Laced with Poison (18 page)

EMMA was behind the counter of Sweet Nothings the next morning when the door flew
open and nearly ricocheted off the hinges.

“Emma, you’ve got to come help!” Arabella was red-faced and panting.

“What’s happened?” Emma dropped the nightgown she was folding.

“It’s Pierre. He pulled the leash right out of my hand and bolted.” Arabella’s voice
quivered as if she were going to cry.

Emma knew how much Pierre meant to Arabella. She made him special meals and even allowed
him to sleep on the bed with her, although he had a second duplicate toile dog bed
at home right next to Arabella’s antique four-poster.

“You sit down, and I’ll see what I can do.”

Arabella collapsed onto the love seat and Emma dashed out the door. The street was
quiet and empty. None of the
shops were open yet. Emma looked right and left, but there was no sign of Pierre.

She heard a loud voice coming from across the street. Someone inside the Gallery was
shouting. The shouts were followed quickly by several sharp barks that Emma thought
sounded an awful lot like Pierre.

Arabella came out of Sweet Nothings to join Emma on the sidewalk.

“That sounded like Pierre, didn’t it?” she asked hopefully. “He must have gone after
that dreadful Bertha again.”

“Yes, it sounded like it was coming from the Gallery.” Emma pointed across the street.

She took Arabella’s arm, and together they crossed the street. The door to the Gallery
wasn’t locked, so they pushed it open and Emma peeked in. The bark had been Pierre’s
alright.

Emma pushed the door open farther and she and Arabella walked in. Zimmerman had Pierre
by the scruff of the neck and was berating him loudly. Pierre was ignoring him in
favor of sniffing Bertha, Zimmerman’s dachshund. Bertha was obviously relishing Pierre’s
affections, and no one was paying any attention at all to Zimmerman’s blustering.

He looked up when he heard Emma and Arabella enter.

“This dog of yours is a nuisance.” He gave Pierre an extra shake.

Arabella raised her chin and drew herself up. “Well!”

“Well, indeed. This cur here”—Zimmerman gave Pierre another shake—“barged in and began,
ahem,” he cleared his throat, “bothering my poor Bertha. And not for the first time,
either!”

“That cur, I’ll have you know, is a purebred French bulldog. His father took Best
in Show at Westminster.”

Zimmerman looked anything but impressed. “It makes
no never mind to me. I won’t have him messing with my Bertha.”

“He was hardly
messing
with her.” Arabella took Pierre’s leash from Zimmerman and wound it tightly around
her hand. “Bertha would be a most unsuitable match for my Pierre Louis Auguste, I
assure you.”

And with that she turned on her heel and dragged Pierre out of the Gallery. Emma had
no choice but to follow behind.

*   *   *

EMMA made herself a cup of green tea and poured Arabella her favorite coffee brew—a
Sumatran blend that she sent away to New York for. Pierre had slunk off to his dog
bed, trying to look as if he’d been there all along and none of this had actually
happened. Finally, Emma’s heartbeat returned to normal, and she could see that Arabella’s
hands had stopped shaking.

“Testy old fellow,” was all Arabella said further on the subject.

“Shouldn’t Sylvia be here by now? It’s her day for bra fittings, isn’t it?” Emma consulted
an appointment book she kept under the counter.

“I think so. I suspect she’ll be along any moment now.”

Just then the door swung open, and Sylvia entered, brutally yanking her oxygen tank
over the threshold.

Both Emma and Arabella looked up. Sylvia’s face was puckered into a scowl worthy of
a Halloween mask, and one of her hoop earrings was missing.

“Good heavens, what’s wrong?” Arabella half rose to her feet.

“That Decker woman”—Sylvia stabbed the air with a nicotine-stained finger—“has renewed
her campaign against me. She’s insisting that I’m responsible for the things going
missing at Sunny Days, and she tells everyone who will listen.”

“Today is beginning to feel more like a Monday than a Wednesday,” Arabella muttered.

“I’m going to move out of that place. Angel’s still got that apartment over the shop
for rent.”

“Won’t that upset your children? I really do think it’s best you stay. You’ve been
enjoying yourself, haven’t you?”

“What about Earl?” Emma added. “He’d miss your company and your card playing.”

Sylvia looked sheepish. “I might not have any choice.”

“What do you mean?” Arabella asked sharply.

“I kind of had a bit of a dustup with that Decker woman.”

“Dustup?” An extremely wary expression came over Arabella’s face.

“Yeah. I couldn’t take it anymore. If there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s being unjustly
accused. Aren’t we supposed to be innocent until proven guilty?”

Sylvia glared at Arabella, her one earring quivering with indignation as if in sympathy
with its owner.

“Exactly what did you do?” Arabella looked at Emma in alarm.

“I just sort of cuffed her on the ear. I didn’t draw blood or anything. The way she
carried on you’d think I’d sliced her open with a knife.”

Arabella shuddered at the graphic image.

“What happened then?”

“That fool Crystal Davis came running and insisted on having the nurse, then the doctor.
And now they’re saying they want to have me tested for dementia. Me!” She pointed
at her chest. “That Decker woman is the one with dementia, if you ask me.”

“Oh dear,” was all Arabella said.

“We’ve got to find out what’s really going on,” Emma said. “I’m volunteering there
tonight. Another ice cream social. Hopefully I can get away and do some digging.”
She put her arm around Sylvia. “We’ll get to the bottom of this. Don’t worry.”

*   *   *

EMMA pulled into the parking lot at Sunny Days and sat for a moment. She tried Liz
on her cell again—she’d called her several times earlier as well—but there was no
answer. She had the feeling that Liz was ducking her calls. Could she really have
misunderstood Emma’s meeting with Walker at the Coffee Klatch?

Emma sighed. She was tired, but she’d promised to help dish out ice cream, and she
really had to look into what was going on with Sylvia.

Everyone was gathered in the activity room when Emma arrived. She spotted Catherine
Decker immediately and was relieved to see that she didn’t bear any bruises, cuts
or scrapes from her confrontation with Sylvia. It couldn’t have been that bad after
all. Catherine was surrounded by a group of extremely solicitous-looking residents
who kept shooting glances across the room to where Sylvia and her friend Earl stood
all by themselves. It was pretty obvious whose side the residents had taken.

Emma skirted the crowd and went up to Sylvia.

“Now I know what it feels like to be a pariah or one of the untouchables.” Sylvia
gave a harsh laugh, but Emma could see the hurt in her eyes.

“Never mind, my dear. We’ll show them all.” Earl tapped the floor with his cane for
emphasis.

A table was set up with a row of ice cream cartons, and someone stood behind each
of them save for one. Emma
grabbed an apron from the utility closet and took up her station behind a giant container
of butter pecan ice cream. She smiled as she dished out generous scoops, but her mind
was elsewhere. She felt terrible for Sylvia and was glad that she had Earl on her
side.

Finally all the ice cream had been dished out, and the residents were seated at the
tables, many with their napkins tucked under their chins. Emma tossed her apron in
the laundry cart and edged out of the room.

The hallway was empty. Ice cream socials were hugely popular, and only illness or
death kept the residents from attending. Emma walked down the hall, not quite certain
what to do. Most of the doors were closed, and after twisting one or two knobs, she
realized that most were locked as well. If someone was stealing from the residents,
they had to be doing it while the resident was in the room. How on earth would they
get in otherwise? Emma couldn’t imagine any of the septuagenarians or octogenarians
that lived at Sunny Days picking a lock or scaling the front of the building and going
in through the window.

She was about to turn around and go back when she noticed one of the doors opening.
That was odd. She would have bet that everyone was already in the activity room. The
door opened extremely slowly, and someone peeked a head around the edge.

It was Crystal Davis.

What was she doing coming out of one of the residents’ rooms? She had something in
her hand, and when she saw Emma, she tried to hide it.

“What are you doing here?” Crystal demanded.

I could ask you the same thing
, Emma thought.

“Volunteering.” Emma had learned over time that sometimes the best answer was the
shortest one.

Crystal looked doubtful but didn’t say anything. Emma was trying to get a glimpse
of whatever it was she had so swiftly tucked out of sight. Crystal nodded and began
to edge past Emma, transferring the object in front of her as she went past, but Emma
was able to get a glimpse of a fairly new-looking digital camera.

Why was Crystal hiding it?
Unless it wasn’t hers
…Emma had to stop herself from exclaiming it out loud. Was Crystal the one stealing
items from the residents’ rooms? She had a passkey and easy access. Crystal continued
down the hall, and Emma decided to follow her.

Emma followed behind Crystal until they came out to the reception area, at which point
Crystal went into her office and closed the door. Emma loitered behind a potted palm
for as long as she dared and was rewarded when Crystal emerged ten minutes later,
leaving the door ajar.

Emma didn’t hesitate. As soon as Crystal was out of sight, she slipped through the
partially opened door and into Crystal’s office. It was a small, windowless room with
a desk in the corner and filing cabinets lining the other walls. Crystal had done
little to make it comfortable beyond an old, fraying postcard from Florida taped to
her computer monitor. A door at the back of the room led to a much larger office with
a big picture window. Emma supposed that was where Jessica Scott had worked.

There was no sign of the camera, and it hadn’t looked as if Crystal was carrying anything
with her when she left. A metal cabinet stood in the far right corner—the kind used
for hanging up coats and stashing umbrellas. Emma turned the lever and eased open
the door.

A sound outside the room made her jump, and she stopped and held her breath. A shadow
went by the open door, but no one looked in. She was safe. She eased the
cabinet door open the rest of the way, and gasped when she saw the contents.

The cupboard was crammed with items—radios, CD players, several MP3 players, a couple
of hearing aids, umbrellas, silver picture frames and what looked to be Mr. Mason’s
missing Korean War medals. Some of the items were valuable, and some had no value
at all except perhaps to the owner. Why on earth had Crystal stolen them? Was it some
strange compulsion—like a magpie collecting shiny objects that catch its eye?

Emma was closing the cabinet door when Crystal burst into the room.

“What are you doing?” she demanded.

“I could ask you the same thing! You’ve stolen these things from the residents, haven’t
you?”

“I…I…” Crystal stammered.

“Haven’t you?” Emma could feel her face burn with fury. All along Crystal had been
letting Sylvia, and goodness knows who else, take the blame for her thievery. “Why?
Why take these things? Some of them are completely useless to you.”

Crystal began to whimper. “I can’t help it. It’s like some strange addiction. Afterward
I feel…calm…and at peace.” She was crying openly now.

“Did Jessica know about this?”

Crystal nodded and wiped her nose with her sleeve. “She said if I ever quit this job,
she’d tell everyone about my…taking things. I’d never get another job. Ever.”

“So that’s why you stayed even though she treated you so badly.”

Crystal nodded mutely. “I didn’t have any choice.”

No, Emma could see she didn’t have any choice except maybe one—to murder Jessica Scott.

EMMA crawled behind the wheel of the Bug and looked at the clock. She was surprised
to see it was barely past seven thirty. She felt as if a lifetime had passed since
she’d arrived at Sunny Days to help serve the residents their post-dinner ice cream
treat.

Crystal had eventually dissolved into a puddle of tears, and Emma had been forced
to try to calm her down and soothe her enough to get her to talk. They’d agreed that
Crystal would leave her job at Sunny Days. As soon as she was gone, the cabinet would
be opened and all the stolen goods would be revealed. If the residents got their precious
items returned, perhaps no one would insist on calling the police.

Emma, on the other hand, had ideas of her own. She was going to call Gladys Smit and
see if the woman she saw go into the garden at the trunk show at Deirdre’s had been
Crystal. Emma was quite positive that it had to have been. Desperate to get out from
under Jessica’s iron rule, Crystal had killed her persecutor. Now it was up to Emma
to prove it.