Murder, She Wrote: Prescription For Murder Page 12

  “Yes. They give you everything you need to know about navigation, airports, radio frequencies to use, the height of obstacles like radio towers and mountains, all the essentials.”

  “Looks like a lot of gobbledygook to me,” he said.

  “They’re not as confusing as they look once you become familiar with them.”

  “Maritza said that her brother was flying to Key West. Wouldn’t he need them?”

  I checked the date on the chart. “This one is out-of-date,” I said. “I’m sure he has new ones.”

  I refolded the chart and laid it on the table. “Seth, I think it’s time we left, don’t you?”

  “I do,” he agreed, and we turned toward the office door.

  “Wait a minute,” I said, and returned to the table. “I just realized something.”

  “What?”

  “This sectional is for Cuba.”

  “And?”

  “I just wonder why he has a sectional chart for Cuba.”

  “You’ll have to ask him when he gets back,” Seth said, and led us down the hallway to the foyer, where Maritza stood at the front door talking to Dr. Sardina’s wife, Ofelia.

  “I just thought I’d stop in and see how Ivelisse is doing,” Ofelia said.

  “As well as can be expected,” Maritza said. “She’s resting now.”

  “I can wait.” Ofelia walked past Maritza and settled in the living room.

  “Ofelia,” Maritza called after her, “is something wrong?”

  “No, nothing’s wrong. Did they—?”

  Maritza nodded.

  “I miss him already,” Ofelia said.

  “Has your husband gone away?” I asked.

  “Can I get you a cold drink, Ofelia?” Maritza said quickly, and I had the feeling that she wanted to divert the conversation to a different topic.

  “That would be nice,” Ofelia replied.

  When Maritza left the room to get Ofelia her drink, I said to her, “We had a pleasant lunch with your husband. He took us to an Asian buffet restaurant and—”

  “He told me,” Ofelia said.

  I wanted to ask about her husband’s negative view of Vasquez, which I assumed he’d shared with her, but wasn’t sure how to approach the subject. Instead, I said, “There seems to be some concern about Dr. Vasquez’s research and how far he’d gotten with it. I imagine your husband will be asked about that many times in the coming days.”

  “Yes, I suppose he will,” she said. She turned to Seth. “Did Pedro tell you much about the research, Dr. Hazlitt?”

  “Can’t say that he did,” said Seth.

  “But Dr. Vasquez did.”

  Seth thought before answering. “Yes, Al—Dr. Vasquez shared some of his results with me. Your husband was—how shall I say it?—your husband seemed to be disappointed in how little was shared with him.”

  “Oh, that’s not true,” Ofelia said, straightening as though to enhance her denial. “Alvaro always took Pedro into his confidence.”

  “I was mistaken, then,” Seth said.

  “Your husband’s away?” I asked again, this time without Maritza interjecting herself.

  “Just for a day. He’ll be home soon.”

  “Business?”

  “Ah, yes. He’s on business.”

  “Having to do with the research?” I managed to ask before Maritza reappeared carrying a tall glass of what looked like lemonade.

  “Oh, thank you so much,” Ofelia said, taking the glass and sipping the drink. “This tastes like fresh lemons. I forget how good it can be with fresh lemons.”

  “I always use fresh lemons,” Maritza said, taking a seat next to the other woman.

  “We should be going,” Seth said, taking my arm. “Please contact us at the hotel if there’s anything we can do.”

  We got in the yellow rental car and pulled away.

  “What do you think?” Seth asked.

  “It’s obvious that Maritza didn’t want us asking questions about where Dr. Sardina has gone. It struck me that Xavier Vasquez and Sardina are both gone for the day. Do you think that—?”

  “That Sardina went to Key West with Xavier? Certainly a possibility.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “Back to the hotel, where I can read what’s in that envelope Al left me.”

  We retraced our trip over the bay and onto the mainland. As we approached a stoplight, Seth swerved suddenly into the adjoining lane to avoid a pothole in the road, and stopped. A vehicle behind us also swerved but in the opposite direction, and ended up stopped at the light in the lane we’d previously occupied. I glanced over at the occupants of the dark blue car. I couldn’t see the driver clearly, but the person in the front passenger seat was a young man wearing the same sort of gray hoodie that I’d seen on the man at the streetcar stop in Ybor City. He glanced at me for a second before turning away quickly so that his face was obscured.

  “Seth,” I said, “that’s the same young fellow . . .”

  The light changed and the blue car pulled away sharply and sped ahead of us.

  “What say, Jessica?” Seth asked as we slowly moved forward.

  “The passenger in the car next to us was the same young person I’d seen in Ybor City, the one who I was certain was eyeing me.”

  “Is that so?” Seth said, and accelerated.

  I put my hand on his arm. “Please don’t try to follow him, Seth. He’s going much too fast.”

  “Not giving me a chance to be a real detective,” Seth said, but he took my advice and slowed down.

  We parked the car when we reached the hotel and settled on a sofa in the far end of the lobby. Seth pulled the envelope from his pocket, opened it, and unfolded the single sheet of paper it contained. His face was set in a hard scowl as he read, and even though we were in a public place, I wished he’d read aloud for my benefit. When he finished, he handed the paper to me. It was a typewritten letter to him from Dr. Vasquez.

  My dear friend and brother-in-arms Seth:

  It is my hope that you shall never read this letter, for if you do, it will mean that I am no longer alive. You see, my newfound best friend, I am surrounded by enemies, people on all sides of me, people who will not shed a tear should I meet with an unfortunate accident, or die from other than God’s will. I can trust no one, not colleagues in the medical profession, not businesspeople, not even my own family.

  As you know, my life has been devoted to finding a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. It wasn’t always easy in Cuba. Funds were scarce, and I had to beg, borrow, and sometimes even steal to keep the research going. When I had a chance to leave Cuba and continue my work in the United States, I jumped at it, especially since the work I’d done in Cuba had enticed the pharmaceutical company K-Dex to commit to generous funding for me. Bernard Peters has been my lifeline, although I must say that his motives as well as his larcenous character have disappointed me greatly of late.

  I have been meticulous in documenting my

  research in the hope that one day what is contained in my documentation will convince others to carry on when I am gone. But because of my distrust of

  others, I am placing a burden on you, Seth, as a man of character, and in whom I see a totally honest and straightforward human being. You would be

  excused for wondering why I would place such trust in a man with whom I have spent so little time. Call it instinct. Call it intuition. Call it what you will, my friend, but whatever it is, I trust it.

  I have written this letter after our aborted golf outing with your beautiful and charming friend

  Jessica Fletcher, and intend to give it to you this evening at the end of what I trust will be an enjoyable evening of good music, good drinks, and good

  conversation. I will, of course, instruct you to not open it while I am alive. But should I die, I ask you
to retrieve the copies I have made of what has been entered on my laptop regarding the progress in the laboratory. I have regularly copied my notes to these little devices—thumb drives—and have carefully stored them. They are located in Tampa Mini-Storage on S. MacDill Avenue. The code for my combination lock on unit number 61 is 7-2-9.

  I know that you’ll do the right thing, Seth. I am counting on it. Of course, I won’t be around to thank you for taking on this weighty task, so I do it now, profusely.

  Your friend,

  Al

  I finished reading and looked at Seth, who rubbed his eyes.

  “This is remarkable,” I said.

  He nodded.

  “To have generated such trust and respect in such a short time is—well, it is nothing short of—remarkable.”

  “I’m at a loss for words,” he said.

  “I understand,” I said.

  Neither of us said anything for a few moments. Finally, I said, “There’s something to this beyond his obvious trust in you.”

  Seth cocked his head.

  “Based upon this letter, I’d say that there’s a strong chance that your friend Al was . . .” I hesitated.

  “Yes?” Seth said.

  I took a deep breath. “That he was murdered.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  We made some wrong turns as we headed for the self-storage facility—by his own admission, Seth can be directionally challenged at times. Eventually we found South MacDill Avenue and drove along until arriving at a modern commercial building with a large red sign, TAMPA MINI-STORAGE.

  “Do we have to check in with someone?” I asked as Seth found a parking space.

  “Probably not. I’ve rented space in the storage facility outside Cabot Cove, and unless you want to use one of their carts, you just go to your unit. Should be the same here. Besides, it’s not like we’re breaking any laws. We have the combination to the lock. Just act like we belong here. They must have plenty of customers and can’t remember what everybody looks like.”

  Buoyed by his confidence, we crossed an impressive, up-to-date lobby, gave a wave to two attractive uniformed people behind the desk, and headed straight for the area where the rental units were located. We walked down a long hallway with an immaculately clean floor. On either side of us, the walls were lined with shiny corrugated metal doors marking the storage lockers.

  “Chilly in here,” Seth said with a shiver as we searched the numbered doors until we reached unit sixty-one. We looked up and down the hall. We were alone. Seth took a slip of paper from his pocket on which he’d written the combination. He rotated the lock’s dial, first all the way around, then to the right to the numeral seven, then left to two, and finally to the right again to nine. One end of the hasp pulled free of the lock. He slipped the lock off and opened the door. Lights had automatically come on when we entered the hallway, and an overhead light in the unit was also on.

  The unit was large; the contents of a studio or small one-bedroom apartment would easily have fit. But the only thing in it was a small round table on which a smoked plastic box rested, like a featured piece of art in a museum. That was it. Nothing else was in the pristine space.

  We heard footsteps in the corridor and I softly closed the door. Seth approached the table and ran his fingers over the top of the box. He glanced at me before lifting the lid and peering at what was inside. I stood next to him and shared his view. There were three black devices about an inch and a half long and three-quarters of an inch wide.

  “What do you call these things?” Seth asked, picking one up.

  “Flash drives,” I said. “Or thumb drives. I use them all the time to back up my files.”

  “Thought you did that on those floppy disks.”

  “No one uses floppy disks anymore,” I said. “Thumb drives are a lot easier to use and hold more data. Dr. Vasquez must have taken what was on his laptop and transferred the information to these.”

  “Can’t believe those little things would hold all that much.”

  Seth’s inherent interest in and understanding of the latest medical research doesn’t translate to computers. He’s always complaining about his computer and his inability to master even its most rudimentary processes. Fortunately, he has a local computer technician in Cabot Cove who’s ready to rush to Seth’s aid at a moment’s notice, and a nurse in his office whose skills are better than his.

  “What do you intend to do with them?” I asked.

  “Take ’em with me, I guess.”

  “Maybe it’s better to leave them here,” I said.

  He pondered my suggestion before saying, “I want to know what’s on them.”

  “You’ll need a computer for that.”

  “You didn’t bring yours?”

  “Of course I did. I always travel with my laptop. You can plug the thumb drives into my computer and store what’s on them on my hard drive.”

  He took the three thumb drives and put them in the side pocket of his jacket.

  “Why not take the box?” I asked.

  “Don’t see any use for it,” he replied. “Let’s go.”

  We peered out the door to be certain the corridor was empty, then relocked the door and walked confidently through the lobby and to the car.

  “Seth,” I said.

  “What?”

  “Dr. Vasquez’s letter to you. The police should know about it. He obviously feared for his life to have taken the time to write the letter and secure the thumb drives the way he did. We should tell Detective Machado.”

  “I don’t know, Jessica. I wouldn’t want anyone else to know that I have his research notes. Seems to me it’s nobody’s business except mine, until I decide what to do with them.”

  “I understand what you’re saying, Seth, but you can’t keep from the authorities that Vasquez was afraid that something would happen to him. It could be crucial to their investigation.” What I didn’t say was that if someone killed Alvaro Vasquez for the research notes, our lives could be in danger, too.

  Seth drove faster than usual in the direction of the hotel.

  “You know how to transfer information from one of these little thumb drives to another one?” he asked.

  “Yes, it’s easy. You plug one into my laptop, take the information that’s on it and save it on my hard drive, then plug in a blank thumb drive and transfer the information back onto it.”

  “Tell you what,” he said. “Let’s stop and buy three new thumb drives, swing past the hotel, do what you say you can do, make me a second set, and then I won’t mind sharing the letter with the police as long as I have a copy of Al’s research notes.”

  Which is what we did. We purchased the drives from a Staples store we passed, went to my room at the hotel, transferred the material, and in less than an hour were back in the car with the originals in Seth’s jacket pocket, the copies in his room’s small safe.

  We had as much trouble finding police headquarters as we did locating the self-storage facility but finally pulled into its parking lot and entered the building. A heavyset uniformed black man sat behind a Plexiglas shield. An open area beneath the shield allowed small items to be passed back and forth; it reminded me of a bank.

  “Is Detective Machado in?” I asked.

  “What’s it about?” the officer said through a speaker in the Plexiglas.

  “Dr. Alvaro Vasquez’s death. I’m Jessica Fletcher, and this is Dr. Seth Hazlitt.”

  He picked up the phone and informed the detective who we were and that we wanted to see him. “Take a seat over there,” he said, pointing to a wooden bench. “He’ll be out in a minute.”

  Too nervous to sit, Seth and I perused various notices hanging on the walls. One sign proclaimed that the Tampa Police Department was able to translate English into thirty-eight other languages, including Yiddish, Polish, Haitian, Cr
eole, Hindi, Serbian, Tagalog, Urdu, Dutch, Czech, Chamorro, Arabic, and Farsi.

  “What in the world is Chamorro?” Seth mused aloud.

  “I think it’s a language spoken in the Pacific on places like Guam.”

  “You would know that,” he said.

  “Just don’t ask me to speak it,” I said.

  Detective Machado appeared as we were admiring a large, colorful graphic of a speeding train cutting through a street map for District One, with the headline: CUTTING THROUGH CRIME. HAVE YOU GOT YOUR TICKET? Accompanying the detective was a man whose face was familiar, although I couldn’t quite put a name to it.

  “Mrs. Fletcher?” the man said.

  “Yes. I know you from somewhere, but—”

  “Carlos Cespedes,” he said. “We met at Alvaro Vasquez’s party.”

  “Yes, of course. You own a cigar factory. How are you?”

  “My cigar factory isn’t so big anymore. People smoke fewer cigars these days, more cigarettes. But this is a minor complaint.” His already elongated face became more so. “How tragic,” he said. “To think that our friend is no longer with us is—it is so unfortunate, so triste, sad.”

  “It certainly is,” Seth said.

  Machado said impatiently to Seth and me, “Is there something you want to talk to me about?” He looked fatigued.

  Mr. Cespedes pulled a business card from his shirt pocket and handed it to me. “Please come visit me at my shop and factory,” he said. He lowered his voice and added, “I must speak with you about Alvaro’s death.”

  Cespedes went through the door, looking back nervously.

  “You know him, huh?” Machado said.

  “As he said, we met at Dr. Vasquez’s party,” I replied, wondering why he was at police headquarters conferring with the detective, and what he wanted to discuss with us about Vasquez’s death.

  “Come on in,” Machado said. “Your timing is good. I intended to call you anyway.”

  He led us to an empty room that I assumed was used to question suspects. It had the requisite large window, which I was sure was a two-way mirror. The table was scarred and stained from countless wet cups, and probably cigarette burns from a time before smoking was banned indoors. The four wooden chairs were spindly. Seth and I sat on one side of the table; Machado took a chair opposite us.