"Here," Timmie said, pointing to the medication schedule. "Gladys bolused her with eighty of Lasix ten minutes before the arrest."

"Alice had bad kidneys," Penelope said. "We'd been upping the dose for a while. That couldn't'a killed her, though. She hadn't even had a chance to make pee yet."

"Not Lasix," Timmie said with a considering look at her evidence box. "Dij. I'm hoping there's a Lasix multidose vial in there that's chock-full of Digoxin. And since Lasix comes 10 milligrams a cc, that would make 8 ccs of Lasix. Make that 250 micrograms of Digoxin per cc instead, and that means Gladys ended up bolusing Alice with 2000 micrograms of Digoxin, which is about eight times the loading dose.... And here's Alice's dij levels at 1.85, which means she was bumping right at the top of therapeutic anyway..."

Penelope looked appalled. "It would have dropped her like a rock. Oh, my God, that poor thing."

"Not a word," Timmie warned. "Not till we've proved this."

"Whatever you need," she said, her placid eyes sparking sudden rage. "Nobody does that to my little old people."

Timmie almost cried. She felt like Lot trying to find one just man, and actually succeeding with three seconds to brimstone. "Thank you, Penelope. We'll do it. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to do some perfectly illegal copying of this chart before anybody with less altruistic objectives can get hold of it."

"It's not Dr. Raymond," Penelope insisted.

Timmie smiled. "I know. But it's somebody."

Timmie copied the pertinent sheets and passed them to Murphy, who tucked them in the inside pocket of a twin of that ratty jacket he always wore. Then it was time to check for possible surprise visitors. Since the only way they could have gotten in was the same way Timmie and Murphy had gotten in, they both headed back to the ER.

The secretary was no longer sitting in the triage area by the time Timmie and Murphy made it back there. Instead, Ellen and Cindy were perched on the desk, clad in identical hospital greens, their backs to the front doors. A sure sign that the place was empty. Not only that, the lights were down and the monitors off, leaving the place looking spectral.

Timmie and Murphy had almost reached the desk before either of the nurses looked up. "What are you doing here?" Cindy asked.

Perched next to her, Ellen straightened like a shot. "Timmie, what's wrong? Are you okay? Is it your daddy?"

"I'm fine," Timmie assured them. "I was just up seeing my dad. Why are you still here, Cindy? Weren't you on evenings?"

Cindy shrugged, her attention torn between Timmie and Murphy. "Just visiting. You know me."

Timmie did, actually. Cindy rarely went home right after her shifts, much preferring to stay with the staff than face her apartment. It was why she showed up at friends' houses so much.

Actually, once Timmie had thought enough to realize she was going to have to stop by the ER, she'd counted on Cindy's habits. That way she could kill two birds with one stone. Or two phone calls with one question.

"You don't see your dad this late," Ellen all but accused.

Oh, well. It was as good a time as any. Never would have been better, but Murphy had raised a question that needed answering.

"I got a phone call tonight," Timmie said, leaning against the open doorway into the desk area, the box still at her hip and Murphy standing guard at her back. "Somebody offered to kill my father if I'd just stop investigating the murders up in Restcrest."

Well, she'd been hoping for a reaction. She got it in stereo. Ellen blanched and Cindy gaped.

"He wouldn't do that!" Ellen protested.

"Of course he would," Cindy immediately disagreed.

"Who wouldn't do that?" Timmie asked, and Ellen paled even more.

It took her a moment longer to actually speak, and by then she looked like she was going to faint. Timmie just waited her out.

"I'm sorry," Ellen all but whispered, shooting Murphy a frightened glance. "I did what I could."

Timmie wanted to hit her. Actually, she just wanted to cry. "You called Murphy to warn him about what was going on."

Cindy was staring now. "I called," she protested.

Ellen answered as if she hadn't even heard. "I didn't know what else to do. You saw Alice die. You saw how sudden it was. She wasn't even sick! That's been happening all summer, Timmie. What could I do?"

Timmie struggled to hang on to her respect for Ellen, who hadn't had the courage to help her patients any more, in the end, than she had herself. "Call the police?"

Ellen shook her head, a frightened, ineffectual woman. "Do you know what would have happened? I would have been fired from the only hospital in town. I had to raise my children."

"You didn't even tell anybody until a couple of weeks ago."

"I called him!" Cindy insisted. "Because I knew who it was."

Timmie didn't even look her way. "Who?"

"Landry, of course. He's a lying, cheating, money-hungry piece of shit who'd do anything to get his way!"

Well, at least she hadn't called him a nigger. Timmie couldn't help noticing that her fury was out of proportion to the discussion they were having.

"Cheating?" she asked.

Cindy's eyes welled with tears of distress. "I hate him."

"And Mary Jane?" she asked, remembering the recent accusation.

Cindy didn't say a word, just glared. Oh, good Lord, Timmie thought. She needed a scorecard. Praying for patience, she turned back to Ellen, who at least made sense.

"You're my friend," she said. "Why couldn't you come to me?"

"Because you love him."

Timmie stopped. "I love who?"

Ellen couldn't look at her anymore. "I don't have proof," she protested. "Not really."

Timmie's stomach had just hit her shoes. "Alex?" she all but shrilled. "You think Alex is doing this?"

"It's Landry," Cindy insisted on a whine.

"It is not Landry," Timmie informed her. "He hasn't been here long enough."

"Well, it sure as hell isn't Alex!" Cindy insisted. "I would have been able to tell."

"How's that?" Murphy asked, whether Timmie wanted him to or not.

"Because I worked in a hospital where this happened before. Alex just isn't the type."

"You did?" Murphy asked.

"In Chicago, before John died."

"We'll compare notes later," Timmie suggested, knowing that the very last thing she needed right now was Cindy one-upping the situation they were facing. "Ellen, why did you think it was Alex?"

"He and Dr. Davies talked about how badly they needed the material for research. He always seemed right there when one of his people passed."

"He's always there anyway," Cindy insisted.

"Was he here tonight?" Timmie asked.

Both of them looked at each other. "No. Why?"

"Because whoever called me, called me from here."

"I saw Landry earlier, by the elevators," Cindy insisted. "He was wearing a black sweat suit."

"Uh-huh. Thanks."

Timmie was ready to head down the hall toward the elevators to blow that theory out of the water when Ellen grabbed her arm. Timmie turned on her friend, still angry with the deception.

"I'm sorry," Ellen said. "I'm just not as strong as you are, Timmie. I tried."