The Prodigal Son (26 page)

“So we don’t
know
?” Carmine asked.

“About the depth of the penetration, no.”

“Could you possibly look at the slides, Gus? I’ll buy you lunch at Malvolio’s any day you like if you do,” Carmine wheedled.

“Lucky for you all the tetrodotoxin cases are still in the lab,” said Gus, intrigued by now. He found John Hall’s box of specimen histology, and the dozen slides on the neck wound.

“Actually they’re okay,” he said, surprised, looking up from his microscope with raccoon’s eyes from pressing too hard. “I’d say the deeper layers of cells weren’t penetrated at all. I think your guy received a subcutaneous injection, not an intramuscular one.”

“What exactly does that mean in terms of symptoms, Gus?”

“Slower onset. This is very precise, if Brad the technician didn’t botch his sections. I must tell Paul to erase any black marks on Brad’s record. The needle lifted the skin and slid just under it, which you could do if the substance were concentrated and all you had to inject was a drop or two, rather than a full cc. Also, it couldn’t have been done at all with that gizmo you showed me — not nearly precise enough.” Gus heaved a sigh of satisfaction. “I must rewrite this.”

“How much of a delay would subcutaneous injection cause?”

The pathologist thought about it. “Depends on how rich the subcutaneous tissue was in blood vessels, but the slides say it wasn’t fatty — the deceased kept himself fit, I’d say. So taking all that into account, anything from an extra ten to an extra twenty minutes.”

“Gus, my man, you are a pearl beyond price, and lunch at Malvolio’s just became lunch at the Lobster Pot.”

From the M.E.’s domain Carmine went to the Commissioner’s.

“Did you know that human fat or adipose tissue is rich in blood vessels?” Carmine demanded as he walked in.

“Well, bless my Aunt Annunziata’s arm flaps! To what is this germane, O honored Captain of Detectives?”

Silvestri in skittish mood meant his day was going well; Carmine stifled a sigh. “John Hall’s neck is germane, O great and wise Commissioner of Police. It had no fatty tissue worth a dime, therefore no wealth of subcutaneous blood vessels, and
no needle punctured his muscle tissue. In other words, he had a lightly built man’s scraggy neck. Our poisoner was very crafty indeed, John. He administered a highly concentrated injection of tetrodotoxin just under John Hall’s epithelium — no more than a drop or two, Gus thinks.”

“So the time window has opened up,” Silvestri said softly.

“The deed was done
before
they went into the study.”

“How did we miss it, Carmine?”

“Human error, oversight, false premise, take your pick. No one’s fault, really, except they put a new technician on taking the histology sections, and, expecting a needle track, blamed the technician when it wasn’t there. The kid was right, Gus wrong.”

“What made you wonder about it now, Carmine?”

“I don’t honestly know, except that something Dean Wainfleet said on an unrelated subject caused a weird shift in my mind, and I suddenly wondered if a subcutaneous injection would slow the reaction time down enough to enable the deed to be done before the men went into the study. Once the symptoms appeared, Hall died quickly — eleven minutes. That says the stuff was concentrated. It was worth a visit to Gus Fennell, I thought.”

“Well worth it. Not that it advances proof of guilt.”

“Exactly.” Carmine sighed. “You know, I could really do with a decent bank robbery or a shoot-out in the Chubb Bowl just for sheer recreation.”

“Always the way with poison cases,” said Silvestri. “It ought by rights to be a woman, but the pickings are lean.”

“Women like a more normal brew. However, there is a woman — Millie. It’s her poison, she made it.”

“Millie didn’t do it,” the Commissioner said abruptly.

“I know, she’s an open book,” said Carmine. “There are two other women with motive, but they don’t have the know-how, John. Davina Tunbull and Uda Savovich. We’ve been digging for a week and come up with nothing that suggests either woman would know tetrodotoxin from tetrachloride — unless Davina is in cahoots with Jim. The only death I can see the Savovich women perpetrating is Emily Tunbull’s. She fits their bill, the others don’t. I keep coming back to Jim Hunter, but if he did it, he’s likely to get away with it because there’s nothing in evidence that points to him that doesn’t point to Millie as well, and Millie’s sacrosanct.”

“With good reason,” Silvestri said stubbornly.

“And around we go again.”

“Did you search Tinkerman’s study at his home?”

“Every last sheet of paper. He dealt with his bills himself, paid them. A testament to his stinginess. Tinkerman even listed his wife’s allowance as a bill.” Carmine put his elbows on the desk and his chin on his hands. “We found nothing.”

“Is there some other glaring mistake we’ve overlooked?”

“With Delia on the job? I doubt it.”

“So do I.”

This time Davina drove to Major Minor’s to meet Chez; she hadn’t realized how far it was to walk, and the days of the
Yugoslavian Alps were long past. She parked around the back and walked to the coffee shop through an arcade of grisly photographs. Major Minor, thought Davina, is a pervert.

“At the rate the cops are going, you might be here until Christmas and still not see Emily’s killer,” she said, sitting down and flashing that smile at the waitress.

“Does anyone in the family know why Emily was killed?”

“No, and Uda hasn’t heard anything.”

“What am I going to do with you, Vina?”

Her eyes narrowed. “In relation to what?”

“Certain New York City activities.”

“Ah!
That’s
why you’re here! Worried that you might be extradited from Florida to New York for something?” Davina asked sweetly. “I knew it wasn’t Emily. You’d just send her a diamond wreath.”

“Shut up!” he snapped.

“Relax, Chez, I’m not going to upset your apple cart any more than you’re going to upset mine. So far the cops haven’t noticed you, but they will, and they’re smart, Chez. I’m an ostrich with my head in the sand, but I’m well aware what a good target my ass makes.” She leaned forward; the waitress would not have liked this smile. “Leave me alone! I am set for life, and I like the life I’m living. You don’t scare me! Nothing does! If I need help, I have Uda, never forget that. I am cultured now. I have a child I adore. I am not letting you ruin my life! I — am — not!”

“I want Em’s killer caught.”

“I don’t care what you want. Leave me alone!”

He really does make a room look small, Max Tunbull reflected as he sat, an attentive expression on his face, gazing at Dr. Jim Hunter.

“Publication Day is April second,” Max said.

“Less than three months off,” Dr. Jim said, smiling. “I can hardly believe it. I always thought writing the book would be the worst agony, but it was nothing compared to Tinkerman. I wish harm to no one, but with Dr. Millstone as Head Scholar, things will be different. He’s everything I could ask for.”

“Davina had a talk with him,” Max said, then stopped.

Jim looked enquiring. “And?”

“I don’t honestly know how to say this, nor do I understand why I was given this duty, but the crux of the matter is that C.U.P. has no publicity department,” said Max, laboring. “It never really needed one, even for
Fire Down Below
— the book about earthquakes that was a big bestseller five years ago. But everybody from Davina to the Board of Scholars thinks that your book needs a professional publicist. Fulvia and Bettina have found one for you. Her name is Pamela Devane, she’s a freelance working out of New York City, and she’s the best in the business. Chauce Millstone and Davina have both talked with her — she’s on the ball. She’s planning a month-long publicity tour for April — New York City, Boston, Chicago, Washington D.C., Atlanta, San Francisco, L.A., Seattle, Denver, St. Louis — about twenty cities in all. Some, like New York and L.A., take several days. TV talk shows, radio shows, newspaper and magazine interviews, a few
more esoteric things. Millie has to go with you to participate in some interviews …” Max trailed off, disconcerted.

Jim was staring at him in horror. “I can’t do that!” he cried, the words erupting as if they didn’t belong together. “I can’t leave my work for
half
a month, let alone a month! Not at this stage! I figured I’d have to drive down to New York City for one or two interviews, not traipse around the nation — Jeez!”

“Vina said it would come as a shock, but none of us believed her,” said Max, flustered. “She insisted we bring in Pamela Devane to support you through it as well as make you see why you have to do it. I thought she was over-reacting, but Chauce was out on a limb — he’s too new in the job to understand something as unusual as the potential of
A Helical God
. But sometimes my wife can be uncanny, she just seemed to know how you’d react.” Max put out a hand. “Jim, be reasonable! A publicity tour is vital.”

“Spend a month saying the same things over and over to a bunch of tiros?” The eyes were incredulous. “Waste my time on something so
stupid
? No!”

Max sighed. “Go home and talk to Millie,” he said.

But a visit to the Burke found no Millie — she was at the apartment? In the middle of the afternoon? What was the matter?
What?

He drove out on State Street to Caterby Street, burst through the door as if pursued.

“Don’t tell me you came home to help,” she said, kissing him.

There were boxes everywhere; she must have looted every shop’s trash to have collected so many. And books. Piles and piles of books, journals, photocopies.

“Dad found us a house on Barker Street in East Holloman, and we’re moving. Imagine it, Jim! Moving out of this dump into a great house — and it’s a great deal as well! The Tucci realtors own some houses for rent as well as for sale. Our house is one of them, and if we find a down-payment on it within a year, the rent we’ve paid in the meantime will be contributed toward the purchase price — isn’t that wonderful? It has three bedrooms, a room that will make an ideal study for you, a decent kitchen, a huge family room, a laundry, a backyard, a two-car garage — oh, Jim, I’m so happy!”

Millie happy took his breath away; Jim kissed her to limp ecstasy, then, lifting her as if she weighed a feather, carried her to the bedroom to kiss her back to frenzied, tumultuous, exalted response. With each other in the most secret and sacred of ways, they forgot publicity tours, books and boxes.

“You still turn me on,” she said, head on his chest, feeling as much as hearing that massive heart beat, beat, beat …

“Ditto,” he said, a laugh in his voice.

“Can you help me pack?”

“Sure. Walter can deal with the lab.” He slid out from under her and headed for the bathroom.

It was over, but it had been a wonderful gift. He was usually so tired, so desperate for sleep, so tormented when he did get
to sleep. Who knows? she thought as she left the bed, this hour of afternoon delight might have set me on my way. I’ve calmed down; even though the canker of Davina will continue to gnaw, a pregnancy is far more mine than Jim’s. The baby will belong to
me
.

“Why did you come home?” she asked, back with the books.

Distressed, he told her of his talk with Max. “People are taking over my life, Millie,” he said. “How come you never told me about the down side of a bestseller?”

“It never occurred to me,” she confessed. “I mean, writers of bestsellers don’t talk about publicity tours, you just see them or hear them or read about them, and the pieces of the puzzle are just that, pieces. Like you, I thought it would be a few interviews done in New York City.”

“I can’t afford the time, and I don’t suffer fools gladly.”

“I know.” She gave him a brilliant smile, eyes filled with love. “I guess just this once, Jim, we’re hoist on your petard. The tour will have to be done, which means you’ll have to hang on to your temper and suffer the fools gladly.”

“They’re going to make capital out of our marriage.”

“Yes, I inferred that.” She blinked, her breath caught. “Oh, Jim! Best feet forward, all that garbage. We’ll survive.”

“We always have, no matter what the odds.”

“We’ve had some narrow escapes.”

“And some victories.”

“Why did you listen to that snake of a woman?” she asked.

“Davina?” He looked blank for a moment, then, apparently drawn by something on a wall bare of its books, turned his
gaze there. “Like I told you already, I respect her opinions. She has the guts to say what other people only think, and she’s worldly. You and I are babes in the woods, she says. Heads buried in our work, no experience of living.”

“That’s an over-simplification, Jim. Why are you so afraid of the world’s judgements all of a sudden? I would have said you and I are veterans of what the world can do,” Millie said stiffly. “I can’t stop you regarding Davina as an oracle, but don’t let her move into
my
space. I won’t stomach Davina Tunbull in
my
space.”

He looked stunned. “Are you jealous?”

“No. Just on my guard. Strange things are happening, and don’t tell me you’re not on your guard.”

His desire to change the subject was transparent; he laughed, then said, “What are we going to do for furniture? Is the new place already furnished?”

“No, it’s too up-market for that,” said Millie, obliging him. “Mom and Dad have donated a few pieces, so have the Ceruttis, Silvestris and the half of East Holloman that’s related to me.” Her eyes and voice grew suddenly sharp. “And don’t poker up, Jim! It is
not
charity. Later on we’ll be buying our own furniture, then we’ll return what was loaned. That’s all it is — a loan.
A loan!
Okay?”

That was a tone he understood: don’t mess with Millie! So he nodded. “Okay by me, sweetheart. When do we move?”

“Tomorrow.” The blue of her eyes, so pure and seemingly unmarred by life, spat sudden fire. “This is my last night on State Street, and never again. Hear me, Jim? Never again!”