Free Sins Out of School by Jeanne M. Dams

the way of the police.
    But I hated not telling him everything.
    As it turned out, I didn’t have to say much. He had just hung up the phone when I walked into the kitchen.
    â€œHello, love. I thought you’d fallen off the ends of the earth. How did you find Mrs. Doyle?”
    â€œA good deal upset, and pretty prickly about accepting help. I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to talk someone from her church—or her husband’s church—into offering a little support, but I might as well have talked to the bricks on the wall. They’d have been just as sympathetic.”
    â€œWell, I have some news for you. That was Derek on the phone. He did manage to push through the autopsy, over the usual bitter complaints about overwork and everyone always wanting everything yesterday.”
    â€œAnd?”
    â€œThey came up with a time of death, for one thing. Doyle died at some time after midnight Wednesday night. Thursday morning that would make it, officially. Between midnight and two, they think, and probably closer to midnight, though the doctor wouldn’t commit himself to an exact time, naturally. They never will.
    â€œThe interesting thing is that it turns out they were quite right about the stab wound. It was made after death. Quite soon after, probably, because there was some blood, but not a lot. I’ll spare you the details, but the kicker is that the man died of an overdose of some form of digitalis.”
    â€œFoxglove,” I said automatically. In novels, when someone dies of digitalis poisoning, it’s always because the bad guy has brewed up some foxglove tea.
    â€œNot in this case, apparently. I didn’t grasp the niceties of the medical explanation, but apparently he was bungful of ordinary medicinal digitalis, the kind given for certain kinds of heart trouble.”
    â€œDid he have heart trouble?”
    â€œDon’t know. Derek hasn’t managed to reach his doctor yet. But he says there was no digitalis in the house when his men searched. No medicine of any kind; they noticed particularly. It’s pretty unusual for a family not to have any aspirin around, or cold medicine, or that sort of thing, but there was nothing at all.”
    Well, that was a relief. “Then it looks as though Mrs. Doyle is out of it, after all.”
    â€œIt’s too soon to say that, Dorothy. But the likelihood has certainly been reduced. Derek phoned the woman and asked if she wanted police protection.”
    â€œWhy—oh, because someone killed Doyle and might be a danger to the rest of the family, you mean?”
    â€œThat was the idea. But Mrs. Doyle rejected the offer quite flatly. Said she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself and her daughter. Rather a peculiar woman, is she?”
    I took a moment over that one and answered with care. “Not so much peculiar, I think, as overwhelmed. Her husband’s dead, and even though she didn’t get along with him, it’s a terrible shock. And she has suffered so long under his domination that I don’t imagine she’s able to cope very well by herself. It isn’t that she’s stupid. She’s a teacher, after all, and a good one. It’s just that he made the decisions all their married life, and she hasn’t learned how, just as she hasn’t learned how to make friends.”
    Alan smiled a little and shook his head. “I knew I’d hear it sooner or later.”
    â€œHear what?”
    â€œThat tone of voice that means you’re about to take another lame duck under your wing.”
    â€œWell—she does need someone with some common sense on her side. And I feel sorry for that poor little girl.”
    â€œMy dear, you don’t have to make excuses. Unlike Mr. Doyle, I don’t presume to make your decisions for you. Except, as it’s getting late and I’m getting peckish, suppose I make a unilateral decision that we’re going out to