The Second Mouse - Archer Mayor [73]
“He ever kill anyone?” Sam asked.
Johnny pointed his chin at the screen. “You won’t find it in there, but there’re some serious thoughts along those lines. Over in New York, they’re pretty sure he did a couple of people at least, but nothing was proved. Among other things, witnesses dried up. Wonder why?”
Willy had been rapidly scanning narrative after narrative on the computer, familiarizing himself with the cops’-eye view of this new interest. From what he was learning, Mel Martin was his kind of bad guy.
He finally swiveled around in his chair and looked up at his partner.
“I like him,” he said.
Chapter 15
Doris Doyle looked up smiling, her pleasure fighting clear of the pain and dullness that cancer and medications had made of her life.
“Ellis. Nancy. What a surprise. I didn’t know you were coming.” She touched her temple. “Oh, Lord, I bet I forgot. I’m so sor—”
“Mom, Mom,” Ellis quieted her, kissing her hollow cheek. “It was just something we decided. Spur of the moment. You didn’t forget anything.”
Nancy followed suit, placing a small package in her lap. “Got you a little something. Probably against the rules.”
Doris tore at the wrapping and revealed a box of chocolates. She immediately opened it and offered them some. “I love these. You are so nice. I’ll keep them hidden.”
They each dutifully selected a sample before Doris closed the box and tucked it away. They noticed that despite her enthusiasm, she didn’t take one herself. She gave them a conspiratorial and unconvincing wink, adding, “For later.”
“How’ve you been, Mom?” Ellis asked, as he always did, increasingly embarrassed by what he saw as the obligation of exchanged lies.
“Not too bad,” she said as if reading the script. “Sleeping better now that all that radiation nonsense is over. That was a real piece of science fiction.”
At least the room was friendlier. They’d moved her back upstairs among the living. Nothing was covered in plastic, the windows were normal-size, and one, in fact, was even half open to let in the warm summer air. It wasn’t a single. That would have been too much to expect, but for the moment at least, the second bed was unoccupied.
Nancy sat down opposite Ellis’s mother, casting a glance in his direction. He walked over casually to the door, from where he announced, “I’ll let you two talk for a bit. I gotta sort out some paperwork.”
“Is everything all right?” Doris asked, alarmed. “Is it money?”
Both of them laughed. “No, Ma,” Ellis reassured her. “I promise. You know how bureaucratic these places are. It’s like I just told you—junk.”
He stepped out into the hallway, content that with that last comment, at least, he’d actually told the truth.
Nervous before he’d even arrived here, he now found himself feeling the way he did with Mel, hypersensitive to the slightest sounds and motions. He wandered down to the exit sign, struggling to look like any other hallway stroller, and took the stairs to the floor where his mother had been moved for her radiation treatment.
As before, it was quiet and virtually empty. The nurses’ station at the far end showed little activity—someone sitting at a desk, talking on the phone, but that was it aside from a few muffled conversations coming through a door or two. He checked his watch. He had three minutes and thirty seconds.
He left the stairwell and stealthily walked the length of the hall, keeping his eyes on the station ahead. There was only one nurse on—Ann Coleman, the one who had helped him earlier—and her back was turned to him. He made it to the bathroom just shy of her area and quickly ducked inside without being seen.
A very long three minutes later, during which he conjured up every possible setback, he heard Nancy’s voice just outside his door.
“Hi. Nice to see you again. I’m here to see Mrs. Doyle.”
He heard Ann Coleman’s more muted response: “Oh, hi.