There was no point in further discussion on this. I could do a two-day hold and act like a well-adjusted normal dead person. I’d make no accusations. I’d get through it, get out and Sabrina and I would work out who the real killer was. Maybe Oz would even help. No, maybe “help” was pushing too far. But maybe he wouldn’t hinder so much.

  “You make sense, I guess,” I admittedly as convincingly as I could.

  “Really?” Burt asked, almost like he didn’t believe me. “No more talk of other suspects? No more hurling accusations at Dr Mendall?”

  “Yep. No more accusation hurling. Now, you mentioned ice cream,” I said and Burt’s frown turned into a smile.

  “I did.” Burt got up from his seat and offered me his hand so he could pull me up. “I’ll even take the heat from Dr Mendall for interrupting your intake meeting to fill you full of sugar.”

  “That’s very chivalrous of you.” I accepted his hand and let him pull me to my feet. Maybe the sugar would speed up the process of my brain untangling the murders. Worth a try.

  “It’s not so bad here, Bridget,” Burt said with a smile and gestured to the door of the office. The cuff of his jumpsuit rode up slightly with the movement, exposing the tattoo on his inside wrist. I smiled at it. It was such a girly thing to have but then a reminder that things would be okay suddenly didn’t seem so silly. Maybe I could get a small something done. Could ghosts get tattoos? And then it was like I was looking at a Magic Eye picture again. Suddenly, the doves morphed into a word. A word written in the most cursive handwriting ever. But a word nonetheless. Gal. No matter how I looked at it the images wouldn’t shift back to the doves.

  My attention jumped to Burt’s face as I dropped his hand and backed up, putting the visitor chairs between us.

  Confusion flitted over Burt’s face. “What’s wrong?”

  “It was you who was having the affair with Lily. That’s why she wrote it so openly because who would see that?” I pointed to his wrist. “What does that even mean? Who’s Gal?”

  “No one. It’s two doves, like I told you. Badly done, it’s true.” Burt pulled the cuff back to trace the outline of the doves. “See?”

  The image reformed briefly into two doves but as soon as he finished tracing the outline it flipped back to the word “Gal”.

  “Look, Bridget, this is getting silly. First it’s Mendall, now it’s me. Suddenly, it’s a lot clearer why they’ve put you on this hold.”

  “It’s you.” I had no idea how I was certain about it but I was. “I know it is. But who is Gal? An ex-girlfriend? Someone else you killed?”

  Burt focused on the ceiling and blew out a long breath. “Honestly, you’re as bad as Lily was. It really is just two doves. She didn’t believe me any more than you do so I made up this story about how people used to call me that when I was younger. Somehow she knew that was a lie and from that assumed I was cheating on her. I had this tattoo before I died. I had it when she met me. And still she thought it was proof that I was cheating.”

  “Were you cheating?” I asked. For some reason it seemed important.

  “Yeah, but not with someone called Gal.”

  I gasped and jabbed a finger at him. “You were cheating with Katie! That’s what she and Lily were arguing about. No, they can’t have known they were both seeing you. If she and Katie had realised you were cheating on them with the other they would’ve dropped you right in it. So you killed Lily because she was threatening to expose you. But your relationship with Katie was still going on while she was in here until she somehow realised that you were Gal. She guessed that you killed Lily and hid. Did Jason find out about your relationship? Was he going to report you? Is that why you killed him? And then Katie used that opportunity to escape.”

  “Where was the diary?” Burt asked. “I looked everywhere.”

  “I was looking for a hiding place and found it.” I was absolutely not dropping Petal in it.

  “Where is it now?” Burt asked as he moved around the back of the chairs so he was between me and the door.

  “Somewhere safe,” I said backing up so the back of my thighs were pressing against the desk. Since I’d already checked the room for anything I could use to incapacitate Burt the first time around I was sure the plant pot was my best option. “How did you know Katie was going to be in the maze tonight?”

  Burt shook his head. “I didn’t. I didn’t kill Katie. I think your buddy Alex did me a genuine favour there. So, now there’s only you.”

  “Okay, so explain the rest to me,” I said.

  “You got it pretty much right.” Burt pulled a syringe from his pocket and uncapped it. “Katie had convinced Jason that Lily had been murdered. She, like you, thought it was Timothy. Jason brought it to
me, helpfully pointing out that Mendall’s first name could be easily confused with the GAL and that we should look into Timothy and Mendall, just in case. I couldn’t risk him realising it was me.” He delivered the explanation in a matter-of-fact way while squirting a tiny fountain of liquid from the syringe. Wouldn’t want to accidentally kill me with an air bubble to my heart, would we?

  “Then it turns out that Katie had been talking to everyone about this Gal. Gary knew. Killing him was pure luck. He’d just delivered your visitation and just appeared at his favourite skiving location. I was waiting for him. I was going to try to pin it on Mendall but the moment he saw me, he knew. I’ve no idea how. I just managed to catch him before he tunnelled away. That was close.” Burt nodded, almost like he was talking to himself as he moved through the chairs toward me. I edged one way and he countered, blocking my escape.

  “It was only a matter of time until Katie managed to get to Timothy. Of course he would be on her side. He never believed that she was guilty so he had to go before she could get to him. Then that guy in the maze saw me knocking Alex out. I had planned to frame him for it but then I heard you and your friend talking about it and realised I could just as easily pin it on Mendall since I figured most people would make the same leaps you did.”

  “What about the two people from Katie’s GA group?”

  “Well, they overheard Lily’s and my discussion when they were having an illegal intimate moment after their meeting. When she was found dead they thought they could blackmail me so they had to go. How stupid do you have to be to try to blackmail someone you think has murdered someone else. I was doing the afterlife a favour there.”

  “Great. I really appreciate you clearing all that up for me,” I said, as I moved around the back of Mendall’s desk. “How about you just sit back down and get comfortable while we wait for Mendall to get back and you can explain all this to him? I’m sure he’ll be incredibly understanding. Maybe you’ll only get a forty-eight-hour hold too,” I said encouragingly. I was pretty sure that was unlikely, but this was the afterlife – the rules never applied like you thought they would.

  Burt nodded his head sadly and then checked his watch. “Actually, he’ll be occupied for a little while. One of the patients in the common room is having an episode.”