“Was there any point when Les wasn’t in here with you?”
“Not really. He did go down to the laundry room for a few seconds.”
“Why did he do that?”
“To fetch a pile of fresh napkins. We were running low.”
“How many seconds was he down there?”
Jory shrugged her shoulders helplessly. “Twenty, maybe thirty?”
“And Jase?”
“Jase never left the mudroom.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“I’m positive. Des, do you mind if I ask you something now?”
“Not at all. Go right ahead.”
“I sort of heard you guys talking before in the taproom, but I wanted to make sure I heard it right.” Jory hesitated, clearing her throat uneasily. “Aaron’s the new boss of us, isn’t he?”
“That’s something you ought to talk to Les about,” Des replied, since the details of Norma ’s last will and testament were not for public consumption. Then again, she reflected, the future of Astrid’s Castle did matter a great deal to this woman. Jory deserved to know the truth sooner rather than later. So the hell with it. “Apparently, Norma and Les signed a pre-nuptual agreement, whereby Les has no ownership rights to this place. Aaron gets it.”
Jory nodded her head glumly. “I guess that means all three of us are out. Aaron and Les can barely tolerate each other. And there’s no way Jase or I will ever work a single day for Carly.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself. Carly may not be in the picture for long.”
“Well, that much is true,” Jory agreed, brightening a little.
“Besides, Aaron said he had no intention of making any changes.”
Jory let out a short laugh. “Sure, that’s what they always say-just before they shut down the factory and move all of the jobs to Malaysia or somewhere.”
Des’s cell phone squawked again.
She answered it and heard an excited Soave blurt out, “Des, you have not lost your touch.”
“What have you got for me, Rico?” she asked him as Jory started for the service stairs. Des didn’t want anyone wandering around the castle alone, so she motioned for her to sit. Jory flopped down at the kitchen table, puffing out her cheeks.
“Well, for starters,” Soave reported, “Dr. Lavin is in Aruba for two weeks.”
“Dumb he’s not. And…?”
“And the doctor who’s covering for him is going to look into Norma Josephson’s records and get back to me.”
“And…?”
“And I bounced your theory off of the medical examiner. He said that if somebody ODs on digoxin it can trigger, wait a sec, I wrote all of this down… ‘Excessive slowing of the pulse, thereby leading to atrio-ventricular blockage. Which, if someone is elderly or has a heart condition, can lead to complete cardiac arrest within a half hour.’ That’s an induced heart attack, in dumbo English. Which is to say, ka-ching.”
“That’s good work, Rico,” she said, her mind starting to race. Whoever killed Norma had known more than a little about her heart condition. Meaning it was someone close to her as opposed to, say, Spence or Hannah. Although Hannah could have known about it by way of Aaron.
“Yolie’s reaching out to your local pharmacist. And I just spoke to the Connecticut Light and Power people.”
“This news is not so good. I hear it in your voice, Rico.”
“Hey, I got you bumped to a high priority, right behind the hospitals, schools and the governor’s mother’s house. But they still can’t promise anything before the end of tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow? Rico, we will freeze to death by then.”
At the table, Jory nodded her head solemnly.
“Hey, at my house we’re looking at seventy-two hours,” he complained. “So consider yourself lucky.”
“What did the SP-One people say?”
“According to the latest forecast, the snow and wind are supposed to taper off early this afternoon. They think we might be able to land up there maybe one, two o’clock. I’ve got the authorization.”
Des glanced at her watch. It was not quite eleven now.
“Des, I’m still willing to do it the old-fashioned way. Just say the word and me and Yolie will be on the road in ten minutes.”
“No, take the chopper, Rico. You’re a bigger help to me right where you are. And you’ll get here faster.”
“Deal. Back at you when I know more.”
Des rang off and she and Jory started back upstairs.
“Would it be okay if we looked in on Jase?” Jory asked her as they climbed. “I want to make sure he’s okay.”
“Any reason he wouldn’t be?”
“He doesn’t do well under certain circumstances.”
“None of us are doing particularly well right now.”
“I know, but he’s real sensitive, and he can get kind of…”
“Kind of what, Jory?”
“Upset,” she said quietly.
“Sure, okay,” Des said, pushing open the steel door to the second-floor corridor. Mitch was still at his post at the top of the main stairs. “I need to talk to him anyway.”
“Can I come in with you?” Jory asked, somewhat pleadingly.
“I’m afraid not.”
“Then I’ll wait right out here in the hallway, if you don’t mind. Just in case you need me.”
“That’ll be fine.” Des tapped on the door to room eleven. It wasn’t bolted. She opened it and went inside, shutting it behind her.
Jase sat hunched on the edge of the bed, facing the windows. The unheated room was beginning to smell of his unwashed presence.
“How’s it going, Jase?” she asked, starting toward him.
He didn’t respond. Didn’t so much as acknowledge her presence.
When she made her way around the bed to face him, Des found Jase Hearn to be perspiring heavily despite the chill. He was nodding his head up and down, wringing his hands, jiggling his knee.
Jory knew her brother, all right. He was definitely upset.
“It won’t open,” he said suddenly. “The window won’t open.”
Indeed not. The deep granite sill was heavily encrusted with ice, frozen solidly shut.
“Are you going somewhere, Jase?” she asked him, keeping her voice low.
“I have to work on the driveway,” he replied, his voice rising with urgency. “Trees are down.”
“In a while, Jase.”
“No, that’s no good,” he protested. “I take care of things. I’m supposed to be out there, not sitting here doing nothing.”
“Soon, okay?” Des perched on the bed next to him. “And you’re not here doing nothing. You’re helping me out.”
He turned and looked at her blankly. “I am?”
“Absolutely. I need to ask you some questions about last night, okay?”
“I guess,” he said, relaxing a little. “I mean, sure.”
“Did you get up at all during the night? I’m wondering if you might have seen anything going on downstairs in the kitchen.”
Jase cocked his head at her curiously. “Like what?”
“Somebody’s flashlight. Somebody moving around in there.”
Jase shook his head. “Jory gave me my pill.”
“What pill is that, Jase?”
“So I can sleep.”
“You take one every night?”
“I do,” he said, scratching at his beard. “If I don’t I can’t stop thinking about stuff.”
“What stuff?”
“Stuff I need to do. There’s just so much stuff.”
“Okay, sure,” she said easily. “Jase, I’d like to go over what happened this morning. Where were you when Ada got strangled?”
“I don’t know,” he answered flatly.
Des frowned at him. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t know when it happened. I only know when I heard that girl scream.”
“You’re right. That wasn’t a very precise question. My bad. Where were you when you heard Hannah scream?”
“Washing my hands,” he said, staring down at them as if they belonged to someone else. “In the mud room.”
“And Jory was in the kitchen?”
“Yeah.”
“And where was Les?”
“With her, serving breakfast.”
“Okay, that’s good. Very good.” Des stood back up, her hamstrings and calves starting to ache from the cold. “Thank you, Jase.”
“Can I go outside now?” he asked her.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to stay put.”