The Ginseng Conspiracy (A Kay Driscoll Mystery) (17 page)

“I suppose the study is the place to start. I’ll look through the desk, and you take the closet.”

“What are we looking for?”

“Not sure, but we’ll know it when we see it.”

The desk had bills, catalogs, and other miscellaneous papers piled up on it. On top of one of the piles of paper was the Stephanie Griffin book Al and I talked about in the post office. Sitting in the old comfortable desk chair, I proceeded to go through the drawers, which contained the usual stationery odds and ends. I also checked under each drawer to see if anything had been taped to it. After looking in the last drawer, I said, “I don’t see anything in the desk.”

I glanced over at Elizabeth. She was busy looking through a box. “Did you find something?”

“Over here. This box…it was on the top shelf, under some photo albums. Look, typed pages of a manuscript dealing with the ginseng farms in Sudbury Falls. Sherman Walters' name is on them.” She looked underneath the pages. “And about a dozen CD’s. These must be the materials that were stolen from Sherman’s office.”

The thud of a car door closing resounded. I peered out one of the stained glass windows and saw a car parked in the driveway at the back. Dr. Anders was walking toward the back door. “Damn! Dr. Anders is here! Quick, out the front door!”

Elizabeth shoved the box back on the top shelf, slammed the study closet door a little bit too loud, and we ran toward the living room. “Someone's at the front door.”

“The closet!” I said. We quickly opened the double louvered closet door in the living room. Just after closing the door and getting behind some coats, we heard the front door open.

“You said Al wouldn't be home this morning,” Elizabeth whispered to me.

“Shhh…” I sharply whispered back. Why wasn't Al at work? Maybe this was an important meeting he couldn't miss.

“Come in. Make yourselves at home,” Al said. “I’ll be right back. I need to let Michael in the back door.”

I moved up in the closet and peered through the slats at the people coming through the front door. A man I had never seen before, and...Margaret? What was she doing here? Did Deirdre follow her over? Was she parked right outside the house?

Al and Dr. Anders came into the living room. “Okay. We are the only ones who could make it this morning,” Al said. “Richard cancelled, and the rest are busy.”

“John, let me hang up your coat. Margaret?”

Elizabeth and I looked at each other in horror and tried the best we could to make no sound as we pushed ourselves against the back wall of the closet. I held my breath.

I heard Margaret say, “No, that's fine.”

The man I didn't recognize said, “I can't stay long.” We breathed out huge, silent breaths of air, and moved forward in the closet again to be able to see and hear better.

“I think it's dreadful Professor Walters had to die. The poor man. When I heard about it, I thought I was going to have a stroke,” Margaret said.

“Deirdre must be outside,” Elizabeth whispered to me. I put my finger up to my lips for her to be quiet. I could smell Elizabeth's perfume. I hoped Al couldn't.

“I just about said the same thing Saturday night,” Al replied.

“His poor wife looked so lost at the funeral,” Margaret said.

“Yeah, yeah, Margaret. The poor professor. He shouldn’t have been sticking his nose where it don’t belong,” John snarled.

“He was doing research for his book,” Margaret said. “John Stewart, ginseng is the main crop around here. What else do you think the agriculture students and professors are going to research in Sudbury Falls? Ragweed?”

So that was John Stewart, Al's brother. He did sound deranged, just like Marissa said.

“Does anyone have any thoughts on who was behind the curtain?” Al asked. I forgot to breathe as I waited for the answer. “The Halloween party was two blocks away, and there were at least two to three hundred people at it. It could have been anyone there.”

“Eventually that person's going to talk. It’s just human nature. They won’t be able to keep it to themselves, and when they do, we'll deal with the problem,” said Dr. Anders.

I looked over at Elizabeth and she back at me, our eyes wide open. Dr. Anders was a part of this whole sordid conspiracy. And so was Margaret. Could anyone be trusted in this town of criminals?

“How could we let that person get away?” John questioned the group’s cleverness.

“Bill reports no one has gone to the police,” Al said. “And it's already been a week.”

“This shouldn’t have happened. John, you were told to destroy those plants a long time ago,” Margaret said. “I didn’t even think they still existed.” She sounded angry.

“As we speak, the workers are burning 'em. A quarter of my crops are being destroyed. Does that make you happy?” John asked Margaret.

“How many lives must be destroyed to protect your secret? Any more deaths, I'll go to the police myself,” Margaret said.

“What do you think that would result in, Margaret?” I could tell by the sound of his voice that he was becoming more and more irritated with Margaret.

“John! Cool it.” Al said. “Enough!”

“Remember my autopsy report. Professor Walters accidentally drowned. Nothing looks out of the ordinary,” Dr. Anders said.

John chuckled. “Yeah, we sure did luck out with his wife being out of town.”

“All of this for money. You act like his life meant nothing at all,” Margaret said. “Think about it. Is it all worth it? Hasn't this gone far enou—”

John interrupted, the rage evident in his voice. “Don't analyze me or talk about money. What do you think paid for your big fancy house? The money you and Earl used to travel the world? Don't be such a hypocrite, accusin' me when you're no different!”

“Stop it! This isn’t getting us anywhere,” Al said.

“You're as much to blame as anyone,” John continued. “You knew what was going on all of these years.”

Al pounded his fist on the coffee table. We jerked a bit in the closet. I cupped my hand over my mouth, afraid I might scream. The room was silent for a few moments.

Dr. Anders broke the silence. “Was Walters' office at the college searched?”

“With a fine toothed comb,” Al said. “Nothing incriminating left. What about the reports from Bioengineering Laboratory?”

“Everything came back normal,” Dr. Anders said. “Walters told me he also gave some samples of the ginseng to a lab in St. Paul. Strangely enough, he told the lab they were from an associate in the UK, so we don’t have to worry about that.”

John laughed and shook his head. “Sure saves us some trouble. Why would he have said something stupid like that?”

“The only loose end is our mystery person behind the curtain,” Al said.

“It was so dark outside, I couldn’t even make out if it was a skirt or not,” John said.

“Skirt?” Margaret said, sounding offended.

“Yeah. Unless you can stare at the person’s butt, it’s hard to tell.”

“John—”

It sounded like they were going to come to blows right there over something that was far from what they were here to discuss.

“Anyway,” John continued. “It was so dark, it was hard to tell what that was...a man or
woman
.” He almost savored the word woman, as if teasing Margaret with it. “Just disappeared into the night.” John snapped his fingers.

“I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary at the Halloween Party. And I kept watching everyone,” Al said. A small feeling of relief swept over me, as much as was possible being trapped in a closet with a bunch of murderers outside the closet door.

“Perhaps the person wouldn’t go to a party after seeing all of that,” Margaret said. “I wouldn't.”

“Maybe that is exactly where they would go to blend in. Did you notice anyone at the party acting
normal
?” Dr. Anders asked.

“Very funny. A number of people came in after I arrived. Okay, Listen up. Anyone asking any questions, no matter how vague, report back to Bill or myself,” Al said. “This pretty much covers what I had to say today.”

Al opened the front door.

I looked through the louvers. No one seemed to be leaving yet. I heard John Stewart saying to Margaret “If anyone acts suspicious, maybe Doc here will just have to pay them a house call.”

“You arrogant half-wit,” Margaret blurted out. “I think there have been enough of these senseless killings.”

“Margaret, what do you think will happen? Do you think we want to spend the rest of our lives in prison? You're old an' withered up. We aren’t,” John said.

Al closed the door. “Keep your voices down.”

“Get a grip, Margaret,” Dr. Anders said as he started for the front door.

“Keep your mouth shut, Margaret. Think about your sister. If anything were to happen to you, she'll be all alone,” John added with a chuckle.

“What's that supposed to mean?” Margaret asked.

No one responded. The front door opened and closed.

We could hear the sounds of dishes in the kitchen. I pointed to my watch. “I hope Al doesn't stay in for the rest of the day,” I whispered.

A minute later the doorbell rang. Al walked back into the living room and opened the door.

“If you think I'm kidding about going to the police, think again. Al, you are more sensible than the others,” Margaret said.

“Margaret, go home. And you'd better watch what you say and who you say it to. Now I am not kidding. Maybe you should go back to your sister’s until this all blows over or take a vacation. It might be good for your health. My wife asked me to have lunch with her and her father, so if you don’t mind.” Al closed the door in Margaret’s face. “Damn it!” he said and walked into the kitchen. A few minutes later he came back into the living room. I saw through the louvers that he was carrying a cake pan. He left by the front door, slamming it.

Elizabeth and I waited a couple of minutes before we left the closet. We looked out the windows. Everyone was gone. We hurried out the backdoor and hustled down the alley. We got into the car in a flash and drove a couple blocks away where we parked and called Deirdre on speakerphone.

“What the hell took you so long to call me? I was imaging all sorts of horrible things.”

“Deirdre, I have never heard you swear before,” Elizabeth said. “I
am
shocked!”

“Shut up, Elizabeth!”

“We are a few blocks away from Al’s house,” I said. “Did you follow Margaret back home?”

“Yes. Did you hear what went on at Al's?”

“We heard everything,” Elizabeth said.

“We'll tell you when we meet up.”

“When I followed Margaret from her house, and she drove north on Chestnut Street and ended up at Al’s house, I had to do my deep breathing to get into a calm state. I saw the others go in, knowing you two were inside. I was so scared. I didn’t know if I should do something. Did you find anything?”

“Pages of a manuscript that must have been stolen from Sherman’s office on the book he was writing,” Elizabeth said.

“Great! We'll have to look them over and get to the bottom of this.”

“We had to leave them there. Everyone started arriving, and we hid in the front closet,” I said. “That was nerve-racking.”

“It was exciting,” Elizabeth said.

“Exciting? I was so scared. Should we go to Marissa's and talk about this? I'm starving.”

“Sounds good to me,” Deirdre said. “I’ll meet you there in a few minutes.”

* * * *

We entered Marissa’s and saw her talking on the phone. She waved and gestured for us to come. Covering the mouthpiece she said, “Cute outfits you two! Choose where you want to sit. I’ll be with you in a few minutes.”

I was also dressed in black but in a totally different look than Elizabeth. We went over to our favorite sofa by the fireplace in the back dining room where it was more private. The warmth of the fireplace calmed me. Deirdre walked in the room. We told her everything that happened.

“I can't believe Dr. Anders is in on this,” I said. “And he sounded so threatening. And Margaret...I knew she was involved somehow because of the silk gossamer robe.”

“Sorry, Kay. I know she's a good friend of yours,” Deirdre said.

I smiled at Deirdre. “Al mentioned that Richard couldn’t make it,” I said. “Professor Laska's first name is Richard.”

“I can think of at least a dozen Richards in town,” Elizabeth said.

“And I'll bet you have probably dated half of them,” Deirdre said.

Elizabeth gave Deirdre a half-smile. “Now we know John Stewart and Kay's beloved Dr. Anders are part of the secret six. That's why Dr. Anders’ autopsy report on Sherman revealed no evidence of foul play.”

“Right...my beloved Dr. Anders,” I said. “I admit, I was wrong about him.”

“You should have heard Al’s brother, John, talk. The guy's twisted,” Elizabeth said.

“That's what Marissa told Kay and me at Pete's farm,” Deirdre said. “So he's John Stewart. I've seen him around town.”

What was taking Marissa so long to come over with a menu? Although, in a way, I was glad because it gave us the opportunity to talk freely about what had happened.