Murder in the Secret Garden (21 page)

“You found out who he was before he came to Storyton?” Tom lowered his coffee cup to Jane's desk and stared at her in astonishment.

“Yes,” Jane whispered and proceeded to tell Tom all the terrible things his father had done.

He didn't interrupt her. Not once. He didn't make a sound or move during her somewhat stilted narrative. He kept his gaze locked on her face. The only sign that she was getting through to him was that he would occasionally flinch, as though some of her words had a shocking bite like the sting of a bee or a paper cut.

When she was finished, Jane laced her hands together. Again, she told Tom how sorry she was for how things had turned out and then she fell silent, giving him a chance to absorb all that she'd said.

“I always knew he had a dark secret.” Tom spread his hands. “Why else would he have chosen to live the way he did? I wanted his crime to be tax evasion or something less, well, odious because it allowed us to have a relationship. I could have dug around. I could have pried. But I didn't. Deep down I knew I'd find something ugly.”

“What made you so certain?”

Tom shrugged. “Because he left me. What kind of man abandons his child?”

Jane almost told Tom that Hannah's father had left her too, but decided against it. That painful truth was not hers to share.

“I also knew that he was working on formulas for a company. They paid him in cash. Off the books,” Tom continued. “But I let myself be convinced that he was doing something good.”

“Maybe he was,” Jane said. “He was trying to produce new pain medications. Perhaps he meant to make amends.”

Tom shook his head in dismissal. “Who knows what would have happened to his formulas once Earle Pharmaceuticals started manufacturing them? Nothing good would have come out of that partnership.”

There was a light rap on Jane's door.

“Come in,” Jane called, and Sue Ross poked her head in.

“The police are here,” she said, her face pinched with worry. “They brought all three of our guests back. Mr. and Mrs. Earle have returned too. And a carload of lawyers.”

Jane bolted to her feet. “Good Lord.” She turned to Tom. “Will you be okay?”

He nodded. “I'd like to speak to Hannah, if they'll let me.” His throat seemed to suddenly tighten around his words and he had to force them out. “I want to . . . I want her to know that I don't hate her.”

Jane was already moving when Tom said these words. She was too focused on the abrupt return of Hannah, Victoria, and Carson to do more than give Tom a quick bob of her head.

Sterling was waiting for her on the other side of the reception desk. “Mr. Butterworth and Mr. Sinclair have managed to steer the recent arrivals into Shakespeare's Theater. Mrs. Earle—the older Mrs. Earle, that is—was causing such commotion that guests were starting to gather in the lobby to see what all the fuss was about.”

“Who could blame them?” Jane asked wryly. “There's nothing like a bunch of armed policemen and an irate guest to get the blood flowing on a Monday morning. But I'll give Mrs. Earle credit for one thing: she must have retained the best defense attorney in the state to have managed the immediate release of Victoria, Carson,
and
Hannah.”

As it turned out, the Earles' attorneys had argued that the Allegany Police Department didn't have sufficient
evidence to hold his clients any longer. Especially since none of them had confessed to any wrongdoing.

Jane was floored to hear this. “Are you trying to tell me that both Hannah and Victoria denied knowing that the druid was Andrew Green, MD? The man who prescribed an unsafe medication to their mother?” she asked Officer McCullough in disbelief.

The two of them were standing at a distance from Jane's guests, who had been told to sit in the first row of seats and were being watched by a trio of stern-faced policemen.

“We went at them pretty hard, but there was a limit to how much we could push Ms. Billingsley,” McCullough explained. “And the newlyweds wouldn't say a word. Not one. We can't take any chances, so right now, we have no confessions, no witnesses, and circumstantial evidence at best. With the Earles lawyering up, we were forced to back off. We need to go over every inch of Ms. Billingsley's room and the bridal suite and pray that we find traces of arsenic.”

Picturing the thoroughness of the housekeeping staff, Jane suppressed a grimace. As reluctant as she was to do so, she had to find another way to prove that Hannah was responsible for Andrew Green's death, and quickly. Constance's lecture on poisons was scheduled to begin at one o'clock sharp. After that, the retreat would officially be over.

Jane spun around and spotted Tom loitering uncomfortably by the doorway.

“What are you thinking?” Sinclair asked, having silently appeared at her elbow.

“He's been through so much, but I believe that he can draw Hannah out. They made a connection the night of the wedding,” Jane said. “I saw it.”

Sinclair glanced from Tom to Hannah. “You must choose between seeing that justice is served and causing Mr. Green additional grief.”

“Yes,” Jane said morosely. “There really isn't a choice, is there?”

She walked to the doorway, took Tom by the hand, and led him over to where Hannah was sitting next to Victoria. Carson was seated with his parents and the family attorney. He had his back turned to his bride as though he couldn't stand the sight of her, but Victoria clearly didn't care. She and Hannah had their heads bent and their foreheads pressed together and looked, for just a moment, far younger than their age. On another day and in another setting, Jane could imagine them whispering about a secret dream or the cute boy who rode the same school bus.

The sisters were so absorbed with each other that they didn't realize that Jane and Tom were standing in front of them until Tom reached into his pocket, pulled out an object wrapped in tissue paper, and began to unwrap it.

Hannah glanced up just as Tom bent down to lay a single purple hyacinth in the palm of her hand, which she had resting in her lap.

Her eyes filled with tears. “For sorrow,” she said in a voice that was barely above a whisper.

“And forgiveness,” Tom repeated in the same soft tone.

“I knew you were a good man,” Victoria said. She gave Tom such a sweet, sorrow-tinged smile that Jane felt a sharp twinge of anxiety. Clutching her sister's free hand, Victoria continued to look at Tom. “Hannah doesn't need your forgiveness though. I'm responsible for your father's death.”

Hannah's body contracted in fear. “Via,
no!
”

Victoria nodded as tears slipped down her cheeks. “It's okay, Banana Cake. I knew this is how things would end up. I planned it this way. I'm just sorry that I had to involve you at all. I never meant for you to feel pain or to be scared, but I knew even if you experienced those things, it would only be for a little while.”

The sisters were so focused on each other that they didn't
see Jane signal for Officer McCullough to come around behind their seats in order to listen to the rest of the conversation. They also didn't notice how Butterworth and Sterling were successfully distracting the Earles and their attorney by serving them coffee and an array of fresh, warm pastries. These items were wheeled into the theater on two carts and both the butler and head chauffeur made a great show of fawning over the infuriated guests.

“I knew it had to be you, of course,” Hannah said. She was crying now too. “But why, Via? Why did you throw your life away to kill this man?”

Victoria ran her fingers as tenderly as a mother's over her sister's misshapen back. “Because he did this to you. Because he gave you every scar. It was his fault you needed all of those surgeries and the braces and the pills. He was responsible for you missing out on kickball games, gymnastics, tree climbing, boyfriends . . .” Victoria released a long, weary sigh. To Jane's ears, it was the sound of someone who was ready to lie down and rest. The sound of a person who was tired of keeping secrets. It was also the sound of a woman preparing to say good-bye to the person she loved most.

“How?” Hannah asked.

“He gave Mom a drug he shouldn't have been prescribing. He was a bad man, Banana. He was receiving kickbacks from Earle Pharmaceuticals, and he didn't want to stop receiving them.” She took both of her sister's hands in hers, nearly crushing the hyacinth. “That drug killed Mom. It's why she got cancer.”

Hannah sagged. Her entire body folded inward, and Victoria pulled Hannah toward her and gingerly held her. “I know,” she whispered, smoothing her sister's hair. “It hurts. That's how I felt when I found out. And the hurt grew and grew.”

“But now I'll lose you too!” Hannah cried, and Jane could see her gripping Victoria's arms so tightly that her hands were trembling.

“Never,” Victoria said calmly. “You'll visit me. We'll write. And Tom will check on you. He'll make sure you're okay.” She glanced up at Tom, her eyes pleading. “Won't you?”

Tom clasped his hands together and stood very tall. “I will. I promise.”

Victoria smiled in relief. “There, you see. And I don't want you to worry about me. I'm tired, Hannah. I've been living with this rage for a long time. It's eaten away at me. It's left me incapable of caring about anyone or anything except for you. I couldn't stop myself once I learned the truth. It's all I thought about. It has totally consumed me.”

“No.” Hannah shook her head in denial.

“You have your work. You still have me. You have your old friends, and now, you have some new ones.” This time, when Victoria looked up, she smiled at Jane. “Things will be a little different, but you're the strongest person I know. You'll survive this.”

Hannah wrapped her arms around her sister and hugged her tightly. “You should have told me, Via. This wasn't the way to fix things.”

“I had to,” Victoria insisted. “I had to.”

A miserable silence descended over the embracing women. The Earles, having finished making their selections from the pastry cart, returned to their seats.

The family attorney remained standing, holding a plate laden with half a dozen pastries. He must have sensed that something significant had occurred and he'd missed it, for he narrowed his eyes at Officer McCullough. “Are you questioning my client?” he demanded sharply.

“He hasn't said a word,” Jane answered on behalf of the policeman. “Though I was just about to ask Victoria—forgive me if I don't call you Mrs. Earle, but it's my guess that you'd prefer not to be addressed as such—how she was able to transfer the arsenic to the cake.”

“She's not going to speak to you,” the attorney said. “She knows what best for her and that's to keep her mouth shut.”

Victoria glared at him. “Why don't you sit down and stuff your own mouth with more of those pastries?” She turned to look at McCullough. “That man no longer represents me. Hannah will help me find a decent attorney later, but I'd like to answer Ms. Steward's question.” Fixing her gaze on Jane again, Victoria said, “I'm sorry to have caused you distress. You've been nothing but kind to the two of us. I'll tell you anything you want to know.”

“How did you poison the cake?” Jane asked.

“One of Hannah's history books showed me the way,” Victoria said. “Mr. Sinclair. Are you familiar with the term
meli chloron?
”

“Roughly translated, it means ‘golden honey,'” Sinclair replied. “Are you referring to the Greek General Xenophon's account of how his men were driven mad by poisoned honey?”

Victoria seemed pleased by Sinclair's knowledge. “Yes. Honey made from a species of rhododendron flower that causes hallucinations, seizures, and even death. This species is prevalent in Turkey, near the Black Sea, and I was able to procure a jar. I stole the arsenic from a lab at Earle Pharmaceuticals, of course. I made Carson take me there after hours and then drugged him with one of his own products so I could help myself to the arsenic. I used his ID badge and master key, and even though I ran into several maintenance workers, everyone knew me by then and I just pretended to be surprising Carson with a late dinner. I carried a take-out bag and wore a sexy dress to look the part.”

“Have you no shame?” Mrs. Earle interjected contemptuously.

“What about you?” Victoria shot back. “If you and your board members had done the right thing years ago, none of this would have happened. You let people
die!
All in the
name of your bottom line! How do you face yourself in the mirror each day?” She pointed at each Earle in turn. “How do any of you sleep at night?”

Victoria shook her head in disgust and then resumed her narrative concerning the honey. However, Mrs. Earle couldn't contain her wrath. Glowering at Victoria, she shouted, “I knew you were nothing but a—”

“This is
not
the time nor the place,” Jane interjected. “If you cannot refrain from interrupting, Mr. Butterworth will escort you backstage.”

Butterworth took a step toward Mrs. Earle, who squeaked in surprise and shock. She elbowed her husband, but he didn't seem inclined to take on the powerful-looking butler.

“The honey?” Jane prompted Victoria.

“I had it in a travel-sized shampoo bottle,” she said. “Inside my little bridal purse. Hannah carried it for me. I poured the honey on the slice of cake Hannah had set aside for the man everyone called the druid. It only took a few seconds. I put the empty bottle back in my bag. Later that night, I washed it out with really hot water and tossed the bottle in the trash.”

Tom, who'd stood very still while Victoria was speaking, now wiped a hand across his forehead. “It must have tasted very sweet. With all that honey.”

“I'm sorry,” Victoria said, and for the first time, Jane believed that she was finally regretting her actions. “I didn't mean to hurt you. You're a good person, I can tell. And I apologize to you too, Ms. Steward, for causing you grief.” She turned to McCullough. “I'm ready now. I'd rather not string this part out. It's hard enough as it is.”