Клэр Донелли - Last Licks

“Nicer than a lot of the eateries in town,” Sunny said.

“A better bar, too,” Ollie muttered, taking in the lunch counter. “I wonder if I could get a beer here.”

An older woman with permed white hair approached them with some menus. “Is this the Barnstable party? I can seat you here over by the window.” She led the way to a table with a splendid view of the gardens. Will parked Ollie’s wheelchair facing the window, and he and Sunny sat down flanking him.

“Elsa wasn’t kidding,” Sunny said. “It looks lovely out there.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ollie griped, already done with small talk. “What kind of progress have you made?”

Sunny was about to protest that they hadn’t had time to do anything yet, but Will jumped in with, “I tracked down Alfred Scatterwell and gave him a call.” This was news to her. “He was definitely not happy to hear that you had doubts about his uncle’s death, but he agreed to speak to us tomorrow morning,” Will reported.

Ollie grunted and turned to Sunny, but she started talking before he could ask any embarrassing questions. “What we really need to hear is what happened this morning. Start from the beginning, and tell us what you saw and heard.”

Before Ollie could start, the permed manageress returned to take their orders. “You’re our first customers of the day,” she said, nodding toward the empty tables around them. “You beat the rush.”

Sunny and Will both ordered the hamburger platter. Their choices arrived quickly, along with Ollie’s lunch. Sunny looked at her boss’s slivers of meat in a reddish sauce. “What is it supposed to be?” she asked, lowering her voice. “Pulled pork?”

“According to the menu I signed off on, it’s turkey tetrazzini.” Ollie unenthusiastically poked at it with his fork. “They give you a lot of choices for each meal, but one always seems to be baked fish. On paper, this looked the least bad.” He raised a forkful to his mouth and began chewing.

“So how is it?” Will arranged the tomato and onion slices on his burger and took a bite.

“Better than yesterday’s Salisbury steak. I guess a lot of the old folks’ teeth probably aren’t up to anything more solid than ground or chopped-up meat. I just wish that they didn’t always seem to have run out of salt in the kitchen.” He watched greedily as Sunny sprinkled salt and pepper on her fries, then dumped a blob of catsup on the side. “I could kill for one of those fries.”

“Are you allowed to have them, though?” Will asked.

Ollie’s expression fell somewhere between annoyed and heartbroken. “They gave me some with the Salisbury steak. Eighteen, to be exact. I counted each one as I ate it.”

Well, the visitors obviously get a more generous portion of French fries. Sunny turned her plate toward Ollie, who reached over to grab a fry—the biggest one, of course—dunked it in the catsup, and then just about inhaled it.

“Well, they don’t stint you on the food,” Will said, not turning his plate to share. “I see green beans, pasta, bread, coffee, milk, and both fruit and Jell-O.”

“Yeah.” Ollie’s eyes followed Will’s burger as he brought it up for another bite. “I’m just a lucky fella.”

“So tell us what happened.” Sunny wanted to get this meeting back on track before Ollie made a grab for her pickle.

“Specifically, why do you think something’s wrong?” Will put in.

“I didn’t want to say it in front of the doctors.” Ollie leaned forward in his wheelchair, his voice low. “They’ll say I was crazy, or dreaming, or blame the pain pills. I’ve been cutting down on them, but I do take one the last thing at night. Makes it easier to sleep.”

“I can understand that,” Will said. “But what did you see?”

“It was more like what I heard.” Ollie shifted uncomfortably in his wheelchair. “Somebody was definitely in the room, with Gardner. I don’t know if what I heard woke me up, or if my eyes just popped open, and that’s why I heard it. But I know I woke up all of a sudden, in the dark, and I heard rustling and low voices over by Gardner’s bed.”

“What were they saying?” Sunny asked.

Ollie shrugged. “I couldn’t make it out. Just a mumble of voices, then a cough—that was Gardner, I think. And then . . .” Ollie groped for a word. “It sounded like someone smacking their lips. I know, that doesn’t make much sense. But at the time I thought, Gardner’s been here awhile and knows everybody. He’s got connections. Maybe somebody’s smuggling in a glass of something for him . He told me once that given the choice, he’d prefer a snifter of brandy to a pain pill. And frankly, I agreed.”

“It certainly might make you cough,” Will said.

“And you might smack your lips afterward,” Sunny added. “But it’s something you wanted, so you could be projecting. Or you might’ve been dreaming.”

“That’s not the kind of thing I usually dream about.” Again, Ollie paused, trying to put his feelings into words. “It felt . . . real.”

I don’t think I want to know what Ollie usually dreams about, Sunny thought, and then found her mocking inner voice chiming in. Says the woman who had a dream about marrying her cat.

“I debated speaking up but decided against it.” Ollie shrugged his heavy shoulders. “I mean, whatever was going on, Gardner was doing it on the sly. I figured if I heard it going on for a couple of nights, I’d ask him about it quietly. Now I wish I’d made a stink—at least found out who was with him.”

“That might not have been the smartest thing,” Will told him. “If it was a killer, what do you think would have happened to you?”

Ollie opened his mouth as if he were about to speak, then shut it with a snap. “I didn’t think of that.”

“So what did you do?” Sunny asked.

“I closed my eyes and must have drifted back to sleep. The next thing I hear, Gardner is moaning. I sat up and got a light on. He tried to talk, but I could barely understand him. Said his face was numb. When he tried to get the beeper for the nurse, he couldn’t handle it. I don’t know if you noticed it, but after his stroke, he was weaker on his left side. Now his right side wasn’t working right, either.”

He shook his head. “I called the nurse, and while I was doing that, Gardner puked. He was choking on the stuff when the nurses arrived. They worked on him, and then Dr. Gavrik charged in. Within a couple of minutes, they were calling for an ambulance. The paramedics came and rushed him off.” Ollie sagged back in his chair. “From what I heard, he was gone before they even got him in the ambulance.”

“And you started raising hell,” Sunny said.

A bit of Ollie’s normal hard edge came back. “I told everyone who’d listen that something was wrong. That Gavrik woman wanted to give me a tranquilizer, but by then I’d already called Frank Nesbit.” He smiled grimly. “Sometimes it’s handy to have the sheriff’s home number.”

Will leaned across the table. “Did you tell him what you heard before Scatterwell’s attack?”

“I didn’t get the chance,” Ollie said. “Dr. Gavrik was all over me, and then they brought in the muckety-muck, Reese. He runs this joint.” He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I was lucky enough to convince Frank through other means.”

Political means, Sunny thought .

“Do you think this is enough for Nesbit to open an official investigation?” Ollie asked.

“I figure he’s already got me—us—on the hook,” Will quickly said, frowning. “According to your agreement, he’s the one who sits in judgment as to whether there’s a case or not.”