Free Death's Savage Passion by Jane Haddam Page B

think of a way to explain what was happening while still making sense. It couldn’t be done.
    I told 911 I had a matter of life and death—poisoning—and needed an ambulance. I told them I didn’t know what caused the poisoning. I told them time was of the essence. I hinted at foul play. I told truth and lies with equal conviction. Nine-one-one had no reaction. Nine-one-one is a computer.
    I hung up and sat down on the receptionist’s desk. I found matches and lit my cigarette.
    “Food poisoning,” I told Marilou, trying to sound confident. “Salmonella. She must have had lunch someplace interesting.”
    “That’s what I thought.” Marilou had managed to get Sarah close enough to the couch to drop her. She brushed off her hands and shook out her dress. “It was the oddest thing. I come through the door and there she is, leaning over her shoes—”
    “Standing up?”
    “Yeah. On her feet and leaning over her shoes. You’d figure she’d have sat down. Or headed for the ladies’ room, for God’s sake.”
    “Maybe it came over her suddenly.” I sounded like my grandmother.
    “It must have.” Marilou threw herself into a chair and started pawing through her purse. “Quaaludes,” she said. “The only thing for a time like this is Quaaludes.”
    I shook my head. The little white Christmas lights had become strobe flashes. Incipient nausea was becoming actual. Every muscle in my face ached. I considered Marilou’s hot pink ultrasuede handbag.
    “You got any speed?” I asked her.
    “You take speed?”
    “I was thinking of something like caffeine pills,” I said. “I—”
    On the couch, Sarah had stopped wretching. She was lying rigid, twitching under the ungraceful folds of her clothes. My exhaustion nausea was joined by an eerie, sick feeling. I knew what was happening to Sarah. In a moment the twitching would stop and the rigidity would melt and the moaning would become a rattle. It would take longer and cause more pain than something simple like a knife.
    “Jesus Christ,” I said.
    “What’s the matter?” Marilou said.
    I turned my head and tried to look at her, to concentrate on the emphasized makeup around her wide blue eyes and the thin strand of silver chain around her neck. The chain was under her dress, so as not to clash with the rhinestone buttons. The silver bangle on her wrist was a study in the non-Euclidean geometry of welded metal. The Quaalude was between the thumb and forefinger of her right hand. She was not holding a glass of water. She must have been intending to chew the thing.
    “What’s the matter?” she said again.
    I pointed to the couch. The rattle had started. It was very low in Sarah’s throat. It sounded like wood scraping against wood.
    “What is that?” Marilou said.
    The room was fluid and uncertain. Walls bulged and sucked as if they were breathing. The carpet made waves.
    I thought of Sarah in Grand Central Station, eyes shining, hands tugging nervously against the strap of her shoulder bag, arrived in Mecca at last.
    “I haven’t had any sleep,” I said.
    “I don’t care if you haven’t had any sleep,” Marilou said. She was shrieking, but it was very far away and I didn’t mind. “Tell me what’s going on,” she said.
    She grabbed me by the front of my sweater and shook me. I saw her shaking me but was unable to feel it. I saw the room and the waves and Sarah on the couch.
    Somewhere on Mars, Marilou Saunders was contorting into the Platonic ideal of rage and frustration and fear. Her face was red. Her eyes were wild. Her Goldie Hawn hair was spiraling into Bride of Frankenstein static electric chic.
    “Listen to me,” she screeched. “None of this is my fault and I’m not going to get caught up in it, I’m not, so you’d better—”
    “I’d better what?” I sounded drunk.
    “What’s wrong with her, McKenna?”
    I made a last, valiant effort to get control of myself. I managed to stand up and straighten my back.
    I thought of Sarah