G'Day to Die by Maddy Hunter Read Free Book Online Page B

Tilly commented. “Henry assigned the task to the right people. They’re quite responsible, aren’t they?”
    “Responsible. Dependable.” I made a sweeping gesture around the room. “Conspicuously absent.”
    To be fair, Henry would have volunteered for ambulance duty himself if Lola hadn’t wrapped herself around his legs, begging him not to abandon her when she was in such desperate need of moral support. So he’d agreed to babysit Lola at the police station and had asked Etienne and Duncan to accompany Jake.
    “You s’pose Lola’s gonna have to spend the night in the pokey?” Nana asked.
    I gave her a palms’ up. “That’ll probably depend on how kindly Jake is feeling toward her and whether he decides to press charges. Do you think he’ll even be able to give the police a statement?”
    “His cuts looked relatively superficial,” Tilly said. “I doubt they’ll keep him overnight. But I’m concerned that Lola may prove to be a disruptive force throughout the whole tour. She’s loud; she’s obnoxious; and did you notice how she hogged Guy’s entire photo session this evening?”
    “The only reason he was takin’ her picture so much was on account a she was wearin’ one a them atomic outfits,” said Nana. She lifted her eyebrows and smiled impishly. “He was waitin’ for the fallout. Did you see the size a them puppies? When she’s my age, she can use ’em for a scarf.”
    “Well, I think Guy is very generous to take professional pictures of everyone. He probably makes a habit of doing nice things for people”—I stared pointedly at Nana—“like offering them jobs that pay six figures.”
    “Forgot all about that.” Sighing, she pulled some loose photos out of her pocketbook and studied them critically. “I don’t know, dear. It’s real flatterin’ to catch the eye of an expert, but every one a these pictures looks pretty ordinary to me.”
    “Do you have your angiosperm photo handy?”
    She sailed it across the room to me; I scrutinized it under the light. “I have a theory about your photo, Nana, but I need you to double-check something on your laptop to see if it holds water.”
    “I love listenin’ to them theories a yours, dear. They’re always so…” She whipped the air with her hand as she searched for the right word.
    “Wrong?” I offered.
    “I was thinkin’ more like, ‘earnest.’”
    “What’s our assignment?” asked Tilly.
    “Here’s the scoop. Claire Bellows told me she had to attend a scientific meeting in Melbourne after our tour ended. Would you access the International Society of Botanists online, and if they have a listing for registrants of the Melbourne conference, see if Claire Bellows’s name is on it?”
    Nana’s mouth rounded into an O. “You think she was a botanist?”
    “If she was, it would explain why she went outside, what she was looking for, and why your photo was never returned. You heard Conrad say that any botanist worth his salt would be able to recognize this angiosperm. If she identified the plant when your photos were making the rounds, she could have slipped your Polaroid in her shirt pocket and went out searching for it when Henry announced we were being delayed. She probably had your photo in her hand when she collapsed, and the wind blew it away. If she’d discovered the angiosperm on her own, it would have been her ticket to shattering the glass ceiling where she worked. She told me she’d have to reinvent the wheel to get any recognition. I’d guess that finding a plant that’s been extinct for a hundred million years would be the botanical equivalent, wouldn’t you?”
    “Bellowspermum australianse, ” Tilly muttered. “Has a nice ring to it.”
    “We’re on the case,” said Nana as she retied her sneakers.
    I regarded her photo once more, another thought occurring to me. “Do you know how many total snapshots you took at the Twelve Apostles?”
    “Three film packets, so that’d be twenty-four