Death at the Voyager Hotel Read Online Free Page B

“Thank you.”
    “Heather was
wonderful with the children and they adored her,” Paula went on, her voice
trembling. “They all said they never wanted her to go back to the States.”
    “She talked a
lot about the kids,” he said, now sounding very sad. “She said she wished she
could adopt one of them. She seemed happy, but now this. I just don’t
understand. The inspector was saying she drowned. How could she have drowned?
She taught swimming lessons in Portland every summer. She swam in the ocean.
Are you kidding me? I mean, you saw the superb shape she was in. I’m sorry, but
none of this makes any sense.”
    “It doesn’t to
me either.”
    “It wasn’t an
accident,” he said, his voice growing sharper. “Someone either drowned her and left
her in the pool, or killed her elsewhere and then threw her in.”
    Paula swallowed
hard. The thought was horrifying.
    “I never wanted
her to go to Ghana,” he continued. “I had a bad feeling about it.”
    “I’m so sorry,”
Paula said helplessly. She didn’t know what else to say.
    “I mean, I’m
not saying anything against you specifically,” he hastened to add.
    “Yes, I know,
but I feel terrible.”
    “I expect to be
in Ghana Friday morning to make arrangements for Heather to be flown back home,”
he said, sounding weak and battered. “I spoke to the people at the American
Embassy in Accra, and they’ll be able to help with that, and I want to get the
FBI involved in the investigation, too.”
    “Oh.” Paula hadn’t
thought of anything like that. “Did you mention the idea to Chief Inspector
Agyekum?”
    “I did,”
Peterson said. “He didn’t really respond. But I know the FBI sometimes goes to
other countries when there’s a suspicious death of an American citizen—like
they did in the Natalee Holloway case in Aruba.”
    “I see,” Paula
said. She knew nothing about it. “Well, I can ask my husband if he can help in
any way. He used to be a homicide detective here in Accra.”
    “Really? Yes,
if there’s anything he can do, please let me know. Thank you, Paula.”
    “You’re very
welcome.”
    “What am I
helping with?” Thelo asked her after she had hung up.
    “Mr. Peterson
is convinced his daughter’s death was due to foul play,” Paula said
thoughtfully. “He says she was a very good swimmer and can’t believe she
accidentally drowned. He wants to get someone from the FBI to come to—I guess to
help with the investigation, or supervise it—or something.”
    Thelo gave a
small snort of derision. “Spoken just like an American. He thinks the FBI can
just march in and take over the case? The Ghanaian authorities have to request
assistance first, and knowing the Director-General of CID, I can practically guarantee
he won’t. He has a brand new, state-of-the-art forensic lab and crime scene unit,
the lab director himself trained at Quantico at Ghanaian taxpayer expense, and
now he’s going to turn around and ask the FBI for help? The media would have a
field day.”
    “You’re right,”
Paula agreed. “What do you suggest Mr. Peterson should do?”
    Thelo held up
his index finger. “The first thing is to wait for the autopsy result, then go
from there. It’s premature to be talking about the FBI and all that.”
    “But I do understand
his bewilderment,” Paula said. “Heather’s death makes no sense.”
     “Wait for the
autopsy,” Thelo said firmly.



CHAPTER FOUR
    On Thursday, having done little or no paperwork in the past
three days, Paula went to the office early to try to make some headway writing
up the goals for the next quarter. She had been working twenty minutes when her
phone rang. It was Chief Inspector Agyekum.
    “Good morning,
Chief Inspector.”
    “Good morning,
Mrs. Djan. I have some news regarding the death of Miss Heather Peterson.”
    “Yes?” she said
tentatively.
    “The medical
examiner has done the autopsy and found no signs of foul play. However, Miss
Peterson’s blood alcohol