by Marie Moore
My nonchalant manner as I downplayed my date with Adam seemed to mollify her somewhat and she fell silent, turning her back to me, watching the dark streets as we rushed through the night.
I relaxed and closed my eyes, resting my aching head on the back of the seat, my mind flooded with the extremes of the last few hours. I was thankfully headed back to Jay and the safety of the hotel, and the morning flight would take me back to Delhi and then home, to my dear little apartment in New York, where life would be calm again.
I would give Sharma’s paper to Brooke, I thought, let her handle it as she saw fit, turn in my detective badge and go home. Simple as that. Calf-rope, my Uncle Earl would say. Stick a fork in me, I’m done.
“Sidney,” Jasmine said, her voice silky and musical once more, “Brooke tells me you think my dear Felix did not die a normal death after all, that Mr. Sharma bribed the official to change the report and now has given you the true one. Is this so? Do you have a document proving his death from the fruit of the suicide tree?”
I was shocked by her question. How could she know about the paper? Brooke didn’t know about it. I hadn’t told her yet, or anyone else. Only Jay and Sharma knew. Even in my foolish moments of intimacy I had not confided in Adam. And I knew Jay would not have told her or anyone.
I opened my eyes and looked at her. She was smiling the wide smile that had dazzled hundreds of her adoring fans.
And in that moment, I knew. I remembered Mohit’s singsong words as he spoke of the potent poison of the suicide tree, “A lovely fragrant tree with white flowers and dark green leaves, but its seeds bring death. It flourishes in the Kerala region.” Kerala. Jasmine’s home town.
“Yes, Jasmine,” I said, thinking fast. “I believe that he was deliberately killed, but what proof could I, an American tourist, have of such a thing? That is ridiculous. I am not the police.”
“No, but you could cause inquiries to be made, and those inquiries could bring results. This is not your world, Sidney. In this world there are many eyes, many ears. It is known to me that foolish Sharma gave the report to you. He told me so himself before he died.”
“Sharma is dead?”
“Yes,” she said, again with the radiant smile, “The night after we left for the Terai, Sharma fell beneath the wheels of a festival cart and was crushed. Such accidents are not uncommon at such times in such a crowd. Just another tragic accident, no? I know you have the paper, Sidney. Sharma told me himself. Now you must give it to me. Where is it? Must I have you stripped to find it?”
“In my room,” I said. “Hidden in my room at the hotel. Take me back there and I will give it to you.” I suddenly knew why my bag had temporarily gone missing at Big Tiger Watch Camp. Jasmine had known even then about the document and thought I might have it with me.
She laughed then, a raucous laugh, enjoying my terror.
“Oh no, Sidney. I cannot afford to do that. I can search your room and destroy this paper without you. Unfortunately you will not be there to hand it over yourself. You will only be a sad reminder of what can happen to a foreign girl wandering alone in a strange country at night. Remember the sad newspaper stories of the girl on the bus in Delhi? You will die like her.”
She tapped the driver on the shoulder. The car pulled to the side and stopped.
At Jasmine’s nod, the man on my left opened his door and pulled me out, forcing my arms behind me as he dragged me to the side of the road. The other man got out of the front seat to help, dodging my kicks and stuffing a filthy rag in my mouth to stifle my screams. Neither said a word. The second man opened the car trunk and removed a length of long thin rope.
“Tie her to that post and leave her,” Jasmine hissed. “The jackals of the streets will soon find her. Before she dies she will know what it means to cross Jasmine.”
The two burly men tied me tightly to the post. My struggles were nothing to them. Minutes later they were back in the car. Then the car doors slammed and they drove Jasmine swiftly away. I heard her mocking laughter through the open windows grow ever fainter as the car’s taillights disappeared around a corner.
Chapter 22
I didn’t die, because the jackals didn’t find me.
Jay and Adam did, accompanied by Brooke, Rahim, and a whole posse of police.
Poor, guilt-stricken Adam had launched an all-out search for me when he got back to the hotel and found that I had not returned. Jay, knowing all the stupid stunts I have somehow managed to pull in my life, pushed the panic button as well, and it’s a good thing they did or I might not be here to tell the tale. Even our journalist friends from the bar joined in the search. It was all pretty embarrassing later, but at the time I could only feel gratitude.
A watch was put on my room and the hotel security caught Jasmine and her assistants breaking in to steal Sharma’s document. Jasmine denied it all, and as she was led away, demanded that her lawyer be called, insisting she could explain everything.
We all agreed that Jasmine would have a lot of explaining to do, particularly as seeds of the suicide tree were found by the police, hidden in the makeup bag in her room.
Her assistants, who blamed each other under separate questioning for pushing Sharma under the wheels of the cart at the festival, were taken away with her.
Before she left for the airport, Brooke pulled me aside to say how sorry she was for putting me in harm’s way, and to thank me for exposing Jasmine as the murderess.
“I’m not quite sure how you do it, Sidney, and I’m not sure you do either, but you always manage to ferret out the truth and end up on top, don’t you? You really might want to be a bit more careful in the future, though. You’ve had more than a few narrow escapes, haven’t you, my dear?”
“Too many, Brooke. I hate to admit it, but I think Jay may be right. I need to dial it down somehow in the future before I get myself in one scrape too many. I’m just going to go back to work in New York and try to mind my own business. If I still have a job, that is, after all this.”
“I wouldn’t worry a lot about that, Sidney. I spoke with your Mr. Silverstein myself this morning on that very subject. I called him because I wanted to be sure he fully realizes what a valuable employee he has in you.”
“You did? I appreciate that more than you know, Brooke. I love my job, and I don’t want to lose it. Thank you for that, and thank you for making this lovely trip possible for us, too. Except for the last few hours, I had a wonderful time. This has been an amazing trip.”
“I’m glad you feel that way, my dear. I had a good time, too, in spite of everything. But now, I am so relieved that it’s over. Fearing that someone wishes you deadly harm is not a good way to live. Perhaps I’ll see you on another trip sometime soon. I understand that the new owner of your agency is planning quite an expansion.”
“New owner of my agency? The agency’s been sold?”
“Yes, indeed. Mr. Silverstein said he would tell you all about it when you get back to New York. Goodbye for now, Sidney. Have a safe journey home, and give my best regards to Jay. I’m leaving in a few moments and don’t expect to see him again before my car arrives.”
As Brooke finished speaking, Rahim and Mohit appeared to escort her to the front entrance where her car, Lucy, and Justin were waiting. I waved goodbye to them as the car rolled smoothly away. Brooke, Lucy, and Justin were headed to the airport, then bound ultimately for Lucy’s home in St. Tropez to rest and recover.
I refused Adam’s invitation to do the same in Scotland. He made it clear that the invitation was open-ended and was there for me if I changed my mind in the future. Like my Southern sister Scarlett, I decided that I would think about that tomorrow.
Mohit had stood beside me silently, with palms folded, bowing toward Brooke’s retreating car in a traditional Hindu farewell until it was no longer in sight.
Then he turned to me, placed his palms together, and bowed again before saying, “Goodbye, lady.” With one of his intent stares through his thick, round glasses, he
added, “It may be that we will meet again. Who can know what will come? It is written that our fortunes await us because of our deeds. Take great care in the future, my lady, for you are pursued by your karma.”
After all was said and done, after signing a statement for the police and leaving my contact information, I was just happy to be climbing aboard a plane at Tribhuvan International Airport and heading back home with Jay.
After stowing his red turban in the overhead, he asked, “Do you think we really still have a job, especially now that we seem to have a new owner?” He settled in his seat and fastened his seatbelt. “He hasn’t responded to my email and my call went to voicemail.”
The big plane pushed back from the gate and taxied toward the runway.
“Who knows?” I said. “We should. I didn’t really do anything this time that people could blame on me, did I?”
“You never do, babe,” he said, shaking his head. “You never do. You may get blamed for this or you may not. I don’t know. With you, somehow these things just happen. I think Mohit might be right. It may be your karma.”
I was quiet for a moment, considering just what my karma might include.
“Jay,” I said, as the big plane lifted off the tarmac and headed west, bound for New York, “It’s not really finished. The mystery, I mean. We never really discovered exactly who tried to poison Brooke, did we? That’s what we were really hired to do. We only proved that Jasmine poisoned Felix.”
“Yes, we did. Lucy, Brooke, and I figured out what happened with the chocolate while you were frolicking at the festival with Adam. In all that happened afterwards I forgot to tell you. Turns out, no one tried to poison Brooke after all, Sidney. The intended victim was always Felix.”
“What? What do you mean? Was the poisoned candy all just Brooke’s imagination?”
“No. It was real, all right, and she’s lucky it didn’t kill her. I’ll bet my turban it turns out to be the same toxic Indian poison that did it for Felix. But it was not ever intended for Brooke, only Felix. Lucy remembered that Felix was sitting next to Brooke that night, and in her haste Jasmine must have switched out the good candy box for the poisoned one at the wrong place. Jasmine didn’t want to kill Brooke, she wanted to kill Felix. She just made a mistake with the candy.”
“That was a pretty big mistake.”
“Yes. She made other mistakes as well, but Brooke didn’t notice them. Lucy has sharp eyes, though. Lucy remembers seeing Jasmine coming back to the table with a candy box in her gloved hand when she returned from the restroom. We think she injected the candy with the poison there before placing it back at what she thought was Felix’s place. Lucy particularly noticed Jasmine’s long gloves that evening. She thought them an odd touch at the time but put it down to Jasmine’s dramatic way of dressing. Brooke was never the intended victim. It was always Felix.”
“She killed him for his money. She really was a spider, like Justin said, wasn’t she?”
“Yep. Felix had made Jasmine his heir and they were not getting along, so he had to die before he could change his will. When the candy attempt failed she pretended to make up with him until she could try again. Brooke’s moving house party in India was the perfect opportunity.”
“Jay, why didn’t Lucy tell Brooke all this before? Felix might still be alive.”
“Because Lucy didn’t know Brooke’s candy was poisoned. Brooke kept it a deep secret, remember? She even thought that Lucy might have poisoned the candy.”
“If Brooke had told,” I whispered, almost to myself, thinking back on all that had happened, “Felix might be alive, and we might have never gone to India or Nepal. We never know, do we, what our simplest actions might set in motion.”
Jay reclined his seat and stretched out, making his nest for the long journey home. “Like Mohit said, babe,” he murmured, with a twinkle of amusement in his warm brown eyes, “ ‘Your karma pursues you.’ That’s all it is. Jasmine might have easily gotten away with it all and moved on to her next victim if it hadn’t been for Sidney, Girl Detective. I think you, Sidney, of all the people I have ever known, must be totally pursued by your karma, don’t you?”
* * *
Photograph by Chad Mellon
Marie Moore is a native Mississippian. She graduated from Ole Miss, married a lawyer in her hometown, taught junior high science, raised a family, and worked for a small weekly newspaper—first as a writer and later as Managing Editor. She wrote hard news, features, and a weekly column, sold ads, did interviews, took photos, and won a couple of MS Press Association awards for her stories.
In 1985, Marie left the newspaper to open a retail travel agency, and for the next fifteen years, she managed the agency, sold travel, escorted group tours, sailed on nineteen cruises, and visited over sixty countries. The Sidney Marsh Murder Mystery Series was inspired by those experiences.
Marie also did location scouting and worked as the local contact for several feature films, including Heart of Dixie, The Gun in Betty Lou’s Handbag, and Robert Altman’s Cookie’s Fortune.
In mid-1999, because of her husband’s work, Marie sold her travel agency and moved to Jackson, MS, then New York City, Anna Maria Island, FL, and Arlington, VA. She and her husband now live in Memphis, TN, and Holly Springs, MS.
Side Trip to Kathmandu is the third book in the Sidney Marsh Murder Mystery series, which began with Shore Excursion. For more information, go to:
www.mariemooremysteries.com.
