Knit Your Own Murder (5 page)

C
onnor
was treated and released the same day. “I haven't been taken that sick for a long time,” he said, as he got into Betsy's car. “Do they know what did it to me?”

“No, not yet,” said Betsy. “But they're pretty sure it's the yarn she was knitting with.”

“The yarn? That's odd. Didn't you give the same yarn to everyone?”

“No, Bershada and I asked each one of the knitters what kind they wanted. Maddy's the only one who picked the dark blue merino. Maybe I'd better pull the rest of that yarn until we find out what's wrong with it.”

“Do you think it could be the needles instead of the yarn?” Connor asked.

“Nnno,” she drawled, thinking. “Everyone got the same size bamboo needles from the same box. Besides, it was the yarn you and I were handling, not the needles.”

Connor nodded. “That's true. So yes, you should pull the merino.”

*   *   *

T
he
following Monday, the Bunch was in session, and the participants spent a few minutes talking about Maddy's strange passing. Betsy, as crack amateur sleuth, was asked for an opinion, but she said she didn't know what to think. Phil suggested it was a sudden allergy to wool brought on by all that knitting Maddy had done in aid of the auction, but his theory was voted down. No one else had any ideas, so the members dropped the subject and began working on needlework projects—any kind but knitting, as they'd all had their fill and more in the last few weeks.

Fulsome congratulations went around to all those who contributed: to Godwin, for the amazing price his knit leopard had brought; and again to Godwin, for winning a place among the honorees who had knit the most toys; to Betsy for contributing time, effort, and material to the auction; but most of all to Bershada, whose idea it was, and who ran the committee organized to pull it off.

Betsy said modestly she hadn't done all that much, Godwin smiled and allowed that the leopard had come out rather well, but Bershada just sat and raked in the accolades, secure in the knowledge that these people didn't know the half of it.

Just then the door chime broke into “I Want to Be Happy” and Jill came in. She was not a frequent attendee of the Monday Bunch anymore, with three young children
and a part-time job at the police department (administrative assistant to the chief, a job she shared with another woman). She had her stitching with her and was brimming with grim news.

“What is it?” demanded Godwin before she had even said a word.

“The preliminary autopsy report on Maddy is back. It appears she was poisoned with nicotine.”

Everyone at the table stared at her in surprise.

“Nicotine?” said Emily. “You mean she smoked herself to death?”

“No, nicotine was found on the yarn she was knitting with at the auction.”

“Ick,” said Emily. “I hate the smell of cigarettes. But how did it get from the yarn into her stomach?”

“It didn't go into her stomach. It went through her fingers into her bloodstream. You can absorb nicotine through the skin. When she handled the yarn while knitting, she absorbed a fatal dose.”

“Then how come people who smoke cigarettes don't die from it getting on their fingers?” asked Phil. He looked around the table. “I smoked for over twenty years, and so did just about everyone I knew back in the day. Many's the time we stayed up all night, playing cards, talking, drinking beer, and smoking like chimneys. Didn't kill any of us. Not right then, I mean. Lung cancer might've got one or two of us, but I don't know, I haven't seen many of them in a long time.” He sighed and looked a little sad about that.

Jill said, “I guess the paper wrapping protected your skin. Besides, tobacco leaves aren't pure nicotine, it takes a special laboratory process to extract the nicotine.”

Betsy said, “You mean, nicotine all by itself is a poison?”

“That's right,” replied Jill. “Someone poured pure liquid nicotine over the ball of yarn in Maddy's bag, and by handling it, she absorbed a lethal amount through the skin of her hands. It doesn't take much. It's an ingredient in insecticides; a squirt or two will kill a whole nest of yellow jackets. I know, I've done it.”

“If liquid nicotine is so dangerous, why can you buy bottles of it in those e-cigarette stores?” asked Alice, a senior woman with a deep voice and rather a lot of chin. She was crocheting a fluffy blue prayer shawl for her church.

Godwin asked, surprised, “How do you know about bottles of nicotine?”

“There was a news segment about it back around Christmas. The bottles come in different sizes and different strengths. And they said even one small bottle can kill a child who drinks it—they come in tempting delicious flavors, apparently. I was quite appalled.”

But Phil said, “I think those bottles aren't pure nicotine, they're diluted. And at least the smokers are not getting all that tar and other things you find in tobacco leaf. E-cigarettes are a lot safer than the real thing.”

“No, they're not!” said Alice, surprised. “It's the nicotine that causes lung cancer.”

“No, it's the tar,” retorted Phil, equally surprised.

“I think it's the formaldehyde,” volunteered Godwin.

“Formaldehyde!” said Doris. “In cigarettes?”

“Absolutely,” said Godwin.

“What, do they embalm the tobacco leaves before they chop them into cigarettes?”

Godwin leaned sideways, laughing. “That's good, Dorie!”

“Surely you're joking; there isn't any formaldehyde in cigarettes,” said Emily.

“Oh, there are all kinds of chemicals in cigarettes,” said Godwin. “Nitrogen oxide, benzopyrene, hydrogen cyanide, and ammonia are just a few, besides formaldehyde.”

Jill, meanwhile, had sat down at the table and brought out a project: a cross-stitched inspirational motto ornamented with a big, elaborate feather. It read, “She took a Leap of FAITH and grew her Wings on the way down.” Done all in shades of blue, Jill had bought it in Betsy's shop as a kit.

“Has Joe Mickels stopped in to talk to you, Betsy?” she asked.

“Joe? Why on earth would he want to talk to me?”

“Didn't you hear what I said? The poison that killed poor Maddy was nicotine.”

“What has that got to do with Joe Mickels?”

“Right around Christmas he bought a little chain of e-cigarette stores.”

Betsy stared at her. “He did?”

Godwin said, “Why didn't we hear about it?”

Valentina said, “I heard he'd gotten into e-cigarettes, that he'd bought a store that sells them.”

“Where did you hear that?” asked Jill.

“At the Leipold's store. Somebody was smoking one in there, said he'd bought the outfit to do it with at Joe's new store in Uptown.” Uptown was an artsy neighborhood of Minneapolis famous for its night clubs, sophisticated shops, and ethnic restaurants.

“Oh my God,” said Doris.

“But he wouldn't—he just wouldn't!” said Emily.

But Betsy was remembering some years back, when she and Jill stood in Joe's Excelsior office while he ranted viciously about another murdered woman, saying that if he'd known then what he knew now, he would have killed her himself. She looked at Jill, wondering if she was remembering that, too. But Jill had her deadpan cop face on, so Betsy couldn't tell what she was thinking.

“Wait a minute,” said Phil. “I've looked at those bottles of nicotine they sell, and like Alice said, they all smell like candy or flowers, plus they look thick, like syrup. How could Maddy use yarn that smelled like strawberries and stuck to her fingers?”

“There!” said Emily. “See? There!”

“Why are you so hot to defend Joe Mickels?” asked Godwin. “He is not a nice man.”

“He is a sad man. I think he's lonesome and doesn't know what to do about it.”

“My goodness, Emily,” said Alice. “Where on earth did you get an idea like that?”

“I saw him the other day—he didn't see me—just sitting in his car, and his face was sad, so sad. I almost went over to him, but he drove away. Honest, he was sad!”

“When was this?” Jill asked.

Emily thought briefly. “I'm not sure. Maybe a week ago? Or longer?”

“Before Harry Whiteside was murdered? Or after?”

Emily thought some more. “Before. I'm sure it was before.”

“Maybe it was around the time he found out that Maddy
won the bidding war for that property on Water Street,” suggested Godwin.

“I hope so,” said Betsy. “Much better that he was sad, not angry.”

There was a thoughtful silence.

“W
ell,
well, well,” murmured Detective Sergeant Mike Malloy, looking over a photocopy of a single document laid in the center of his small desk in a back room of the Excelsior Police Department. He spoke to himself—the desk pushed up against his was unoccupied. Elton Marsh, the second investigator in the department, was taking a day off to attend a school concert his youngest daughter had a solo part in.

The document was a record of the sale of three e-cigarette stores to one Joseph Alan Mickels on receipt of “one dollar and other good and valuable considerations.” Malloy had run across that phrasing before; it virtually always meant more money.

Malloy wasn't interested in how much more money; he was interested in the fact of the e-cigarettes. His fellow investigator was a smoker, and it had taken an order from the chief to get him to take a smoker's break outside the
building. The problem now was, he was a heavy smoker and was frequently gone during the working day for five to ten minutes at a time. In Malloy's never humble opinion, he had just about gone from full-time to part-time employment and ought to be given a commensurate cut in pay.

Apparently the chief thought so, too, because the instant e-cigarettes appeared on the market, Elton had been persuaded to transfer his addiction to them and began smoking at his desk again. He and Malloy exchanged research on them, and Malloy was forced to admit that e-cigarettes were not a source of the tar that instigated lung cancer, and that what a “vaper” exhaled was merely scented water vapor.

“That's why we call it ‘vaping,'” Elton had said smugly.

The only concession Malloy had managed to get from Elton was a switch from scented nicotine to the unscented variety. Filling the office with the smell of wintergreen or oranges was distracting and unprofessional, in Malloy's never,
ever
humble opinion.

Maddy O'Leary had been killed by nicotine. It had been absorbed through the skin on the palms and fingers of her hands—shocking to learn that nicotine could be absorbed through the skin. It could be absorbed quickly, too, judging by the way Connor Sullivan had gotten so doggone sick just from handling the yarn while helping clean up after the auction.

Nicotine is never a natural ingredient in yarn. So someone put it there. Who? And when? And why?

When investigating crimes against a person, Malloy knew you began with the victim. Why would someone have wanted Maddy O'Leary dead? She was a wealthy businesswoman, somewhere in her fifties—accounts differed as to
her age. She was tall, five seven and a half, gray haired, with a robust build—one sixty-eight, the ME reported. She had been widowed after a brief marriage, had no children, no near relatives in the area.

Several people he'd talked to indicated she'd had a strong A-type personality that included a quick temper. She was the widow of a wealthy attorney and had immersed herself in business and become very successful at it.

Maddy's success came from her skill in real estate. She always appeared to know what the competition was up to and took quick action to counter them. She had a reputation for sharp business dealings but hadn't broken any laws—or at least was too sharp to be caught doing something illegal. She was not a drunk or a doper. Once a year she took a two-week vacation, but nobody knew where she went. Seven years ago she had left her Methodist church and formally become a Baptist. She was very generous toward her church and various charities, a surprising discovery few knew of, as she never spoke of it to anyone.

And she liked to knit. That last bit of information came from Betsy Devonshire, who said she had donated more knitted toys to that fatal auction event than anyone else. Who would have thought?

People were complicated. That's why Malloy preferred the kind of crime committed by professional—or at least semi-amateur—criminals. There, motives were clear and simple. Plus, it was relatively easy to convince a pro to confess or at least drop a dime on the perp. These amateurs lied when they didn't have to, or couldn't get their facts straight when they were trying to be truthful, or refused to learn the rules of the game. Malloy strayed from his train
of thought. Funny how the expression “drop a dime”—to make a phone call offering a solid clue about the perpetrator of a crime—was still around, when public phones, which once charged a dime to make a call, now charged fifty cents if you could find one at all.

But back to the subject at hand. Who hated Maddy O'Leary enough to think up that ridiculous—and successful—plan to kill her?

Because it
was
ridiculous! Pouring a poison on knitting yarn so she'd absorb it through her skin! Why not just take a hunting rifle and ambush her from behind a tree, or use a handgun and shoot her from your car as she walked down the street? Or, like the unfortunate Harry Whiteside, lay in wait in his house to knock him on the head?

Say, could there be a connection between the two murders? O'Leary and Whiteside were bidding against each other—and Joe Mickels—for that property on Water Street. And Malloy's fellow investigators in Wayzata thought that maybe the mess in the Whiteside house wasn't what you'd expect a burglar to leave. It was more like vandalism; there was anger, even hatred, in the destruction inside that house.

Also, O'Leary hadn't paid off on her bid yet—she'd just won the war. Did her company inherit the right to buy the property? Or an heir? Or did the bidding reopen as a result of her death? Or, perhaps, was the property offered to the last person standing in the bidding war: Joe Mickels?

Mickels, notorious for his violent temper; Mickels, the recent purchaser of three e-cigarette stores. Hmmm . . .

Malloy reached for his phone.