Going Through the Notions(93)

I didn’t see any sign of Betty, and I didn’t ask if she’d been to see him.

He grabbed my hand and squeezed it. “Thanks for sticking by me, kid. I know I was out of it for a while. At least that’s what they tell me. But you always believed in me. I remember that part, and I’ll never forget it.”

“Sometimes a good friendship is like a good marriage,” I said. Sometimes more enduring. I’d come so close to losing him—either to a murder conviction or a meningioma.

My eyes welled up and I plucked a couple of tissues out of the box on his bedside table. “Jeez, my allergies are so bad today.” Although in a climate-controlled hospital, who was I kidding?

Angus leaned back against the starched white pillows with a sigh. “I’m going to be in physical rehab for a couple of weeks. They tell me I’ll be real tired for a while when I go home and not allowed to lift anything heavy. Might be a couple of months until I’m fully recovered. Sounds like Patsy’s been doing a good job. We’re thinking about hiring her part-time to help out. What do you think?”

I smiled at him. “I think that’s a great idea. She seems to have a knack for this business. And more importantly, the passion.”

“Even when I’m back on my feet, I don’t want to work all the time like I did before. I want to enjoy what’s left of my life. The doctor said the five-year survival rate is pretty good for the type of tumor I had.”

I blinked rapidly. I wasn’t going to cry. But thinking about the rest of his life in terms of a handful of years? I was determined to make the most of every minute with him in the future. I’d never complain about getting up early to go picking again.

His eyes misted over, too. “The doctor said I can expect to go through all kinds of emotions in my recovery.” He blew his nose loudly. “And I still wanna know who killed my friend Jimmy. I know he wasn’t perfect, Daisy, but he didn’t deserve to die.”

I wanted to tell him about Jimmy’s abuse of his wife, and the gambling, but in the unforgiving light from the fluorescent bar over the bed, Angus still looked fragile, so I kept quiet.

A comfortably plump nurse came in with a tray full of pills and a syringe.

Angus groaned. “Here’s Ms. Misery. Probably here to stick more needles up my ass.”

“Now, now, Mr. Backstead,” she said in a thick Jamaican accent as she grinned at me. “Try to be a good patient.”

I slipped out of the chair. “I’ll leave you to it.”

“See you. Love you, Brat.”

“Love you more.”

In the hospital parking lot, the Subaru hesitated before it started, and then sputtered out again. I pumped the gas and turned the key, holding my breath until it fired up. I raced the engine, kept one foot on the brake, and quickly threw the car into drive.

Once I was back out on the main road, I called Joe to tell him I had a couple of errands to run before I came home. There was one last piece of the puzzle to slot into place before I could truly let this whole thing go. Joe wouldn’t be pleased if he ever found out, but it was something I had to do.

Hey, perhaps I could star in a new reality show on TV, I thought as I turned off Sheepville Pike onto Forty Acre Road. Ex-Schoolteachers Behaving Badly.

Fiona’s driver was loading luggage into the trunk of the Mercedes roadster as I pulled onto the graveled driveway of the Four Foxes. Just in the nick of time.

I got out of the car and was about to ask him where she was when I heard a rhythmic clatter and Fiona appeared at the brick archway, the wheels of her rolling suitcase bumping over the flagstones on the patio.

“Daisy! What are you doing here? Any news about the pens?”

“Not exactly. I do have something for you, though, but you must promise me you’ll never tell anyone where you got it.”

“How intriguing.” She handed the suitcase to the driver. “Do I need some kind of code word? Like Rosebud?”

I rolled my eyes. Again. “Just promise, okay?”

“Yes, yes.” Fiona waved her arms impatiently.

I dug into the recesses of my pocketbook and handed over the precious Parker Duofold Lucky Curve pen.

“Oh my God. Is this what I think it is?” She grabbed the pen and held it up to the light.

“Yes.” My smile was so big it stretched the skin on my face.

Suddenly Fiona’s eyes narrowed. “How much do you want for it? Where’s the rest of them?”

The driver moved closer.

“Oh, no, Fiona, you’ve got it all wrong,” I said hurriedly. “I found this at the Kratzes’ farm when I was looking around on my own. I think the killer dropped it when he was fleeing the crime scene.”