One Dead Under the Cuckoo's Nest (32 page)

“Did it involve bread?” I chuckled.

“No, actually it involved the younger nun.”

Younger nun? I'd guess since Sister Liz, Sister Janet and Sister Barbie went to the convent with Mary, they were younger than Sister Dolores, but that didn't help. “The tall one?” I asked with no one special in mind. I hoped it would jar Mason's memory to give a better description.

“The one who wears a different outfit.”

A novice. Novitiate Lalli. I gave him a brief description of her and he nodded.

What the heck went on between her and Joanna? I figured it was a mental-health issue, since Lord knows, Joanna appeared to have a slew of them.

“Joanna kept talking to her doll, saying things about Spike.”

My ears perked up like Mr. Spock's.

“Mason, you have to tell me everything. Everything, even if you don't think it's pertinent.” I leaned over the table as if to pull more information out of him. A few cards flew onto the floor. “Geez. Sorry.”

“It's only a game.”

We bent to pick them up at the same time. Our hands touched, his on top—and I didn't pull back. Actually I didn't want to pull back. Mason was a good-looking guy and nice to boot. He held my hand a few minutes, then leaned near, placing a kiss on my lips.

Wow!

Before this case, I'd recently been forced into celibacy by my ex-boyfriend's arrest, and now two kisses in one week. From two different men!

Could life get any better?

We pulled apart, and Mason picked up the cards. When we sat up, we just looked at each other.

And behind Mason, was my shadow, Dr. Dick.

He walked past us, down the hallway to Ward 200B. Maybe I should follow him and explain. But explain what? There was nothing between Jagger and I other than a physical attraction—on my part.

I knew not to go sniffing around where I didn't belong.

Mason, on the other hand, was right for me despite the fact that he lived over a thousand miles away. I ignored what just happened and said, “What else do you remember?” I croaked out, and then cleared my throat.

He smiled. “Joanna must have heard Sister Lalli talking to Spike at one point.”

“Novitiate Lalli.”

He lifted the cards and restacked them into a pile. “Oh, sorry. I'm not Catholic.”

Oh, boy. He was now off Stella Sokol's Characteristics of Pauline Sokol's Future Husband list.

“That's all right. What did she hear?”

Mason continued on, with lots of information that Jagger and I already knew. It had been established that Spike was the “brawn” in the fraud scam, but we had yet to identify the “brains.”

Maybe it had been Vito? I looked at Mason. “Did she mention Vito at all?”

He thought for a minute. “Vito. Vito. I'm not sure. Joanna was not too coherent at times. Mostly she'd talk to her doll. Then Novitiate Lalli would tell her to be quiet. Almost as if she was trying to silence Joanna. Soon after that, Nurse Lindeman came and medicated Joanna. She fell asleep very quickly.”

Roadblock. Another dead end. Courtesy of the Green Demon.

I wasn't going to give up though. We'd gotten Spike out of there, and maybe the police, much more skilled in interrogation than I was, could get something out of Spike. Then Jagger would tell me.

In the meantime, I had to do something. I had to tail Novitiate Lalli.

Because I was damn sure she knew
something.

After we had left the dayroom to do some spying, I nodded to Mason to sit in the dayroom near the door to the tunnel. Certain that I could trust him, I had explained the next step of keeping the novice nun within earshot.

Meanwhile I dropped down on the couch near a sleeping Joanna. A stuffed Mickey Mouse sat on her chest, almost falling to the floor, but no way was I going to fix Mickey. He'd have to take the fall before I got that close to Joanna.

One thing I'd learned in nursing school was not to let a patient in pain grab onto your hand (give them the metal side rail to squeeze) and never wake a sleeping psychiatric patient unless absolutely necessary.

I looked around the room. Most patients were either talking to themselves, arguing with each other or watching the television. Jackie Dee was nibbling on something, this time a cracker. So I stayed next to Joanna and waited.

Every once in awhile I'd look over at Mason and wink. Callie Jo came over to him and stood there, talking up a storm. I had no idea who she was at the moment, but her distraction seemed to work. No one paid attention to Mason or me. Sister Lalli came out of the nurses' station with Nurse Lindeman and the medication tray.

Mason stood and pretended to be watching television. I guessed he was listening to whatever went on while still talking to Callie Jo. Most patients ran toward the nurse as if she were passing out gold. I guessed to some of them, the Green Demon was gold. Sadly, many of them needed it.

One of the red-pajama men got his pills, swallowed them down, opened for Novitiate Lalli, and then walked over toward me. He smiled as he sat next to me. It did look as if he'd had a handful, so I figured soon he'd be fast asleep. How sad. Life, nearly the end of his life, was passing him by.

Once the pills were gone and everyone was getting happier as the medication melted into their systems, the nurse and nun left and Joanna started to stir. Oh, boy. I had to be on my toes now or I'd be wearing Mickey on my head.

I smiled at her. “Did you have a good nap?” It must not have been her time for medication, since no one had waked her up.

She held Mickey tighter to her chest. “What nap?”

I'd better change the subject
, I thought. But what the heck was a safe subject to talk about with her?

She started telling Mickey to watch out for me. Me! I was the one. The one who
knew.

Now
I
was freaking out. Joanna was scary, to say the least, and now she was downright creepy.

How much did she really know?

“What are you talking about, Joanna?” I asked as softly and nonthreatening as I knew how.

She hugged Mickey tighter.

“I'm not going to touch your doll.”

She clucked her tongue at me and cackled. Yes, cackled. It sure wasn't a real laugh. “Mickey Mouse, you fool, is not a doll.”

Nor is he real, you fruitcake.
“Oh, sorry. Anyway. What were you telling Mickey about me?”

She leaned near. “I know. I heard you talking to him.”

“To Mickey?”

Another cackle. “You're dumber than you look. No, you fool, to the doctor.”

Jagger? She'd heard me talking to Jagger? “The doctor. What did I say that was so wrong?”

Joanna's eyes darkened. She was actually a very attractive woman if her eyes didn't show her mental illness so readily. A little makeup and combing of her brunette locks would do wonders for her. One thing about this place, very few patients cared about personal grooming.

She'd better not start with that “you know” business when I asked her a question, I thought. I was losing my patience with Joanna although I knew the woman was sick. So I bit my tongue and waited.

“Ha! You said you'd sleep with him. He told me so!”

Jagger said that?

Now I was getting more confused than Joanna. “I never said I'd sleep with anyone.”

She looked at Mickey and ignored me.

Fine. Let her talk to a stuffed mouse.

“He told me so. You remember hearing it. Don't you?”

I looked at the mouse, waiting for a response. Then I came to my senses and got up. “This is crazy,” I mumbled. “Good night, Joanna. Mickey.” I nodded to the damn mouse.

Joanna cackled again and then said, “He really did tell me. Then when he went to her room, she killed him. He was lying right on top of her when we all came to the door.”

I shut my eyes.

Great. She was talking about the late Terry and his
accidental
death.

But, damn! Had Terry really told her I'd sleep with him?

After ordering myself to ignore the fact that Joanna had started some rumor about Terry and me, I motioned for Mason to come next to me.

The man in the red pajamas woke up, glared at Joanna and Mickey and said, “Shut the hell up, you two. Can't Santa get some sleep around here?”

Mason and I chuckled. I wanted to ask him if he'd heard the lies that Joanna had told, but decided it wouldn't benefit the case. Terry was gone and no matter his part in the fraud, we couldn't prosecute him or stop the scam from continuing with her information.

I actually believed Terry was not involved and was merely a sick man.

“Did you get anything out of her?” Mason asked.

I sighed and shook my head. “Poor woman is worse off than I thought. She almost had me talking to Mickey Mouse.”

Mason laughed and put his arm around me. We walked down to the other dayroom to talk privately, and I surprised myself with the fact that I didn't shrug off his arm. I heard shuffling behind us, and turned to see Santa following us. Guess he was fed up with Joanna.

The two other red-pajama men were there fast asleep. I watched “Santa” take a seat next to them and smiled. What a threesome. I only hoped that they'd all be out of here by next Christmas.

We sat in the love seat by the window. It was so dark out tonight that I could barely make out the Cupid fountain in the distance.

Mason looked around. “Lalli—Novitiate Lalli—and Spike used to date.”

I felt my jaw drop. “What?”

“I heard her talking to Nurse Lindeman. You know when they pass out the medication, they chat. It's as if they are robots doing the job. I guess they give out so much medicine around here that they barely pay attention.”

“What?” I repeated, still floored.

“You heard me right, Pauline. She told Nurse Lindeman that she was glad Spike got hauled off.”

“And you knew she was talking about the cops taking him.”

He nodded. “Yes. So, I moved closer when I heard Spike's name. The bastard.”

Now I nodded. “Go on.”

“Okay. The nun said she used to date him. Said when she was in nursing school, he was her first patient that she had to give an injection to.”

I smiled, remembering my first time.

Mason grabbed my hand and held it. “Pauline, Spike had just gotten out of jail. He had an infection, and she had to give him an antibiotic shot. Then, she started to get to know him better each day, she said. Nurse Lindeman didn't seem too interested, but she was polite and let Novitiate Lalli talk.”

“Her conscience must be eating away at her. Guess she thought Nurse Lindeman was a good sounding board. She seems very passive and nice.”

“I guess. But, imagine, Novitiate Lalli and Spike were . . . lovers.”

“And a scorned lover makes a wonderful snitch,” I said.

“So, Novitiate Lalli and good ol' Spike were lovers,” I whispered to Jagger as if anyone could hear us in the exam room. The staff must have thought I was getting intensive therapy, since Jagger and I met so often. He'd come to get me before lights out, which worked out perfectly. For once I didn't have to call him to give him the information that I'd found.

Mason had politely excused himself, and Jagger's glare followed Mason all the way down the hallway.

How cute.

“Good job, Sherlock.”

I smiled. “Thanks. Now we need to find out more from her. From Lalli. Don't you think?”

“Do you?”

“Why, yes—” I curled my lips at him. “Don't give me that psychobabble, Jag. I catch onto medical stuff too easily.”

We both laughed. It was nice, for a change. All in all, today wasn't such a bad day. Especially since I got to get out of the Institute, even if only temporarily.

I thought of the spa and felt my face burn.

Jagger took out a toothpick, unwrapped it and held it near his lips.

I couldn't take my eyes off the little stick of wood.

Before he touched it to his mouth, he said, “Look, Sherlock, forget about this morning or we're not going to get past it enough to work together.” He popped the end of the toothpick into his mouth and stared.

If my face had been burning, it had just exploded from the heat. But he was right. I had to forget that he'd seen my butt and I his. That was going to be hard to do, but I would force myself. So again with humor, I said, “Oh.” I laughed. “Sure, it's already forgotten. A butt's a butt.”

He grinned. “I was talking about you missing your parents, because if you get too emotional, you could mess up. It could get dangerous.”

I wondered if my face was redder than “Santa's” pj's. “Yeah. I knew that, but a butt is still a butt,” I mumbled, and had to cover my mouth with my hand to shut myself up.

Maybe I really couldn't work with a guy like Jagger.

I let out a breath, removed my hand and said, “So, I'll see if I can get anything else from Lalli. I'm not even going to call her Novitiate Lalli. She doesn't deserve it, and maybe she isn't even going to be a nun. And with the info from Mason and Margaret, I'm guessing Spike was driving the white van that followed me from Dr. De Jong's.”

He nodded. “Lieutenant Shatley said there were no fingerprints on the broom handle that was used to kill Vito. They have no leads.”

“Not even Terry? He did seem like a real sick man. I mean, didn't Terry kill him?”

“Or Spike.”

I disliked the guy, but murder? “Do you think he did?”

“Sherlock, I don't think in this business. It's all common sense. We find evidence and tie two and two together, then deliver it to the cops.” With that he stood, leaned over and kissed me on the forehead. “Get some sleep.”

I stood and walked to the door. “Okay. You too.” When I walked toward my room, I touched my forehead. Couldn't I have come up with something better, maybe more romantic? Then again, he had kissed my
forehead
, like one of my brothers.