The Calling by Inger Ash Wolfe Page A

should wear it on your skin like the mark of Cain.
    “I am. I’m grateful to be welcomed into your home.”
    “I’m not sure you’re welcomed,” said the man. “But you’re needed. Come in.”
    Simon closed the door behind him, locking it with the chain. At eleven thirty, he heard a knock on the door, and he froze in silence. After a minute, he heard footsteps moving down the walk away from the house. He went to one of the living room windows and pulled the curtain back slightly to see a man in a black parka, walking along the sidewalk. He was carrying a little black kit bag, a miniature of his own. A Jehovah’s Witness, perhaps. Imagine building a church out of whoever wanted to join it, Simon thought. He and his brother had always been more discriminating than that. At noon, he searched Mr. Ulmer’s fridge and found a bunch of parsley, which he moistened with the juice of a lemon and ate. At two thirty, Mr. Ulmer was ready. Simon photographed him and thanked him. As luck would have it, the house was already so immaculate—but for the faint, hanging odor of cigarette smoke—that there was nothing for him to do. He was pleased when he found that the ones he visited had taken his directives seriously, although he imagined in Mr. Ulmer’s case that the cleanliness of his
house was a result of hired help. Just the same, it confirmed for him that he had not made a mistake in choosing Mr. Ulmer, or indeed any of them, and it deepened his joy that he was there with them to give succor, to save them. As he had been saved in his own life. He was repaying his debt, and it filled his heart with happiness. And for this reason especially, his entire morning and early afternoon, both with the MacDonalds and with Mr. Ulmer, 29, had been very agreeable indeed.

5
    SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 8:15 A.M.
     
    Detective Howard Spere slapped an envelope down on Micallef’s desk. “I
was
planning on spending today watching football with my sons, but you know what I do when you say jump, Hazel.”
    “Yeah, Howard, you say it can wait until Monday.”
    “She’s still going to be dead tomorrow.”
    “And you can tape your football game.”
    “You’re welcome.”
    She unwound the string on the back of the envelope and pulled out the post-mortem report. She scanned the summary. “Hyoscyamine? Humulene? These are drugs?”
    “Sort of,” said Spere, wedging a thumbnail between two of his front teeth. “They’re compounds found in belladonna and hops.”
    “She was drinking?”
    “No . . . this was medicinal hops. In plant form. They found bits of matter in her stomach that she’d ingested just prior to death. Both plants are sedatives.”
    “How strong?”
    “In the quantity of belladonna they found in her, probably very.”
    “So you’re telling me she was
anesthetized
?”
    “I’m saying she probably didn’t feel a thing. She was as high as a kite. But neither of these compounds killed her. This did.” He put his finger on a word at the bottom of the report.
    “Amatoxin.”
    “You ever heard of the destroying angel?”
    “No.”
    “It’s a mushroom.
Amanita bisporigera.
The most poisonous mushroom on the planet: The amount that would cover the surface of a dime one tenth of a millimeter thick would be enough to kill her three times over. It’s a hepatotoxin.”
    “English, Howard.”
    “Shuts down the liver and kidneys almost instantly.” Hazel cast her eyes over the report again and her mouth turned down. “Are you telling me that Delia didn’t die of blood loss?”
    “The amatoxin is fully metabolized. He bled her after she was dead.”
    Hazel closed the folder and sat back down in her chair. “How do you get the blood out of a person’s body when their heart isn’t pumping it anymore?”
    “You suck it out.”
    “Jesus, Howard. Who is this guy?”
    “There’s more. She’d been fasting, too. There was nothing in

the bowel—clean as a whistle. I gave her to Jack Deacon at Mayfair Grace. He said