Hiss of Death: A Mrs. Murphy Mystery Read Online Free

Veronese gave Paula her B 12 shot.
    How the group teased Paula, who took it all with good humor. She also feared spiders, as do many people. The girls gave her a big fuzzy stuffed toy spider to overcome her phobia. It didn’t work, but she kept the toy anyway.
    Pulling into the long dirt drive down to Paula’s farm, Harry marveled at the work the divorced, quite pretty nurse had done in two years’ time. Lined with glossy green Nellie Stevens hollies, the drive funneled down to the restored frame farmhouse.
    Even in her crabby moments, Harry was grateful for the number of old farms and larger estates the new-monied people had not only saved but improved. Then there were those who built the McMansions on five acres, but all of America was jam-packed full of those. Couldn’t blame the comeheres for that environmentally disastrous fad.
    As she approached Paula’s farmhouse, Harry noticed that the hollies encircling the drive now reached five feet. The effect was pretty. In a few years’ time it would be dramatic, for Nellie Stevenses could top out at thirty feet.
    Due to the odd hours she kept, Paula had no pets. This disappointedTucker, the corgi, who evidenced a social streak. Nothing better than catching up with another canine. Living with two cats could pluck one’s last nerve.
    Paula’s brand-new Dodge half-ton, sparkling silver, was parked off to the side of the house.
    Harry cut the engine and let her animals out in the crisp spring air, then walked onto the porch and knocked on the door. No answer.
    “She knows I’m coming,” Harry said aloud to her animals. “She’s got the extra runner numbers for me. They came in late. Sure glad they made it, or I’d be sitting up cutting out paper.”
    “Paula!” Harry called.
    Harry would happily ride a horse anywhere, but she avoided running since she did quite enough walking, trotting, and lifting on the farm. By the end of the day her thighs often ached—hence her willingness to do the “bench work” at the 5K.
    The door was unlocked; Harry peeked in. “Paula?”
    She walked around the house to the old barn in the back, to Paula’s potting-shed refuge, a pleasant place to force bulbs.
    Pewter, feeling she already had enough exercise this morning, turned to go back to the truck.
    Tucker paused to watch, then waited for Mrs. Murphy to join her.
“No wonder she’s fat.”
    “I heard that,”
the gray cat called over her shoulder.
    “You heard me, yet you’re doing nothing about it,”
Tucker persisted.
    “Bubble butt.”
Pewter raised her head, her tail upright, as she marched toward the truck.
    Mrs. Murphy and Tucker fell in behind Harry. As the temperature hung in the low fifties and probably would stay there all day, the barn doors were closed, but a light shone in the area Paula had closed off.
    “Knew it. She lost track of time.” Harry smiled as she pushed open the barn doors.
    She opened the door to the potting room, lit by both skylights in the roof and some infrared lights casting their odd color. The smile froze on her face.
    “Paula!” Harry rushed to the woman slumped at her potting table, head on the table. Next to Paula, a dead hornet lay on the table, too.
    Harry touched her. Cool. She took her pulse. None.
    “She smells funny. I’ve smelled that odor before, but I can’t place it,”
the corgi commented, her powers of smell surpassing anything a human could imagine.
    “Yes, I know what you mean,”
said Mrs. Murphy, no slouch in the nose department, either.
    Not one to panic, Harry gently placed Paula’s hand back on the table, then left the room, animals with her.
    Now she ran. Sprinting for the truck, she nearly stepped on Pewter’s tail, for the cat was under the truck, playing with something she’d found.
    Opening the glove compartment, Harry pulled out her cell. She kept it in there so she wouldn’t be tempted to call while driving. This strategy forced her to pull over to make calls. Taking your eyes off country roads could