SACRED MUSHROOMS by J. Broussard
The first taste of the coming Alaska winter was in the air. A swirl of dry snow blew across the airfield as the Cessna approached. Shem Duval suddenly had the feeling it might crash, the last thing he wanted to have happen. It didn’t. The landing was smooth; the plane taxied swiftly over to Kukavik’s airport waiting room, a forty-by-forty wooden building that doubled as the control tower. The lone passenger alighted, hunched his shoulders against the chilling wind and hurried toward the shack. Shem didn’t wait for him to enter. Pulling on his fur hat, he walked out to shake hands with Dennis Knapp. It had been six years since he’d seen him. Six long years.
As a deputy sheriff, Shem had long been acquainted with Dennis, a small-town lawyer operating out of the nearby county seat. The two hadn’t corresponded since the latter had moved to California, so there was a lot to catch up on. But Dennis was impatient to get to the topic Shem had called him about in the first place. There hadn’t been much in the way of details. Shem had merely told him about the recent discovery of gold specks in the stream meandering across the land Dennis owned and been trying to sell since he’d left Kukavik. 
There was no stopping Shem today, however. He was off onto other matters. He had always been a talker, and seemed to have become no less so over the years. During the short drive to Kukavik and on to Shem’s house on the other side of town, he brought Dennis up to speed on what had and what hadn’t changed.
“Hotel facilities haven’t improved any since you left. Mamie McCarthy is still running a bed and breakfast, and her food hasn’t showed any signs of improving either.” Dennis nodded. Shem’s house, where Dennis had been invited to stay, was a far cry from his own luxury apartment in San Francisco, but was a vast improvement over what he remembered of Mamie’s offering. 
It was beginning to get dark when they arrived, a reminder to Dennis that short days and long nights were closing in fast, this far north. It wasn’t until they had settled down into the small living room and Shem had poured them each a drink of Bushmiller’s “for old times sake,” that Dennis was finally able to push the monologue over to the topic that was on his mind and which was why he had made this sudden visit.
Shem settled back into one of the comfortable overstuffed chairs, took a sip of his drink and said, “The reason I called you is because Karl Knutsen found the settlings on your land. So far, he and I are the only ones who know about it, but you know how he is. I swore him to secrecy, promised him he’d get a share if it turned out to be a good find—I knew you’d be willing to do that—and gave him enough money for a couple of drinks, but not enough for him to get drunk and start shooting off his mouth. We can go out first thing in the morning and scout around. This early snow won’t amount to much, and we should be able to take my four by four back there without any trouble.”
It was difficult to keep Shem on the subject. Soon he was drifting off onto the events that might have been prime topics of conversation for residents, but held little interest for Dennis. The weather, of course. And a mild earthquake that had shaken the town a few months back. Crime, or the lack of it, in Kukavik. Shem shook his head. “We never did figure out who killed Naomi Weiser. That kind of sticks in my craw, what with me being a deputy and the one who found her. That happened while you were still here, didn’t it? Why, ‘course it did. I remember now. Must have been six months or so before you left for California.”
“One of the natives, I’m sure.”
Shem nodded, getting up and moving to the kitchen, which opened up into the living room. “More than likely, but we haven’t been able to prove a thing. Say, I’ve got a big pot of that slumgullion like you used to rave about on hunting trips. It’s been simmering since noon. Will you be hungry enough to eat in a half-hour or so?”
Memories of the hunting and fishing trips with several of the gang flooded back. The smell of the stew didn’t exactly conjure up thoughts of a San Francisco gourmet restaurant. But Dennis had eaten only a light lunch on the plane to Alaska, and the memories did include the wonderful taste of that stew after a long, tiring day of tramping through the woods and hauling game back to camp.
Shem brought the steaming casserole over to the table, handed Dennis an old US Navy issue ladle and said, “Dig in.” They both did, eating silently for several minutes. Better than a gourmet meal, Dennis decided, breaking off a large piece of Russian rye to supplement the stew. 
“Help yourself to more,” Shem said as Dennis tilted his bowl to scoop out the last pieces. “It will be kinda nice not to have leftovers. I can never bear to throw them out, so I eat them, even when they don’t taste as good as the first time around.
“That killing always did stick in my craw,” Shem repeated to a puzzled Dennis who had forgotten the earlier conversation about the Weiser murder. “No sign of a burglary. No sign of a sex attack. ‘Course she was close to sixty and no beauty, so you wouldn’t expect anything like that. We’ve had some killings around here over the years—not many—and all of them pretty straightforward. Brawl at the Moosehead. Simp Smith shooting his wife. No mystery to any of those. But why would anyone want to kill the Weiser woman?”
As Shem rambled on, Dennis noticed a weakness in his hand holding the black bread. “I feel funny,” he said, trying unsuccessfully to shake off the sensation of paralysis creeping over him. 
“Jet lag. That’s what it is. Last time I flew down to Juneau, I felt weak as a kitten. Good night’s sleep will fix you right up. More slumgullion?”
Dennis tried shaking his head. Nothing moved. His hands fell down to his side. His feet felt like lead. His voice became hysterical. “It’s not jet lag. I can’t move.”
Shem seemed to be unperturbed. “If that ain’t it, maybe it’s the mushrooms I put into the stew. You know—those sacred mushrooms the natives talk about. We had quite a crop this fall. Prettiest things you ever seen. I’ve been eating them for four or five years. Little at a time, you know. That way you can build up a resistance to them like the old shamans used to do. Guess maybe I put too many in the stew for someone who’s new to ‘em.”
The eyes in Dennis’ immobilized head looked wild. “You poisoned me!”
“I guess. In a way of speaking, I guess you might say that.”
“But why? You’re mad!”
“In a way, you’re right. I am mad. Mad because I know you killed the Weiser woman and just walked away scot-free. You see Dennis, I know she was blackmailing you. I never was able to figure out quite what she had on you. But I was sure it was you putting fifty dollars in cash into her account every week, right up to the week before you killed her. What happened? Did she raise the ante? It had something to do with the Brown estate, didn’t it? Somehow you got Wally Brown’s money and his land, and she knew something about that. Something shady. Right?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The eyes were straining.
“That’s OK. Maybe I’m making a mistake. I could call 911. We have it here in the boonies these days. And the medic is less than a mile away. Let’s see. From what I’ve read, you really don’t have anything to worry about if your stomach’s pumped out within ten minutes. They could get here long before that. But, look at the bright side. Some people don’t die. Their livers get pretty badly screwed up, though. You’d probably spend most of your life in and out of hospitals. No more booze of course.”
“You can’t get away with this. You poisoned me. They’ll find the mushrooms in the stew.”
Shem showed his amusement. “Shucks, Dennis, I’ll insist they pump out my stomach too—even before they have an autopsy on you. Same Bushmiller’s, same bread, same stew, same mushrooms. Nope. It’ll just be one of those things. You must have been allergic to something. Too bad. But I’d be willing to call 911 right now, if you’d tell me why Naomi Weiser was blackmailing you.”
“She…she wasn’t.”
“Shucks. If you’re going to be that way, I might’s well wash up the dishes and go to bed. And, by the way, you won’t be able to talk much longer anyway. The paralysis gets to the throat muscles after a while. I think that’s what does…”
“OK. I didn’t kill her, but she was blackmailing me. She was a witness to the will along with the old gardener, who didn’t know what he was doing. She knew I was the attorney, and wondered how I could inherit. So she checked the county records and found out Egen Mock was the one who actually signed the will as attorney. I…I had a hold over him. He had no alternative but to sign it, even though he wasn’t the lawyer present with the witnesses.”
“Well, I’ll be damned. Poor Egen. No wonder he drank himself to death.”
“For God’s sake call 911.”
“No way. Now that I know what the motive was, all I need is a full confession. Admit that you killed her, and I’ll get right on the blower. You’ve still got six minutes. Take your time. How’s your throat?”
“Call them. Call them. Please!”
“Seems to me you’d be better off confessing. Didn’t you use to claim the State of Alaska mollycoddled its prisoners? Why, a smart lawyer like you might be able to get off with only a half-dozen or so years. Six years of mollycoddling would be better than what’s going to happen to you in a few minutes—at least, to my way of thinking.”
“Alright, alright. I did kill her. Call them!”
“One more minor item. Sheriff Toomes and I had two different locals confess to that murder, the usual kind of kooks who love to confess, but neither of them knew something about the crime scene that only the Sheriff, me and the murderer could know.” Shem held his hand up high, palm outward. “You tell me what it was and I’ll call 911 right away.”
“Call, call, for God’s sake! It was a swastika. I drew it on her forehead with her own lipstick.’
Shem smiled. “Bingo! That’s it. That’s what convinced me it wasn’t just some native. It had to be someone reasonably well educated who knew she was Jewish and probably believed the old stereotype about Jewish greed. I can still remember how you went on and on about Jews. I’m real pleased to think we had sense enough to wipe that off before we turned her over to the coroner. Toomes said that knowledge would come in handy if it didn’t get spread around. And he was sure right. Well, a promise is a promise. Guess I’d better put in that call.”
Shem ambled over to the old rotary phone on the kitchen counter and dialed 911. “Why, hi Betty! When did you start working the night shift? Don’t it worry you none to leave Jed alone in the evening with all those young gals around who keep eyeing that handsome husband of yours? Why am I calling? Oh yeah, I almost forgot. Would you ring Sheriff Toomes and have him come over to my place. I finally ran down Naomi Weiser’s murderer. Nope, I’m not kidding. And after you’ve called the Sheriff, give the medics a ring will you? The murderer ain’t feeling none too good. Seems to think he ought to have his stomach pumped out. Thanks. And say ‘hi’ to Jed for me when you get home. Be sure to tell him how lucky he is to have a pretty wife like you. Tell him Shem Duval said so.”
Dennis was still cursing when the Sheriff arrived—moments before the medics, who stormed though the door, equipment in hand. “You won’t need that stuff,” Shem told them. “Dennis just had a small dose of mountain laurel mixture in his booze. Something I got from one of the locals. It was just enough to paralyze him. It takes almost an hour to work, but it wears off in fifteen minutes or so. Isn’t that right, Dennis? You should be able to start moving your fingers about now, and you’ll be right as rain in next to no time.” 
As he spoke, Shem strolled over to the kitchen counter, uncovered a tape recorder, ejected the tape and gave it to the Sheriff. “A full confession, Bill. It’s all here. He murdered the Weiser woman, and was able to describe the body exactly the way we found it. Not only that…”
Dennis gave a contemptuous snort as, with an effort, he raised one of his hands to the height of the table. “None of that means a thing. I was never read my rights.”
While placing the handcuffs on him, Sheriff Toomes said, “That applies only if the interrogator is a law officer. A lawyer should know that.” Then, grinning, he turned to Shem. “I guess you didn’t fill him in, did you?”
Shem looked solemn. “It just slipped my mind, Sheriff. Sorry, Dennis, I guess I didn’t tell you I quit the sheriff’s department almost a year ago. That conversation you and I had was between two ordinary citizens.”