Stork Raving Mad: A Meg Langslow Mystery (A Meg Lanslow Mystery)

kitchen. Not a very promising plan.
    Devising a flimsy plan would be completely out of character for Kathy. My family praised how organized and efficient I was, but I was nothing compared to Kathy. Her incredible organizational skills made her invaluable to the drama faculty and students—so many of them highly creative right-brain types who couldn’t organize their way out of a wet tissue. If Kathy came up with a plan, you could be certain she’d researched it thoroughly, had worked out contingency plans for any possible snags it might hit, and would execute it flawlessly. Wandering into the library in the hope that she’d get a chance to poison her potential victim was not something Kathy would do.
    But marching into the library to confront Dr. Wright—that I could see Kathy doing. And if, once there, she saw Dr. Wright apparently asleep and calculated that there was no serious obstacle to getting away with murder?
    Maybe. And if Kathy thought she’d killed Dr. Wright or realized she’d just attempted to kill somebody who was already dead, that could account for her unusually agitated state. She’d been almost babbling, and that was completely unlike Kathy. Unless Kathy, like me, was cool and calm in action and sometimes got the shakes afterward. I could see that, too.
    I should probably mention all this to the chief.
    Later. I was way overdue for my nap. But by now I couldn’t even bear to look at the stairs. I went into the living room instead. It was a cluttered mess, since about fifteen students were sleeping there—though at least it was empty, since the students were all out in the barn, nervously awaiting their turn to be questioned. Or possibly singing “Ding, dong, the witch is dead!” and coordinating their alibis.
    Their sleeping bags and air mattresses were still there, along with their other belongings. The few organized ones had stuffed their possessions in cardboard boxes or plastic bins. The rest just surrounded their beds with huge deltas of clothes, books, cosmetics, and other paraphernalia.
    The students’ belongings! Surely some of them had food stashed away that I could eat. I’d replace it later. Tenfold.
    I searched the students’ belongings until I found a couple of unopened packages of cheese crackers and an orange soda. Both items from what Michael and I referred to as the neon-orange food group, processed as hell and not normally to my taste. Rose Noire would slap my hands if she saw me reach for them. But she was out in the barn, waiting her turn for interrogation. I pounced.
    I picked my way through the debris to the far corner, where a quirk in the architecture made a nook that Michael and I had filled with a particularly comfy couch with its back to the room, making a lovely, private little niche. Assuming the students hadn’t moved it. . . .
    No, it was still there, under only a moderate layer of pizzaboxes and laundry. I cleared it with a few quick shoves and settled down for my rest.
    I had to rearrange my position three times before I found one that Castor, Pollux, and I all liked. Then I opened the orange soda and took a long swig. Ambrosia. And where had I gotten the idea that packaged cheese crackers were junk food? I’d had artisan cheeses that hadn’t tasted this good.
    I ate and drank until I could hold no more—which took less than ever these days, with the kids squishing my stomach to miniscule proportions. Then I pulled an afghan over me and curled up for a well-deserved nap.

Chapter 14
     
    “Are you sure you don’t want a nice cup of tea?” Rose Noire kept asking me. “Just one cup of tea?”
    She was holding out a teacup. Toxic fumes billowed out of it and bubbles rose to the oily surface and popped, as if some small but sinister aquatic monster lurked and breathed in the depths of the cup. She began lifting it to my mouth as if to help me drink.
    I woke up and saw with relief that I was still alone in the alcove. Nobody was bending over me proffering glasses of herbal swill or dainty cups of poisoned tea.
    “Tell me what you put in her tea,” a woman’s voice said out in the main part of the room.
    I glanced down. No tea on the floor beside my sofa, only the empty orange soda can.
    “Forget it.”
    I recognized Ramon’s voice.
    “Danny saw you.” Bronwyn. “From the basement door. I made him promise not to tell the police until I talked to you.”
    “Yeah, right. He’s probably already gone running to the cops.”
    “No, he’ll