Not a Chance in Helen by Susan McBride Page A

for her hand, squeezing it warmly. She summoned up a smile, genuinely glad for her friend. “I’m thrilled,” she said. “And you do deserve it. This past year’s been so hard.”
    “I’m determined to put it behind me.”
    “When’s this party? I only hope it won’t interfere with the LCIL luncheon.”
    “Oh, my God, the luncheon,” Jean repeated, and she raised her eyebrows. “Oh, Helen, don’t tell me that I got the gig?” Her hands went to her heart. “Is it possible?”
    “The gig is yours,” Helen said, grinning, tickled by the look of surprise on Jean’s face. “Well, it’s yours if you want it.”
    Jean breathed a soft “Oh, my.”
    Helen took a sip of coffee, glad she set the cup down when she did, or it would’ve splattered across her sweatshirt when Jean hopped out of her chair and caught her in a hug.
    “You did it, didn’t you? Probably forced me down their throats,” she was saying. “I can’t thank you enough.”
    Helen laughed. “For heaven’s sake, I was doing myself a favor. I couldn’t bear the thought of having the Catfish Barn cater again this year. My intestines would never forgive me.”
    The doorbell rang, and Jean let Helen go. Jean straightened up, tucking her blouse tighter inside her blue jeans.
    “Are you expecting someone?” Helen asked.
    Jean shrugged. “Not that I’m aware of.”
    The bell chimed again.
    “I’m coming!” Jean shouted. Assuring Helen she’d be back in a flash, she left the kitchen, the tap of her flat-soled shoes audible even after she was out of sight.
    Helen listened as the front door opened and she heard a man’s voice, one she recognized well.
    She got out of her chair and retraced Jean’s steps, walking into the foyer to see Frank Biddle standing in the doorway, his hat in his hands.
    Jean turned to her with cheeks pale as chalk. “Oh, God, Helen,” she said, a warble in her voice. “Why didn’t you tell me the whole story? Eleanora didn’t just die, she was murdered.”

 
    Chapter Ten
    “ E LEANORA WAS MURDERED?” Helen repeated, walking up to Jean and taking her arm. Her friend looked like she might faint. Helen didn’t feel very steady on her feet either. “So it’s for certain then? It wasn’t natural causes?”
    “No, ma’am, it was poison,” Biddle told them. He spun his hat round and round in his hands. He didn’t seem any more at ease with the answer than she or Jean. “Doc said it was sodium tetraborate.”
    “Oh, no,” Jean breathed and swayed against Helen, who kept an arm around her waist to steady her. “Oh, no, this can’t be happening.”
    “Sodium tetra . . . what?” Helen asked the sheriff. Her chest tightened at the thought of such violence in River Bend, of all places.
    “Sodium tetraborate,” Frank Biddle repeated, enunciating each syllable. “It’s a form of boric acid.” He glanced at Helen then Jean and back again. “It’s mostly used in insecticides.”
    “Are you sure it was intentional?” Helen asked, wondering if the sheriff and Jean could hear the overloud beat of her heart. Her ears pounded with the noise of it. “Maybe it was an accident.” At Biddle’s lift of eyebrows, she added, “It has been known to happen.”
    “The evidence is pretty forthright, ma’am.” The sheriff cleared his throat and inclined his head toward Jean, who stared at the floor, eyes unblinking, as though in shock. “Forensics tested what remained of the goose liver old Mrs. Duncan had been eating, and, from the concentration in what was left, they figured there was probably at least a teaspoon mixed in. It was more than enough to kill someone. It’s relatively odorless, you know. Doc said that since our senses dull with age, she probably didn’t even taste it.”
    Helen nodded. Her mouth was too dry to form words. She found herself thinking of the car that had nearly hit Eleanora yesterday morning and wondered if the person behind the wheel had been the one to put poison in the goose