The Monolith Murders (14 page)

Chapter 23

Fred was clearly concerned. “Doc, what’s in that needle?”

Dr. John said, “I’m going to inject you with a significant amount of warfarin which hopefully will start to immediately counteract the effect of the copious amount of coumadin that you’ve somehow ingested.”

“Wait a minute, Doc. I’ve never taken coumadin in my life.”
 

“Well, Fred, somehow it got into your system. And I suspect, based on the length of time that you’ve had symptoms, it wasn’t just from one dose.”
 

“What’s the effect of too much coumadin?”
 

“If it’s not reversed quickly, you will bleed to death. It’s commonly referred to as a blood thinner, but it doesn’t really change the viscosity of blood. It simply reduces the quantity of the selective proteins in the liver that influence blood clotting. I use it in my practice to dissolve blood clots. It’s also used in rat poison. But under no circumstances would I ever prescribe the level that you presently have in your system. Have you had any nosebleeds recently?”

“Yes, severe ones.”

“That’s also a clear sign of the overdose.”

“But I know I never took the stuff; so how in hell could it have gotten into my system?”
 

“It’s taken orally. Your overdose was either by accident or design.”
 

“Well, it wasn’t my design; and I know damn well that I didn’t take it accidentally.”
 

“Fred, it appears to me that someone’s trying to kill you. I would suggest, before you ingest anything at all that you have at your house, that you have all your food and drinks checked for the presence of coumadin.”
 

“But Maureen has been fine.”
 

“Then it must be something that you’ve consumed but she hasn’t, because humans have no natural defense for coumadin consumed in large quantities. If she were also taking it, she would be as sick as you are.”
 

* * *

On the way home, Fred mentally filtered through all the food and drinks that he and Maureen had consumed during the past week, trying to isolate those products that Maureen either did not consume or had consumed in very small amounts. They generally ate the same food in only slightly different portions, but Fred realized that he was the only one to drink regular coffee and orange juice. He only consumed coffee in the presence of Maureen; and since she had been with him for breakfast only one day this past week, his coffee input had been intentionally limited. However, he routinely had one small glass of orange juice each morning. Maureen had problems with the acidic taste of all citrus fruits, so she never consumed the drink.

Fred contacted the police medical unit to conduct an analysis of the content of the orange juice in his refrigerator. The results came back right away. The juice was saturated with coumadin.
 

Jim said, “I suggest we check out all the other food products in your home as well, Fred. Knowing Donna, she might have contaminated more than one food source, hoping that when you found it in the orange juice, you would believe that you wouldn’t need to check further.”

Fred said, “I have to agree with your logic, Jim. I’ll make sure every food product in our house is checked out.”
 

“Fred, when did you purchase this juice?”

“About a week ago; Maureen bought the orange juice at the local supermarket. Obviously, the poison had to have been introduced sometime after it was in our house.”

“The next question, Fred, is how did Donna get into your house?”
 

“I don’t see how she could have, we had a police guard at the house the entire week; and I also have a fairly good security system in place. We’ve had no indication of any tampering or break-ins. With Donna’s past use of surrogates to do her dirty work, the other question I have to ask myself is—who’s been in my house the last week or so?”

“Good point, Fred, and who has been?”
 

“Let’s see—there was the pizza delivery man, Maureen and I have pizza once every week; the air conditioning repair man came during the week to check out our system; and, of course, Patrolman Stewart was there all this week for security purposes.”
 

“Would any of them have entered or had access to your kitchen?”
 

“All of them, the pizza man delivers via our back door, which enters into the kitchen. The air conditioning man worked on our faulty thermostat, which is located next to the café doors to the kitchen. And the patrolman has coffee and donuts in the kitchen every morning.”
 

Jim said, “None of them sounds like the usual suspect. However, get me the names of the air conditioning repair man and the pizza delivery man, and I’ll bring them in for questioning. I think we can bypass Patrolman Stewart in the investigation, at least for the moment.”
 

Fred said, “I’ll make the arrangements.”
 

His first call was to the Fast Fix Air Conditioning Company. Curt Ryan, who had serviced Fred’s home, agreed to go to the station on his way home from work. Fred refused to provide Ryan with any information, except to say he needed his help in a police investigation. Fred’s next call was to the pizza shop located a few blocks from his house. Fred recalled the young man who delivered to their home that week was named Rudy. When he asked for Rudy, the manager said, “I have no idea where he is.”
 

“What do you mean, he shows up for work, doesn’t he?”

“He’s a full time college student, but he’s also a part time pizza delivery man who works for us only in the evenings. He hasn’t shown up for work for the past two days. As far as I’m concerned, he’s no longer working for us. College kids come and go; I suspect he got a nice fat check from his parents and he no longer needs the work. When the money runs out, he most likely will be on our doorstep looking for work again and I guess I’ll probably hire him again. He’s a good worker.”

“Do you have his phone number and address?”

The manager provided Fred with the requested data. After several phone calls with no answer, Fred decided to visit Rudy’s home address.
 

He called Jim to give him a briefing. Fred was surprised when Jim said he wanted to join Fred in the inspection of Rudy’s living quarters. Fred got there first. On the street in front of the house was a rusty 1980 Honda with
make love not war
decals plastered all over the back bumper. At the side of the house was an empty bike rack. A couple of minutes later Jim met Fred on the front steps of the sprawling pale-yellow ranch house. When they knocked on the door, they were greeted by an elderly man who possessed a heavy waxed white mustache curled down and around his lips. He looked to be the perfect candidate for an old time beer ad, Fred thought. Fred showed the man his badge and explained that he wanted to see Rudy to obtain his help with their investigation.
 

“It’s nothing serious you, understand.” Jim added. As Jim was speaking the man glanced at him with a peculiar expression. As they entered the living room, Fred felt he was suddenly thrown back into an earlier era. None of the furnishings were contemporary, and most displayed years of heavy wear. In a few cases there was an unsuccessful effort to repair some of the more dilapidated furniture pieces.
 

 
The man said, “Rudy is overdue with his monthly rent and he hasn’t contacted me for the past few days. In fact, I was just getting ready to put his stuff out on the street.”

That’s good, Fred thought. Since the room has reverted to the homeowner’s control, he and Jim didn’t have to get a warrant to search the place; they just needed the homeowner’s permission.

Rudy’s quarters consisted of a large one room efficiency apartment. There was a small kitchen area squeezed in one end of the room. It consisted of a tiny stove and a camper-sized refrigerator. A trailer-sized sink was wedged in between the two. Above were two cabinets containing an assortment of dishes from different sets. There was no bathroom; Fred assumed that Rudy used the nearby one in the hall.

The owners had obviously built the rental unit for extra income. This was a residential zoned area and Fred suspected that the owners did not get permission from the county to rent part of their house out. He also suspected the income had never been reported to the feds. He was not concerned about that small a violation; he only hoped that Jim would not pursue it either, since more important issues prevailed.
 

Fred opened Rudy’s clothes closet. Rudy’s wardrobe was the standard outfit for a college student; jeans and colored tee shirts dominated the hangers. On the shelf above was a stack of neatly piled college textbooks. The bed was neatly made up. A light gray-lined maroon jacket rested on the black spread.
 

Fred went through the dresser drawers. Underneath Rudy’s socks and underwear was a bank book. A deposit of four thousand dollars had been made in late November. An annotation was made: “from Dad for college tuition.” Small deposits of varying amounts had been made at other times during the year; Fred assumed they were from Rudy’s pizza delivery income. But a deposit of ten thousand dollars had been made five days ago. There was no annotation.
 

Jim said, “Well, Mr. Detective, what do you make out of all this?”
 

“Well,” said Fred, “First I assume that Rudy disappeared during daylight hours; my best guess is between ten in the morning and mid afternoon. Most likely he disappeared at or around his college. He never returned home for his pizza delivery job. His college is nearby. And by the way, he’s the man who attempted to poison me and perhaps Maureen as well.”

“How did you possibly come up with all of that based on what little evidence is in this room?”

“During this time of the year, the evenings and early morning are light jacket weather. His jacket was on the bed. By 10 a.m. the mornings warm up considerably, so I’m assuming he has late morning or early afternoon classes. His car is parked directly outside; no way would the homeowners own that car with the category of messages that appear on its back bumper stickers. His bike rack is empty, so he obviously took his bike to class. Had he returned from classes and left for his job, he would have taken his jacket with him to cope with the cooler evening weather. And, of course, the bike rack wouldn’t have been empty.”
 

“OK, but how do you know that he tried to murder you and Maureen?”

“I’m not sure that he attempted to murder us both or just me—not enough evidence yet for that determination. But his father paid for his spring tuition about a month or so ago. It was clearly annotated that the large sum came from his father. About five days ago he had deposited a large amount of money with no annotation. It’s an educated guess, but I’m sure that was his payoff money. Jim, lets talk to the pizza owner and see if we can find out more about Rudy.”

“Wait a minute, why do you believe it was payoff money? It could have just as easily come from his job at the pizza place.”

“Uh, Jim, ten thousand dollars from pizza deliveries? That’s a hell of a lot of pizza! Besides, according to his bank book he was in the habit of frequently putting small sums of money into his checking account; that obviously was his money from his pizza deliveries. Based on his banking habits, he didn’t accumulate any savings from his pizza money; so such a large sum had to have come from a separate source.”

“Next question, Fred, why isn’t it possible that he tried to kill both you and Maureen?”

“It’s entirely possible. It’s possible that when he contaminated the orange juice he anticipated we would both be drinking it; or it’s also possible that he knew that Maureen didn’t drink orange juice. If I believe the latter, I would have to either believe that Donna has regained her full powers and was able to read my mind; or someone close to us knew about our habits, and Donna used that information to selectively go after me. I just don’t know the answer.”
 

Fred again met with the home’s owner and asked him, “Would you know anything about any phone calls Rudy might have received?
 

“Oh yes, he has no phone; I tried to get him to buy a cell phone but he said he didn’t have the money. So he used our phone to make and receive his calls. He usually spoke to his girlfriend, and sometimes to his father.”

Jim asked, “How did you know who it was?”

 
Again the man looked strangely at Jim and paused before he spoke.

“I always answered the phone and got used to hearing their voices. Also, I couldn’t help overhearing his conversations with them. It became obvious who he was taking to and often what it was about.”

Fred asked, “Did anyone else call Rudy recently?”

“Yes officer, he did,” the man said, as he pointed to Jim.
 

Chapter 24

It turned out that Jim had a similar voice to Rudy’s mysterious caller. The elderly man confessed that with his new hearing aid, a lot of male voices had started to sound similar. The man provided Fred with Rudy’s father’s phone number and address. He was located in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, which Fred noticed was coincidentally the same area in which Donna’s mother had resided.