The Plague Doctor (3 page)

Chapter Five

I descended the narrow staircase with as much dignity as I could muster. The old woman was standing next to Watson, her tiny little foot tapping out staccato displeasure on the brick driveway.

“Miss Hannah?”

“Heavens, no! It's Lolly you're talking to. I'm Lolly Parsons. Who are you?”

I made a silent invocation to my grandmother's spirit and asked for help with this nosey old bag. The last thing in the world we needed was for her to call the police.

“I'm Paisley Sterling…John and Anna's first child.”

“Paisley Sterling. I remember you. You used to tease my cat. I never did like you.”

I tried to smile but my lips were dry and they stuck to my teeth. “Oh, I am sorry about that. Children can be a nuisance sometimes. I'm sure I was a holy terror. How is your cat now?”

“Dead.”

“Oh.”

Cassie came bouncing down the wooden stairs with my leather handbag slung over her shoulder. She looked like she didn't have a care in the world.

“Hi, Miss Lolly. My, don't you look pretty today. Have you been to that beauty shop again?”

She gave the little old woman a quick peck on the cheek.

Miss Lolly beamed from ear to ear as she gave her cap of tight white curls a proud pat. I watched in amazement as she deftly avoided my gaze and smiled fondly at my daughter who was no more Southern than a turnip, but had learned from observing her grandmother how to walk the walk and talk the talk.

“Cassandra, dear, how nice to see you. Won't you come in and have some tea? Hannah has made some of that orange walnut bread you like so much.”

“I do wish I had time, but Mom and I…have you met my mother, Paisley DeLeon?”

Miss Lolly sniffed suspiciously, “I thought she said her name was Sterling.”

They went on discussing me as if I were not standing there like a display room dummy.

“Sterling's her maiden name. My grandmother is Anna Howard and my Grandad was John Sterling. You remember them?”

“Why of course I do, child. They were fine people and so was your great-grandmother Howard. She was a good friend of mine when we were schoolgirls. And your great-grandfather was a fine figure of a man.”

A faint blush covered her wrinkled old cheeks. “But I'm sorry to say,” she went on, “your mother was nothing like any of them. Bad seed, she was. Used to torment my poor Mr. Whiskers.”

She glared in my direction. I smiled until my cheeks hurt but Cassie laughed. Pretty soon they were both laughing. Miss Lolly hid some very bad teeth behind her skinny old hand as she tittered away at my expense.

I grabbed my leather handbag from Cassie, almost dropping it because of the unexpected weight of Ethan's electronic goodies, and headed for Watson. I heard Cassie wisely covering our tracks as I climbed in the driver's seat.

“Looks like Dr. McHenry is not at home. I'll be back later, and we'll both come in for some of that wonderful bread. Tell Miss Hannah not to eat it all.”

She gave the old bag a gentle hug and hopped in beside me. I stomped childishly on the gas and the tires squealed as we took off.

“Whew! Looks like we got away with it. Head for home, Mom!”

“Humpf.”

She started laughing again. “Mr. Whiskers! What did you do to her cat? It must have been something really awful for her to hold a grudge this long.”

I chuckled then. It was good to see Cassie laugh, even if it was at my expense.

“I spray painted him from head to tail.”

“Oh, my God, Mom. That
is
awful. The poor thing!”

“I know.” Now I couldn't stop laughing.

“I probably shouldn't ask, but what color?”

“White. It was a black cat, and when it crossed in front of me one day I was sure I would have bad luck unless I did something. So I got some white spray paint and made a stripe down its back like a skunk. It seemed like a great idea at the time.”

“How old were you?”

“Eight or nine.”

“You definitely were the bad seed.”

“I know, I know.”

When we got home, we took the contraband from Ethan's apartment into the library and set it out on my father's big desk. I had to move my own laptop and the notes for Leonard's new book over to the library table to make room for all of Ethan's equipment.

“My goodness, Cassie, you brought the whole kit and caboodle!”

“Why not? I knew there would be no second chance.”

Cassie carefully plugged everything into the corresponding receptacles and I spread the floppy discs out.

“Nothing is labeled. He just has them numbered,” complained Cassie.

“Look closer. The numbers aren't sequential, and they have too many digits. I bet it's some kind of code. I bet he has the discs encrypted, too. Probably takes yet another password to read them.”

“Why would he go to that much trouble?”

“Probably no trouble at all to him—just standard operating procedure.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Think about it. Why would he leave all this out in the open where anybody could come across it if it were so easy to read?”

“Mom, you seem to forget that all this was locked up in his apartment. Aren't you being just a little melodramatic? After all, he's not Superspy.”

“Okay, turn it on and see for yourself.”

Cassie sat down and went through the motions again. This time I watched closely to see if I could catch Ethan's login password, but her fingers were too quick on the keyboard. She slipped one of the discs into the “A” drive and went to “File Manager.” A big red box appeared across the screen with a message in black letters “Enter Password.” Cassie typed in the password she had used to login. Another message flashed across the screen.

“You are locked out. Please contact your supervisor.”

“Wow! Looks like you weren't kidding. How did you know, Mom?”

“Leonard told me.”

“Hah!”

“Seriously. Our new book is all about industrial espionage. I had to read up. I learned a lot.”

“I bet Leonard knows even more.”

“Humpf.”

We trudged into the kitchen where Mother was busy layering a lovely looking salad in a big glass bowl. Cassie sneaked a white mushroom cap and a hunk of Parmesan and went to the refrigerator for a drink.

“Perrier, Mom?”

“Sure.”

“Gran?”

“No thanks, dear; but I'll take a glass of iced tea, if you don't mind.”

I was amazed at Cassie's composure. Our little foray this morning seemed to have gotten rid of her anxiety, or a least gotten it under control. During lunch she regaled Mother with the story of Miss Lolly and my misadventures with her striped cat.

“Paisley! What a naughty child you were. It's funny, but I don't remember anything about that particular incident.”

“That's because Granpa Howard hushed it up for me.”

“You're kidding?”

“I think the old lady had a crush on him. Anyway, he made me fork over all my allowance. He pitched in the rest and together we bought her a dozen yellow roses. He said she would have misunderstood red ones.”

“I should think so!” agreed Mother.

“Am I missing something here, or is this some old-fashioned thing?”

“You would do well to learn more about the language of flowers and love, my dear. Young people nowadays have no sense whatsoever of romance. It's all slam, bam, thank you, m'am!”

“Good grief, Mother. Not in front of the children.”

Cassie went to her room after lunch to pick out a “visiting your boyfriend in jail where he is being held for a capitol offense” outfit.

I helped Mother with the dishes. When we were done, we both decided a nap was the only way we would live to see another day. She went to her room and I headed back to the sofa in the library. Poor lonely little Aggie dusted my heels with her long white beard as she tagged along behind me.

We had just curled up on the big, red chintz-covered sofa when Cassie entered. She was dressed in a soft, full-skirted yellow dress with a tiny pink flower print. Her long hair was tied back with a matching pink ribbon. She looked sweet and innocent and lovely—not at all like a gangster's moll.

“Do you want me to go with you, sweetie?”

“No, Mom. I think I need to see Ethan alone.”

“Oh, thank God. I'm exhausted.”

“Sweet of you to offer, though. Maybe you can come with me tomorrow.”

“Cassie, maybe he'll be out tomorrow. This whole thing is probably one whopper of a mistake. Come home with some good news, okay?”

“Sure thing, Mom. May I take Watson, for luck?”

“Of course. And please pay some attention to this canine ragmop when you get home. She's driving me crazy.”

Aggie hopped up and traversed my prone body like a mountain goat. She lay down at my feet and started licking my toes, one at a time.

Chapter Six

I thought I would fall asleep immediately, but my mind kept nagging my body awake. Through heavy-lidded eyes, I stared at the bright red, yellow, and orange leaves as they danced and swirled in the wind outside the French doors. Fall was definitely here. I could already see the squirrels' nests exposed to predators in the forks of the big old oak on the field side of the back fence.

Mother had a fierce ongoing battle with each and every squirrel on the farm. She called them fancy rats with delusions of grandeur. She vowed that they were responsible for everything from house fires to the high unemployment rate.

Last year she placed a wicked, evil-looking squirrel trap in the back yard. When a poor furry soul wandered inside Mother called one of the army of high school students who worked for her to come and carry the cage far away and bring it back empty. I secretly believed that the crafty kid would let the squirrel out before he left the driveway—insuring himself a future phone call and another five bucks.

Mother forgot to disarm the trap last May when we went to visit Cassie at Emory University. When we returned home we found a poor little dead squirrel huddled up on the bottom of the cage. It had obviously starved to death.

The trap disappeared the next day. I haven't seen it since. From the look of the size of the nests, we would be hearing lots of fancy deluded rats playing in the attic this winter. Mother was right about one thing, though. Squirrels carried diseases like all rodents. What was that word Horatio had told us about—vector?

Squirrels were vectors and so were prairie dogs. Why was that so important? I fell asleep in a mild state of curiosity. I dreamed I was running and running on a wire wheel in a big cage and getting nowhere.

I awoke fours hours later in a dark, chilly room with no furry little companion to keep my feet either wet or warm. I lay there puzzling for a moment, trying to get my bearings. Then I heard Aggie's welcome home bark. Cassie was back.

I stood and stretched, surprised to feel remarkably rested. And I was famished.

I headed toward the kitchen to let Cassie in and feed my face.

The back of the house was warm and bright with good smells coming from every corner of the kitchen. My mother's answer to everything is “when in doubt, cook!” I opened the oven a tad to peek and got smacked on the behind with a wooden spoon.

“Paisley Sterling, you'll fall my cake!”

I rubbed my smarting nether parts and opened the back door for Cassie. I knew better than to try and correct my mother's grammar.

Cassie slumped into the kitchen with a long and mournful mien and a worse disposition.

“Get out of the way you stupid dog!” Immediately contrite, she bent and lifted the fat, squirming puppy into her lap.

I sat down at the table across from Cassie and waited for her to open up.

“He's such an idiot!”

I knew better than to reply to that.

“He doesn't even try to defend himself. He just keeps saying, ‘I didn't do it' over and over, but he won't explain anything. I just don't understand, Mom. He needs help, but he refuses to let me call Dr. Haywood, or anybody in Atlanta. What are we going to do?”

She turned her lovely tear-stained face to me. She must have cried all the way home.

“What about Bruce Hawkins? Mother, has he returned your call yet?”

Mother carried the unfrosted cake and a big bowl of icing over to the table and sat down.

“I talked to him about an hour ago. That's why I'm baking.”

Cassie and I exclaimed in unison, “Uh-oh.”

“Yes, I'm afraid the news is not so good. Bruce is representing the family of the victim, or victims, I should say. He cannot even recommend anyone else because it might be considered a conflict of interest. He said he was sorry because he'd met Ethan when he first came to town and liked him a lot.”

Cassie's face got even longer and more morose looking. She was absently stroking Aggie's soft furry ears. I was a nervous wreck waiting for the first nip of those nasty little teeth. She never let any of us, including Cassie, pet her.

“Cassie, tell us exactly what the situation is—not what Ethan says, but what Joiner told you.”

“That's just it,” she cried. “I couldn't talk to Chief Joiner. They made me go in through the back of the jail. I never got to the front office, so I didn't get to see anyone else. The deputy said it was for my own safety. Something about the town being ‘riled up'—whatever that means.”

“So, we still don't know exactly what happened.”

Mother cleared her throat and licked the icing-covered spatula. I was astounded. That was a first. She must really be upset.

“I spoke to Mavis,” she said quietly.

“Ah, ha! Now we're getting somewhere.”

Mavis was an erstwhile friend of Mother's. She had a police scanner and the biggest personal address book in town. Mavis knew everybody's business before they did. I should have suggested that Mother call her in the first place.

“Mavis heard the call over the police scanner when the young woman telephoned for help. I think her name is Hayes, Brittany or Brandy, one of those 1980s names. Anyway, she called 911 and said her father had been shot. Mavis heard the dispatcher order a police car to the Hayes' farm and then call Doc Baxter. When the police got there, the girl's father was lying out on the side of the road by his mailbox with a bullet through his head. The girl was found lying unconscious on the front porch.”

I glanced at Cassie and watched her face grow paler as her back stiffed.

“When the doctor got there he revived young whats-her-name and put her in the ambulance. On the way to the hospital she accused Ethan of raping her. When they told her that her father was dead, she said Ethan must have done that, too.”

“Impossible!” cried Cassie.

“Go on, Mother,” I encouraged grimly.

“Chief Joiner himself went over to the Parsons' house and quietly arrested Ethan. He was in his apartment working on some papers. He claimed that he knew nothing about Mr. Hayes being killed, or the daughter's rape, but he couldn't explain some really bad scratches on his hand and arms.”

“No, no,” moaned Cassie.

“Mavis said they photographed his wounds and booked him. The judge has refused to set bond since it's a murder case.”

Cassie jumped up, dumping the sleeping puppy in a furious snarling heap on the kitchen floor.

“Ethan is innocent! He could never do anything like that!”

“Listen to me, Cassandra! Your friend is in big trouble, but you can help him if you don't wallow in your own feelings. His little genius medical brain seems to have shut down for the moment, and we're going to have to do the thinking for him. So cool it and calm down.”

She stared down at me for a moment, then sat down hard on the kitchen chair. Aggie jumped back up on her lap immediately.

“You're right. You're absolutely right.” She tucked in her chin and grew three inches taller. I was proud of her. “Where do we start?”

Mother knew.

“Cake, anyone?”