Hiss of Death: A Mrs. Murphy Mystery (22 page)

“Thadia was consumed by jealousy. She thought Paula was sleeping with Cory Schaeffer. Thadia was obsessed with him, according to Toni Enright. Toni’s not one to get in the middle of people’s stuff, but Thadia didn’t hide her feelings, at least to Toni.”

“The real question is, did she hide them from Cory?”

Harry stood up straight. “I am such a dolt. I never thought of that.”

“You never think of how aftershave soothes razor burn, either.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s subjective. You and everyone else sees the world through their own eyes. You have to make an effort to think about how it looks or feels to be someone else. I wonder what it’s like to be five-six.”

“I’m five-seven, thank you very much.” Harry stretched her height and the truth a tiny bit.

“Of course. But you see what I mean? If you can turn your questions upside down or inside out, you might come up with an answer.”

“That will throw her for a loop.”
Pewter giggled, a little puff of air being exhaled.

As Harry grappled with this, Fair called the 800 FedEx number for a pickup.

“Is there a cheaper way to send semen?”

“Uh-huh. Fresh cooled. But that only works if the vet or tech pulling the semen understands the rate of cooling. It’s a lot less expensive if you know what you’re doing. Now they’ve got these Styrofoam boxes for fifty bucks for shipping. They’re insulated, and you can use cans of water. It’s easier than liquid nitrogen, but the drawback is you’ve got to impregnate the mare within forty-eight to seventy-two hours. I know the Standardbred people use the Styrofoam boxes all the time. I prefer the blue boxes if I’m to send out fresh cooled semen, but those are three hundred dollars. Here’s the other problem: If your box sits on the tarmac on a hot day and isn’t promptly loaded into the hold of the plane, you can lose your investment. What I’m sending today is five thousand dollars’ worth of sperm. To one of the great Thoroughbred farms in Kentucky or Florida, that’s chump change.”

“Hey, don’t forget Pennsylvania’s coming way up in the horse world, as is West Virginia. Remains to be seen about New York. The legislature seems not to care if they harm the Thoroughbred industry.” Harry knew a lot about the economics of horses because of her husband and because she grew up with them. Like so many East Coast people, she forgot about all the good Thoroughbreds in California.

When Harry was young, Maryland was one of the great states of the equine industry. Blind legislators in less than a decade had destroyed a century and a half of labor, gutting the lifeblood of many a Maryland country resident. Those who held state office in New York, Pennsylvania, Florida, California, or Kentucky determined who would eat and who would go hungry. Kentucky had its troubles despite a brilliant, horse-friendly governor, Steven Beshear.

“It’s pretty much a muddle.” Fair placed the yellow cylinder by the front office door in case he wasn’t there when the delivery driver arrived.

“I wish I could get those two bodies out of my mind.”

“I do, too. I have something that might help. Came in the mail here today. I was going to wrap it up, but you need it now.” He handed her a cardboard box, eight inches by eight inches.

Harry took her penknife out of her jeans’ pocket to slice open the flaps. Green Bubble Wrap enclosed the gift. She slit the Scotch tape, then peeled off the Bubble Wrap.

“Oh, wow.” She kissed him. “Can’t wait.”

Fair had bought her the DVDs for the television series
The Tudors
.

“I don’t want to watch a bunch of people in puffy sleeves.”
Pewter was disappointed.
“He could have ordered some little fake furry mice with that.”

“Be glad he didn’t order the
Miss Marple
series.
” Tucker didn’t much feel like watching something about the sixteenth century.

“Why?”
Pewter wondered.

“Miss Marple is a fictional detective, English, and she solves clever crimes. It would only inflame Mom,”
Tucker said.

“I know that.”
Pewter sniffed.
“I’ve read over her shoulder. I don’t understand why people need to make up things. Why can’t they focus on real life?”

Mrs. Murphy rose, stretched, and offered this thought:
“Their senses, except for sight, are so poor. They can’t take in as much information as we can. They don’t know as much real life. They try. But the made-up stories help them. They collect them from humans long dead. Calms them.”

“Twaddle,”
Pewter pronounced judgment.

“If only they knew what we were saying, I’m sure it would help much more than their made-up stories,”
Tucker teased her.

“It would.”

“
Whether it would or not, I actually wish Mom would be watching
All Creatures Great and Small
instead of
The Tudors.” Mrs. Murphy heard the FedEx truck coming down the paved drive.
“That was fast.”

“In the neighborhood,”
Tucker reasoned.

“Back to Miss Marple.”
Pewter’s curiosity was aroused.

The tiger sighed.
“Miss Marple had the sense to keep her mouth shut. Mother, and I truly love her, but sometimes she can be a fountain when she needs to be a well.”

N
ervously sitting in the small booth with the fabric curtain, Harry waited for the results from her first mammogram since the surgery. She knew if she was called back for a second set of images, it wasn’t good.

Nurse Denise Danforth called outside the booth. “Harry.”

“Yep.” Now clothed, Harry pulled the curtain back.

“You’re good to go. No abnormality at all after your surgery.”

“Thank God.” Harry exhaled.

Denise, late thirties, put her hand on Harry’s back. “You caught it early, girl. Good for you, and good for Regina MacCormack for getting you into surgery pronto. When she retires, what will we do?”

“Regina still makes house calls.”

“The only people who do that these days are thieves.” Denise smiled, then added, “Charlotte told me you were cool as a cuke when they found Thadia.”

Charlotte Lunden, Denise’s sister, had photographed the deceased Thadia Martin. The Charlottesville area remained a tight community, so many people had known one another all their lives. Denise had graduated from high school three years before Harry. They were tied by geography and generation. Some families had five generations alive and breathing who knew other families of five generations.

“I didn’t think about it.”

“A terrible end to an unhappy life.” Denise walked Harry down the long aisle to the waiting room.

“So it seems,” Harry murmured.

“Being a nurse, I see so much: people who have brought their conditions upon themselves, those who had a misfortune drop out of the sky. Seeing how people handle this is a privilege. You wouldn’t think that, but it is. The smallest, most unassuming woman can have the greatest courage.”

“I’m seeing that in my support group.”

“Glad you’re going.”

“Denise, I’m a medical idiot. I know a lot about equine health but next to nothing about human health. I had no idea that one out of eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime.”

“True.” Denise opened the door for Harry. “I pray they find a cure, even if it means I’ll probably be out of a job.”

“Oh, Denise, we need nurses so badly. You can work anywhere in America, anywhere in the world, I bet.”

“I’m staying right here.” Denise hugged Harry.

Once outside the building, Harry stopped, breathed deeply. Spring’s signature fragrances filled her. An Appalachian spring assaults all the senses. This spring seemed more vivid than any other, or perhaps she appreciated it more.

At ten in the morning, the mercury reached sixty-two degrees, low humidity, the air a touch cool, with a light breeze. It couldn’t have been more perfect.

The Volvo sat in the crowded parking lot, the windows down two inches because the kids had hitched a ride. No matter how she tried to keep Tucker in the house, the intrepid dog found a way out, only to blaze down the driveway, barking furiously. Once she’d picked up the corgi, all thirty pounds of her, she’d usually turn back to fetch the cats. If Tucker got to ride and they didn’t, destruction followed.

Walking toward her, Annalise Veronese waved. “Good morning.”

“Hey, how are you?”

“Good. Just attended an incredible lecture sponsored by the Virginia Historical Society about the medical advances springing from the War Between the States.”

“Annalise, since when did you start calling it the War Between the States? I thought you were born and raised in Vermont.”

Annalise laughed. “Yes, I was, but I’ve lived here long enough to watch my P’s and Q’s. Say, how do you feel after that workout with Noddy?”

“Pretty good.” Harry then added, “But you were right about the second day. I feel muscles I’ve never felt before.”

“If you stick with her program, she’ll keep mixing it up so you don’t get bored, and you’ll be super-fit. How’s everything else?”

“Just had my first mammogram after my surgery, and I’m fine.”

“That is wonderful news. You must be a fast healer, too. I was surprised you could do the push-ups and stuff,” Annalise complimented her. “You’ll beat it.”

“Thank you.” Then Harry informed her, “Susan makes a paste, I have no idea what’s in it, for the horses. Heals up flesh wounds so fast I used it on myself. I keep asking Susan what’s in it, and she says it’s a family secret. I hope it doesn’t have mouse droppings in it.”

“Harry, you’d know.”

They both laughed. “If you ever want to attend any of the special medical lectures, like today’s, let me know. As I recall, you like reading history.”

“I do. Regina was telling me she has to put in seventy hours each year to keep her license current. Is it the same for you? I thought perhaps not.”

“Same. You’d be surprised at how much there is to do in pathology to keep current. All of medicine is changing so rapidly, thanks to the technological advances. Harry, something as simple as pollen—now, I’m not a forensic pathologist, as you know, but if there is pollen in the nostrils or lungs of a corpse, it’s possible to trace where that person had been. Often murder victims’ bodies are not left at the murder site. It fascinates me. I know people think we cut open dead bodies and that’s about it, but some of the biggest advances in medicine come from pathologists.” She held up her hand and smiled. “You’re on the end of an unasked-for lecture, but I am so passionate about what I do. Karl Landsteiner, who was born in Vienna in 1868, a pathologist, was the first doctor to distinguish between different blood types. Do you know
how many lives have been saved by that once we knew how to perform transfusions?”

“No. I know so little about any kind of medicine.”

“It’s one big detective story. I’m going up there now to perform an autopsy on a twelve-year-old who died of a brain tumor. I’ve asked Cory and Jennifer to attend. We are seeing a disturbing uptick in brain tumors in the young. A researcher in Sweden reports that anyone using a cellphone before age twenty—and that’s everyone, and they use them nonstop—that individual has a four to five times greater chance over a nonuser of developing a brain tumor. University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute researchers report an increase in brain tumors in Americans under thirty. No warning about the dangers! The cellphone industry is at stake, and until the public demands changes, nothing will be done. In fact, it will be denied. Same with computers. We know they cause certain types of health damage, the eyes being the most obvious. Billions in revenue could be lost, so what’s life compared to profit? Sometimes I wonder how long it will take for citizens to realize we have poisoned ourselves. Even plastics aren’t as safe as you think. Every day I see the damage from all forms of pollution, from the chemicals—even from antibiotics in the meat we eat, to say nothing of hormones, which are even worse. We’re awash in chemicals. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death. Right? It’s not all from smoking, Harry. It’s the great American way: Blame the victim.”

“I don’t know why we’re like that,” Harry puzzled.

“It’s the very air we breathe, and it’s a result of those polluting industries belching out filth. I see what these substances do to the human body. Year after year, I see the man-made damage.”

“Annalise, a lot of that has been cleaned up.”

“Harry.” Annalise reached out to her. “A lot hasn’t. What’s worse, we don’t really know the life span of those particles released in, say, 1937. I didn’t mean to take up your time, but I so care. I try not to let emotions affect me when I do my job, but I can tell you, looking at a twelve-year-old will affect me. Then I have to put it out of my mind and go to work. Maybe I can contribute something that will repair damage, slow injury, retard aging. I won’t contribute on the level of Dr. Landsteiner, but I can do something to help.”

“It’s good you’re passionate about your work. If people love their work, they’re happy. We spend more time with our co-workers than we do with our families, most people.” Harry mentally exempted herself, since she farmed.