Capacity for Murder (Professor Bradshaw Mysteries) (22 page)

There were no matches or makings of poison here. No evidence she’d killed her husband.

His search had turned up nothing to help explain Freddie Thompson’s death. But in his pocket he had the Zuyder Zee tinfoil.

He returned to the library, sat in a chair visible to all those present, pulled the ball of tinfoil from his pocket, and began to pick it apart.

He asked, “Who can tell me what this is?”

Deputy Mitchell leaned closer.

“Not you, Deputy. Let’s see what these three have to say.”

In a few minutes, several inches of shiny green foil glinted in the lamp light. Loomis sucked his teeth and fidgeted, clearing his throat. Ingrid Thompson gave the foil a single glance, then looked away, burying her face in her hands.

Only Zeb Moss watched Bradshaw painstakingly unravel the foil. “Cheese,” he barked out, his craggy face beaming with pride at having guessed. “That’s a cheese wrapper.”

“How do you know, Mr. Moss?”

“I seen it before, haven’t I? They served it one night, here in this room. A treat, I tell you. Loomis was doing parlor tricks, and used that foil off the cheese to pull electricity from everybody’s clothes! It was the dangdest thing. He rubbed it off of us and put in a water tumbler, and it sparked so loud you could see it.”

A Leyden jar. Arnold Loomis had built and charged a Leyden jar using a drinking glass and tinfoil, revealing a thorough knowledge of the device and a possibility of passing that knowledge to the others.

Loomis had gone pale. He shrugged and lifted his hands innocently and said, “The old static trick. A harmless little bit of science. Child’s play, really.”

For Bradshaw’s child, yes, it was a favorite trick. Justin often delighted his schoolmates by building Leyden jars and discharging them with toy tin soldiers so that it seemed their rifles fired. But he was the son of an electrical engineer. Most adults thought it was a magic trick, not science.

“Anyone care to guess where I found this cheese wrapper?”

Moss sat forward, legs jumpy with excitement, like a child wanting to win a game.

“What about you, Mr. Loomis?”

“I don’t understand what you’re getting at, Professor. It’s garbage as far as I can tell.”

“Are you in the habit of storing garbage in your room?”

Loomis guffawed. “I know we have a disagreement about the Luminator, Professor, but that is no justification for framing me.”

“How does a bit of tinfoil frame you?”

Loomis shot to his feet, and Deputy Mitchell stood, putting a hand on his holster, looking surprisingly like a capable lawman.

“Now listen here, Professor, you can’t do this to me! You know very well you didn’t find that wrapper in my room. Deputy, I want you to pay close attention here; you are the authority in this room, and I’m telling you this man is attempting to frame me for David Hollister’s death.”

Mitchell looked to Bradshaw for direction.

“That’s an excellent idea. Deputy, it might be prudent to make an official record of my finding and Mr. Loomis’ response.”

The deputy found paper and a pen and scratched out a statement from each of them.

Bradshaw then asked, “Mr. Loomis, why do you believe this tinfoil connects you with David Hollister’s death?”

Loomis glared at Bradshaw. “Everyone here saw me perform that parlor trick.”

“That doesn’t answer my question. How does the tinfoil connect you with David’s death?”

“You did not find it in my room!” He threw up his hands. “That’s it!” He sat down and crossed his arms and legs. “I’m done speaking until my attorney is present.”

“Make a note of that, too, Deputy.”

Mitchell’s pen scratched across the paper again, and then Bradshaw announced, “The deputy will now escort you upstairs to your rooms. Mr. Moss, I will fetch your nightclothes from your cabin, and you will be spending the night here. You will all remain in your rooms until you are otherwise notified. Deputy Mitchell will be on guard in the hall for the night should you need anything.”

Moss bit his lip, and his ruddy complexion deepened. He cleared his throat. “My nightclothes are in my case, under the bed.”

Bradshaw knew that, just as he knew Moss’ embarrassment came from the belief his illiteracy would be revealed by the other contents of the case.

“I’ll bring your suitcase to you.”

Moss nodded. “Oh, good. Thanks.”

When Bradshaw returned with Moss’ suitcase a few minutes later, they all marched upstairs. Moss gratefully took his bag into an empty bedroom. Ingrid disappeared into her room without a complaint, and Loomis marched into his, still seething, and slammed his door. The house fell deathly quiet.

On guard in the hall Deputy Mitchell whispered, “What if they go out a window?”

“It’s a long way down. And it’s a long way to anywhere from here.”

“I won’t fall asleep. I promise.”

“I’ve got a solution that will allow you to get some rest.”

The solution required only string and a bell and a few minutes of arranging.

“If Mrs. Thompson or Loomis or Moss opens their door even the slightest, the bell will ring and wake you if you’ve fallen asleep.”

Deputy Mitchell looked visibly relieved. It was not an alarm likely to block a serious escape attempt, but Bradshaw had arranged it for a reason he would not tell Deputy Mitchell. The deputy was armed. Two men had already died here at Healing Sands. He didn’t want a bullet from the deputy’s gun to kill a third. If any of them tried to leave their room, he wanted the deputy awake.

Chapter Twenty-five

After gathering a few necessities from his cabin, Bradshaw returned to the main house and chose the vacant room next to Loomis’, leaving his door wide open to the hall. Fully dressed, minus felt slippers, he stretched out on the bed to rest and think, and he spent the hours until dawn drifting in and out of sleep. When the window lightened from black to soft gray, and the birds began to sing, he got up and looked into the hall. Deputy Mitchell was puffy-eyed but awake. A rap on each door, and a demanded response, ensured him no one had escaped.

Well. He’d made no deductions, but his mind was clear and he felt refreshed, and he had the makings of coffee in his cabin. When he brought the deputy a smuggled-in mug of the real stuff, tears welled in the lawman’s eyes.

“Bless you, Professor.”

Mrs. Hornsby and Martha Hollister, in the kitchen sliding plump, dark loaves of bread into the oven, agreed to serve the guests breakfast in their rooms and Deputy Mitchell in the hall, just this once.

Bradshaw then decided to sneak in a bath. In one of the private bathrooms, he shaved and showered, and he found the towels to be as soft and luxurious as promised. He emerged into the main hall feeling clean, smelling of lemon soap, holding his bundle of clothes and toiletries, and he met Missouri.

She, too, held clothes and toiletries for a bath.

He didn’t say good-morning. Their eyes met, and it was as if the intervening hours since they last spoke had never happened. Her words were there, her declaration of love, the revelation she was done waiting for him. But there was an appeal this morning, too. A worry that transcended their personal concerns.

She said, “Was Mr. Thompson really poisoned?”

He nodded.

“How?”

“Phosphorus.”

Her mouth opened with a small, quick intake of breath, and her eyes flashed with pain. “Matches?”

He nodded again.

“I knew someone….” She shook her head. “Her baby—he’d just learned to crawl. He’d only sucked one match, but…those matches should be outlawed.”

He agreed. “I believe Mr. Thompson was poisoned before we arrived and he only succumbed last night, but I’m taking no chances.”

“You’re sending us home? It’s for the best. For Justin and Paul, especially. Are you in any danger?”

“Me? No.” No more than he ever was when deeply involved in a criminal investigation. There was always someone who didn’t want him to discover the truth. He’d been threatened, hit, kicked, nearly drowned, nearly electrocuted, and nearly run over by a streetcar. He’d not yet been nearly poisoned, and he wouldn’t allow this case to be his first. “No,” he repeated.

She nodded, and he could see she didn’t believe him, but not arguing was her way of saying she trusted him to look out for himself. She moved past him, and he reached out to her, putting a hand on her shoulder. She turned her head to look at him. Was there ever a time he didn’t love her?

He said, “Will you look after Justin until I get back? Can you stay at the house?”

Her brow furrowed. “Of course,” she said, but her eyes begged, “Why?”

“He knows about his mother’s death. He learned yesterday morning. Not the details, just that she chose to end her life because she was unwell.”

Her face registered all he felt in his heart for his son, love and fear and sorrow that such a horrible thing was now part of his boy’s life. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears. He felt his own eyes well. He cleared his throat.

“I’ve informed Mrs. Prouty, of course, but Justin—he sometimes will speak to you about matters he doesn’t want to discuss with anyone else. I would feel better knowing you were at the house.”

“Yes, of course I’ll stay. Try not to worry.”

“Thank you.” His voice was grave with emotion.

She stepped up to him and kissed him on the cheek, then quickly turned toward the bath and slipped inside. He heard the door lock click.

He didn’t have an opportunity to see her alone again before she left.

The same low tide that took her and the others away brought Henry and Knut in the Stanley with Sheriff Graham and Captain Bell of the Secret Service, along with a half-dozen men in a hired wagon.

For a few minutes the beach was a busy transfer station. He’d hugged his son fiercely and told him to take care of Mrs. Prouty until he returned home. He shook hands with the others, and only Knut complained because he had to do an about face and return from whence he came, without the Stanley Steamer. Bradshaw commandeered it, sending money with Colin to pay the owner for another week’s rental as they passed Copalis. He’d also given Colin a letter to deliver to the university president, Thomas Kane, explaining his absence. When he returned, he would contact his students and complete the course before the start of the fall term.

He watched the wagon take his charges safely across the creek, his heart heavy at their going, and yet relieved. At last, he turned to the newly arrived lawmen, who’d climbed from their vehicles and already begun assessing the scene.

Although sixty-two and nearly bald, Captain Bushrod Bell, head of the Northwest Division of the Secret Service, exuded the strength and energy of a much younger man. He fanned his face with his hat, squinting into the hot sun as he and Sheriff Graham approached Bradshaw, and he said, “Well, Professor, I hear you’ve found a thief.”

“Our thief is dead, Captain. Freddie Thompson was poisoned.”

Sheriff Graham pushed back his hat and rubbed his jaw.

Captain Bell ceased fanning his hat. “Huh. Where’s the body, Professor?”

Chapter Twenty-six

Captain Bell removed his boots on the porch of Healing Sands, and slid his feet into felt slippers. Bell’s men followed suit, but not Sheriff Graham. He again used his handkerchief to wipe clean the bottoms of his boots, and marched inside with a clomp of authority.

Bradshaw and Captain Bell had worked together a few times over the past couple of years in Seattle. Bell was a man who wore his authority quietly. Although his experience had shown him the worst of men, and he never trusted at face value anything he was shown or told, he retained a refreshing sense of humor and held a genuine fondness for his fellow men. Even when arresting them. He’d seen much in his years of experience, and had grown philosophical about the human species.

“So Professor,” Bell said, once he and Bradshaw and Sheriff Graham were settled in the library. “You’ve uncovered a nest of foul play here at the edge of the continent. Start from the beginning, and let me know what you prefer to keep off the record.”

The telling took a full hour, during which Captain Bell and Sheriff Graham listened without interruption, and one of Bell’s men took notes. Wanting to hear the opinion of the experienced detective, Bradshaw did his best to give facts only, not opinion, but Bell was a shrewd man and picked up on the undercurrents.

“You trust Doctor Hornsby and his family?” Bell asked.

“Yes.”

“I will investigate them.”

“As well you should.”

“And you believe Mr. Thompson was poisoned before your arrival?”

“His symptoms indicate that, yes.”

“One of my men served as a medic in Cuba. He’s experienced enough to perform a preliminary autopsy. Phosphorus poisoning is, unfortunately, routinely seen and well understood. Could we have two separate, unrelated cases here, Professor?”

“It’s possible.”

“I tell you right now, Bradshaw, my money’s on Arnold Loomis for the Hollister death. I’ve dealt with him before. He’s not likely to be pleased to see me.” Bell cocked his head. “You don’t agree? Not Moss, from what you’ve told me, he’s not got the brains, or a motive, unless he’d been trying to kill Mr. Thompson. The woman, then, Mrs. Thompson? It’s true women do tend to choose poison when they turn their hands to murder, so if we’ve got separate cases, she’s likely guilty there. Unless it was suicide. But electricity? More of a man’s weapon, wouldn’t you say?”