Listening to this, Roxanne had returned to her chair. She sat, thinking, teeth pinching her lower lip. She then said, “Logically, we have three possibilities: he died of a bad cold, which seems unlikely; or he died of some other natural cause, possibly an illness with coldlike symptoms; or he was murdered, the victim of foul play, such as poisoning. Have I missed anything?”
Lucy shook her head. “That would seem to cover it.” She tapped her pencil on a pad, where she had drawn a grid. With her other hand, she raked her fingers straight back through her short red hair. “Wait,” she said, zeroing in on the blank fourth square she had drawn. “Poisoning isn’t necessarily foul play—it
could
be accidental.”
Pierce and I exchanged a glance, nodding.
“Good point,” said Roxanne. “I stand corrected—we have
four
possibilities.” She turned to Pierce. “A complete medical-legal autopsy is under way, I presume?”
“Yup. Vernon said he’d get going on the physical examination this morning.” Pierce looked at his watch; it was about two-thirty. “The lab work could still take a while—weeks, in fact—but Vernon ought to be through with the grisly stuff. Maybe he has some initial findings.” Pierce turned to me, indicating the phone on the table. “Shall I try to catch him?”
“Sure,” Roxanne and Lucy answered for me, in unison.
I laughed. “By all means. Go ahead, Doug.”
He pulled the phone over to him, lifted the receiver, and punched in the number. A moment later: “Hi, Vernon, it’s Doug. Glad I caught you in. Any progress with the Thrush boy?”
Pierce nodded as he listened, reached for a notepad, then reconsidered, telling the coroner, “Vernon, hold on. I’m here with Mark Manning at the
Register
’s offices. We’re doing some brainstorming with his editor and a lawyer friend. Do you mind if I switch you to the speaker-phone so we can all talk?”
Pierce listened for a moment, then chuckled. He told me, “Vernon says he’ll tell you what he knows, but it’s off-the-record at this point.”
“No problem.” I reached across the table and pushed the speaker button.
Pierce hung up the receiver, asking, “Still there, Vernon?”
“Yes, Douglas.” Formhals’s rich baritone was barely recognizable through the low-fi electronics, sounding like a transmission from the moon.
“Good afternoon, Doctor,” I told him. “Thanks for talking to us.” I knew that he and Lucy were acquainted, but I couldn’t recall if he and Roxanne had met, so I made a proper round of introductions. Then I asked if he could share any findings regarding Jason Thrush.
“Please understand,” he told us, “that this is all very preliminary. Results of the external and internal examinations were inconclusive, and further testing, including toxicology, is necessary. At this point, there’s very little I can confirm.”
Looking up from the notes I was scratching, I asked, “And that would be…?”
“For starters, we can conclude that Jason’s time of death was between five and six yesterday, as initially estimated. Further, the
mechanism
of death was respiratory failure, but that doesn’t tell you what you need to know—yes, he stopped breathing, but why? There are many conditions and circumstances that could be responsible. As of now, the specific
cause
of death is unknown.”
Roxanne asked, “So we’re back to square one?”
“Oh, no, not by a long shot. I found several rather conspicuous conditions that provide valuable hints regarding the direction of further testing. Specifically, Jason’s body was severely dehydrated, and closing of the throat was noted, as was the presence of copious mucus in the mouth and throat.”
I said, “Even I noticed the mucus in the mouth.”
Pierce added, “It was hard to miss.”
“Are you saying,” asked Roxanne, “that the kid choked on his own snot?”
There was a pause. The coroner coughed, then said, “In effect, yes.”
Pierce said, “So it wasn’t ‘just a cold.’ ”
“Actually,” said Formhals, “it was. He had a common cold, albeit a bad one. I found no evidence of other medical conditions that would mimic those symptoms. In fact, he was in excellent health.”
Lucy made the obvious comment: “Except, he was dead.”
“As a doornail,” confirmed the coroner (whose sense of humor was dry, at best). “Let me explain. Even though Jason’s illness was ‘just a cold,’ something else apparently exacerbated the symptoms so seriously that he choked, which in turn led to respiratory failure.”
“Doctor,” I told him, “you have our undivided attention. You referred to ‘something else.’ Like what?”
He paused before telling us, “Poisoning.”
“My God,” muttered Lucy.
“Specifically,” added Formhals, “mushroom poisoning.”
“
Mushrooms
?” said Roxanne, incredulous.
“Uh-oh,” said Pierce, catching my eye.
Formhals continued, “It’s merely a theory, and there are still several possibilities that need to be explored, but the boy’s symptoms—dehydration, closed throat, and copious mucus—do strongly suggest certain types of mushroom poisoning. Of course, the stomach contents still need to be analyzed, so we don’t know yet whether the subject ingested mushrooms, and still further testing will be required to detect the presence of particular toxins. Still, there is nothing to indicate whether the
manner
of death was accidental or deliberate. For now, though, the mushroom theory is the best one we have, so…”
The coroner was still talking, but I’d tuned out. Pierce was still watching me, and I was worried. It was bad enough that Thad had threatened Jason, but now there was talk of mushroom poisoning, and during the previous school year, Thad had become quite the young expert in this area. I had no doubt of his innocence in Jason’s death, but it was clear that Pierce now had one more reason not to let our friendship cloud his objectivity.
Formhals concluded, “I’ll try to put a rush on the tests—not sure it’ll do any good, though.
Everyone’s
in a hurry when the evidence takes a turn toward murder.”
The rest of the afternoon was lost to fretting. I returned to the house with Roxanne, and we informed Neil of the coroner’s disturbing theory, deciding not to mention it to Thad yet—he had a performance that night, as well as the party afterward, so there was plenty on his mind already.
“Crap,” I said to Neil in the bedroom that evening as we dressed to go to the theater. “This mushroom wrinkle is way out of my league. It leaves me feeling so helpless—I mean helpless to help Thad. My knowledge of fungi is nil.”
Tying a perfect Windsor with a quick, fluid motion, Neil reminded me, “We have a friend who’s a mycologist—at least I do.”
I paused midknot, feeling like an idiot. “Of course. Frank Gelden, the adviser to the mushroom club at school—he might be a great resource for pinning down particulars that could exonerate Thad before this whole mess spins out of control. You know Frank far better than I do. Do you think he’d be willing to help?”
“Oh, I think so,” Neil answered through a coy grin. “Since I started working on the home-office project with Cynthia, both she and Frank have mentioned several times that they’d like to get to know us better. They’ll be here at the party tonight. Let’s nab Frank and tell him about the coroner’s theory. I don’t know if Frank could actually be of help, but if nothing else, I’m sure the mushroom angle would intrigue him.”
I nodded. “Worth a try.” Sprucing the knot of my tie, I mulled Neil’s comment that Frank and his wife were eager to know us. I had not yet met Cynthia, and I had spoken to Frank only once, but he’d surely sparked my interest. The prospect of a budding friendship appealed to me.
Shortly after seven-thirty, I drove Neil and Roxanne to the theater, where Pierce would meet us. Because Barb had already seen Thad play the leading role in Friday’s opening, she felt that her time would be better spent on last-minute spiffing for the cast party that night, so she decided to stay home, promising Thad she’d attend the show again the next weekend.
In the car, Neil and I continued to gab about the vexing implications of the coroner’s mushroom theory. Neil was in the backseat, and I was at the wheel, with Roxanne sitting next to me in front. During a pause in the conversation, I realized that she hadn’t said a word since getting into the car.
“Jeez,” I said, turning to her, “I’m sorry, Roxanne. I forgot—there’s something you’ve been wanting to discuss with us.”
She patted my leg. “That’s okay.” Her tone was sincere, though shaded by melancholy. “You guys are concerned about Thad—we all are. My ‘little issue’ can wait. Maybe we can find some time to talk later tonight.”
“Of course,” we assured her. “Just say when.”
Turning onto First Avenue, I was surprised by the sight of congested traffic down the street in front of the playhouse. I had presumed that the previous night’s performance, being the premiere, would draw the biggest crowd—and in fact the theater had been full—but tonight there were far more cars, and a line of people wormed its way from the box office past the next-door antiques store. “Glad we have tickets,” I told the others.
After we’d managed to park, I found that the lobby was packed. Grumbling would-be patrons were now being turned away from the ticketbooth. For the first time in the Guild’s history, the playhouse had completely sold out, not only every seat, but standing room as well. The buzz in the lobby confirmed, as I feared, that this rush of interest in amateur theater had been generated not by Glee Savage’s glowing review in that morning’s
Register
, but by the news of Jason Thrush’s death, by the uncanny life-imitates-art circumstances, and by the knowledge, now common, that Thad Quatrain had threatened the Thrush boy before he died, stepping into the leading role.
Neil and I divvied up our tickets. He and Roxanne would work their way toward the auditorium, escaping the crush of the lobby, while I would remain, waiting for Pierce. After a minute or so of watching the door, I spotted Pierce across the lobby, his head bobbing above the others, apparently in search of us, so I began sidling through the crowd in his direction.
Along the way, I noticed Glee Savage enter the theater, accompanied by Lucille Haring. Glee had originally planned to review both the Friday and Saturday performances because of the double casting. Those plans had now changed, of course, but she had enjoyed the show so much, she was back for another look. Lucy, on the other hand, had not, to my knowledge, planned to attend at all, but with the murder and the potential for developing news, she had decided to see the play out of sheer curiosity; her decision was doubtless bolstered by the assumption that Roxanne would be in the theater that night. With devilish insight, I now understood why Lucy (not, by nature, a party person) had so readily accepted my invitation to the house after the show.
Setting these thoughts aside, I continued through the crowd toward Pierce. Surrounded by a babble of voices, I seemed to hear both everything and nothing that was said. Snatches of conversation, phrases lacking context, words without meaning—the chatter was like aural wallpaper, seamless and unending, a random pattern of hearsay and do-tell, spoken in loud whispers of gossip. Most of it, I was certain, pertained to Thad and Jason, but I tried to assure myself that I was merely being paranoid, imagining my own concerns being bandied about by this cross section of the town’s faceless, nameless populace.
Then I actually heard the two names, clearly and unambiguously, spoken by a woman within inches of my ear: “…a world of difference between Thad Quatrain and Jason Thrush.” I stopped, turned my head, and saw the speaker standing near my side, her back to me, conversing with another woman whom I did not recognize. The speaker seemed familiar, though, even from behind—her proper posture, her measured speech, her perfect, stiff hairdo. She was now speaking of Jason’s death in a tone neither hushed nor gossipy. She stated flatly, “What goes around, comes around. Sometimes destiny doles out its own harsh justice.” And with that, she offered the other woman a nod of farewell, leaving the distinct impression that she saw no tragedy in Jason’s passing. As she moved away, I got a good glimpse of her profile. It was Nancy Sanderson, owner of First Avenue Grill.
Distracted by this encounter, I momentarily lost sight of Pierce in the shifting crowd. Focusing again on my mission, I stood on the balls of my feet, noticed Pierce doing the same, and caught his attention. Holding the tickets over my head, I motioned toward the double doors to the auditorium.
A minute or two later, we greeted each other with a perfunctory handshake, took our programs from the usher, and headed down the aisle toward our seats. I told him, “Strange crowd tonight.”
He glanced around. “
Great
crowd tonight.”
I hesitated. “I don’t know—something tells me they’re out for blood.”
Arriving at our row, we found the two outer seats left open for us so that Pierce could sit on the aisle; I resolved to sit through the entire show that night, regardless of whatever enticing emergency might lure Pierce away. Neil and Roxanne had taken the inside seats, but between them sat someone else, a woman I’d never met. As Pierce and I slipped in and sat down, Neil told me, “We ran into Cynthia Dunne-Gelden, and we had Barb’s extra ticket, so I asked her to join us.” Then he introduced us.
“Mark,” said Cynthia, stretching across Neil to shake my hand, “at long last, such a pleasure.” Her gold bracelets rattled.
I returned her smile. “My pleasure entirely. Neil’s told me so many nice things about you.” Saying this, I realized that Neil had in fact told me little about the woman, and I was surprised to note that she did not fit the vague mental image I’d drawn of her.
I’d known only that she was a businesswoman, apparently well-off, and married to Frank for eight years. Frank was forty, but I felt that he looked younger than his years; Cynthia seemed older. Though she looked trim and fit, and she dressed beautifully, she was not (to be coldly objective) “pretty.” In short, I thought that she and Frank seemed mismatched—but I quickly chided myself for judging them on mere appearances. They were both mature adults when they had married, and it was unfair of me to question their pairing on such superficial grounds. Clearly, I reasoned, their commitment ran deeper than “good looks,” and the ring on her finger proved it. Recalling too the ring on Frank’s finger, I was ashamed of myself for finding him so attractive, for judging her so unworthy.