Page 38 of Trick of Light
“Mmm…can’t be more than secondhand,” said Chen. “Amelia to Tamara, Tamara to us. Two hands.”
Tamara ignored the back and forth. Surprisingly, her hair was neatly combed out and didn’t contain a single flower petal or bit of moss. Gabby must have done that for her sometime in the night. “That can happen when someone has a terminal illness.”
Everyone went still. Barnaby smirked to himself.
“Are you sure about that?” Detective Hooper sounded skeptical. “How would you know?”
Barnaby bristled. “The autopsy should confirm it, along with her doctors.”
“Autopsy results are still pending. She hadn’t seen her primary physician in five years.” Chen flipped through her notes. “They had a falling out.”
“Amelia was a very difficult patient,” Tamara explained. “I often needed a dose of my own stress relief tea after an appointment.”
“What was her illness? Did she tell you that?”
“She told me that she’d talked to a German doctor over Zoom, and sent him a blood sample. He’d diagnosed her with terminal ovarian cancer. She didn’t want to fight it. That’s what people always say, don’t they? So and so is fighting cancer, or they lost their battle with cancer. She wanted to make peace with it. She said she was ready to go. All she wanted was to feel as well as she could while it happened. I gave her herbs to handle the pain, when it came, something for nausea, and of course the anxiety and depression.”
A hush fell over the room as Tamara told that story in her singsong storytelling manner.
“So you weren’t trying to heal her?” Hooper asked.
“Oh no. She said she was terminally ill and I didn’t disagree.”
“Wasn’t it your job to disagree?” The hostile tone of that question had Barnaby glaring at Hooper.
“Is it?” Tamara looked bewildered by that. “But I didn’t disagree. The signs were consistent. She was dying.”
“So that’s why you said it was a long time coming when she was found dead?” Chen was being much more gentle in her questions. Were they doing a good cop bad cop thing?
“That’s one reason.”
Barnaby braced himself for some mention of a raven or a cloud formation or who knew what other omen. But Tamara left it at that. Of course—she’d had nearly eighty years of dealing with skeptics.
“Here’s a scenario.” Hooper sat back, his Harbortown PD t-shirt straining over his belly. “You knew she was dying anyway, so you hurried it along with a dose of toxic tea. But only after she’d changed her will so you’d inherit her house.”
“But I have a house!” Tamara cried.
“So you can sell Amelia’s and get yourself a nest egg.” Hooper tapped on his pile of notes. “Gotta wonder how you make enough money selling herbs at five bucks a pop.”
“I don’t need much. And Barnaby helps me out from time to time.”
Hooper turned a puzzled gaze on Barnaby. “Now that’s interesting. Why would you do that? Because you’re her champion?”
Although he was needling Barnaby with his questions, Barnaby got the sense he knew there was more to his relationship with Tamara. Was there a record of it somewhere? Or maybe Tamara had let something slip?
“I’m not the one being interrogated here.”
“It’s a simple question. Why wouldn’t you answer?”
Why did Hooper care about that? Was he trying to implicate Barnaby in Amelia’s death as well? “Because it’s irrelevant.”
“Is it? Now that Tamara owns Amelia’s house, she can sell it and become a rich woman. You won’t have to send her money anymore. Seems relevant to me. How about you, Chen?”
Officer Chen had been watching the convo and jotting down notes, while holding back on the wisecracks Barnaby was used to hearing from her.
“No. You’re wrong.” Tamara shook her head, her shock of white hair vivid against her browned face. “Amelia had a lot of debts. She told me all about it. She invested money and kept losing it. I’m quite sure the house sale will have to cover those debts.” When they all looked at her in surprise, she said, “I went over it with Gabby last night. She’s such a smart girl.”
Barnaby felt his teeth clench. Had Tamara spilled all her secrets to Gabby?
