Randall #03 - Sherwood Ltd. (35 page)

I could see the keys to the Taurus on the dresser next to Rosalee’s purse. I could drive to a phone. I had to call Plant and tell him not to drink the poisoned vodka.

As soon as I got Rosalee out of the room.

Like all polite people, I knew the value of a useful lie. This was the time for one.

“I hid it,” I whispered. “My passport. It’s in a book. Agatha Christie.” There were at least forty Agatha Christie titles up there. The search would buy some time.

Rosalee grabbed her bag and stomped up the stairs—leaving the keys still on the dresser.

Yes! I grabbed the bedpost to pull myself to my feet, grabbed the keys, and stuffed them in my pocket. Using the walls to prop myself up, I made my way toward the back door.

I had almost reached it when I heard Rosalee’s voice behind me.

“Is this picture really you? You look like Gwyneth Paltrow. Totally. Hard to believe you were ever that young and pretty.” She waved my passport. “In a book, huh? Right. I checked your luggage again and noticed the lining of your make-up bag was torn. You’re such a liar. I should have known. That’s all good manners means—lying.”

I gripped the door handle for balance. Maybe Rosalee was right. Maybe I was a professional liar. Like Peter Sherwood. I gave her a little smile, then pushed through the back door, lurching toward the Taurus. I’d find a phone—find anybody—to call Plant and tell him not to drink the Grey Goose.

But my legs wouldn’t work right.

“You idiot,” Rosalee said, right behind me. “You can’t drive. You can hardly walk.” She grabbed my arm in a steely grip and pulled the keys from my pocket. “Don’t you get it, baby girl? You’re already dead.” She stomped to the car and jumped in.

But she got into the wrong side. She’d obviously never adjusted to the British left-side driving thing.

That gave me just enough time to get the driver’s door open and clamber in. Rosalee straddled the shift, trying to vault over to the driver’s seat, her face inches from mine as she shoved me against the door. Her breath smelled of peanut butter.

My stomach lurched. I could taste the vomit in my mouth. And up it came, in awful gray-green chunks. All over Rosalee’s new navy blue suit. Her hand moved instinctively to wipe it off, and the keys slid from her grip.

I grabbed them and started the car.

Rosalee fell back into the passenger seat.

“You bitch. This suit is dry-clean only.” She tore off her jacket and began wiping her skirt with it.

I hit the accelerator. My vision wasn’t great with those halos everywhere, but I managed to steer onto the dirt road where I could see the sign ahead for Old Somercote. Only a few miles away.

But Rosalee, still screaming about her suit, lunged across my lap, opening the driver’s door. With prodigious force, she leaned against my shoulder and pushed. I let up on the gas pedal and concentrated on grasping the steering wheel. But I couldn’t hang on. My muscles were too weak. I felt another painful shove and then…nothing but the cold dirt of the road.

I rolled into a ditch as I heard the Taurus speed away.

I lay on the side of the road staring at a green meadow full of wildflowers. A daffodil poked at my ear. The grass felt clammy, and the sky above was beginning to darken.

Something smelled awful.

Me.

I seemed to have been sick again. My throat was raw and my limbs wouldn’t move. It was as if the body I inhabited wasn’t mine to control. I felt pain in my right hand and arm where I’d tried to break my fall. Luckily, the car had been coasting slowly when Rosalee shoved me out, so I didn’t seem to have broken anything. Not that it mattered. I was dying from all that poisonous tea. I closed my eyes, hoping it would come quickly.

But my mind filled with the image of Plant—Plant reading my email and thinking I was home safe. Pouring himself a Grey Goose. Then he’d die too. So horrible. He probably never did have a bad heart—it was all from Rosalee’s poison. So many people dead—all over “a dreadful medieval vampire saga, writteneth forsoothly.”

Something damp dropped on my face. Great. English rain. All I needed. I opened my eyes. It wasn’t rain. It was a slobbery dog. A dog with a familiar looking, terrier face. Much. It couldn’t be, could it?

I heard a voice calling—a woman’s voice.

“Much,” she called. “Much!”

How many little terriers named Much could there be?

The dog barked. The woman called again as she appeared in my line of vision: a plump, pretty young woman, who smiled and called to someone else.

“Dad, she’s here. The dog found her!” I had seen the woman before. On the Swynsby river walk, pushing a pram.

“Don’t try to move. Hang on,” the woman said. She turned and spoke to someone coming down the lane. “She’s here. Alive.”

Alive. Yes. I was alive. I needed for Plant to be alive too. I needed to tell them.

“Grey Goose,” I said in my scratchy voice. “Plant. His Grey Goose…”

“You’ve been sick, Miss Randall. Good job,” said a man’s voice. I looked up and saw the smiling pink face of Charlie Vicars. “You’ve chucked some of that poison out of your stomach.” He turned to the woman. “Thank goodness you thought to bring the dog, Dorcas. We never would have seen her down here.”

So the woman’s name was Dorcas. Charlie Vicars’ daughter. She had a halo, much brighter than Rosalee’s. She was a beautiful, round, shiny angel. So was Charlie.

“Are you seeing odd lights?” said Charlie. “Have a bit of an itchy rash? Muscles weak? Feeling down in the dumps—a bit confused?”

My tongue felt too thick to make words, but I was so grateful. Charlie. He’d get the message to Plant.

“Grey Goose,” I tried to say.

“Digitalis poisoning.” Charlie said. “I saw the tea on the stove of the cottage. Fairy Thimble leaves. Look a bit like comfrey. Can do dreadful things.”

“So can falling in a bloody ditch,” said the woman. “Whether she took poison or not, we need to get her to hospital, Dad. Can you help me lift her?”

Charlie squatted down and lifted me in his arms.

“Don’t worry, Miss Randall. We’ll get you sorted.” He spoke to Dorcas. “I’ve got her. You fetch the car.”

The car was familiar. So was the plush badger in the back seat. I clutched the toy as Much curled at my feet, and I slipped into unconsciousness.

Stomach pumping—“gastric lavage”—was not a fun experience. Neither was the impersonal prodding and poking and injecting with whatever drugs were supposed to counteract the effects of digitalis poisoning. But by evening, lying in my bed in Lincoln County hospital, I was feeling as if I might survive.

But I couldn’t get anybody to understand that somebody had to contact Plant and tell him to stay away from the Grey Goose. I kept telling people—telling everybody I met—doctors, nurses, orderlies, but all they did was smile and nod and tell me I mustn’t try to speak or I’d damage my vocal chords permanently.

Dorcas was kind, but she didn’t understand, either. She seemed to think I was emotionally attached to the stuffed badger, which she carried from room to room and left snuggled next to me as I slept.

Not Dorcas, Dorie.

“Dad’s the only one who calls me Dorcas. I’m a bit sensitive about me name. I didn’t like what that American lady had to say about it, not one bit. I was so pleased you stood up for it. But don’t talk now. The doctors forbid it.”

Dorie sent Charlie off with Much and stayed by my bedside. Apparently Charlie had taken Much home when he was released from the vet. Vera hadn’t wanted to let him roam around the still-muddy factory. It was Vera who had called Charlie asking him to make another search for me after Peter thought he’d found the cottage empty.

“Mr. Sherwood was driven to distraction when he heard you were out there in Puddlethorpe with that American cow,” Dorie said. “He suspected her of being a poisoner even before we found the pot of foxglove tea. He knew Alan had nicked his absinthe, and nobody else was in his office that day.”

I was grateful for every bit of information they dropped about Peter. He was apparently still a police suspect, and they didn’t want him to leave the country. I wished I could see him; hold him; tell him how much I regretted doubting him.

Dorie promised she’d be back for tomorrow’s visiting hours. As she was leaving, she had a phone call from Charlie. He had news of Rosalee. “That awful woman was detained for traveling with your passport,” Dorie relayed. “Can you imagine she believed anybody would think you two looked alike?”

As she started out the door again, and I tried one more time.

“Tell Plant,” I whispered. “About the Grey Goose.”

“Oh, yes, we’ll sort your Grey Goose. Don’t worry. And don’t talk.”

The next morning, an array of Sherwood denizens paraded through my room at visiting time. All brought encouragement and friendly smiles.

And geese.

Charlie brought a stuffed Mother Goose—a gift from one of Dorie’s little ones—that had been worn to a balding grey. Meggy had found a bluish-gray plush gosling in the baby aisle at Tesco. Vera brought a tiny ceramic goose made into a refrigerator magnet, and later Liam and Davey arrived with a large yellow Easter duckling—closest thing they could find at the charity shop near the bus stop, they said.

I tried desperately to get them to understand about Plant, and I tried to ask them to give me pen and paper, but everyone kept jumping in to tell their news.

Just as visiting time was ending, in strutted Jemima Puddleduck—a huge toy bird dressed in a red calico frock and matching head scarf, carried on a pair of elegant legs, encased in Prada boots.

“Hello. I’m Emily Weems,” said the owner of the boots, setting Jemima on the bed. “I hope Henry’s told you how much I adore your book,
Good Manners for Bad Times
.” She sat in a chair Liam had vacated for her. She was an aging, but still beautiful English blonde—with porcelain skin and wide blue eyes. “My copy of
Wedding Rx from the Manners Doctor
is completely dog-eared. I bought it in New York a decade ago.”

I was suddenly aware of how awful I must look. I tried to sit up in a more dignified position and make her understand about the dire danger to Plant, but a nurse came in to give me a shot and told me again not to speak.

Emily Weems kept up her tea-party chatter.

“I have no idea why Henry let himself be talked into publishing that awful werewolf book before yours. Robin Hood as a werewolf—have you ever heard of anything so silly? Werewolves are so…Balkan. I blame Walt Disney. He made Robin Hood into a fox, and poor Robin’s been getting more beastly ever since. He’s English, Robin Hood. Civilized.” She gave me a broad smile. “Mr. Vicars tells me that you’re worried about the cost of your hospitalization, so please do know that Sherwood is handling all the paperwork. Everything taken care of. Henry would be here except he has a meeting with the flood insurance people today.”

“I hope he gets things sorted,” said Davey. “Or we’re not going to be able to publish anybody’s books.”

Emily Weems dismissed this with a regal wave.

“I’m sure he’ll handle everything satisfactorily. Once you’re out of hospital, you’re to come and stay with us until you’re able to fly home. I don’t know why Henry hasn’t had you to visit before.” She leaned in and lowered her voice. “He hasn’t been himself lately. I think perhaps it’s piles. He has trouble with piles.”

I caught Davey in an eye-roll, and hid my smile in the furry body of Jemima Puddleduck. It explained so much to find that Henry was married to a woman who could explain away blackmail and murder—and all the trials of the past three months—with a case of hemorrhoids.

I faded into drugged sleep, still unable to get anybody to understand about Plant and the vodka. I could only pray that he was continuing to abstain.

I woke—or it felt like waking—to see a giant Mother Goose coming at me from between the curtains that surrounded my bed. A doctor or orderly of some sort, dressed in green scrubs and mask, held the large plush toy. I heard a familiar laugh.

As he removed the mask, my visitor morphed into Peter Sherwood. If he wasn’t real, this was a nicer hallucination than any of the others I’d had recently.

“It’s not exactly gray,” Peter whispered, handing me the goose, “But after a few days at the Maidenette Building, I’m sure it will become sufficiently grimy.”

He kissed me. A lovely kiss. Sweet, with just enough heat to remind me why I’d missed him.

“Is it the right sort of goose? Charlie said you were desperate for one,” he said, putting the goose beside the others. “I’m sorry I couldn’t come earlier, but the coppers might have nicked me. I’m a bit AWOL, you see, for their murder investigation. They asked me not to leave the country, but I must sail in the morning for Tobago.”

I suppose I looked devastated at this news.

“Don’t worry. I won’t be gone more than a few months. And I’ll come back with enough money to pull the company out of its financial muddle. And get your book published, too.” He squeezed my hand. “I’ve booked you a ticket back to San Francisco. I hope that will be all right. Plantagenet Smith will be there to meet you.”