Death and Honesty

by Cynthia Riggs

  He sighed. “Can’t see anything anyway.”

  The second floor was dark except for the lamp on Oliver’s desk and a dim glow from his computer screen, where the rabbits continued to frolic. Victoria felt chilled and uneasy. She could smell Oliver’s nervous sweat. Or was it her own? She heard his breathing. In the faint light she found her way to the stairs that led down to the first floor.

  Where was Howland?

  CHAPTER 16

  Victoria was at the top of the stairs when she heard Howland’s voice on the first floor. She called down, “I’m up here on the second floor. The attic has no light.”

  “Sorry I was gone so long,” Howland called back. “Took me a while to locate the chief.”

  “Oliver is still here,” Victoria warned.

  At that, Howland took the stairs two at a time and confronted Oliver. “What’re you doing here, Ashpine?”

  “Chief? Police chief?” asked Oliver.

  Howland spoke to Victoria. “Casey’s parking the Bronco. She called the barracks.”

  “Barracks?” asked Ashpine. “The state police?”

  “She’ll need a flashlight,” said Victoria.

  Casey, followed by Sergeant Smalley and Trooper Tim Eldredge of the state police, came up the stairs to the second floor.

  Oliver started to get up, then turned back to his computer and shut it off. “Good night, everyone. Lock the door when you leave.”

  “Just a moment, Mr. Ashpine,” said Casey. “Wait here.”

  “Who, me?”

  “Sit.” Casey pointed to his chair, and Oliver sat. “And don’t move.”

  “How long will you be?” asked Oliver.

  “Can’t tell, sir. We may be all night,” said Casey.

  “I’m sick!” said Oliver, turning back to his computer.

  The police, Victoria, and Howland trooped up the attic stairs by the light of two five-cell Maglites, lifted the lid of the window seat, and shone the light in.

  Victoria had not looked closely at the body before. She did now.

  A woman, shriveled, almost mummified. Her face was turned sideways, and Victoria saw her profile.

  Casey shone her light around the body. “Doc Jeffers is on his way.”

  Sergeant Smalley turned to Tim Eldredge. “Get some extension cords and a light up here. You’ll need to stay until forensics gets over to the Island.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I know who she is,” said Victoria.

  “Yeah? Who?” asked Casey.

  “Tillie Willoughby, former clerk to the assessors.”

  Oliver turned his computer back on and studied the video clip again. He didn’t want to chance someone’s seeing it, but he was really pressed for time, and, in truth, he did feel sick. He had to get the video off the town computer, now, before the weekend. He looked up as the sound of jangling chains announced Doc Jeffers. Oliver quickly switched to the screen saver. Doc Jeffers was wearing his black motorcycle leathers. A V-necked green scrub shirt showed in the half-zipped front.

  “What’s up, Doc?” said the cartoon rabbit.

  “Very clever.” Doc Jeffers gave him an icy glance and headed up the attic stairs.

  “That wasn’t me,” Oliver called out, but the sound of Doc Jeffers’s chains had already faded out of hearing.

  Oliver left his computer on and turned his back to the animated screen saver, hugging his aching gut.

  An hour later, Doc Jeffers had finished his preliminary examination of Tillie Willoughby’s remains and he and Sergeant Smalley headed downstairs again. Trooper Eldredge called down from the attic to Smalley, “Boss, we’re about out of crime scene tape.”

  “Right. I’ll have another roll sent over.”

  Victoria, Howland, and Doc Jeffers gathered around Oliver’s desk. Victoria sat in the visitor’s chair, while Howland half-sat on the desk.

  “I can’t get anything done with all of you hanging around,” Oliver whined.

  The others ignored him.

  “I saw Tillie as recently as last November,” Victoria said. “Can a body mummify that quickly? Only five months?”

  Doc Jeffers stood on the other side of Oliver’s desk, filling out forms. “Dry up there,” he said. “Even in winter, it gets hot. Wouldn’t take long to desiccate a body. As I recall, she was skinny, almost anemic. Not much body fat. That could account for her condition.”

  Victoria leaned forward, hands together on the top of her lilac wood stick. “How did she die?”

  Doc Jeffers shrugged. “I won’t know until they do an autopsy.” He finished filling out forms, snapped his black bag shut, and saluted Victoria. “I’d say, at a guess, she was strangled.” With that, he disappeared down the stairs, boot chains jangling.

  At the word “strangled,” Oliver gasped and breathed in when he should have breathed out. That set off a coughing fit. Howland was still perched on the edge of the desk. Oliver’s face was red and he pounded his chest.

  “You okay?” asked Howland.

  Oliver nodded and coughed.

  Victoria studied Oliver’s computer screen with its bouncing rabbits.

  “Put your arms straight up over your head,” commanded Howland. “Straightens your esophagus. Here, I’ll help.” He reached over to Oliver and in doing so hit the keyboard. The rabbits disappeared and in their place were two animated pink bodies, complete with sound effects.

  “Good God!” said Howland.

  Oliver turned and jerked the computer plug out of the wall socket and coughed some more.

  “Is that what you watch on town time?” Howland asked.

  Oliver shook his head, unable to speak.

  Victoria, who’d seen the few seconds of writhing bodies before Oliver killed the action, looked thoughtful.

  Oliver’s cough had become a steady throat clearing.

  “Let’s get out of here, Victoria,” said Howland. “Leave this creep to his porn movies.”

  They were halfway down the stairs when Victoria said, “I believe I know what he’s watching.”

  “What in hell are you talking about, Victoria?”

  “Let’s go to my house and sort this out.”

  “Damn,” said Oliver once Victoria and Howland had left. “Damn, damn, damn.” He thumped the “Caps Lock” key on his keyboard repeatedly with his left index finger, causing a small square of green light in the upper right corner of the board to flash on and off. He’d been careless about that video clip. Now, because of that buffoon Doc Jeffers, Mrs. Trumbull and Howland Atherton had seen what he’d been viewing. He’d have to copy the clip onto a disk and get it off the Town Hall computer immediately. Now. Instantly. He looked through his desk drawers for the blank disks he’d brought from home. They were the wrong disks. “Damn!” said Oliver again, putting his head down on the keyboard.

  People were moving around upstairs, probably Junior Norton, the chief, and the remaining state cop.

  He couldn’t concentrate. He had to get home and crawl into bed. But he had to do something about the video. He wasn’t sure how to encrypt it with a code word, and didn’t feel well enough to read up on how to do it. He decided he could safely save the video in some innocent-sounding file, and after thinking a bit, came up with “Honeybee.” No one would look there.

  He closed down his computer, called up the stairs, “I’m sick. I’ve got to go home,” and left.

  “I’m pooped.” Doc Jeffers dropped his motorcycle helmet behind the desk in the Emergency Room at the hospital and shucked off his leather jacket, exposing his green scrub shirt. “This had better be a quiet night.”

  “Pee-yew!” exclaimed Hope, who was on duty. “What have you been rolling in?”

  “Don’t ask,” growled Doc Jeffers. “I need a shower and clean clothes.”

  “I’ll hold the fort, Doc, until you get back.”

  He hesitated.

  “Go ahead. I’m fine.” Hope settled herself behind the admissions desk.

  Shortly after Ocypete got home
and into bed, she was violently ill. She crawled out of bed and collapsed on the floor, her stomach a ball of fire. She managed to knock the phone off the cradle and dial 911.

  Ellen felt wretched. She took a couple of aspirins and crept into bed. An hour later she felt worse, and realized she’d better call 911.

  Oliver toughed it out for a couple of hours once he got home. Around seven, he dialed 911.

  No sooner had Doc Jeffers trudged down the hall to the shower when the Tri-Town Ambulance pulled in, lights flashing. Two EMTs, a slender blond man with slightly tilted eyes and an even slimmer young woman with a buzz cut, wheeled in a stretcher. On the stretcher was a woman in her seventies, a large woman clad in layers of pastel-colored veils. She was holding an arm to her head and her fingers were tangled in her mane of white hair.

  Hope stood up.

  “Ocypete Rotch. West Tisbury. Abdominal distress,” said Jim, the male EMT. His partner stood off to one side.

  Ocypete groaned.

  There was a faint beeping sound and Jim checked his pager. “Gotta go, Hope. Another call from West Tisbury”

  “Right,” said Hope. “I’ll worry about the paperwork.”

  “Where do you want Ms. Rotch?”

  “Take her to room two. Thanks, you guys.”

  Erica, the other EMT, smiled. “Any time.”

  Ocypete was strapped into a cool bed and kind people worked purposefully around her. They gave her a shot of something, and within seconds she no longer felt pain, and no longer cared.

  A half hour later, the Tri-Town Ambulance pulled in again, lights flashing. The same two EMTs wheeled in a stretcher with a second woman in her seventies.

  “Hi, again,” said Hope. “Who do we have this time?”

  The woman on the stretcher had intense black hair and was dressed in a severe navy blue pants suit. Her hands were folded over her stomach.

  Doc Jeffers still had not returned from his shower.

  “Ellen Meadows from West Tisbury,” said Jim.

  “Abdominal distress?” asked Hope.

  “The same. Where would you like Ms. Meadows?”

  Hope checked the chart. “Room three. Thanks, guys.”

  “No problem,” said Jim.

  Within a few minutes, Ellen was on a cool hospital bed with people working on her. And within seconds, she, too, was no longer in pain.

  Doc Jeffers returned, scrubbed pink and wearing a blue scrub suit. He lifted his head to peer through his glasses at the admissions slips. “What have we got here?”

  “Two cases of abdominal distress, both West Tisbury.”

  “Stomach cramps, vomiting, diarrhea,” Doc Jeffers noted. “Flu.”

  “Sounds more like food poisoning to me,” said Hope.

  Doc Jeffers looked over the top of his glasses. “Think so? One of them’s been complaining about stomachache for a couple of days.”

  “Maybe they ate the same thing at different times. Shellfish or mushrooms. Chicken salad.”

  “Flu’s around this time of year. But check it out.”

  “Certainly,” said Hope.

  An hour later, while Doc Jeffers was still conferring with his patients, the Tri-Town Ambulance pulled up again at the ER and Erica and Jim wheeled in the stretcher a third time.

  Hope was filling out paperwork at the desk. “Another stomachache?”

  “You guessed it,” said Jim.

  This time the patient was a man, a fairly short, plump man with a pasty white face and slicked down hair.

  “Oliver Ashpine of West Tisbury,” said Erica.

  “Room one,” said Hope. “Don’t bring in any more. That’s all the room we’ve got in the ER.”

  “Bedtime,” said Jim, and yawned. “Good night, all.”

  “Fruit jellies?” Doc Jeffers asked Oliver. “You sure?”

  Oliver moaned.

  Hope said, “I’ll find out if the other two have eaten any fruit jellies lately.” She hurried to the adjoining cubicles in the ER and was back shortly. “They’re both out. I’ll ask them when they wake up.”

  Doc Jeffers poised his pen above the form on his clipboard. “Where was the candy?”

  “Someone left it on my desk.”

  “How much did you eat?”

  Oliver moaned. “Three pieces. Four.”

  “When?”

  “This morning. This afternoon. Maybe five pieces.”

  Doc Jeffers continued to take notes.

  “Am I dying, Doc?” whispered Oliver.

  “No such luck,” answered Doc Jeffers, and scribbled something.

  “Wasn’t on my desk three days ago,” murmured Oliver. “Mrs. Danvers.” His voice rose above a whisper. “It’s Mrs. Danvers. She’s trying to kill me!”

  Doc Jeffers turned to Hope. “Take Ashpine to the lab. See what they can make of his stomach contents. Looks as though he ate the stuff most recently.”

  “You’re pumping out my stomach?” Oliver half rose from the gurney in room one.

  Doc Jeffers smiled. “Damn right we are,” and moved on to the next cubicle to check his sleeping patients.

  CHAPTER 17

  Early the next morning, Howland, still agitated about Oliver’s viewing habits, dropped in at Victoria’s. He paced from the cookroom to the kitchen to the dining room and back.

  Victoria was working at the cookroom table. “Sit down, Howland. I can’t think with you all over the place.”

  He picked up a copy of the Island Enquirer from the kitchen table, rolled it up, and slapped it on the tiled countertop, his leg, the door frame.

  “Stop that. There’s something I want to say to you. Help yourself to coffee.”

  Slap! on the cookroom table. “He’s a creep, Victoria. Porn flicks! In Town Hall, for God’s sake. Right where everyone sees them.”

  “Please, sit down.”

  Howland tossed the rolled-up newspaper on the table and sat. “If he’s going to watch that stuff, at least he could do it in the privacy of his own home.” Howland pulled on his nose, then ran his fingers through his hair.

  “I know what that movie was,” Victoria said.

  He stopped fidgeting. “What are you talking about?”

  She traced the lines of the red-checked tablecloth with her ridged thumbnail. “The other day, Delilah confided in me. Before she met Henry, she was a call girl, and she doesn’t want Henry to know.”

  Howland started to say something, but Victoria held up her hand. “Delilah complained to Oliver about her taxes. He threatened to blackmail her. Told her if she made a fuss about the taxes, he’d tell Henry about her past life.”

  “The video?”

  “I believe it shows Delilah.”

  “In action?”

  “Something like that.”

  Howland picked up the paper again. “Don’t dirty your hands with this, Victoria. It’s between Delilah and Oliver. Possibly Henry.”

  “And, quite possibly, Darcy,” said Victoria.

  “What in hell does her chauffeur have to do with it?”

  “I intend to find out.”

  While Howland was pacing Victoria’s house, Henry was pacing the conservatory of Delilah’s. His and Delilah’s house, he told himself. Where the hell was she? She wasn’t in her room and she never got up this early. He pinched off a dead blossom from an orchid plant as he passed, and jammed his hands into his pockets.

  Who was Darcy, he wondered for the hundredth time? Darcy even smelled phony. Henry had called the agency and the woman who answered said that Miss Sampson had hired Darcy through them. But he could tell she was lying.

  He picked up the silver bell on the table next to the sofa and shook it vigorously.

  Almost immediately, Lee appeared. “Yes, sir?”

  Henry swung around abruptly. “Where’s Miss Sampson?”

  “She left about an hour ago, sir.”

  “At eight in the morning?”

  “Yes, sir.” Lee waited uncertainly.

  “She say where she was going?
”

  “No, sir.” Lee started to leave, then turned. “Is there anything I can do for you, Reverend True?”

  At that, Henry stopped pacing and looked at her closely, which he’d never really done before. Pretty. A nice figure. Pleasant smile. Good hair, good cut. Not too tall. “Lee, right?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How long have you been with Miss Sampson?”

  “Almost five months, sir.” Lee stood straight with her hands behind her back, her feet slightly apart. Henry turned to the orchids and felt the bark soil. “Miss Sampson noticed these are dry. You might water them.”

  “Certainly, sir.” Again, she started to leave.

  “You were here when Miss Sampson hired the new chauffeur, right?”

  She turned to face him. “Yes, sir.”

  “What do you think of him?”

  She blushed. “He seems quite capable, sir.”

  Henry smiled. “You like him, eh?”

  “No, sir.” The flush deepened and Lee looked down. “I mean, yes, sir. He’s very pleasant. Dedicated to his job.”

  Henry changed the subject. “Ever done any acting?”

  “No, sir.” The blush faded. “Will that be all, sir?”

  “Ever wanted to?”

  “Act, sir?” She paused. “Not really.”

  “That means ‘yes,’ right?”

  She smiled. “I guess most little girls dream of acting when they grow up.”

  “I have a television show, did you know that?”

  “Yes, sir. With Miss Sampson. My mother watches it all the time. Very inspirational, she says.”

  Henry assumed his most sincere expression. “We’re always looking for new talent.”

  “That leaves me out,” said Lee, with a laugh. “Zero talent. Besides, I’m not exactly what you’d call religious.”

  “Not a problem. I have several shows. Would you like to audition for one of them?”

  Lee clasped her hands in front of her. “Audition, sir?”