Chapter 7
When Jessica spotted Sheriff Metzger approaching them, she let of Seth's arm, which irritated him. The wonderful stroll he and Jessica had shared had been the highlight of his day, and he hated to see it come to an end so quickly.
"Hello there, Sheriff!" Jessica greeted in her cheery voice.
"Mrs. F," he greeted back and nodded towards Seth, "Doc."
"Sheriff," Seth acknowledged, "I see your timing is as impeccable as always!"
"Not sure what that means," Mort cautiously said, "but I'm sure I don't care what that means!"
Seth grunted as Mort turned to Jessica.
"I'm glad I caught up with you, Mrs. F," Mort said.
"Oh?"
"You'll be glad to hear that this morning, I arrested a suspect in the killing of Zachariah Henshaw!" he proudly announced.
Jessica looked unsure,"So soon, Sheriff?"
"Yep," Mort triumphantly rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet, "and I couldn't have done it without your earlier help."
"Is that so?" Seth gave Jessica a questioning 'look', "I find that hard to believe, being that Jess just finished telling me that her input was very minimal, due to the time she must spend with the new book she is struggling with!"
Jessica tried to poo-pahed that idea, "Welllll, Seth, I have been extremely busy with my book, but the sheriff here just needed a sounding board, " she then politely turned to Mort, "Please continue, Sheriff."
"Being that the explanation is quite involved, what with arresting the suspect and all," Mort suggested, "why don't we head over to my office so I can tell all? Now that I have the guilty party locked up, the case is practically closing by itself!"
Seth rolled his eyes, but Jessica looked intrigued.
"I am curious to take a peek at your suspect, Mort," she said agreeably.
So there goes the rest of my mornin', Seth sourly thought, as he walked in tandem with Mort and Jessica.
#
The Sheriff's Office, from the outside, looked like a makeshift wooden shanty. The interior, however, looked official, with a counter, two working desks and wall to wall paper-filled bulletin boards.
Mort sat at his desk while Seth and Jessica sat across from him.
"We'll hear what you have to say," Seth said in a doubtful tone, "but I have a feeling you may not have arrested the right person, Sheriff."
"Really now?" Mort huffed, "so if you're so sure I'm already wrong, then why would you want to hear what I have to say?"
"Because this is me!" Seth claimed, "professional and cooperative!"
Jessica did her best to hide her smile as she steered Mort back on topic.
"Mort, please tell us how you found your suspect," she said, tilting her head with interest.
Mort turned his attention to Jessica, "Oh yeah, that. After some research and deductions, I found that in the two months before Mr. Henshaw opened his post office box, he was hired by 30 different clients for electrical work. 18 of those homes had the owner watching Henshaw the entire time as he worked, so he wouldn't have time to look for blackmailing evidence. That leaves 12 homes. Of those, 8 homes had him working in the bathroom, which is rarely the designated room to hide incriminating information. So that leaves a possibility of 4 homes where he might have access to living rooms, bedrooms, or home office, possible places were he might be able to find compromising evidence."
"That makes perfect sense, Mort," Jessica stated as Mort looked pleased as punch.
"Not bad," Seth admitted, "So you've narrowed it down to four suspects. How did you narrow it down further? Asked the group if one of them had poisoned an electrician in order to keep a secret, and one of 'em raised his hand?"
"Seth!" Jessica lightly berated him, "I think the sheriff is doing a fine job!"
But Seth was not happy how his afternoon turned out.
"If you mean," Seth stated stubbornly, "that Metzger did a fine job of going over the entire murder procedure with you once again, I'm inclined to agree!"
"Hey, Doc, it's a free country, and the door is right behind you," Mort reminded him, pointing to the exit.
Jessica politely interrupted, "Sheriff? We were discussing you narrowing down the list of suspects?"
Both Seth and Mort had the sense to look guilty.
"Oh yeah, I was; sorry, Mrs. F," Mort apologized, "Anyway, as far as finding the suspect, I found out that one of the homes Henshaw had done electrical work on was in the neighboring town of Harbor City."
From his file, Mort took out a photo and showed them a house, "it belongs to a Jim Murphy, the guy I have in jail now. He's a hospital technician, which would mean he has knowledge of poisons."
"That's it?" Seth sounded unconvinced, "And you made an arrest based on that?"
"Of course not!" Mort exclaimed. He then showed them several close up photos of all angles of Murphy's front and side yard while pointing at some flowered plants, "According to his neighbor, Mr. Murphy is quite a gardener, and these blue plants here? They're called larkspur."
"Larkspur," Jessica repeated under her breath, "you know, I had done research of that plant for one of my books. Although it is a lovely flowering plant in appearance, the plant actually is made up of poisonous leaves and seeds, isn't that right?"
"Ayuh," confirmed Seth, "Larkspur contains atropine. By boiling down the seeds and leaves, a person can produce enough poison to kill a person topically. After ingestion, the victim will experience nausea, vomiting and the slowing of the heartbeat and in six hours, the plant becomes lethal."
"Exactly!" Mort beamed, "so Murphy was in possession of a poisonous plant!" he now smugly asked Seth, "NOW who's in the wrong?"
Jessica carefully studied the pictures of Jim Murphy's home and yard. She did not look happy when she looked back at Mort.
"Actually, Mort, after observing these pictures of Mr. Murphy's residence, I have to say..." Jessica tried to be as diplomatic as possible, "...I'm not totally convinced that Mr. Murphy is your suspect."
"A-HA!" Seth looked pleased.
Mort's face fell, "Really, Mrs. F? I've arrested the wrong guy again?"
"I'm afraid so, Sheriff, " she ruefully stated, as she handed the pictures back to Mort , "and I think the pictures here will bear out that fact!"
TBC
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