Michelle gobbled down her eggs. “I'm listening, Momma Peach, keep talking.”
“Well,” Momma Peach said, feeling her brain waking up, “if a man was intent on killing someone wealthy and wanted to lure them into a trap, how would he go about doing it?” she asked. “It sure seems to me that the best way to set a trap for a wealthy person would be to play on the same playing field.”
“In other words, lure the rich by being rich?”
“In a sense, yes,” Momma Peach explained. “Wording killed his victims in some mighty fancy hotels. Now, if I was about to be blackmailed but the snake blackmailing me wanted to meet in a fancy hotel, why then, I would feel safer. I sure wouldn't think I was going to be stabbed in the back anytime soon. No sir, it sure seems to me that J.W. Wording understood how to manipulate his victims in just the right way.”
Michelle grabbed her coffee and checked the clock hanging over the kitchen sink. “Okay, Momma Peach, let's assume for a minute that each of Wording’s victims was connected to him. Let's assume each victim received an illegal organ transplant at the Jeremy Wyatt Wording Medical Center and Wording Junior, after faking his death and killing off his father, saw them as an easy meal ticket.”
“Let's assume,” Momma Peach agreed.
Michelle studied her breakfast plate. “You stopped Wording from killing his sixth intended target,” she said and looked at Momma Peach. “There's really no telling how many targets J.W. Wording was going after.”
“That's true.”
“But let's focus on the five we know about,” Michelle stated. “We know they were all killed by a highly lethal poison that stops the heart within a matter of seconds. And we know they were killed by the same man who is hiding in this fog.”
“That's the ingredients in the cake.” Momma Peach took a bite of eggs. “Not bad, I reckon. Might need to go to the hospital later, but that's the chance you take eating that old woman's food.”
Michelle leaned back in her chair and thought and then jumped to her feet. “I need to call Beth,” she said and ran out of the kitchen.
Momma Peach pulled her body up out of her chair in alarm and curiosity. She hurried into the front room and watched Michelle call Beth.
“Medical records?” Beth asked when Michelle explained what she needed. “Sure, Detective, I can pull up the medical records on the five names Ralph helped me find. It could take some time, though.”
“Beth, we don't have time,” Michelle pleaded.
Beth put down a donut and checked her watch. “We sure don't,” she agreed. “Okay, Detective, I'll put everything I'm doing on hold and get to work on finding something. They should have autopsies on file, since they were murder victims. Will that do?”
“It’s a start. Please hurry,” Michelle begged and hung up the phone. She turned and looked at Momma Peach. “I think the medical records are our best chance at digging up a connection, but perhaps Beth can find us something in the autopsy reports. I’m trying to remember if autopsies record organ transplants or not…” Michelle wracked her brain for information.
Momma Peach took Michelle's hand and walked her back into the kitchen. “There’s no way to know until Beth finds the reports,” she said and sat Michelle back down at the baking table, “so let’s sit tight until then. No sense getting in a tizzy about it.”
Michelle sat down and grabbed her coffee. As much as she loved Momma Peach's kitchen, the kitchen was beginning to feel very stuffy. “I say after we deal with the second puzzle we drive down to the station, Momma Peach. I need to stretch my legs.”
Momma Peach hesitated. She wasn't happy about the idea of stepping outside into strange fog. The truth was that even with an officer of the law at her side, she was scared of the fog. An unseen monster was lurking in town, and Momma Peach had a target on her back. In her mind, she kept seeing a hairy claw reach out of the fog and begin strangling her. Of course, that was nothing close to the threat she faced in reality, but Momma Peach felt that the human hand attached to a killer was just as scary. “Baby, I don’t...I really don't want to go out in that fog,” she confessed.
Michelle looked into Momma Peach's scared eyes. “Okay...uh, we can stay here at the bakery if that makes you feel better.”
“My bakery is my fortress,” Momma Peach told Michelle in a serious voice. “I know every inch of my bakery. If I go out into that there fog, I’ll feel as lost as a puppy wandering around a giant forest. Or a delicious fish swimming into a shark tank. Or…”
“I understand what you mean,” Michelle told Momma Peach and patted her hand. “The village in China where I grew up as a little girl would always get soaked in fog. The fog would become so thick at times that you could get lost walking from one house to another. I guess I'm used to the fog.”
Momma Peach looked into Michelle's sweet and caring eyes. “Do you ever miss China?” she asked.
“I miss the village I once called home,” Michelle confessed. “I miss my family. I miss the people, the food...the land.” Michelle looked down at her hands. “I don't miss my enemies…men intent on destroying the freedoms and rights of innocent people...men intent on killing anyone who stood in the way of...dictatorship.” Michelle raised her eyes. “Momma Peach, China is a beautiful country filled with beautiful people who only want to be free and have a chance at being happy, just like you and me. Christianity and freedom is growing in the hearts of my people...but the men in power want my people to worship the government. My people are suppressed and beaten down by a cruel hand. They deserve to be free and rule themselves in a true democracy. I could never go back to live in China...visiting is difficult enough.”
“Sometimes I wonder if America is much better these days,” Momma Peach told Michelle. “Yes sir and yes, ma’am, America is a divided country ruled by tyrants and criminals. Folks think they're free until the IRS tells them what to do or the government dictates what health care they can have and what taxes they'll pay.” Momma Peach shook her head. “Used to be in the old days we understood what freedom meant. Freedom was the Wild West, freedom was the Underground Railroad, freedom was anywhere someone worked to improve the country and defend the rights of all people. Nowadays there’s so many laws and regulations on this land I sometimes wonder if I’m going to get a ticket for cooling a pie on my windowsill. So perhaps we should ask ourselves if America is truly as free as she likes to think she is.”
“I guess not.”
“Take this J.W. Wording for instance,” Momma Peach continued. “He became known as the Manhattan Killer and because of that title, grown men cowed down in fear instead of going after the monster. Isn’t that giving up a little bit of our freedom, too?” Momma Peach stopped talking and shook her head in disgust.
“My question, Momma Peach, is whether we are to blame for our fears, or whether J.W. Wording is to blame for being evil in the first place,” Michelle commented. She took a sip of her coffee, thinking. “Perhaps it’s neither…we all have a responsibility to each other.”
“I suppose you’re right about that. But all I know is that every time I think about this Wording fellow, I get a sour feeling in my gut. We better eat before I lose my appetite altogether,” she said and picked at the rest of her breakfast as the fog sat silently outside the back door, waiting for her.
At exactly thirty minutes to noon, Beth called the bakery. Michelle ran to the phone as fast as her legs would take her. “Hello?”
“Don't kill me,” Beth begged, “digging up the medical records took longer than I expected.”
“What do you have, Beth?” Michelle asked in an urgent voice. “Time is running out.”
“Okay,” Beth said and rustled through the stack of papers covered with notes before her. “I don't want to kill you with details right now. I'll do that later.” Beth took a deep breath. “Detective, each of the victims was admitted to the hospital that the older Mr. Wording financed. Not at the same time...some years apart.”
“What was the reason for their hospital
stays?”
“Routine checkups,” Beth explained. “Or so their medical records claim. However, it seems awfully fishy to me that someone admitted for a routine checkup would spend a full week in a hospital.”
Michelle looked at Momma Peach. “Each of J.W. Wording’s victims was admitted to the Jeremy Wyatt Wording Medical Center for routine checkups…but each one stayed a full week.”
“Bingo,” Momma Peach said in a triumphant tone. “Ask that sweet Beth how many folks were admitted for this kind of so-called routine checkups?”
“Beth, can you find out how many people were admitted for routine checkups that resulted in a week’s stay?”
“I figured you might ask that, so I divided the workload and assigned that task to my cousin,” Beth said and fought back a yawn. “Oh,” she said in a quick voice, “before I forget, I did manage to get in touch with a Shelly MacNeigh in New York while I was waiting for the medical center to fax me over the information I needed.”
“The wife?”
“The daughter,” Beth corrected. “Detective MacNeigh is dead, detective. He died over ten years ago of lung cancer. But his daughter was very happy to talk with me. She gave me her phone number and said you could call her at any time after six o'clock this evening.”
“I'll give the woman a call,” Michelle assured Beth and jotted down the number. “Maybe Detective MacNeigh left some old files or something behind that might be useful in this case. In the meantime, take a break, go home, catch a few hours of sleep, and then get back to work.”
“But the other names you—”
“Beth, go get a few hours’ sleep,” Michelle ordered.
Beth fought back another yawn. “I guess I should,” she agreed. “I'll be back at my desk no later than...let's say...four.”
“That'll be fine,” Michelle said. “Drive safe, okay?”
“I will,” Beth said and hung up.
Michelle hung up the phone and turned to Momma Peach. “Looks like we have a solid lead.”
“Looks that way,” Momma Peach agreed. She walked over to the display window and looked out into the fog. “My, it's like a whole different world out there,” she said. “And somewhere out in this here fog, J.W. Wording is lurking about.”
Michelle walked over to Momma Peach. “He'll be calling soon. We need to make sure the answer we have for him is the answer he wants.” Michelle drew in a deep breath. “Momma Peach, it does seem to me that each victim was connected to the Jeremy Wyatt Wording Medical Center, and it’s tied to the truth behind the rumors allegedly started by Wording’s wife way back in the day. It looks to me like each victim received an illegal organ transplant that was purchased at a very high price. And it seems that Wording Junior came after these people, first for money, and then for murder.”
Momma Peach kept her eyes on the fog. “That about sums it up,” she said, “and that's what we're going to tell that monster.” Momma Peach narrowed her eyes. “He wants me to know who he is...but first he wants me to understand how he got there...what made him the way he is...what created that evil lurking in the heart beating inside of his chest.”
“Are you sure?” Michelle asked.
Momma Peach nodded her head. “I am dead sure. You see,” she said in a low whisper, “the last time I fought this monster, I fought him as the Manhattan Killer. Now Wording wants to fight me with his mask off. He wants me to see his real face. Not the face he created to scare people. He wants recognition.”
Michelle gazed out into the fog. “Momma Peach, how did you end up tangling with J.W. Wording after the housekeeper was found dead? You never said.”
Momma Peach stared outside at the thick swirls of heavy fog. The fog slowly faded as she remembered her lovely hotel room from all those years ago, with its large king bed surrounded by burgundy walls and a white carpet so soft a person could sink down and vanish. “Detective MacNeigh came to my room about an hour after that poor woman’s body was taken away,” Momma Peach told Michelle. “I heard a knock at my door and nearly fainted. I nearly hid but found the courage to ask who was knocking on my door.”
“Detective MacNeigh,” the man called out and shoved an unlit cigar back into his mouth.
Momma Peach carefully eased her room door open and spotted a gruff man with a pockmarked face and uncombed, oily black hair standing out in the hallway. “What can I do for you, Detective?” she asked.
Detective MacNeigh chewed on his cigar and looked at Momma Peach with curious eyes. “You’re the woman who won the Golden Days Flour Contest, right?” he asked.
“Yes sir, I sure did, and I’m starting to regret it,” Momma Peach confessed.
“You're from the south, right? Georgia, maybe Alabama...no, I'm thinking Georgia.”
“Good guess. I am indeed from Georgia,” Momma Peach said, keeping her eyes on Detective MacNeigh's hard face.
“My sister married a southern man. They live in Statesboro, Georgia. Nice place.”
“Statesboro is a nice town,” Momma Peach agreed, still nervous to find out what the man was after.
“I'm a city man, myself,” Detective MacNeigh commented, unhurried. “I was born in Brooklyn and have lived there ever since. I don’t think I’d know what to do with myself in a place like Statesboro. How do you get around without cabs and subways? I would miss the crowded sidewalks and tall buildings, and I make my living dealing with crime. Not too much of that around Statesboro, I gather.” Detective MacNeigh chewed on his cigar. “Four years ago, I was assigned to this hotel after recovering from being shot in the shoulder. I'm not too far away from my pension, you see, and my boss figured this beat would be a safe place to lay low until I retire. I can't say I mind. Being a hotel detective is a cake walk. Or, at least it was.” Detective MacNeigh looked hard at Momma Peach. “A woman was killed. I don't like people dying on my watch.”
Momma Peach looked to her right and then to her left. The hallway was empty. “Detective, I would feel better if we could talk in my room.”
Detective MacNeigh nodded his head and walked into Momma Peach's room and closed the door. “I heard someone at the front desk say that you call yourself Momma Peach, is that right?” he asked.
“My real name is Caroline Johnson, but folks back home know me as Momma Peach,” she explained. She walked over to a luxurious green armchair in front of a window covered with thick white drapes and sat down. “I don't like murder, Detective.”
“Who does?” Detective MacNeigh asked. He examined the room and then sat down on the edge of the king bed. “Tell me, Momma Peach, why did you lift the sheet off the dead woman and smell her?”
Momma Peach grew silent and listened to a heavy rain falling outside. The city was drenched and felt very dark in her mind. Her heart was screaming to race to the airport and fly home. Momma Peach knew she couldn't leave New York until she helped capture a killer, though. So she looked at Detective MacNeigh with steady eyes and said: “I smelled the killer.”
Detective MacNeigh chewed on his cigar. “Who killed the housekeeper?”
Momma Peach folded her hands together and drew in a deep breath. “If I tell you, he might come and try to kill me, too. Momma Peach don't need you playing John Wayne and putting my life in danger.”
Detective MacNeigh put his cigar into the right pocket of his overcoat. “Momma Peach, I'm a man that goes on hard facts and even harder evidence. I was shot in the shoulder chasing a jewel thief that robbed over ten jewelry stores. After collecting months of evidence, I narrowed a certain store down and managed to catch the thief in action. Unfortunately, the rabid dog managed to get off a lucky shot, but before I went down, I put a bullet in him, too. So don't worry about me acting hastily. I'm a cop, not a clown. You can trust me.”
Momma Peach looked at Detective MacNeigh. There was something about the hardened man that she liked. She didn’t know exactly what it was, but what she did know was that the man could be trusted and even relied on. “J.W. Wording,” she told Detective MacNeigh in a seri
ous voice.
Detective MacNeigh nodded his head. “I figured it was him,” he told Momma Peach. He stood up, walked over to the window, pulled back the drapes, and looked out at the rain. “Ever since that guy arrived, he's been making the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.”
Momma Peach didn't know what to say. Here she thought Detective MacNeigh might criticize her or even disagree with her statement. But instead, the man wholeheartedly agreed with her. “What are we going to do?” she finally asked.
“Not sure,” Detective MacNeigh confessed. “The room the housekeeper was found dead in was squeaky clean. Not a shred of evidence to be found anywhere. Oh, we tossed some powder around and collected some prints, took some photos, the usual routine. But all in all, Momma Peach, we came up empty-handed. The Manhattan Killer managed to kill again without leaving any breadcrumbs. Of course, this killing was different from all the rest.”
“All the rest?” Momma Peach asked and swallowed.
Detective MacNeigh kept his eyes on the rain. “All the other victims were poisoned. I'm guessing the housekeeper was killed because she saw something she shouldn't have…the killer didn't have time to go get his poison, so instead, he strangled her to death.” Detective MacNeigh took out his cigar and began chewing on it again. “She was killed in an unoccupied room...would have helped if she had been killed in a room assigned to a guest.”
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