Stork Raving Mad (25 page)

“No, thanks,” Ramon said.

“I sit too much anyway,” Danny said.

Bronwyn just folded her arms and leaned against the wall. Danny and Ramon, on either side of her, followed suit.

“Suit yourself,” the chief said. “Ms. Langslow, you can start taking notes now. Arthritis,” he added, turning back to the students. He flexed the fingers on his right hand a couple of times, as if stretching out a cramp. “Ms. Langslow is being kind enough to give my hand a rest.”

They all gave me a perfunctory glance and then focused back on the chief.

“Now,” he said. “Any of y’all got anything you want to add to your previous statements? Here or in private?”

They stared at him.

“I thought not,” he said. “So I wanted to notify all three of you that you might want to find yourselves attorneys.”

Danny’s and Ramon’s mouths fell open. Bronwyn’s tightened.

“I’m probably not going to arrest anyone till after I get the preliminary tox-screen results,” the chief went on. “But all of you already have a lot of explaining to do. First, Mr. Soto. You want to tell me why you slipped some of your sleeping pills into Dr. Wright’s tea?”

Ramon’s face drained of blood, and after standing frozen for a couple of seconds, he whirled to face Browyn and took several steps away from her.

“You said you wouldn’t tell anyone!” he shouted.

“I didn’t, you idiot,” she said. She didn’t look at all shaken, either by the chief’s revelation or Ramon’s anger.

“No, she didn’t,” the chief said. “We learned that through another source.” I was grateful that he didn’t even glance in my direction as he said that. “Though since we’re tying down every loose end, I’d appreciate it if you would make a statement about what
you
observed, Ms. Jones.”

“And why should I?” she said. “You’ll only use it to frame Ramon for the murder.”

“At the moment, we’re not charging Mr. Soto with murder,”
the chief said. “I expect the DA will go for reckless endangerment.”

“Reckless endangerment!” Ramon exclaimed. “I wasn’t trying to hurt her! I just wanted to put off the damned meeting that was going to kill my hopes of ever getting my doctorate.”

“It doesn’t matter what you were trying to do or why,” the chief said. “You gave Dr. Wright a dose of your Valium.”

“No, it was my sleeping medicine,” Ramon said.

“Your sleeping medicine
is
Valium,” the chief said. “Or, more accurately, diazepam, the generic for Valium.”

Ramon blinked. Another person who hadn’t done a bit of research on the drugs he was so happily chucking down this throat.

“Even if that’s so, Valium’s just a mild sedative, right?” Ramon said when he found his voice again.

“To most people,” the chief said. “We have no way of knowing if she had any medical conditions that would make it dangerous to her. And even if your medicine didn’t harm her, you knocked her out and made her vulnerable when someone else came along who did want to kill her. I’ll let the DA decide whether that justifies a charge of accessory to murder.”

“But I had no idea anyone was trying to kill her!” Ramon spluttered.

“Doesn’t matter,” the chief said. “You contributed to her death. Then there’s Ms. Jones, who also added something to Dr. Wright’s tea. Just what was it?”

Bronwyn looked a little shaken now.

“I didn’t,” she said. “You’re just making that up to threaten me.”

“I have very reliable evidence to indicate otherwise,” the chief said. He turned toward Danny. “Mr. Oh—”

Danny started as if the chief had fired a gun.

“You idiot!” Bron snapped at Danny.

“It wasn’t me!” he said. “You have to believe me, Bron!”

“As I was about to say—” the chief said.

“I’d never do anything to—” Danny began.

“Oh, shut up,” Bronwyn snarled. “It was just more of Ramon’s sleeping medicine,” she said, turning to the chief. “It was his idea, and I thought he wanted me to do it. I didn’t realize he’d already done it, or that it could hurt her.”

“I did not!” Ramon exclaimed. “She’s lying!”

“And it was only two tablets,” Bronwyn said. “I told Ramon that would be enough, but he didn’t agree. He argued with me. I bet he gave her more than he’s admitting.”

“Bron—” Danny began.

“Shut up,” she snapped at him.

Danny blinked. His face wore a look of hurt surprise, like a puppy who’d been kicked.

“She’s lying,” Danny said finally. “She put at least four in there.”

Bronwyn looked from Danny to Ramon. Ramon was glaring at her. I’d have found Danny’s look of painful disillusionment harder to bear, but Bron probably didn’t care.

“Maybe I lost count, but they were just Valium,” Bronwyn said. “What’s the harm?”

“Are you sure about that?” the chief said. “Remember, when the tox reports come back, it may tell us an interesting tale. Were all of those pills you people put in her tea from Ramon’s
pill bottle, or are we going to find out that Dr. Wright also ingested some of Señor Mendoza’s pills?”

I had to admire the way he avoided lying about what was in Señor Mendoza’s pill bottle.

Ramon looked puzzled. Bron looked paler but put on an air of offended dignity.

“The pills I used were from Ramon’s bottle,” she said. “I don’t know about Ramon. He was awfully interested in helping pick up Señor Mendoza’s pills.”

“You lying b—” Ramon spluttered. The chief rapped sharply on the desk, and we all jumped.

“None of that language, young man,” he said, with a sharp look at Ramon. “As I said, we’ll see what we find when the tox reports come back. Meanwhile, on to another subject. Mr. Oh?”

Danny, who had been staring at Bronwyn with a look of utter misery on his face, turned slowly to face the chief.

“She put the pills in the tea,” Danny said. “At least four of them. Could have been more.”

“Pills that may have poisoned Dr. Wright,” the chief said. “Or at the very least, immobilized her sufficiently to give the real killer a chance to strike. Would you like to tell me what happened when you went into the library, Mr. Oh?”

Danny’s mouth fell open and then his shoulders slumped and he looked down at his feet.

“I don’t know why I did it,” he said. “Actually, I do—I did it because Bron kept going on about how Dr. Wright was doing this to hurt her career—”

“Her career!” Ramon snorted. “That’s rich.”

“And when I saw her just lying there with her head on the desk and that horrible statue was right there. . . .”

He began shaking his head, slowly and repetitively, as if doing it enough might shake off the memory of what he’d done.

“You hit her on the head with the statue?” the chief asked.

Danny nodded.

“You did that for me?” Bron asked.

Danny’s head shot up.

“Yeah,” he said. “Pretty stupid, right? Committing murder for a bi—a worthless harpy like you. I must have been crazy.”

Bronwyn looked more shaken at the defection of her conquests than she had at the chief’s veiled threats. The chief looked as if he felt a little sorry for Danny.

“Actually, we don’t yet know that you did commit murder, Mr. Oh,” the chief said. “The wound you made bled very little. Dr. Langslow tells me that she was probably already dead when you bludgeoned her.”

“I didn’t kill her?” Danny asked. “What a relief!”

“Don’t be too relieved,” the chief said. “I think the DA will go for attempted murder. After all, you were trying to kill her. Even if she was already dead when you made your attempt, that doesn’t change your intent. And even if you get off, which is always possible, you’ll have to live for the rest of your time on this Earth with the knowledge that you’re capable of taking a human life.”

“Yeah, but at least I didn’t actually do it,” Danny said. He sounded almost tearful with relief.

“So if she wasn’t killed with the statue, how was she killed?” Ramon asked.

“We believe she was poisoned,” the chief said. “We’ll know for sure when the tox screen comes back.”

Bronwyn frowned. You could almost see the wheels turning in her head.

“You realize, don’t you, that you’ll never prove who put what in the tea,” she said with a smug smile.

“I don’t think we’ll have too much trouble figuring out who poisoned her,” the chief said. He was wearing what I thought of as his Cheshire Cat smile. “And all three of y’all are in for some legal trouble. Murder, attempted murder, accessory to murder, reckless endangerment—they all carry hard time. I’ll let the DA sort out what he thinks he can convict you people of. If any of you think you have information that might help you make a deal, I’d cough it up soon. The DA’s not a patient man. Now, unless you have something to say, make yourselves scarce. But don’t leave the county.”

The three of them looked at each other. Ramon and Danny looked properly stricken, as if they had at least begun to realize how badly they’d screwed up their lives. Bronwyn was glaring at the two of them as if she thought they were to blame for her predicament. She was the first to move.

“I think you’re bluffing,” she said, and sailed out with her head held high.

Danny and Ramon both watched her go, then turned and looked at each other.

“Man,” Ramon said, shaking his head.

“Yeah,” Danny said.

The two of them stumbled out shoulder to shoulder.

“I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” I said.

“Good,” the chief said. “Then they probably won’t mind if they have to share a cell in a day or two. Our jail’s pretty small.”

“And now I understand why you wanted to interview them together. Seeing Bronwyn in action really hit Ramon and Danny hard.”

“Yes,” the chief said. “I suspected that they would continue to protect her unless confronted with the reality of her self-centered behavior. Nice to know my plan worked.”

He frowned and shook his head slightly.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Good thing none of them is a lawyer,” the chief said. “I got carried away. Reckless endangerment is only a misdemeanor. You don’t do hard time for a misdemeanor.”

“Any criminal record is the kiss of death to the college,” I said. “To say nothing of the job market, which all three of them may find themselves facing sooner than planned, and without their degrees. Unless, of course, they end up getting room and board courtesy of the state.”

“Sad,” the chief said. “I have a hard time feeling sorry for Ms. Jones, but I can’t help but feel a little sorry for both of those young men. Particularly Mr. Soto, considering the pressure he was under.”

“But is that any excuse?” I said.

He sighed and took off his glasses to rub his eyes.

“Speaking as an officer of the law, no,” he said. “But if I were that young man’s attorney, I think I’d try to make the jury
understand what a toxic atmosphere that woman had created for the students under her power.”

He leaned back in the chair, pulled out his pocket handkerchief, and polished his glasses as he spoke.

“Just one student and you could say he’s a wacko,” he said. “But we have three of ’em hating Dr. Wright enough to take some dire action against her. And at least a dozen others who hated her so much—and were so vocal about it—that they’re petrified I’m going to arrest them on motive alone. What kind of a person inspires that much hate?”

“A very bad one,” I said. “But unfortunately the Commonwealth of Virginia hasn’t yet declared an open season on bad people.”

“No,” he said. “Thank goodness, because sometimes it takes us longer than we’d like to get to the bottom of a case like this. Did you notice any discrepancies between what they said to me—the men, anyway—and what you overheard?”

I thought about it for a few moments.

“No,” I said. “I think Bronwyn’s lying.”

He nodded.

“What about Ms. Borgstrom?” he asked.

“You’re asking me if my friend is a murderer?”

“I suppose I am,” he said.

I thought about that even longer.

“I don’t know,” I said. “If she did it, it was because of the same pressure Ramon was under. Only in Kathy’s case, she wasn’t only worried about herself, but about all students and faculty
in the department. Especially Abe. He and his wife have been like second parents to her.”

It wasn’t the ringing declaration of Kathy’s innocence that I wished I could make, but it was honest. The chief nodded.

“One more thing,” he said. “I hope not to be occupying your husband’s office much longer, but while I am, could I ask you a favor?”

“Of course,” I said. I braced myself. Was he going to berate me for interrupting him too much, or chew me out for interfering in his investigation?

“May I get rid of these blasted things?” he said, pointing to one of the guest chairs. “I don’t mean to insult your taste or Michael’s—they’re certainly attractive chairs to look at—”

“No they’re not,” I said. “At least I’m not particularly fond of them, nor is Michael.”

“Bargain at the furniture store?” he asked.

“No, a present from Mother, and undoubtedly an expensive one, which makes it all the more ironic that they’re the most miserably uncomfortable chairs I’ve ever had the misfortune to sit in. They look as if they’d be comfortable, but after five minutes you realize your back and shoulders and legs are all scrunched in odd positions. And as for getting out of them—forget it!”

“Then for the duration, may I swap them for a few of those nice, straight-back chairs I saw in your front hall?”

“Be my guest,” I said.

“Sammy!” the chief bellowed.

Sammy poked his head through the door.

“Swap these chairs out for some of those in the front hall,” the chief said, shoving one of the desk chairs at Sammy.

“Yes, sir.”

“And you go and rest,” he said, turning to me. “You look exhausted, and if you don’t watch out you’ll overdo it and go into labor early.”

“Not that early,” I said. “Thirty-eight weeks. Only fifteen percent of women last this long with twins. In fact, some doctors would consider that full term for twins and would probably start pressuring us to induce.”

“Is that why you’re running around the house bringing me suspects and evidence?” he asked. “Hoping to bring on labor?”