Lethal Legend

LETHAL LEGEND

Kathy Lynn Emerson

Chapter One

June 1888

Schooners, steamboats, yachts, and fishing boats navigated the choppy waters of Penobscot Bay, but Ben Northcote was too deeply troubled by what he’d found on Keep Island to appreciate the attractive picture they made. The promontory upon which he stood was the highest point of land on the island and commanded a spectacular view of surrounding landmarks. He had a clear view of Eagle Island with its beacon light. Shifting his gaze just slightly, he could see North Haven, Vinalhaven, and the Gulf of Maine beyond. Still farther out was the Atlantic Ocean, and if one kept going, England.

Slowly, he turned until he could see almost the entire length of Islesborough with the undulating Camden Hills beyond. Rotating further, he found himself looking across a cluster of tiny islands to Cape Rosier and Castine Head, its lighthouse prominent on a rugged cliff on the mainland. As he completed his circle, he remembered another time when he’d stood just here on a clear day and been able to pick out the top of Cadillac Mountain on Mt. Desert Island. 

He could not see that far today. Nor could he put off making his report much longer. If he didn’t go in, Graham Somener would come looking for him. Keep Island’s seventy-five acres was comprised of meadows, cliffs, pebble beaches, rocky outcroppings, a swamp, and a cave. The latter offered the only possible hiding place, but held little appeal to Ben as an adult.

When he’d been a young boy and stayed on Keep Island as a guest, he’d always had hopes that what they’d named “the pirate’s cave” would one day yield a buccaneer’s treasure. If such a thing had ever existed, he and Graham had never been able to find it.

Keep Island belonged to the Somener family and had for at least three generations. Graham’s grandfather, Jedediah Somener, had made his fortune in shipping and built the house. Jedediah’s daughter, Graham’s Aunt Min, had planted imported shade trees. Grown to respectable size now—black walnut, copper beech, and chestnut—they complimented the island’s fragrant native pine and cedar. When Graham moved back to the island five years earlier, he had made numerous improvements, the addition of indoor plumbing and a gas plant the most obvious.

Overhead a gull screamed in counterpoint to the sound of waves breaking on the rocks below. Ben breathed deeply of the salty air and squared his shoulders. Procrastination solved nothing. Resigned, he headed back down the path that led to the Somener mansion.

He found Graham in his library, seated at the huge partners’ desk that dominated the room. He was not alone. Miss Serena Dunbar had arranged herself in a most unladylike fashion in one of the overstuffed chairs, head resting against one arm, lower limbs dangling over the other. Just as well she was present, Ben decided. She needed to hear his conclusions, too.

“Well?” Graham was tall, only a bit shorter than Ben himself. Like Ben he had dark wavy hair, but where Ben’s eyes were dark brown, Graham’s were the color of agates.

“All three men were poisoned.”

Miss Dunbar did not move but her unfashionably sun-browned skin blanched, making her freckles stand out. “You’re certain? There couldn’t be any possibility of a mistake?”

A frown knit Graham’s brow. “Food poisoning, do you mean?”

Interesting, Ben thought. Miss Dunbar assumed and accepted the worst while Graham continued to search for a more benign explanation. He wasn’t sure if this change in his old friend’s outlook was an improvement or not.

“Unless Miss Dunbar’s assistants are habitual opium eaters, it is unlikely they could have ingested that much morphine through error. One man might take an accidental overdose, but all three show the symptoms of narcotic poisoning—sleeplessness and dizziness alternating with bouts of unconsciousness, vomiting, a yellowish tinge to the complexion, rapid pulse, and pupils retracted to the size of pinpoints.”

Miss Dunbar righted herself and stood, brushing absently at the wrinkles in her divided skirt. “Will they recover?”

“If they survive another twenty-four hours without respiratory failure, the prognosis is good, but I make no promises.” 

“Morphine?” Graham couldn’t seem to grasp the concept. “Narcotic poisoning? How can that be? Where would anyone get such a thing on my island?”

“Morphine has come into wide use as a painkiller in the last year or so. It would not be particularly difficult to obtain, though it is hardly something one acquires on the spur of the moment.”

“Do you mean to say that someone intended to murder my crew?” Miss Dunbar glared at Ben as if that were his fault.

“Possibly, although if so, they made a poor choice of weapon. There are other poisons more readily available that would have done a better job of it. If I had to guess, I’d say someone wanted to make whoever ingested the morphine ill and simply didn’t care if one or more people died instead.”

“That’s horrible!” Miss Dunbar exclaimed.

“Yes, it is.” And it made Ben wonder who the real target had been. Paul Carstairs and Frank Ennis were new to the area. George Amity was a local man who’d been hired to do the heavy digging at the excavation site when Miss Serena Dunbar had somehow talked Graham into letting her conduct an archaeological excavation on his private island.

Ben took the chair Miss Dunbar had vacated and stretched his legs out in front of him. It had been a long day. He’d been up at dawn—around four at this time of year—and had gone early to his surgery in Bangor. Graham’s telegram had arrived just before seven, giving Ben barely enough time to catch the 7:15 train. He’d scarcely had a moment since to draw in a deep breath.

“You’re certain it couldn’t have been food poisoning?” Graham asked. “They weren’t particular what they ate. Meals out of tins half the time. Maybe that—”

“Why did you send for me if you thought the answer was that simple?” Ben interrupted. He did not move, but his sharp tone belied the relaxed posture. “There are other physicians closer to Keep Island. One on Islesborough, another in—”

“None I’d trust to keep silent about this!”

Alert for anything that might indicate a return of the mental depression and dementia from which Graham had suffered five years earlier, Ben watched his friend intently, albeit through half-closed eyes. The unfortunate and well-publicized collapse of a building Graham had designed had culminated in claims that he had been responsible for the loss of several lives. Deeply affected by the tragedy, hounded by the press, he had retreated from the world to live on Keep Island year round.

“Are you certain you didn’t suspect foul play?” Ben asked.

“No! I swear to you, I was sure it was just food poisoning. But rumormongers might easily have turned that into something else.”

“What? Plague?”

Ben hoped the sarcastic suggestion would jar Graham back to reality before he convinced himself that another spate of half-truths and false accusations was imminent. He had a deep-seated fear of attracting attention to himself and Ben well understood why. Unfounded speculation among his former associates and in the press had driven Graham out of Boston and very nearly driven him mad.

Miss Dunbar’s long strides took her back and forth over the diamond trellis design of leaves and flowers on the carpet. She came to an abrupt halt in front of one of the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and turned to face Ben. “Some people think there is a curse on this island.”

Ben’s eyes popped all the way open and he sat up a little straighter, thinking he must have misheard her.

“Don’t look at me like that, Dr. Northcote. I did not say that I believe in such nonsense. The notion came from Mr. Somener’s housekeeper.”

The redoubtable Mrs. Prudence Monroe. Ben remembered her well from his childhood. She was as prickly as a porcupine, but she could turn a bit of dough, a few apples, and a dash of cinnamon into ambrosia.

“Tell me about this curse.” Ben was certain he’d never heard of it before.

“What is there to say?” Graham’s exasperation had increased to the point where he’d raked agitated fingers through his hair, leaving clumps of it standing on end. “The locals never inhabited this island before my grandfather built here. They seem to have gotten it into their heads that it was a dangerous place. I don’t know why. The rocks off shore are no worse than anywhere else in Penobscot Bay. There have been no shipwrecks—”

“That you know of,” Miss Dunbar interrupted.

“No matter what happened here in the distant past, Keep Island has not been unlucky for the Someners. For me it has been a blessed refuge.”

“I understand your desire for seclusion,” Ben said, meeting Graham’s eyes, “but this looks like a case of attempted murder. You can’t just ignore it and hope it will go away. You need to contact the sheriff.”

“Out of the question. Besides, what good does it do to close the barn door after the horse has escaped?”

“Whoever poisoned those men could try again.”

Tossing aside the pen he’d been toying with, Graham huffed out an exasperated breath. “I do not see how some stranger could come to my island and tamper with supplies without anyone noticing. It defies logic.”

“Someone already here, then.”

At Ben’s suggestion, Graham sent a speculative look in Miss Dunbar’s direction.

Affronted by the very idea that one of her crew would poison both himself and his associates, she swept across the room to within striking distance of Graham’s chair. Hands on hips, lower limbs braced wide apart, she fixed Ben’s friend with a fulminating stare.

Graham slowly rose, regaining the high ground. “Perhaps we should ask—”

“The notion is absurd. I have total confidence in my men.”

“Well acquainted with each of them, are you?”

“Well enough!”

Ben interrupted before the quarrel could escalate. “My patients are too weak to be interrogated just yet, but I do have a few more questions for the two of you.”

They turned on Ben as one, identical glares scorching him. He found that strangely reassuring. Under the circumstances, Graham’s display of temper was a normal reaction.

“What do you want to know?” Graham asked.

“This house is huge. Why were those three men obliged to camp out while Miss Dunbar stayed in one of the guest rooms?”

“It was their choice,” she informed him in a lofty voice. “They preferred to be close to the excavation. I would have stayed with them had Mr. Somener not insisted I accept his hospitality.”

“And meals? Why didn’t they join you for those, or eat in the kitchen with the servants?”

This time Graham answered. “They chose not to.”

“Two of them are accustomed to living rough when on an expedition,” Miss Dunbar elaborated. “Mr. Ennis spent several seasons excavating in Egypt. Mr. Carstairs is just back from studying the Casa Grande ruins in Arizona. I believe Mr. Somener’s mansion intimidated them. It certainly awed Mr. Amity. They all felt more comfortable sleeping in tents and cooking their own food.”

“Then whoever administered the morphine expected it to be ingested by one or more of those men, but not by one of you,” Ben concluded.

Graham and Miss Dunbar exchanged a startled look.

“None of the victims seems likely to have provoked the wrath of anyone who would use morphine as a weapon,” Ben continued. “That makes me wonder if the motive was to close down the excavation.”

“Deliberately poisoning three innocent men seems an extreme measure if that was his only purpose.” Miss Dunbar boosted herself up to sit on the corner of Graham’s desk while he subsided into his chair.

“I agree, but if it doesn’t turn out to be the result of, say, a quarrel one of the victims had with someone, then you need to ask yourself if you have any enemies who’d resort to such measures.”

“I have professional rivals,” she admitted, a thoughtful expression adding creases to her brow. “There is one archaeologist in particular who seems to delight in ridiculing my theories. But why would he try to kill my men when he’s so certain I’m never going to find anything? Besides, no one knows what I’m doing here. I’ve been careful to keep it secret.”

“People are aware there is an archaeological excavation on Keep Island. They can see that much from a passing boat.”

“But they don’t know what it is I’m looking for.”

Neither did Ben, but at the moment that seemed irrelevant.

“Consider this rival carefully. Might he simply have meant to disrupt things? Someone who doesn’t understand how powerful a drug morphine is could have thought it would stop work by making your men sick.” A dangerous mistake, but possible. “Mischief like that could easily have turned into murder.” Ben heaved himself out of the chair. “I need to return to my patients. I’ll stay until they’re out of danger.”

“I appreciate that, Ben.” Graham managed a bitter laugh. “I don’t need any more deaths on my conscience.”

“Then reconsider calling in the sheriff.”

As a parting shot, Ben doubted it was effective. Graham guarded his privacy as ferociously as a lioness did her cubs.