Topped Chef(70)
“Good morning to you, too,” Eric said when I finally drew a breath. “Let me stagger out to the kitchen and grab a cup of coffee and then you can pelt me with your questions.”
While he made his coffee, I explained again how I’d gone to talk to Derek, and how Elsa had said she saw someone who looked like Derek arguing with Turtle yesterday. But Derek claimed he knew nothing about it. “How could I tell if he was lying?”
“This is police business,” he said. “Did you tell the cops about Elsa and Derek?”
“I’m planning to call Officer Torrence when I hang up with you. But the more details I give him, the better the chance he’ll follow up, right?”
Eric groaned and slurped his coffee. “Probably he wouldn’t make eye contact with you if he was telling a lie. Though if he’s a practiced liar, that might not be true. Or you might notice excess eye movement,” he suggested. “A lot of blinking, drawing eyebrows together, that sort of thing.”
I sighed. “That pretty much describes him all the time. Any conversation with me, he behaves like he wishes he were somewhere else—anywhere else. I guess you don’t land a job washing boats at the crack of dawn because you love working with people.”
Eric laughed. “What did he say when you asked him about Turtle? Did he act defensive? Was his body language stiff?”
“He’s always stiff,” I said. “He mentioned thinking Turtle brought the beating on himself. And something about hoping the person who attacked him didn’t go back to finish the job.” I heard Eric’s dog yip in the background.
“Dog’s got a lizard—I better go. Last question: Would Derek have shared his theories with the cops?” Eric asked. “Because if he didn’t, you should.”
“I will,” I said. “I promise. Now that I’ve got Turtle’s real name, I’m going to drop in on him at the hospital—see if I can do anything for him. Lord knows he doesn’t have any family on this island. And maybe not anywhere.”
* * *
I took a quick shower and drove up Route One, off Key West to the next pearl in our little string of islands, Stock Island. Though with its landfill and marine industry and trailer parks and homeless shelter, this one more resembled a misshapen freshwater pearl than a perfect white orb. Turning left before I hit the golf course, I imagined that Turtle might have taken this route many times to get to the overnight homeless shelter. Except he’d have been on foot. Every night around six o’clock, a stream of folks seeking a place to spend the night shuffled or pedaled along Route One to the Stock Island shelter.
I pulled into the parking lot of the pink and blue stucco medical center, trying to press back the unpleasant memories of my recent outpatient visit and then a visit to Miss Gloria after she’d been attacked by a would-be killer. As I approached the building, the glass entry doors slid open, releasing a blast of refrigerated, disinfected air. At the information desk, I explained to a white-haired woman in a blue jacket that I wished to see Mr. John Sampson.
She flashed through several computer screens, and then glanced up and squinted through thick lenses. “Name, please?”
“Hayley Snow,” I told her, thinking they must have upgraded their system to print out personalized visitor badges.
She tapped my name into her computer.
“I’m sorry. Mr. Sampson cannot have visitors right now,” she said.
“But you see, I’m his friend and I’m worried. I’m the one who found him yesterday and called the police.”
She slid her glasses down her nose and peered over them. “It says here, ‘no visitors.’”
“Then why did you take my name?” I couldn’t help asking, feeling frustrated and disappointed.
“I’m not at liberty to discuss this,” she said firmly, gripping her computer desk with both hands.
Clearly I wasn’t going to get anything more from her. I retreated from the reception area and took a seat on a hard plastic chair that had been bolted to the floor. Derek’s voice rang in my head: “Hope they find who did it before they finish what they started.”
So I texted Torrence, telling him that I was at the hospital, had hoped to visit Turtle, and had some other information that might have bearing on the murder. As I stood to leave, I spotted a small woman signing papers at the insurance desk and recognized her as the traveling companion of the woman who had taken ill at the Mallory Square taste-off. I hurried across the room to greet her.
“How are you? And how’s your friend doing?” I patted her back and told her my name. “I was one of the judges at the cooking demonstration. I’ve been thinking about you ever since. Is your friend okay?”