Death of a Lovable Geek

by Maria Hudgins

  After Lettie left for her own room, I sorted out my thoughts by writing the day’s events in my trip journal. Were John’s death and Froggy’s murder related? I couldn’t see how, but the odds that they weren’t, given the fact that I was convinced John’s death was also murder, were long. Two unrelated murders right here, in less than a week? But I was at a loss to find a connection.

  The connection, I decided, must have something to do with the dig. That was the only link between John and Froggy. Might Froggy have discovered something that John found inconvenient? Maybe Froggy’s pollen study had thrown doubt on the ages of the three spots we were excavating, thus ruining John’s plans for building the place into a tourist attraction. If John killed Froggy, who killed John? Maybe Tony, because he wants to take over the dig? Maybe he wants to take over Fallon. It didn’t take a behavioral psychologist to see that something was going on there.

  As for the people at the dig, there was Proctor Galigher, whom Froggy had turned in for plagiarizing. There was Tracee Wagg, who might resent Froggy for warning Van away from her, or for embarrassing her before the spring dance, although, in that instance, it was Froggy’s friends who did it; not Froggy himself. There was Iain Jandeson. Ambitious. Very strange. That’s all I knew about him.

  And then there was Van. I had to find out about those Super Bowl tickets. If they were Van’s, why was one lying in the stairwell here, shortly after Froggy’s murder? If they weren’t Van’s, what was the second one doing in his desk?

  What was going on at the camp last night? It hit me. Mushrooms! Psychedelic mushrooms. That would explain why the kids had been saying “shroom” to each other all that afternoon. There was to be a magic mushroom party that evening and they all knew about it. Who would have been their supplier? Were psychedelic mushrooms to be found in the woods around here? Did I have one before me right now?

  I opened my mushroom book to the labeled diagrams and spent the next hour learning the parts of a mushroom and the terminology that mycologists use to describe them. As is always the case with any branch of biology, the specialists have to make up a five-syllable word for every little thread and do-hickey one might find on any sort of mushroom. I learned about asci and basidia and rhizomorphs. I learned about veiled mushrooms and cobwebby rings; about polyphores and slime molds and jellies and stinkhorns. Just reading about some of them made me sick, but I also learned that it was important to make a spore print of each specimen, ah="48; Jbook explained how to do it.

  It suggested inverting a drinking glass over each cap to minimize air currents and it suggested setting the cap down on paper that was half white, half black so whatever color the spores were, they would contrast with one side or the other. I recalled the mushroom caps under glasses on Froggy’s desk, and my eyes welled up with tears.

  I had only one glass in my room and I didn’t want to contaminate it by contact with something that might have killed John or made us all sick, but I recalled seeing a shoe box in the bottom of my wardrobe. I had to get down on my knees and scramble through the pile of laundry I’d been collecting since I got here. Towels, shirts, underwear, jeans. I really needed to find the castle’s laundry room. I knew they had one somewhere. I pulled out a brown paper bag that smelled musty and contained some sort of dark, mushy stuff. What the hell was it? Oh, yes. It was the stuff I had found in the cellar the other day. I tossed the whole bag into the wastebasket beneath the basin.

  When I dragged out the shoe box and opened it, I found it contained a couple of sheets of black tissue paper of the sort they wrap new shoes in. I cut several strips of it using the scissors in my travel sewing kit and laid them on sheets of white paper that I ripped from my notepad. Voila! Half-black-half-white paper for making spore prints. I placed several of the mushroom caps, gill sides down, over the papers and set the empty shoe box over all of them.

  I crawled into bed with my book and read until my eyes crossed, then got up and splashed my face with cold water. It wasn’t simple. There are thousands of species of mushrooms and hundreds of them are known to be poisonous. But only a few of the poisonous species are really deadly and death by mushroom poisoning is a fairly rare occurrence. Many are hallucinogenic or psychoactive but there seemed to be more anecdotal evidence than hard facts in this area.

  The worst poisons, the book said, are heat-resistant chemicals known as amatoxins and phallotoxins. That answered my question about whether or not cooking would have rendered them harmless. It wouldn’t have. The Amanita mushrooms included the species phalloides (Death Cap) and virosa (Destroying Angel), both of which could kill you. But there were also Amanitas like the muscaria (Fly Agaric) and the pantherina, which could fly you to the Land of Oz. So confusing. There was the Deadly Lepiota, the Poison Pie, the Jack O’Lantern (which looked and sounded harmless but wasn’t) and the Deadly Cort.

  When I found the section on the symptoms of Amanita poisoning, I read it over several times.

  There is a long latent period of approximately ten hours before the first symptoms appear. Then a period, lasting about one day, of nausea, abdominal cramps, and vomiting. Followed by yet another period of apparent remission. It is during this symptom-free period that severe damage is done to the liver and kidneys. In the last stage, the patient may lapse into a coma and death may follow. Patients who survive this last stage will often require a liver and/or kidney transplant.

  Pharmacological treatment with large dosages of penicillin and/or milk thistle extract may be effective if started soon after ingestion.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  I delivered Lettie to the Aviemore train station at eight twenty-nine to catch the eight twenty-nine train. I parked the car and walked out on the platform in time to see the train’s automatic door close on Lettie’s purse then slide open again when she yanked from the inside. As the door slid shut for the second time, a uniformed conductor appeared behind her, and Lettie threw her hand over her mouth in an exaggerated “Oops” gesture.

  The Aviemore station was amazing. Over the platform, a white frame canopy trimmed in red looked as if it had been painted that morning. The whole place, preserved in the style of the early 1900s, was spotless. I allowed myself a five-minute rest on a varnished wood bench before heading on to my appointment with the lawyer I hoped to hire for Van.

  His name was Edward Cross and he was an associate in the firm of Bobble, Bangle and Bede, Solicitors. Where had I heard that name before? The reception room appeared to have been recently renovated, the smell of new carpet mingling with that of morning coffee. Computer cables neatly encased in plastic ran along the baseboards.

  I had been there only a minute when Robbie MacBane loped out of one office, his jumble of red curls slicked down today in a rough approximation of neatness, and I remembered where I had seen the name Bobble, Bangle, and Bede. This was the same firm that had sent Robbie the letter that he had interpreted as threatening his lease of the farm. It made sense in light of the fact that William had recommended Mr. Cross to me. These folks had probably been the Sinclairs’ solicitors for generations, and, given the sparse population hereabouts, it might be the only multi-partner law firm between Fort William and Inverness.

  Robbie crooked his finger at me as he walked past, so I followed him outside. “You were right,” he said, closing the big oak door behind us. “This was all John’s doing. Bangle says he cannae guess why John is so interested, but he says John came in a week or so ago and told him to go over my lease with a fine-tooth comb.”

  I caught Robbie’s arm and stopped his progress toward the parking lot. “I have to stay close by. I’m waiting to see someone myself.”

  “So, the bottom line is, John and William Sinclair can do any damn thing they want. They can offer me some sort of incentive to give up the farm if they want, but if I refuse to leave, they can make up any bleedin’ reason in the world why I’m an unsatisfactory tenant, and the lease is null and void. I cannae believe it. I’m their own flesh and blood! Sort of.”

  “Y
ou haven’t heard yet, have you?” I looked deeply into his blue eyes. “John died last night.”

  Robbie turned more colors than a schizophrenic octopus in the next few seconds. Embarrassment, regret, relief, confusion—all flashed across his ruddy Scottish face. “I dinnae ken! I’m sorry. What did he die of?”

  “That’s still to be determined, but the short answer is, his liver and kidneys failed.”

  Robbie ran his fingers through his hair, returning the sides to their normal jumble of red curls. “Is there anything I can do? Anything I can do to help?”

  “Do you know about Van’s arrest?”

  “What?”

  I explained why his tenant wasn’t in his room anymore. Robbie haphrenic o vssumed that Van was simply gone for the night, perhaps hanging out at the camp. He fell back against the granite front of the building, his gaze darting left and right. “They think he murdered Froggy? But why?”

  I asked Robbie if he knew anything about some Super Bowl tickets and if he had heard quarreling between the two roommates. He could offer no help on either. “Also, have you seen the presentation Van has been putting together for John? It might have some bearing on why John had that letter sent to you.”

  “Nae. I dinnae go into their room often. I like to let boarders have a bit of privacy.” Robbie said he wouldn’t know how to turn on Van’s computers or run the presentation even if he did. “But you say they’ve got him at the police station, noo? I’ll drap by and talk to him.”

  “They won’t let you see him. I already tried that. They’ll be questioning him this morning and, after that, maybe they’ll let him see visitors. In fact, that’s why I’m here now. I want to get him a good lawyer.”

  “You? Why you?”

  I tried to explain, but felt Robbie still didn’t understand why I would put myself out for someone I knew so casually. Not that it mattered if he understood or not. I told him I would probably go to the police station later today and asked if it would be all right for me to stop by his house beforehand and pick up a few things from Van’s room.

  “I’m sorry, but I willnae be home until late this evening. I’m drivin’ to Inverness to see me wife.”

  “Your wife?” I had no idea Robbie was married. Were he and his wife separated? Fortunately, he explained before I had to ask.

  “Me wife and I are expectin’ a bairn in aboot three months.” His chest puffed out as he told me. “She’s had two miscarriages before, so this time we decided she should stay with her folks in Inverness so she’ll be close to the big hospital if there’s any … if she needs to get there quick, ye ken.”

  “Oh, of course. Quite sensible.”

  “If ye need to get into the hoose today, Boots can let ye in, if ye can find him.”

  The front door opened, and the receptionist stuck her head out. “There you are, Mrs. Lamb. Mr. Cross is ready to see you.”

  Ed Cross was a soft, little man with gray, thinning hair, and his office smelled of old smoke. “I’m curious, Mrs. Lamb, as to exactly what your interest is, in this young man.”

  I was growing tired of explaining. “I have gotten to know both him and the murdered boy, Dylan Quale, through our work at John Sinclair’s dig. Have you seen it? The dig?”

  “The tent and such out by the castle? Aye.”

  “I’m convinced that Van Nguyen didn’t do it, and I very much want the person who did do it to pay and pay dearly. I know that Van can’t afford to hire his own solicitor, but I want someone who will protect his interests to represent him. William Sinclair recommended you.” Flattery, flattery. William hadn’t exactly recommended him. He’d merely made this appointment for me.

  “I see. Can you tell me anything more concrete than that you’re convinced he didn’t do it?”

  I was at a loss to offer anything more concrete than Van’s lack of a sufficient motive to kill his roomma">O TKd ruin his own bright future. I filled Cross in on the Super Bowl tickets, the shirt, the nature of Van’s work and Froggy’s work, and the discovery of the body.

  He scribbled notes on a yellow legal pad as I talked. At one point he interrupted me with, “You say Duncan Coates is in charge of the investigation?”

  “Yes.”

  Cross’s face didn’t betray what he thought of Chief Inspector Coates. He scribbled some more, then placed his pen precisely alongside the yellow pad. After several seconds of silence, the only sounds soft taps from the receptionist’s keyboard outside our door, Cross said, “Let me explain my fee.”

  * * * * *

  It was almost obscene how easily the death of John Sinclair, leader and prime mover of the Dunlaggan dig, was accepted and overcome. By the time I walked into the tent, about ten o’clock, Tony Marsh had taken control, promoted Graham Jones to assistant director (Tony’s own job until yesterday), and Iain Jandeson to site supervisor. Tony had already held a general meeting and told everybody about John’s death.

  As I entered the big tent, Iain Jandeson strutted across to the coffee urn, waved a finger at me and said, “You’re on the church wall today, Dotsy. Grab a trowel.”

  The nerve! I’m almost old enough to be his grandmother and he’s bossing me around like I’m some kind of quarry slave. Yesterday Iain and I were equals; today he’s my boss. I considered the possibility that I might have to remind him that I was a volunteer and I could leave any time I wanted to.

  Instead, I grabbed a trowel and proceeded to the site of the fifteenth-century church. Joyce Parsley sat, Indian style, on the ground at one corner of the wall, her trowel scraping along the bottom of a stone. As usual, she had her camouflage hat pulled down so low that I couldn’t see her face. I dropped my kneeling pad a few feet farther along the wall and plopped down on it with an audible “Oof.”

  “I heard you had a magic mushroom party at the camp Saturday night,” I said, deliberately giving her no time to make up a story.

  “Who told you that?” Joyce dropped her head a bit closer to the ground, until her shoulders touched her knees.

  “Van,” I said. “Who got the mushrooms, Joyce, and where did they get them?”

  “Why do you care?”

  “Did Iain Jandeson get them?”

  “No, Proctor did.”

  “Where did he get them?”

  “How should I know? Maybe he picked them in the woods. Maybe he got them from somebody else. It’s not illegal, you know. It’s not against the law to pick mushrooms and eat them.”

  Was that right? Were the picking, buying, selling and consumption of hallucinogenic mushrooms illegal, or not? It seemed as if it ought to be illegal, but I didn’t know for sure. “Look, Joyce, be careful with that kind of stuff. You never know what effect it’s going to have. It can be dangerous.”

  “Yeah, okay,” she said, like a scolded child.

  “And what was that light show all about?”

  sat, Iit?at up quickly and turned to me, her eyes sparkling. “It was so cool! I wished Froggy could have been there to see it. You get this plastic bag, you know, a thin one like they use at the dry cleaners, and you tie knots in it every few inches, and you hang it from the ceiling or something and put a pan of water under it, you know, so you won’t burn the place down, and then you light the bottom end of it, and it makes these amazing streaks of light and every time a blob of it falls, it makes this sort of ‘zweeep’ sound.” She was fairly bouncing with excitement as she explained it to me.

  “Why did you yell out, ‘You killed Froggy,’ when you saw Van, Joyce?”

  Her face went blank and she turned back to her troweling. “I don’t remember that. I don’t remember seeing Van at all.”

  Iain Jandeson tromped by us. He pulled off his Aussie hat, smoothed his hair back and replaced the hat, squinting into the sun as he did so, as if he was deciding whether the sun should be moved to another part of the sky. “Back to work, girls. This isn’t a social hour,” he said.

  I just stared at him.

  Joyce, her back to Iain, flipped him a one-finger sa
lute that only I could see.

  “Iain, I need to get my good trowel,” I said. “Is the finds shack open? I left it in there.” This was not true, but I felt certain there would be at least one trowel in the finds shack and I could say it was mine. Actually, I wanted to have a good look at the computer that Froggy used.

  Iain walked me to the door and popped the brass padlock open with one of his keys. I looked around, spotted a trowel on the floor, and said, “Here it is.” I bent over to pick it up and fell to my knees. “Uh oh,” I said, placing both hands flat on the floor, “I’m having one of my spells, I fear.”

  I stuck my hand into my jacket pocket and pulled out a little carton of orange juice. “I’m diabetic, Iain. When I forget to eat properly, my blood sugar goes down too far. I need to drink this and sit here a few minutes.” Matching the deed to the words, I sat on the floor looking as spacey as I could.

  “Are you going to be all right? Should I go and get someone to help you?” he asked.

  “No, no. I’ll be fine in a few minutes.” I sat there staring at the wall until Iain got bored and left.

  “When you come out, don’t forget to get Tony, Graham, or me to lock up the finds shack,” he said.

  As soon as he was gone, I hopped up and ran to the computer. Someone was already logged on, so I clicked out of their document and considered how to log on as Froggy. The user name they had given me was dlamb, so I tried dquale. It worked. I got the screen that asked for a password. Now I was stuck. What password would Froggy use? Probably something clever, I thought. This could take forever, and I knew the computer only gave you a certain number of tries before it cut you off. Would he have been so obvious as to use “froggy” as his password? I tried it and stared incredulously at the screen. It worked. I was in.

  With as many errors as one would expect of a woman not born in the computer age, I checked Froggy’s recently used documents and files and then went online and checked the recently visited Web sites. I couldn’t get into his E-mail because that required another ? e vbe , and “froggy” didn’t work.