Murphy's smile was grim. "Since he drove me, he said he couldn't go home till I did. I think he's just here for the food."
Timmie laughed. "Hell, I'm just here for the food."
A tidy little family of four in Lord and Taylor's best paused a moment to press cheeks and murmur something trivial about Jason's life and death before moving on. Timmie sighed and leaned against the wall. "So, what's been happening on the investigation front?"
Murphy sipped his water as if it were a couple of fingers of neat scotch. "You already have a homicide officer attending your ex-husband's funeral. Don't you think you might want to put this off for a while?"
"It gives me purpose, Murphy."
"It's gonna give you a homicide file of your own, if you're not careful. Word's out around the hospital who's been making waves, which means Micklind's right. You're asking to be target du jour, and Walter and I can only watch you so much."
She grinned at him, wanting very much for him to ease the pressure. "Worried about me, Murphy?"
"You bet." He looked away. "Nobody else in this state's even let me suggest meaningless sex."
Timmie was stunned by Murphy's reaction. No one else noticed because Murphy responded in millimeters. But Timmie saw the flash of anger that had escaped into those lazy eyes. She heard the hitch in his easy answer. She wanted him to be funny for her. Not to be afraid for her.
"Humor me, Murph," she all but begged, and he regained control.
"That guy who looks like Truman Capote and sounds like Father Guido Sarducci..." he offered.
She nodded. "Conrad."
Murphy nodded back. "Finished the post on your ex. Said there wasn't anything to see except the gunshot wound, which means he didn't put up a fight, and alcohol both in his bloodstream and stomach, which means he'd probably had something to drink at your house and then been capped."
"My house?" she echoed. "There isn't any alcohol in my house."
But there had been. Mattie had found it at the back of her cabinet, where Timmie could have sworn it couldn't have been.
"Alcohol," she mused, thinking of another death. One in which the victim had been anesthetized. "Much?"
"Probably one to two drinks."
"Which isn't even enough for Jason to notice," Timmie mused, rotating her glass so that the ice clinked. "If you were trying to get somebody in a position to inflict a close-range gunshot wound to the head, how would you hold him still?"
Unfortunately, more than one person heard. Timmie just smiled politely and lowered her voice. "How about a Mickey Finn?"
Murphy turned her way. "Chloral hydrate and alcohol? It'd certainly work. The question still is, who did it?"
"I don't know. Somebody not given to violence, I think."
Murphy squinted at her. "Why say that?"
"Because all the murders have been committed at a polite distance. As if the perpetrator couldn't stand the idea of seeing the victim in pain, or didn't want to be close enough to bear responsibility."
"You don't think a close-range gunshot wound is close enough?"
Timmie shook her head. "Not if he's unconscious. That seriously lowers the personal contact factor."
"Like shoving drugs in the line of a snoozing patient."
"Almost exactly."
"Which would certainly cover your crowd at the hospital."
"Access, method, and motive aplenty." Timmie sighed. "I think I was right. It's everybody."
They thought about it for a moment as a couple lighted next to them long enough to commiserate and comment on Jason's pretty daughter.
"Well," Murphy said, watching them go, "we know that the only person Davies offered to kill was your father."
Timmie leaned back against the wall, rubbed her eyes. Slugged down some water. "Have they questioned him?"
"Who, Davies? Oh, yeah. Micklind says he admitted to making the offer to you, but he swears he wouldn't have been able to go through with it. And he swears that was his only involvement. Says he got the idea from hearing Mr. Cleveland rant about his father."
"Uh-huh."
"They also got the fingerprints off Alice Hampton's vial. Her nurse's, just like you said. The old gal died of a massive digitoxin overdose, also like you said." He sipped a second, watched the crowd.
Timmie opened her eyes again, hopeful. "And the floor nurse said Davies was there around the time we think the medication was switched. I'm telling you, he's looking better and better."
"Is there any reason it couldn't be more than one murderer, just like we thought?" Murphy asked. "Maybe Mary Jane's helping out. She and Davies. Or she and Raymond. After all, Mr. Cleveland couldn't swear the other caller was a man."
"Or Mary Jane and Alex and Davies and all the floor nurses. Or all the floor nurses and Ellen and Cindy and me, because the three of us have been up there, too. Gladys said that the same nurse didn't take care of all the patients who died, so maybe we were working in shifts."
"Could it be?" he asked.
Timmie wanted to laugh. She didn't quite make it. "I don't know," she said. "I don't know anything anymore."
Except for one thing. Just as much as Murphy had wanted Alex to be responsible, Timmie wanted it to be Davies. Davies, whom she didn't know. Who couldn't disappoint her or hurt her by being selfish and shortsighted and cowardly. Davies, who could kill anybody in town he wanted without making it a personal thing.
"There's something else to consider," Murphy said. "I can see Victor being killed to keep him quiet. I can see Jason being a warning or a mistake. But what about the other murder?"
The fact that it took Timmie so long to make the obvious connection betrayed just how badly Jason's murder had affected her. The fact that she'd been progressively forgetting it over the last couple of weeks betrayed how bizarre this whole deal had gotten.
Timmie had to follow Murphy's line of sight to where Ellen was saying her good-byes to her hosts to remember what had gotten her involved in the first place.
"Oh, God," she murmured, her stomach sliding. "I completely forgot."
Murphy nodded. "Why kill Billy?"
For a moment, the two of them couldn't seem to do much more than stare. "Could that have scared Ellen enough to keep her mouth shut?" Murphy finally asked.
"You mean, was it a message to her?" Timmie shook her head. "It's another one of those perception problems. I'm the only one in the known universe who thinks Billy Mayfield was murdered. And if it was to scare Ellen, don't you think she might have said something when she finally told us she'd been calling you? And if Billy was a present for keeping her mouth shut, why open it?"
"She only opened it surreptitiously. And don't forget, Cindy claims she was the one who called."
Timmie sighed. "Cindy would take credit for the invention of CPR if she could figure out how. No, I think I'd like to talk to Ellen before she leaves."
Murphy followed her across to where Cindy was helping Ellen pull on her coat.
"Ellen," Timmie greeted her friend. "I need to ask you an important question."
One sleeve still only half on, Ellen stopped dead. "Of course, honey. What is it?"
"Has anybody threatened you to keep your mouth shut about Restcrest?"
Ellen didn't so much as blink. "No, they haven't. I have to admit I've been living in mortal fear, waiting for somebody to figure out what I was doing. But nobody did."