The Bee Balm Murders (16 page)

He’d killed her. He knew he had.

With that, he fell asleep, and when his face relaxed, it assumed its normal pleasant expression.

C
HAPTER
21

Sean, the beekeeper, showed up at Victoria’s kitchen door early Friday morning as she was taking a blueberry pie out of the oven.

“Come in,” she called.

“Brought you some honey.”

“Thank you.” Victoria set the pie on a rack to cool. Purple juice oozed through Xs in the golden brown top crust. “Do you have time for coffee?”

“I’ll make time.” He sat down at the table.

Victoria noticed his expression. “What’s the matter?”

“One of the hives looks like it swarmed. I can’t find the swarm.”

“Where would they go?”

“Not far, usually.” Sean scratched his head. “Scouts go out to find a site for a new hive and the swarm waits till the scouts return.”

“That’s quite civilized,” said Victoria.

“Pheromones,” said Sean.

She eased a wedge of pie onto his plate.

“They wouldn’t settle into a new hive before the scouts come back, Mrs. T. They’d do what you saw the other day, attach themselves to a branch temporarily.”

Sean finished his pie and put his plate in the sink. “I’m going out to look again.”

“I’ll help,” said Victoria.

While they were in the west pasture searching the thick cedar trees for the swarm, Orion drove up.

“Good morning,” Victoria said. “I’ve missed you.”

“Bad news, Victoria. Tris Waverley is dead.”

Victoria backed up to her bench and sat. “What happened?”

“One of Trip Barnes’s crew found his body near where the drilling unit was stored. He was strangled.” Orion ran his hand over the top of his head. “Smalley showed up at my office yesterday evening. Tris and I had talked over a couple of beers a few days ago.”

“I didn’t realize you’d met him.”

“Met him Monday. Dorothy hired him to tap my phone.”

“Let’s go into the house,” Victoria said.

As they walked around the flower border, Orion told her how Dorothy had outmaneuvered him.

They crossed the rutted drive.

“She deliberately wrote that contract in an ambiguous way.” Orion grimaced. “Go ahead and say it.”

Victoria shook her head.

“I was ready to kill her. The next thing I knew, I was on the road home.”

“I don’t know what to say,” said Victoria.

“After I got back to my office, the police arrived.”

“
Had
you killed her?”

“I don’t know.”

Victoria stood up. “I’ll call her house and find out.”

A few minutes later, she returned. “Dorothy’s in bed, having her morning coffee.” She sat down. “This means you’ll still have her to deal with.”

“I suppose I’m relieved,” said Orion.

*   *   *

The next morning, Victoria was up early. Elizabeth was sleeping in, so Victoria and Orion breakfasted together.

“What sort of hindrance is she?” Victoria asked.

“The company has been paying for the drill, something we didn’t anticipate. Eight thousand dollars a month.”

Victoria made a whistling sound.

“Aside from that,” Orion said, “her partnership is a nuisance. She views it as an opportunity to spend money, when we’re doing everything we can to work within budget.”

“I wish I could think of some way to help.”

Orion bit into a piece of toast and grinned.

“You have something in mind.”

“A thought just came to me.” He said nothing else, and Victoria didn’t ask.

When they finished eating, Orion gathered up the dishes and took them into the kitchen. “I’ve got to clean up the mess I made.” He told her what he’d done. “Stupid.”

“I’d say you controlled yourself pretty well, smashing pictures and lamps instead of Dorothy.”

“I’ll be home early,” said Orion, and Victoria smiled at his mention of home.

She watched her tenant from the cookroom window as he walked slowly to his car. It was difficult to imagine her life without this decent man in it. She ached to think of him cheated by that woman.

Orion reached his car and patted its side. He tugged open the door. Immediately, he threw his arms across his face and fell backward. A cloud of bees hovered around him. Victoria got up from her seat in a hurry, burst out through the kitchen door, flew down the stone steps, and rushed out to him without even thinking of her stick.

Orion was writhing on the ground.

The antidote. She had to get that, and quick. Orion gasped for breath. His face was white. The antidote was in the glove compartment. A syringe holding epinephrine. She wrenched open the passenger side door, snapped open the glove compartment, seized the EpiPen.

How to use it? She rushed around the back of the car to where he lay on the ground, twisting off the cap as she went. She must be careful not to trip and fall. Orion was not breathing. She took a deep breath, as though she willed him to breathe with her, lifted her arm, and jabbed the device into his thigh with all her strength, through his heavy jeans and muscles.

“Please, please work.” She prayed.

Almost immediately, Orion gasped. He opened his eyes.

“I’ll call nine-one-one.” Victoria reached into his pocket for his cell phone, something she’d never used before, and punched likely buttons.

The Tri-Town Ambulance was there in less than five minutes, Erica in the passenger seat, Jim driving.

“Nice going, Mrs. Trumbull,” said Erica. “Anaphylactic shock comes on fast.”

They strapped Orion onto a stretcher and loaded him into the ambulance. Jim helped Victoria into the back and slammed the door. She sat next to Orion, whose color was returning. The ambulance took off, lights flashing.

When Victoria could move close enough to talk to the EMTs she said, “I’m sure he was stung by at least a dozen bees.” She braced herself as the ambulance passed around the car ahead of them. “I saw a cloud of insects around him. He put his hands up to protect his face.”

“You knew he was allergic?”

“He tells everyone he works with how to use his EpiPen in case he gets stung. He’s out of doors a great deal.”

“He’ll be okay.”

Victoria sat back on the bench and watched Orion, who looked almost normal. His eyes were open and he smiled.

Erica leaned over the seat. “We’ll give you a ride home, Mrs. T., once we’re sure he’s okay.”

“Thank you,” said Victoria. “I can’t imagine how those bees got into his car.”

*   *   *

Victoria used the emergency room phone to call Sean while she waited for Doc Yablonsky to treat Orion.

“I’ll go over to your place right away and clear the bees out of his car,” Sean said.

“Do you suppose that’s where the swarm set up their new hive?”

“Unlikely,” said Sean. “His car wasn’t there when the swarm went missing.”

“Oh,” said Victoria. “You’re right.”

*   *   *

The doctor came out into the waiting room while Orion was putting his shirt back on.

“Saw your poem in the latest issue of
The Lyric
, Mrs. Trumbull,” he said. “Nice sestina.” Before Victoria could comment, he continued, “Powerful. Moving,” and he handed her his card, which had a silhouette of a dancer with his arms outstretched. The card read, “G. William Yablonsky, MD,” and under that, “Poetry, Theater, Medicine.” Victoria tucked his card into her cloth bag, while the doctor continued his dissertation on the shortcomings of modern poetry, which, they agreed, neither he nor Victoria understood.

Orion came out of the examining room, buttoning his shirt. He stood waiting for a break in the mostly one-way conversation. Doc Yablonsky was leaning against the high counter, an elbow resting on it, hands clasped, one ankle crossed over the other.

“I’ve tried sestinas myself. Never could get that complicated rhyme scheme to work for me.”

“Doc?” asked Orion.

“Those sapphics of yours are remarkable. ‘Sapphics on Greek Isles.’ Clever title.”

Orion coughed.

Victoria said, “I believe…” She stood. “I look forward to reading your work, Dr. Yabov … Yabnov…”

“Call me Bill.” He grinned and turned to Orion. “Oh, sure. You’re fit as a fiddle. I’ll give you a prescription for a new EpiPen. Make sure it’s handy for the next time.”

“Right,” said Orion. “How many stingers were there?”

“I didn’t remove any. Didn’t find any.”

“No stingers at all?” asked Orion. “That’s odd.”

“There were a dozen swellings on your head, neck, and hands, but no stingers. A heavy dose of venom, even for someone who’s not allergic. Wonder it didn’t kill you.” Doc Yablonsky, at least four inches taller than Orion and thirty pounds heavier, slapped Orion heartily on the back, almost felling him. “Guess your number hasn’t come up yet.” The doc then turned to Victoria, and, still talking poetry, walked her and Orion to the waiting ambulance where Jim and Erica were engrossed in a game of cribbage. Jim stowed the cribbage board and cards behind the front seat, climbed down from his perch, went around the vehicle, and opened the back.

“Would you mind waiting a minute?” asked Doc Yablonsky. Erica had shifted from the passenger side into the driver’s seat and was about to start the engine. The doc reached into the large front pocket of his white lab coat and brought out a weather-beaten book, its jacket torn and blotched with what looked like raspberry jam or blood, the pages dog-eared, frayed, and soiled along the edges. He turned to Victoria, who was waiting for Jim to help her into the back of the ambulance, and held the battered book and a pen out to her. “Would you mind very much signing this for me, Mrs. Trumbull?”

Victoria eyed the well-read volume of her poetry with delight. “I’d be honored,” she said.

C
HAPTER
22

On Monday, Orion drove to work as usual. Sean’s truck pulled into the west pasture and Victoria stopped what she was doing to watch him work.

“Mornin’, Mrs. Trumbull.”

“Good morning to you.”

Sean unfolded his white suit. “How’s the patient?”

“He left this morning as though nothing had happened.”

“Lucky you were there.”

Victoria watched Sean spread out his suit. “How did the swarm get into Orion’s car?”

Sean tugged the suit around his shoulders. “You mean, since his car wasn’t there when the bees swarmed, right?”

“Exactly.”

“Fact of the matter is, they weren’t my bees.”

Victoria shifted slightly on the hard wooden bench. “How can you tell?”

“You really want to know?”

“Yes, of course.”

He zipped up the suit. “They were yellow jackets, not honeybees.”

“Good heavens.” Victoria stared at him. “How did they get into his car?”

“Left his car unlocked that night.”

“Everyone does,” said Victoria.

“Couple of overripe apples on the seat.”

“Yellow jackets couldn’t materialize overnight.”

Sean smoothed out his hood and looked at Victoria with his far-seeing eyes. “Not on their own.”

Victoria realized she’d have to wait for him to explain at his own pace.

“Someone dropped a yellow jacket nest into his car along with the apples.”

“How could anyone get hold of a nest? I thought yellow jackets lived underground.”

“They build nests under eaves. Gray papery masses.”

“That takes someone with nerve to detach.”

Sean shrugged. “Gloves and a long-sleeved shirt, put a big paper bag over the nest, scrape the nest off with a spatula, and close the bag, quick.”

She thought about the killer wasps and shuddered.

Sean placed the hood over his head. Victoria could barely hear him. She thought he said, “Someone allergic to insect stings, good way to kill him.”

*   *   *

After Sean left, Victoria went back to her typewriter. She’d finished her column when a dark green Bentley pulled up. A uniformed chauffeur emerged from the driver’s seat and came to her door.

She greeted him. “Primo, why the uniform?”

Primo lifted his cap in a deferential flourish. “I’ll be driving you, Mrs. Trumbull.”

“What happened to your Ferrari?” she asked.

“We thought it might be too conspicuous.”

“And you don’t think a Bentley is conspicuous?”

Primo looked down. His breeches, tucked into polished boots, matched the car. “We thought you might be more comfortable in a sedan.”

“Good heavens!” Victoria said. “Where’s your brother?”

“He’s vetting personal assistants for you.”

“What am I going to do…” Victoria realized she was out of her element. “Well, come in. We need to talk.”

Primo’s boots made new-shoe squeaks as he climbed the steps. He followed Victoria into the cookroom and she sat down heavily. How was she going to solve this problem of too many helpers with too much money trying too hard?

“All right,” said Victoria. “I need information.”

Primo sat down. “Of course, Mrs. Trumbull.”

“Tell me about your father. What was he like? Did he have brothers and sisters?”

Primo set his hat in his lap. “My father was the eldest of eight children. He had one brother and six sisters. His brother was the youngest.”

“Are they still living?”

“Only my father has passed away, bless him.” Primo crossed himself.

Victoria felt a surge of sympathy. “I’m so sorry.”

“Thank you.”

She waited a respectful moment before asking, “What do your aunts and uncles do for a living?”

“My oldest aunt is a nun, the other siblings are married with families.”

“And your uncle?”

“Uncle Basilio and his wife have no children. He owns a television studio near Secaucus.” Primo folded his hands on the checked tablecloth. “He calls himself Bruce. My father was displeased with that, his brother denying his Italian name.”

“Our names are important to us.”

Primo stood. “If you’d like, I’ll make tea.”

Victoria nodded. She counted up the number of days she must continue taking the doxycycline. Three more. It had seemed an interminable amount of time. Three days from now she’d be in a better frame of mind to withstand the blandishments of these young men. In the meantime … Well, she’d never ridden in a Bentley.