“Everything!”
“Could you tell me about them?”
“I suppose… yes.”
“Why don’t you begin with the one that you didn’t realize was a murder at the time?” Susan said.
“Okay. It was Mr. Roper; we used to call him Mr. Reporter. That’s what he had been. He worked on a paper in California -I don’t remember which one-and he loved to talk about it. The good old days. You know, lots of the residents felt that way about the past and we tried to humor them.”
“Like calling him Mr. Reporter.”
“Exactly.”
“How did he die?”
“He was diabetic and his blood sugar got out of control and he went into shock. After he died, empty bourbon bottles were found in his locked drawer. Each resident had a locked dresser drawer although we never had any problems with theft, at least not while I was working there. Anyway, after they found the bottles, everyone assumed that he had drunk himself to death-not a terribly difficult thing to do if you have diabetes, a serious heart condition, and you’re almost a hundred years old.”
“But you didn’t believe that was the cause of his death?”
“I… it didn’t make sense. See, one night we-some of the younger staff-were having a little celebration for another nurse who had just gotten engaged. We had champagne and little cakes, but we weren’t getting drunk or anything. It was just a toast and a bite to eat and back to work. Anyway, Mr. Reporter was having trouble sleeping and he wandered down the hallway so we asked him to join us. And he did, but he refused any champagne or anything to eat. He said he hadn’t gotten to be as old as he was by ignoring doctor’s orders.”
“So you don’t think he drank?”
“Oh, it’s possible. I know that some alcoholics refuse to indulge in public and will drink only when they’re alone. But… well, everyone was surprised when the bottles were found. And we took good care of our residents. I don’t think something like that could have gone unnoticed.”
“How could he have died then?”
“It would have been possible for someone on the staff to either give him the wrong medication or withhold the proper meds and cause a serious imbalance in his blood sugar levels.”
“And then plant the bottles in his locked drawer?”
“Yes.”
“What about the lock?”
“There was a master key. It was kept in the office. Almost anyone could have gotten hold of it if they had wanted to.”
“Anyone on the staff or anyone at all?”
“Oh, I think just the staff…” She paused and rearranged Rosie’s arms, much to the baby’s dismay. “I guess… I mean, no one ever thought it might be a resident.”
“Why not? Were they so incapacitated that they couldn’t have killed someone, or taken the key and stashed empty bottles in that drawer?”
“No. We had residents who were quite…” She paused as if searching for the correct word.
“Spry?” Susan suggested.
“Spry and more. Most of the residents were elderly and many were incapacitated, but a few were perfectly able to… to do what you just described.”
“Were the residents ever considered suspects?”
“Not that I know of. Not seriously. The police questioned them of course, but one was the result of a lethal injection, one was suffocation, and… and another was pushed off the top of the building.” She shuddered. “That was Mrs. Hershman. I found her.”
“Was she the next person to die after Mr. Roper?” Susan asked.
“No, she was the last. The next person was Mr. Blake. He suffocated.”
“So everyone knew it was murder right away.”
“No, an accident. He was found tangled in his blankets. It sounds odd, but it could have been just one of those things-an old man thrashing around in the night. Anyway, no one thought of murder until Miss Breen died the very next day. She was a lovely lady, a retired school teacher-Latin. She had lived all over the world teaching in unusual places and she knew so many interesting people. P.I.C.C. was pretty out of the way, but she had lots of visitors, people she had taught mainly. Two of her students are now professors at Yale and it was one of them who went to the police and insisted on an investigation. If he had done it earlier, it might have stopped the murderer.”
“She was the one who died because of an injection?”
“Yes… There was no reason for her to have been given it at all, so once it was found in the body, everyone knew something was wrong. But the results of the autopsy didn’t get back until the afternoon of the day I found Mrs. Hershman.”
“Tell me about that.”
Shannon sighed. “She… She was… It was awful. It was late morning and I went outside to get some fresh air. P.I.C.C. was clean and it certainly didn’t smell the way some nursing homes do, but it was hot. Many of our residents had circulation problems of some sort and they all got chilled easily so the thermostats were always turned up way too high. Anyway, I went out to cool off and I found her. She was lying on the ground. Her arms and legs were in a weird position, but I just thought she had fallen down. I called to her and touched her gently on the shoulder, but she didn’t move. I thought maybe she was in shock so I took off my sweater and put it around her and ran back inside to get help. She was dead and… and it was obvious right away that she hadn’t just tripped and fallen down.”
“I’m surprised that residents were allowed to wander around outside on their own.”
“They weren’t. And I don’t remember it ever happening before. There were only a few doors and all of them were alarmed except for the back door where supplies were delivered, and there was a door between that area and the living area that was kept closed as well as alarmed. And there was always someone working in the kitchen twenty-four/seven, so no one could have gone out there without being seen. I don’t think anyone could have just wandered out, but I didn’t think about that then. I mean, what’s more likely-that someone had wandered out the back door where the alarm was turned off or someone had gone up on the roof and been thrown off?”
“Good point,” Susan said. “But how did they know she had been thrown off and not gone up there alone and just fallen?”
“The police searched all over. They thought she might have jumped out of a window, but all the windows on that side of the building are semisealed. They only open a few inches. So they checked out the roof. They found a necklace up there that she always wore. It had been pulled off her neck and broken. The autopsy showed that as well as other signs of a struggle before her death. They also found heavy leather gloves. They had been used to strangle her before she was tossed off the wall.”
“Was there any way to tell who had worn them?”
“No. Apparently the killer had put on surgical gloves before putting on the leather ones-there were boxes of gloves outside of each room; everyone had access to them-and dozens of pairs were tossed out every day, so searching the garbage didn’t reveal anything.”
Susan put down the almost empty bottle and moved Ethan up onto her shoulder and patted his back gently. “But there was no doubt that she was murdered.”
“None. And then they looked into the other two deaths and decided they were also suspicious…”
“But not Mr. Roper’s death.”
“No. I wonder why.”
“Me, too. It doesn’t make sense,” Susan said. But she didn’t mention the other thing that didn’t make sense to her. Why someone who went outside to cool down would still be wearing a sweater.
TWELVE
SUSAN HAD NO IDEA WHAT TO DO SO SHE DID WHAT MANY women would do in her situation: she called her best friend. And, proving her worth as a best friend, Kathleen responded immediately.
“We can talk on the phone, but I sure don’t want to be overheard by… by anyone.” Susan looked at her closed bedroom door. She had come upstairs to make this call, but she knew Shannon might interrupt at any time.