“You’ve known him for a long time?”

  “Long enough,” Matthew said.

  We leapt to our feet when the door swung open. The doctor who was a guest at Haggerman’s came through. He gave me a tight smile, and I began to introduce him to Matthew.

  “Doctor . . . uh . . . ? I’m sorry.”

  “Fife. Ben Fife.” The men shook hands.

  “How’s it look?” Matthew asked.

  “Not good, I’m sorry to say. But I’m a pediatrician, not an emergency room physician. All I can say is they’re working hard back there. A nurse called me a cab. I’m heading back to the hotel. Can I give you a lift, Mrs. Grady?”

  “Thank you, but no. I’ll stay awhile. Thank you so much for your help.”

  “Good night.”

  Ben Fife left. Matthew and I exchanged a look as we resumed our seats. I flipped idly through the magazine. He lit a cigarette.

  “How much of this movie’s finished?” I asked.

  “You mean if Elias has to . . . uh . . . take some sick time? Not much. The scenes in the Catskills are the first to be filmed with the principal actors. Bringing the entire crew and most of the stars on location for two weeks is an expensive endeavor. I don’t want to see it go to waste. Outdoor filming is tricky, and I hate it. You’re dependent on the weather, on keeping the sun in the same spot for the same scene, even if filming has to be over several days.”

  The doors to the rest of the hospital opened again and Dave Dawson, newly appointed chief of police of Summervale, came in. The redness in his eyes, the stubble on his chin, the rumpled untucked shirt, and the wrinkles on his pants told me he’d been roused from his bed.

  “Mrs. Grady,” he said.

  “Deputy. I mean Chief. I haven’t had the chance to congratulate you on your new position.”

  “Thanks,” he said.

  When I’d first met Dave Dawson I thought him slow, lazy, and largely uninterested in doing his job. I’d been wrong, and he’d proved himself. I was pleased his work had been rewarded. “What brings you here? I didn’t hear anyone else being brought in tonight.”

  “Guy took ill at Haggerman’s?”

  “Yes, but he had a heart attack.”

  “Did the doctor tell you that?”

  “No, but . . .”

  “That’s what we thought,” Matthew said. “Are you saying he didn’t?”

  The double doors swung open, and a man in scrubs, a mask draped around his neck, came through. A nurse, her white uniform so highly starched it probably stood up in her closet all by itself, followed. Their faces were impassive, but something about the stiffness of those expressions told me the news was not good.

  “I’m Dr. Higgins. Are you family of Mr. . . . ?”

  “No,” Matthew said. “I’m a longtime acquaintance and business associate of Mr. Theropodous. We’re here on business, and he has no family in New York State.”

  The doctor glanced at me.

  “Manager of the hotel where he took ill.”

  “Doc?” Chief Dawson said.

  “I’m sorry, but Mr. Theropodous died a few minutes ago.”

  Matthew shook his head.

  I barely knew the man. What I did know I didn’t like, but still I felt a wave of sadness flow over me. I dropped into a chair. It would be up to me to tell Gloria. Tonight, she’d alternately chatted happily and fondly with him and been furious at him. They had a complicated relationship, but I suppose that was natural enough for a divorced couple who worked together on occasion. It wouldn’t be easy to break the news.

  “I called the police.” Dr. Higgins nodded at Dave Dawson. “Because I believe the gentlemen died as a direct result of something he consumed this afternoon or this evening.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “You’re the manager at the hotel where he’s staying?”

  “Not staying, no, but he had dinner with us.”

  The doctor turned to Chief Dawson. “I suggest you close the kitchens at this lady’s hotel and the one where he was staying if he ate anything there today.”

  Chapter 7

  People come to the Catskills for the fresh mountain air, to fish and to swim and to hike, to let their children play in a way they never can in the streets of the city. They come to snag a husband for themselves or for a daughter in danger of being left on the shelf. They come looking for a wife for life or a girlfriend for a weekend. They come to reunite with distant relatives, childhood friends, or army buddies. They come because their grandparents started coming before the first war. They come to see comedy and singing stars, and the next big thing.

  A great many come for the food.

  If Haggerman’s kitchens were closed, no matter for how long, we’d be finished.

  It wasn’t easy, but I managed to talk Dave Dawson out of shutting us down. For now.

  I pointed out that not one other person had come into this hospital tonight with suspected food poisoning. I mentioned that Haggerman’s had a substantial number of elderly guests. I told him Elias had eaten from the same food prepared for everyone and his drinks had come from the public bar. Yet no one else had taken ill.

  “Might have gone to a different hospital,” he said.

  “Why on earth would anyone go farther away, when this hospital’s perfectly good, and”—I waved my arms around— “nearly empty tonight? Call the ambulance services, call the other hospitals. Ask them.”

  “I will, Mrs. Grady. I will. But first, a moment, Doctor?”

  The chief of police and the doctor went to a corner, where they talked in low voices. I considered edging closer to try to listen in, but one sharp stare from the steely eyes of the nurse had me reconsidering my plan. “I should call Richard Kennelwood,” I said to Matthew. “He needs to know that his kitchens might be under suspicion also.”

  “Okay,” Matthew said. “You do that. Then I’ll call LA. The people financing this picture need to be told what’s happening.”

  “Picture?” The nurse perked up. “You’re in the movies?”

  “Yeah. Believe me, sweetheart, sometimes I wish I wasn’t. Most of the time I wish I wasn’t.”

  “Where can I find a phone?” I asked her.

  “A pay phone is by the emergency entrance. You passed it when you came in.”

  “I need to talk to the doctor about . . . arrangements,” Matthew said. “Then we’ll get Freemont to drive us back.”

  “Are you going to break the news to the others?” I asked.

  “I’ll have to. Mary-Alice will need to know tonight, but other than her, I want to do it once and once only. They all breakfast at different times, and some eat in their rooms. The crew and minor actors are staying at other hotels. I’ll talk to them all at eight when they show up for tomorrow . . . today’s filming.”

  “Gloria?”

  “She’s at your mother’s house, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you be willing to tell Gloria? She should hear privately.”

  “Sure.”

  “Go and make your phone call.”

  I turned to leave. Then I turned back. I patted the tiny beaded evening bag looped over my arm. “Sorry, I don’t have any money. I never carry money around the property.”

  He dug in his pocket and handed me a fistful of coins without counting them.

  I found the phone and asked the operator to connect me to Kennelwood Hotel. She told me how much the call would cost, and I put coins into the slot. The coins dropped, lines clicked, and I was connected. I told the Kennelwood switchboard I needed to speak to Richard Kennelwood on a matter of urgency, and she said, “One moment, please. I’ll try his home.”

  I waited. Static came down the line, but nothing else. “No one is answering,” the voice said at last. “Shall I try Mr. Jerome Kennelwood?”

  I hesitated. Richard’s father was not a friend of ours. When Olivia and I first arrived to take over Haggerman’s he’d bad-mouthed us throughout the entire Catskills hotel community as well as to the booking agencies. I’d recently had occasion to tell Jerome Kennelwood what I thought of him. In retrospect that might have been a mistake. I didn’t think he’d handle it well if it was me who told him the police might order his kitchens closed.

  “Is Mr. Kennelwood Jr. possibly in the bar?”

  “I can try, but he might be anywhere. At this time of night, we can’t summon him via the loudspeakers. He might not even be on the property. Perhaps you could leave a message and I’ll find a page to attempt to deliver it?”

  “Ask him to call Elizabeth Grady at Haggerman’s, never mind the time. It’s”—I checked my watch—“two fifteen now. I’ll be home in about twenty minutes.”

  Back in the waiting room, the doctor had left, and Dave Dawson was talking to Matthew. Matthew was telling him what Elias had been doing in the Catskills.

  “Phone’s free,” I said to Matthew. I turned to Dave. “What makes the doctor think Elias was poisoned? He was in his sixties, and not exactly a calm, relaxed man. He had a heck of a lot to drink tonight, not to mention a large, rich dinner. He had a heart attack.”

  “They pumped his stomach, but they were too late. The doctor’s going to send the stomach contents for analysis,” Dave said.

  My own stomach lurched. “They can do that?”

  “Oh, yes. The doc’s not swearing on the Bible the guy died of something he ate, but he said the signs are all there.”

  I didn’t ask what those signs were.

  “You yourself told him the guy threw up before he passed out.”

  “Yes, but . . . I thought he was drunk.”

  “They get a lot of food poisoning cases in this hospital. Kids, and adults, from the city who pick and eat berries and mushrooms without knowing what they are. Food left behind at the bungalow colonies, and the next lot happy to have the free grub without checking it out. Even some of the better hotels sometimes get in a bad lot of beef or the milk goes off.”

  “We didn’t—”

  Dave lifted his hand. “What you said made sense, Mrs. Grady. No one else has come in tonight with suspected food poisoning, and the doctor has his nurse calling the hospitals around here. In the morning if we start hearing about people having problems, I’ll shut you down faster than you can blink. Some people react worse to that sort of thing than others, and a lot don’t go to the hospital, thinking it’ll pass, but you’re right that plenty of elderly people and little kids are staying at your place. So, for now . . .”

  “Thank you, Chief Dawson.”

  “If you’re right, and no one else got sick tonight, and if the doctor’s right that Mr. . . . uh . . . the gentlemen was poisoned, then I have to ask how that happened.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He was unlikely to have gone for a walk in the woods and picked a mess of toadstools, right?”

  “Right.”

  “He didn’t dig around under the kitchen sink and find a bottle of rat poison and decide it looked tasty, and the doc says he didn’t look like the sort of guy who cooks his own meals and tries to cut corners to save a few pennies.”

  “He definitely was not that. Are you saying you think he deliberately ate something bad for him? Why would he do that?”

  “I have to consider that someone fed it to him.”

  “You mean . . . ?”

  “He was murdered.”

  I dropped into a chair.

  “I’m still looking to hire a deputy, and my officers are swamped with the season in full swing. I can’t handle this by myself, so I’m going to have to call in the state police.”

  “Because they did such a fine job last time,” I said.

  He tried, and failed, to hide a grin. “We won’t hold that against them. It’s late and you must be tired, but before you go can you tell me what was going on tonight. That other guy, Mr. Oswald, explained about the movie crew and the private dinner. He said after dinner the group went to the ballroom. Is that correct?”

  “Yes. I was a guest at the dinner myself, and I went to the ballroom with them.”

  “Was the food put on individual plates in the kitchen or brought out on serving platters for everyone to serve themselves?”

  “It was dished up in the kitchen and the plates brought to the table by waiters. Two choices were offered for each course, no special orders. I can’t see any of my cooks or waiters taking the opportunity to poison a guest.”

  “Never assume, Mrs. Grady.”

  “I’m no older than you, Chief Dawson. You can call me Elizabeth.”

  “Might as well. I’m still Dave.”

  “Dave. We had a bar set up next to the private dining room for the exclusive use of that group before and during their dinner. After dinner, Elias and his group joined the guests in the ballroom, where they were served from the main bar and helped themselves to the dessert buffet.” I tried to remember who had been where when. “Before dinner we mingled in the reception room, and after dinner they were popping up and down all night, visiting tables, having visitors to their table. Some of them ordered drinks from a waiter, and some went to the bar themselves. About the only—” I sucked in a breath.

  “The only?”

  “Elias’s secretary fetched his drinks for him. I can’t say they were the only drinks he had, but she did spend a good part of the evening getting him drinks. As has been said, he drank a heck of a lot.”

  “What’s this secretary’s name?”

  “Mary-Alice Renzetti.”

  Dave scribbled something in his notebook.

  “You don’t think . . . ?” I began.

  “I don’t think anything. Not yet.”

  “There’s going to be a heck of a lot of unhappy people in LA tonight.” Matthew came into the waiting room. “And one or two who are going to be absolutely delighted.”

  “What does that mean?” Dave asked.

  “Elias had his enemies. Powerful men do.”

  “You think one of these enemies might have followed him here?”

  Matthew shook his head. “I haven’t seen anyone I recognized since we got here, other than Olivia Peters. Not anyone who isn’t part of the shoot. Ready to go, Elizabeth? I’ll drop you off on the way to Kennelwood.”

  I looked at the chief of police.

  “You can go now,” he said. “I have more questions for the doctor. I’ll be at the hotel first thing tomorrow. You said this guy and his group are staying at Kennelwood?”

  “Elias was, and some of the lead actors as well as me,” Matthew said, “but not all the film crew. Everyone’s been told to be at Haggerman’s at eight to start the day’s filming. I’m planning to break the news then.”

  “I’ll be there,” Dave said.

  Matthew and I walked away. “Freemont,” I said. “Has anyone told Mr. Freemont?”

  “I didn’t. I can’t imagine a nurse went out to the car to tell him.”

  “He said he’s been with Elias for twenty years.”

  “Yeah. Tough. Which makes me think. Can we go to Kennelwood first and then I’ll have Freemont take you home? I’d like you to be with me when I break the news to Mary-Alice.”

  “Why? I don’t know her.”

  “The woman’s touch. It’ll help, I think, if a woman’s there.”

  I couldn’t see why, and I was about to say so, but I changed my mind. Mary-Alice had been hovering around Elias most of the night. If anyone saw someone trying to poison Elias, it would have been her. If anyone had poisoned Elias, the most likely person was her.

  * * *

  * * *

  I stood silently in the deep shadows of the warm night as Matthew told Freemont that his employer had died. At first, I thought Freemont hadn’t understood, but then I realized he was simply stunned. The parking lot of the hospital was mostly empty. A rapidly flickering light mounted high on a pole lit up the area around the Skylark. The chauffeur had been standing beside the car enjoying a smoke when we walked up, and Matthew spoke quietly to him.

  “Dead,” Freemont said at last. “I figured that man would live forever.”

  “No one lives forever,” Matthew said.

  “The police will want to talk to you,” I said.

  Freemont threw me a frightened look. “Why?”

  “The police are . . . not entirely sure it was natural causes. They’ll be wanting to know if Mr. Theropodous had any enemies.”

  “I don’t know nothing ’bout anything like that.”

  “I’m sure you don’t,” Matthew said. “Come on, let’s go. We’re going to Kennelwood first, and then you can take Mrs. Grady to Haggerman’s.”

  “I’ll find my own way back,” I said. “It’s been a long day for everyone, and I don’t want to bother Mr. Freemont any further.”

  “No bother, ma’am.”

  “Nevertheless, I’ll find my own way home.” I’d worry about how later. Freemont and his employer might not have been close, as in friends or even confidants, but they’d been together for many years. Freemont needed time to process the news.

  He gave me a slight bow and held the door for me. I was about to get in when the screech of brakes had me turning around. A car, going far too fast, pulled up to the emergency entrance, and a short chubby man leapt out. For a moment I thought it was someone needing help, and I started to wish him well. He turned his head as he reached the doors, and the light above shone on his round face. Martin McEnery, a reporter with the Summervale Gazette.

  My good wishes died. I had no doubt what had summoned him here in the middle of the night, and I feared it would do the reputation of Haggerman’s no good.

  “Ma’am?” Freemont said, and I slipped into the car with a mumbled apology.

  Goodness but this car was comfortable, and immaculate. The Skylark was polished to a shine so bright it reflected the moonlight, and inside there was not a speck of dust on the seats or mud on the floor or streak on the windows. I settled myself into the luxurious seat and wiggled happily. Matthew got in beside me.