Proof of Murder (Beyond the Page Bookstore Mystery #4) - Lauren Elliott Page 0,90
so?”
“Except I was just upstairs, and there are no rear windows in the attic.”
“What do you mean you were upstairs?”
Addie waved off his question. “I’ll explain later, I promise, but I saw with my own eyes the attic is one large, empty room. There are two front-facing windows and one on either side. But the back wall is solid.”
“Maybe there was a door you just didn’t notice.”
“No, from my vantage point I had a good view. There were no doors. I need to get back up there. We can take that hidden staircase I found. There was another door leading up to the third level that I didn’t explore. I bet it comes out behind what looks like that solid wall in the back of the attic.”
“What hidden stairway, and why were you in the attic to begin with?”
As they wandered around the side of the house to the front, Addie relayed the story of her most recent adventures. A sense of smugness left its telltale mark of a sly smile. She had cracked this case. “What do you think?”
Simon scrubbed his hand through his thick black hair. “I think that Philip and Blake know more about what happened here than either of them has let on, and it seems Philip’s appearance here didn’t come as the surprise they allowed us to believe.”
“My thoughts exactly. I think Blake was so reluctant to report the thefts to the police—”
“Because he was the one committing them, or he put Philip up to it.”
“It also gives me a new theory for Charlotte’s death.”
“You said that before, and I don’t understand. It was a heart attack. There’s no other indication of anything else.”
“Is it possible for a person to be literally scared to death?”
“Sure, there’s no question about it.”
“Really? How?”
“Well . . .” Simon scratched his head. “The autonomic nervous system uses adrenaline to send signals to different parts of the body to activate the fight-or-flight response. It’s the chemical that has ensured mankind’s existence over millennia.”
“Can it lead to death?”
“Unfortunately, yes, adrenaline in excessive amounts is also toxic because it damages the internal organs. You know, like the heart, lungs, liver, and kidneys. Most sudden deaths are attributed to the damage of the heart, though, because when the other organs fail it doesn’t cause sudden death to occur.”
“What exactly happens when the heart is flooded with too much adrenaline?”
“Let’s put it this way: If the system is overwhelmed with adrenaline, the heart can go into abnormal rhythms, probably a ventricular fibrillation, which isn’t compatible with life and . . .” He raised his shoulders in a matter-of-fact shrug. “A person will drop dead.”
“Are there any other medical factors that could contribute to a person actually dying from fear?”
“Of course, if there’s predisposition to heart disease or the person has high levels of prolonged stress. Things like that could increase the risk of abrupt death if there was also a sudden jolt of extra adrenaline, but it happens at all ages and can happen to otherwise healthy people. We talked about her high levels of adrenaline before, and in a naturally occurring heart attack they’re bound to be elevated somewhat anyway. So what are you thinking now?”
“I’m thinking that whoever was smuggling stolen property out of the house might have come through the hidden library door while Charlotte was working alone and scared her to death.”
“Yeah, the shock could have overloaded her system and contributed to her heart failure.”
“Robert told the police that the rumors about the house being haunted had bothered her, so she was on edge whenever they had to work late—there’s your prolonged stress. That night she got agitated, increasing her stress levels higher, and sent him packing. There she is by herself in this creepy old house. Picture her, sitting at the desk. It’s two or three a.m., and suddenly someone is standing behind her. She knew she was alone in the room, and the door was bolted.”
Simon nodded his head slowly, seemingly following the imagery she presented.
“We already discovered the peephole into the library, so it stands to reason that someone was watching her, knew she was nervous, probably why she bolted the door on the inside, and whoever was hiding in the hidden chamber used its existence to create the perfect murder weapon.”
“If causing her death was intentional, then it is murder.”
“Really?”
“Really. After we talked about it before, I did some research and discovered that there was a case in North Carolina a few years back where a