The Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the Crown (33 page)

In fact, the slim volume that was sitting in the very center of her little desk had one page that was more thoroughly read than any other, and that was page 18. There was a passage on that otherwise unremarkable page that she knew by heart: “A nurse must always leave her prejudices at the door when she walks into a patient's room.”

The book modestly called itself
The Fundamentals of Ethics
, by Julia Dalrymple, R.N., Ph.D., Professor of Nursing at the Yale University of the U.S.A. Ladarat regretted extremely the dullness of the title. It didn't really do justice to the wisdom of this little volume, which she'd discovered in a used bookstore in the city of Chicago in the United States when she was there for a year of ethics education. Not a day went by that she didn't seek Professor Dalrymple's wisdom to answer a question, to solve a problem, or sometimes just to be reminded of a nurse's obligations.

So she would follow the good professor's advice. She would leave her prejudices at the door.

“And the man's name?” she asked.

The detective hesitated. “It was… Zhang Wei.”

“Oh no.”

“Exactly. Oh no.”

As she jotted this name down on her increasingly crowded—but increasingly interesting—yellow pad, Ladarat reflected that Zhang Wei was a very common Chinese name. A little like John Smith in the United States. And when a name was common in China, there weren't just thousands of them—there were millions.

“And the previous man's name?”

“We don't know. The corporal can't even remember which hospital it was—apparently he's worked at many. So it's unlikely we'll ever be able to find out.”

That sparked another thought that it seemed like a detective might ask.

“And this other death, when was it?”

“Ah. Well, the corporal thinks it was in July.”

That was only three months ago. Two months to find another man, get married, and have him die.

“You are sure that the woman was truly married to the man who died last night?”

Wiriya smiled. “So now you're definitely thinking like a detective. No, we don't know for sure. She claimed to be, at least.”

She dutifully wrote: “Married???”

“So you think this might be… murder?”

Her first thought was for that unfortunate man, of course. But her next thought, almost immediately, was for the good name of her hospital. What would it look like if they had just let a murderer walk in and walk out? That would be very, very bad.

Especially with the Royal Hospital Inspection Committee arriving next Monday. What would the inspectors think of a hospital that aids and abets a murderer?

And think how they would look to the public. Ehhhh, this was very, very bad. Something must be done.

“Serial murder, yes,” Wiriya said. “If there are two cases we know about, there may be others.”

They both thought for a moment about what that might mean. A woman out there, somewhere, who was murdering her husbands. But why? Why would she do such a thing?

Then she saw. “Insurance money? She's pretending to be married and then killing them for their insurance money?”

Wiriya nodded. “At least that's a possibility. It's all I can think of,” he admitted.

“But then why bring them to the emergency room?”

Neither of them could answer that question, but one piece of the corporal's story struck her. “The death certificates,” she said. “It's the death certificates. She's taking them to the emergency room so she can get a death certificate.”

He nodded. “She'd need one to collect the life insurance, of course.” He was smiling, now. “You're quite good at this.”

For a moment she suspected that the detective had reached this conclusion ahead of her. He was, after all, a detective. Perhaps this was a test? Or maybe he was giving her a chance to figure it out for herself? In any case, she was proud of herself for reaching the correct conclusion on her own.

Ladarat Patalung, ethical nurse detective. She liked the way that sounded.

“But… why do you come to me? What can I do to help?”

The detective didn't answer immediately. When he did, she thought for a moment that he hadn't heard her question.

“In your work here, you must have to review… cases?”

Ladarat agreed that she did. There would be questions about a patient's care and she would investigate. Although she wouldn't use that word exactly. She would look and listen and ask questions. She would try to determine whether her colleagues behaved in the proper way. And if they didn't, she would look for opportunities to help the doctors and nurses involved see what they could have done differently. So yes, she was used to looking and searching.

Wiriya thought about her answer for a moment.

“You see,” he said finally, “I don't know if there have been other cases at this hospital. And I can't find out without a search warrant. And… well… there isn't nearly enough evidence for one. The chief would just laugh at me.” He paused, thinking.

“And so you see, I thought that because of your position, you would have a justification to look through medical records… quietly.”

“But what would I be looking for so… quietly?”

“Well, if this woman were a murderer, then we'd need to think about poison. That would be the logical method.”

Ladarat nodded, then stopped to think about that. “It would?”

The detective nodded. “Poison is often a woman's method. It is a known fact.”

Ladarat wasn't so sure about that. That was a rather sexist thing to say, wasn't it? But presumably Khun Wiriya knew what he was talking about. Still, shouldn't she question everything? That's what a real detective would do. So she wrote very carefully: “Woman = Poison?” And underlined the question mark.

“So,” Wiriya continued, “we need to look for evidence of poison. Blood tests, and… so forth.”

Ladarat was intensely curious about what the “and so forth” consisted of. Yet she began to see what the detective had in mind. “So you want me to see if there were any lab tests that were ordered.”

Wiriya nodded, relieved.

Then Ladarat had another thought. “But if this was only last night, it might still be possible to run new tests on a blood sample.” She'd heard of the coroner's office doing such things for suspicious deaths.

“Well, it's not so simple, unfortunately. The body has been taken for cremation already.”

“Already? But he only died last night. And wouldn't she need a marriage certificate to be able to obtain the body?”

Ladarat knew that the marriage certificate would be essential in order for this woman to claim the body and receive a death certificate. She'd been involved in a terrible situation last year when a woman wanted to bring her husband's body back to Vietnam to be buried at their home near My Tho. But the poor woman didn't have a marriage certificate, so she couldn't prove that they were married. Eventually the hospital monks had to intervene.

Now Wiriya looked grim. He smacked his solid hand down on the desk in front of him and looked at her with a new respect.

“I knew I was missing something. I knew something was wrong. She had the marriage certificate with her last night.” He paused. “You see?”

She didn't. But then she did. Very clearly.

If your husband died suddenly, would you have the presence of mind to find your marriage certificate and take it with you? You would not. You would panic. You would call your family. You would do any one of a number of logical and illogical things. But you would not think to take your marriage certificate to the hospital with your newly deceased husband.

“So that means that the hospital has a copy,” she pointed out. “We'd need to keep a copy of the marriage certificate for our records.”

Wiriya was nodding enthusiastically now. “So at least we'll be able to get her name. That's good. That's very good.” He smacked his palm on the desk again, for emphasis, but more gently this time. And he was smiling.

“Well,” he said finally. “This is progress. Perhaps it will be nothing, but maybe…”

He left the sentence unfinished, but Ladarat knew what he was thinking. Maybe, just maybe, they were on the trail of a murderer. They knew that she was out there somewhere, but she didn't know that she was being pursued. That thought gave Ladarat energy and a sense of excitement she hadn't felt in a long, long time.

Being an ethicist was important work, of course. And satisfying. But it wasn't… exciting.

“So you'll do it?”

Ladarat started to say that of course she'd do it. But she hesitated. She was the ethicist, after all. And here she was offering to look through a patient's records. Was that… ethical? She thought so, but…

“Yes, I'll do it.”

“Good. And in the meantime, I will ask around… quietly. Perhaps there have been other suspicious deaths…”

They stood up to say their good-byes, and she thought Wiriya might have lingered just a little longer in her door than was absolutely necessary. But if she had to be completely honest with herself, she didn't mind. She wasn't sure whether that was because he was such good company, or whether it was simply the excitement of the investigation. Whatever the reason, she found that she was a little sad to see the door of her little office close behind him.

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The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Copyright © 2016 by Vaseem Khan

Excerpt from
Murder at the House of Rooster Happiness
copyright © 2016 by David Casarett

Cover design by Anna Woodbine

Cover copyright © 2016 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

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ISBN 978-0-316-38683-8

E3-20160630-JV-PC