Caught Redhanded
Gayle Roper

To Chip and Audrey

and

Jeff and Cindy,

we couldn’t be prouder.

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Jim Ford, director, Good Works of Chester County, PA, for taking time to talk with me.

You and the hundreds who help you have put that which God has put in your hand to service for the King.

I appreciate you and all the others.

ONE

“I need to get in shape,” I said one mid-July day as I sat at my desk at The News: The Voice of Amhearst and Chester County where I was a general reporter. “For the wedding.”

My wedding was less than two weeks away and I knew that realistically not much could change in that short a time. It was more a case of hope springing eternal. After all, if the women’s magazines could guarantee the loss of a bagillion pounds in one week, why shouldn’t I lose a few by exercising a time or two before I said “I do”?

Still, I didn’t mean for anyone to take me up on the comment, certainly not for anyone to challenge me to actually do something about it. It was more one of those rhetorical statements I tend to make, and I neither expect nor want a response.

“You need to take up jogging.” Jolene Marie Luray Meister Samson looked me up and down from her desk across the aisle. “You could use it.”

Just because she was beautiful and had a figure to die for was no reason to give me that condescending look. I might not be up to her standard of pulchritude, but I was hardly ugly. Curt, my one true love, seemed satisfied, and what more did I need?

“Thanks, Jo,” I said dryly. “Just the encouragement I need.”

She nodded, taking my words at face value. “I’ll meet you in the parking lot at Bushay’s tomorrow morning at six-thirty. It’s still cool enough to run at that hour. We’ll take the jogging trail they have through the woods. It’s pretty, too. Goes beside a creek part of the way and through the woods the rest of the way.”

I’m pretty sure my mouth dropped open, making me look addlepated. I couldn’t decide which threw me more, the hour for the suggested run or the fact that Jolene seemed to be saying she jogged. I wouldn’t have expected one scintilla of physical exertion from her, not even running for her life. And I was supposed to believe she jogged regularly?

“What?” she asked, somewhat huffily. “You think I got this figure by praying for it? I jog three or four times a week.”

“Even in winter?” I was overwhelmed at the picture of Jolene in sweats and watch cap, breath pluming behind her.

“Then I use the track at the Y.”

“At 6:30 a.m.?” Edie Whatley stared. She was the editor of our family page and a general reporter, a slightly plump, happily married woman with a sixteen-year-old son. She looked as shocked as I did at the twin thoughts of Jolene jogging and the hour.

“What is the matter with you two?” Jolene demanded, allowing a frown to mar her lovely face. “Just because you always see me when I’m beautiful…”

She let her voice die, but not because she was embarrassed to have called herself beautiful. She was a strong proponent of truth in advertising, even when it was self-promotion. Rather, she’d just had an idea. I could tell because she narrowed her eyes as she looked from me to Edie and back. The newsroom at The News was small and looking from desk to desk was not in the least difficult.

“I dare you both,” she said. “I dare you to run with me. Prove you’ve got the guts and the stamina.”

Edie and I looked at each other with more than a touch of disbelief.

“You’ve got to stay looking good for Tom, Edie. And you—” Jolene pointed at me with one of her lethal fingernails “—you need to keep Curt interested. You’re not married yet.”

But soon, I thought joyfully. Soon.

“Is that how you keep Reilly interested?” I asked, not willing to tell her that I didn’t think a few pounds one way or the other would make Curt lose or gain interest. He was too much a man of principle to be repelled by something as petty as a few pounds. Not that I planned on gaining any weight, but I was wise enough to know that life happened. After all, Mom had once been a size ten.

“Jolene,” Edie said kindly, “Tom is fine with me the way I am, just as I’m sure Reilly loves you just the way you are.”

Jolene grinned at the mention of her husband to whom she had now been married for several months.

“And I must tell you,” Edie continued, “that I gave up dares in junior high school.”

“Just because you’re well past junior high doesn’t mean you can’t accept a challenge,” Jolene said, either unaware or uncaring that she had just semi-insulted Edie.

“Look, kiddo.” Edie emphasized the kid in kiddo. Jolene was about my age, which was just-turned twenty-seven. “No jogging. I exercise enough to feel healthy and that’s all I plan to do.”

I nodded, though I didn’t get any more exercise than running from story to story.

“You’re afraid,” Jolene taunted, her eyes on me. Apparently she recognized Edie as a lost cause.

“Get real.”

“You know I’ll whip you frontward and backward.”

“I doubt that.”

“Tomorrow morning,” Jo said. “Six-thirty. I’ll be waiting.”

And that’s how I ended up winded, trying my best to keep up with the lovely Jolene, who was proving herself a more than capable jogger as we traced the trail through the woods behind Bushay Waste Management. She wasn’t even huffing in her Lycra top and jogging shorts, her perfect, long legs eating up the distance, her iPod clipped to her waistband, the wire to her earbuds swaying with each stride.

I, on the other hand, expected to fall over any moment. My feet had never felt so heavy, my legs so much like jelly. I pressed my hand against the pain spearing my side.

“Wait for me!” I managed to get the words out between puffs. Why I ever thought this romp in the woods would be a snap was beyond me. You’d think I’d have learned by now that just because Jo looked like a piece of beautiful fluff didn’t mean she was one. Edie had warned me often enough.

Even yesterday after I’d fallen into Jo’s trap, she’d said, “Merry, Jo never speaks from a position of weakness. If she thought she’d lose this dare, she’d never have made it.”

I’d waved her wise words away, but I should have listened, especially since Jo sat at her desk with that cat-who-ate-the-canary look of smug satisfaction.

Even Curt cautioned me when he called to say good-night. “Don’t be too cocky, sweetheart. Jolene likes to win. Always.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I muttered, not the least bit concerned.

Now I was just hoping to make it back to the parking lot without totally embarrassing myself because it was a given that Jo would never let me forget if I failed.

The early morning humidity made everything blur around the edges as I ran. At least I thought it was the humidity and not failing eyesight due to physical over-exertion. I tried to ignore the pains shooting through my shins at every step.

“Slacker,” Jolene yelled back at me over her shoulder.

And that moment of inattention to the path threw us both into the middle of another murder.

I watched in horror as Jolene tripped and went down flat.

“Jo!” I forced myself to go a bit faster. “Are you all right?”

Now she was gasping, too, the wind knocked out of her. “Fine,” she managed in a raspy voice as I knelt beside her.

She pushed herself onto her hands and knees, still struggling for oxygen, head hanging. Bracing herself on one arm, she held out the other scraped and bleeding palm. We inspected it carefully. She turned it over and breathed a sigh of relief. “No broken nails.”

I’d been more concerned about broken limbs.

She sank back on her heels and held out her other palm. Scraped and slowly oozing blood, too. She flipped the hand over. A broken nail, the middle finger. She said a few of the words that Edie and I were trying to convince her weren’t ladylike. Obviously we had more work to do.

She climbed slowly to her feet, looking down at her knees. More oozing scrapes.

“Now how am I supposed to wear skirts with scabs all over my legs?” she demanded.

“Wear pants,” I said with an appalling lack of sympathy. Now that I knew she was all right, I was back to being disgruntled.

She gave her typical snort, always so surprising from someone who looks like her. Clearly she felt a mandate to share her beautiful limbs with the world. How she had become one of my best friends was still a mystery to me. She was even going to be one of my bridesmaids along with Maddie and Dawn.

“I tripped over something.” Jo sounded as if whatever she had stumbled over had deliberately attacked her. She pushed to her feet with me helping by taking her elbow.

We turned together to see what had brought her low and stared wide eyed at the foot clad in a gray-and-white running shoe protruding from the chicory and wild phlox lining the path.

My pulse accelerated to a rate that far outstripped the hammering I’d experienced when jogging. Oh, God, I prayed, unable to articulate all the thoughts that raced through my mind. I don’t want to look. I must look. What should I do if she needs help? If she needs help? Of course she needs help. She’s lying on the ground and I doubt she’s just taking a nap.

Carefully I leaned over the weeds, following the line of the woman’s body, for it was obvious from the size of her foot and the shape of her ankle that it was a woman. She was lying on her stomach, face turned toward the left, away from us, sleeveless pink scoop-necked knit shirt twisted about her torso.

It was the gaping wound at the back of her head and the bloody weeds surrounding her that made my stomach heave.

TWO

I swallowed and then swallowed some more until the urge to be sick subsided.

“Martha!” Jolene said in a disbelieving voice. “It’s Martha Colby!”

I might have known she’d recognize the woman. Jo has lived in Amhearst all her life and knows everyone who lives here—and all their secrets.

I knelt quickly beside Martha, taking care not to step in the blood, and felt for a pulse. As I looked into her open, staring eyes, I didn’t expect to find one. I didn’t. I glanced at Jo and saw she had lost all her color and was swaying slightly. I understood completely. If I felt this shaky and I didn’t even know the woman, how must Jo feel?

“Why don’t you run for help?” I suggested quickly. Neither of us had carried our cells as we ran, but mostly I wanted to get her out of here before she passed out.

“911,” she said vaguely.

“911,” I agreed. “I’ll stay here with Martha.”

Jo blinked at me, nodded, then took off, running with remarkable speed. I felt a maternal pride—or what I think such a thing feels like—in her quick reaction. The last time we faced a body together, she’d fallen to pieces. Of course, it had been her ex-husband’s body then.

I sat down beside Martha’s foot on the path. She looked so vulnerable, so sad lying there. So alone. For some reason I wanted to rest my hand on her foot, on her running shoe. I fought the feeling that she needed attachment, touch, because she no longer did. I was the one who did. Death always brings home the fragility of life.

But if I touched her anywhere, even if I only touched her shoe, I might inadvertently destroy evidence. Who knew what she might have stepped in and what trace evidence lingered on that surface?

I blinked as I realized I was assuming murder. Why?

My eyes swept over the area. There was no limb lying nearby that might have fallen on her. In fact, there were no trees close to the path where we were. Also Martha couldn’t have stumbled and struck the back of her head, nor could the soft earth beneath the chicory and phlox and wild mustard have made that horrid gash.

The scene said foul play as clearly as if the weeds themselves could speak.

So I sat by Martha’s foot, careful not to touch her, feeling she deserved someone acting as honor guard or some such thing, though we were obviously too late to shield her from whomever had harmed her.

Suddenly it struck me that her neck had still been warm when I felt for a pulse. My back muscles contracted as I quickly scanned the edge of the woods that stood back about twenty feet from the trail. Dogwood and mountain laurel, their blossoms now gone, mixed with poplar, beech and oak. Whoever had struck Martha might still be nearby. Maybe they were watching me from behind the thicket of bushes? The summer foliage was dense enough to hide a small army if it chose to secret itself behind the trees. Certainly one murderer could be hiding there easily.

Oh, Lord, if he’s there, make him go away! I remembered my manners and quickly added, Please!

“They’re on their way,” Jo called as she raced back.

I breathed a relieved sigh. Help was coming and there was safety in numbers, even if the number was only two at the moment.

Jo shoved her picture phone at me. “Here, take a few shots before the crime-scene guys arrive and we won’t be allowed near Martha again.”

“I hate this part of being a reporter.” I climbed to my feet and took the phone.

“Mac would kill us if we missed the opportunity.” She heard herself and made a distressed noise as she looked down at Martha. “Poor choice of words.”

“Yeah.” Trying to be the uninvolved newspaper professional, I took several pictures. When the police arrived, I’d take a couple more of them at work and it would be one of those that actually got printed in the paper. We certainly wouldn’t print Martha, so defenseless, lying here. The pain that would give her family was unimaginable. But we would use them as a reference for whatever we wrote.

Jo stayed carefully on the path, but continued to stare at Martha, looking sad. “I went to school with her younger sister Tawny.”

“Tawny? Like the color of a lion?” It’s amazing the strange things your mind sticks on when reality is too terrible to contemplate.

“Yeah.”

“Interesting. Martha is such a traditional name, biblical and all. Tawny is one of those cutesy modern names.”

“Different moms. Martha’s mom took off when she was about three. Left her with her father. He remarried a couple of years later, and Tawny and Shawna come from the second marriage. Martha was four or five years ahead of Tawny and me, but I always thought she was so cool. She was a cheerleader, the real perky kind who does splits and tumbles. Mac was her tosser.”

“Mac?” I squeaked. “Our Mac?”

Mac Carnuccio was our editor at The News, and he was also Amhearst born and bred. He might be many things, but I’d never in a million years have pictured him as a cheerleader. The secrets that lurk in people’s pasts are amazing.

Jolene nodded. “Our Mac. He and Martha went together from high school until well into college. Then when he came back to town to work at The News, they dated again, sort of off and on when he wasn’t chasing someone else. He sort of broke her heart.”

That sounded like our Mac.

Jo shrugged and looked thoughtful, always a circumstance guaranteed to bring an unexpected insight. “Or maybe she broke his. Who knows? She dated other guys a lot.”

Now there was an interesting thought. Mac, a ladies’ man through and through, reaping his own whirlwind.

“And in a fit of frustrated passion—” she waved her arm in the air like she was banging something against the back of a head “—he…”

I frowned at her. “Don’t even go there, Jolene Marie. You know Mac is changing. And even the old Mac would never have done something so violent.”

Jo actually blushed. “Yeah, you’re right.” She leaned over Martha, I thought because she was too embarrassed to look at me. Accusing one’s boss, even in thoughtless speculation, isn’t the done thing.

Jo tensed. “Look. She’s got a tattoo on her left shoulder.”

I looked. Sure enough, sticking out from under the edge of her sleeveless running shirt was the curve of one side of a red heart.

“It has a name in it,” Jo said. Before I realized what she planned to do, she reached over and slid the shirt to the side.

“Jo! Don’t touch!” I could picture the unhappy face of Sergeant Poole of the Amhearst police.

Jolene ignored me just as she ignored anything she didn’t want to hear. “It says M-A-C. MAC.” She looked at me. “Our Mac?”

Yikes. The very thought made me uneasy.

“Even if it is, it doesn’t mean anything anymore,” Jolene hastened to say, obviously trying to undo her previous suspicious thoughts. “He’s going with Dawn Trauber now.”

He wishes. Dawn was the director of His House, a residential ministry to teen girls in trouble, most of them unwed mothers. She was also a strong Christian and Mac wasn’t. I didn’t think he was any kind of a believer, strong or weak, committed or un. Therein lay their problem. In spite of mutual attraction, Dawn was holding tough against too deep an emotional attachment. At least she was trying hard. It was a case of unequally yoked.

“It looks new, doesn’t it?” Jo asked, still studying the tattoo.

I knew nothing about tattoos except that they were permanent and that it hurt to get them. Oh, and that as you aged and your skin sagged, so did your tattoo.

The first response team arrived in an amazingly short time, swarming the area, cordoning off the crime scene with yellow tape. My friend Sergeant William Poole led the police contingent.

“What is it with you two?” he asked, his furrowed face curious as he studied Jo and me. “You turn up at an inordinate number of homicides, especially you, Merry.”

I gave him a sickly grin. “You think I enjoy it?”

He smiled kindly, his furrowed face wrinkling like a shar-pei’s. “Of course you don’t, any more than I do.” His eyes took on a teasing glint. “But I think you love the stories.”

I couldn’t deny that, ghoulish as it made me seem. For a reporter everything is a potential story and bomb-shells like local murders are guaranteed to interest readers. I looked at the crime-scene investigators hovering over Martha. “The stories may be great, William, but I’d rather not have them. They hurt too many people.”

I thought of Martha’s family. Were her father and stepmother about to be devastated? Or wouldn’t they care? Did she have more siblings than Tawny and Shawna, perhaps ones who shared the same mother? Had Martha been close to her much younger half sisters? Where was her mother now? Had Martha had contact with her or had she disappeared completely from her daughter’s life?

Oh, Lord, they’re all going to need your comfort. Be there for them.

William nodded. “This one definitely hurts. I watched her grow up.” He sighed. “Her family lives down the street from us.”

“What kind of a young woman was she?” I asked. There I went, story-writing again.

“Most of the time she was great. When she was in high school, she babysat for our kids. At college she went a little wild for a time—a couple of DUIs, a bust for pot—but she straightened herself out.”

“Did she still live at home?”

“No.” He and Jolene said it together.

“She had her own place,” William said.

“Over in those new condos off Chestnut Street,” Jolene said.

I knew the condos she meant. They were nice, moderately priced units, built about four years ago. They didn’t begin to compare with the luxury condo that Jolene shared with Reilly, but then, not many did. Not many people had an income like Jolene’s. Twenty-five thousand dollars a month for twenty years. She and her late husband, Arnie, had hit it big in the state lottery.

“Did she live alone?”

Jo shook her head. “Her latest boyfriend is Ken Mackey. They share.”

“Mackey?” William cast an unhappy eye in her direction.

Jo nodded but for once kept her mouth shut. Hmm. Definitely something to be learned there. Between Jo’s silence and the way William said Ken Mackey’s name, we had an issue with a capital I. When Jo and I were in the office, I’d nail her for the scoop on old Ken.

“You two can go home and get ready for work,” William said. “Just stop at the station today and give a formal statement. If I’m not there, ask for Officer Schumann.”

We nodded and turned to leave. I paused and took a few shots of the men and women working the scene. William saw me and gave me an unhappy look, but he didn’t forbid me. I appreciated his trust.

Poor Martha appeared to have trusted the wrong person.

THREE

As William suggested, I went home and showered. I ran my mousse-globbed hands through my hair, trying to make it look stylishly spiked instead of like I hadn’t bothered to brush it today. I put on navy slacks, a pink wide-strapped camisole top and a white sheer blouse covered with pink flowers. I liked the way the pink in the cami made the pink flowers in the sheer blouse so vivid. And I immediately felt guilty for thinking about something so frivolous with Martha lying dead.

With a sigh I snuggled Whiskers, my much-pampered cat, for a moment, then went to the kitchen. I kept one eye on the clock as I toasted a couple of slices of Jewish rye nice and crisp. I slathered them lavishly with real butter and ate them with a Diet Coke as I drove to the office, all too aware that deadline was looming. I needed to do my piece on Martha.

This wasn’t the first time I’d written about a crime with which I was intimately connected and I disliked it this time just as much as the first time I’d inadvertently found death. My heart bled for the lost life, for the lost opportunities, the lost joys and sorrows, and most deeply for the lost chances to know God intimately. My soul shriveled at the audacity of someone who thought that the right to decide life and death was his. How heinous, how prideful, how offensive. How evil. It was Cain and Abel wearing modern garb, man killing man for power and greed, love and hate. It was proof positive that mankind had not changed though we dressed better and enjoyed luxuries those biblical brothers could not even imagine.

And there were those left behind who through no choice of their own were forced to share Eve’s sorrow and loss, compelled to forfeit part of their lives, too. I’d seen their faces and their pain. I’d written about it, attempted to comprehend their great bereavement and make readers feel it and understand that as the victim had been robbed of so many possibilities, so had those who loved that person.

I wanted to be a voice for the dead and for those they left behind, to articulate their horror, their despair. If in this way I could make some contribution to the apprehension of the person responsible for all this pain, I would feel I had offered some small compensation to those who remained.

Chin up, shoulders back, I marched into the news-room, Joan of Arc to my own fields of Orléans.

“How many inches?” I called to Mac, the can of Coke still in my hand. I swallowed the dregs as he called back, “As much as you need. We’ll adapt.”

I stared. I wasn’t used to such freedom and it felt strange.

Mac scowled at me. “Just write, Kramer. Fast.”

I blinked. “Right.”

I wrote a straight news piece, not too long since the incident was only an hour or so old and neither I nor the police had had time to gather much information. Then I wrote the personal piece, adding quotes from Jolene to flesh it out, trying my best to communicate the horror without titillating. I dragged the icon for the pieces and dropped them into Mac’s in-box, then sat back in my chair and thought about the morning. I got up abruptly. I wanted to go to the crime scene and see firsthand if anything new and interesting had developed.

I parked in the Bushay lot, now full of cars. Most were those of employees, but several had flashing lights and crackling radios. I followed the jogging path to the yellow crime-scene tape. Sergeant Poole looked up from his blue study of the matted grass where Martha had lain. He stood alone, but clever sleuth that I am, I knew there were other cops somewhere because of the cars in the lot.

William’s craggy face grew ever more furrowed as he frowned at me. “Merry.”

I decided to ignore the lack of enthusiasm in his voice. “Hi, William. Anything new happening?”

He extended his arm to indicate the empty space around him. “As you can see, not a thing.”

“Any comment for the paper? What have the crime-scene guys found?”

“The investigation is continuing apace.”

I cocked an eyebrow at him. He was the only person I knew who said apace.

“Sorry, kid,” he said, not sorry at all. “That’s it.”

“No weapon? No motive? No suspect?”

“Merry, the woman’s been dead mere hours.”

“Hey, William! Come ’ere quick!”

He and I turned to the woman who burst out of the woods, ducking under the graceful branches of a dogwood. She wore a uniform like William’s without the stripes of rank. Her face was alight with excitement.

“Oops.” Officer Natalie Schumann skidded to a halt as she saw me. “Uh, Sergeant Poole, may I see you for a moment, please?”

“If you’ll excuse me, Merry,” William said. “I’m sure you need to leave and get about your reporting business somewhere else. Maybe there’s a fire in West Chester or a drug bust in Downingtown.” He nodded and turned to follow Natalie into the woods.

As soon as William and Natalie disappeared into the trees, I followed as quietly as I could. At times like this I find it wonderful that my work provides me a legitimate excuse for my nosiness. No guilt for a change.

About a football field into the woods I saw a cluster of cops standing around what appeared to be a large thicket of raspberry brambles growing in a patch of sunlight. One of the men was picking ripe berries and popping them in his mouth as he and the others watched someone in the middle of the thicket intently.

That officer was taking pictures of something from all angles. He muttered words that I would never say as thorns tore at his uncovered arms and clung to his uniform pants. His particularly loud snarls seemed reserved for the ripe raspberries that insisted on bleeding all over him.

I snuck up behind Natalie and tried to peer around her. I needed to see what had attracted all this attention. When I couldn’t see as well as I wanted, I stepped forward and trod on a rock hidden under the natural refuse littering the ground. My ankle turned and with a squeak I pitched forward into the raspberries. Normally I love the wild raspberries that grow profusely on fences and stone walls at the edge of fields as well as in clusters like this where sunlight penetrates the canopy of leaves. The early flowers smell spicy with a hint of cinnamon and I enjoy picking the fruit when it ripens. However, falling into a thicket is a different matter.

I threw my hands out as if they would protect me. It raced through my mind that the scratches I was sure to get should clear up before the wedding. Unless they festered.

Just before I went in headfirst, a strong arm grabbed my blouse in the back and pulled me up short. When I got my feet under me, I glanced over my shoulder at William.

“I thought I told you to get lost,” he growled.

Ever astute, I deduced that he was not happy to see me. Ignoring his comment, I smiled at him. “Thank you, William,” I said most sincerely. “The bride wore scratches isn’t the look I want. What are you all looking at?”

It was obvious he didn’t want to tell me, but at that moment the cop emerged from the grasp of the raspberry brambles, still muttering under his breath as he tried to detach one long tendril that insisted on clinging to his pants. His arms were laced with red scratches and berry stains. His light blue shirt would be a total loss if the red polka dots stained as I thought they would.

William forgot me as he stepped close to examine what the cop held balanced on a piece of toweling.

“Paper bag,” William called and Natalie flipped open what looked like a bag from the grocery store. Carefully the officer from the raspberries slid his find into the bag—a jagged rock large enough to be a deadly weapon, a rock stained with blood, a rock that had strands of hair stuck to it.

My stomach churned as I pictured the murderer bringing it down on the head of an unsuspecting Martha.

“Natalie, take it to the crime-scene guys at the Lancaster barracks,” William ordered.

With a brisk nod, she and her paper bag were gone.

“Why a paper bag?” I asked William. On TV they always use plastic bags.

“So moisture doesn’t build up inside and break down the chemical properties of the blood and the other trace elements.”

“I’m assuming that’s the murder weapon?” I indicated Natalie’s retreating form.

“I don’t know.”

“But the blood and hair—”

“We don’t know that they belong to the vic.” He stared at me. “Goodbye, Merry. I have work to do.”

He turned to the officer with the camera and he and the others made a circle that shut me out. And rightly so, I admitted. It was time for me to go.

As I walked to the car, I knew that rock was the murder weapon just as I knew the blood and hair were Martha’s. Otherwise it was a case of one deer walloping another and tossing the rock in the raspberries where he knew it would be hard to find.

Right.

I climbed into my car, lowered the windows to release the heat that had built up and pulled out of my pocket the slip of paper I’d written Martha’s address on. I pushed the air-conditioning button and drove across town to her condo development with the windows open. My father would think I was crazy for having the windows open with the air-conditioning going, but I find the resulting mixed temperature most comfortable. I also love the air blowing my hair, which couldn’t get too messed up with all the mousse in it.

I wandered up and down the twisting streets west of Amhearst near Sadsburyville for a good five minutes looking for the right road and house number. I became totally confused and began to fear I’d never find my way back out, let alone Martha’s place. Why couldn’t developers put in straight streets anymore? Life had been so much easier when the line from point A to point B was a straight one instead of a corkscrew. Mazes might be fun to solve on paper or in an autumn cornfield, but in developments they leave a lot to be desired.

Finally I stumbled across the right road and followed the numbers until I came to the series of five attached units, the second from the left being Martha’s. Her unit had creamy vinyl siding, crimson shutters and a crimson front door behind a white screen door. The neighboring units were taupe, white, blue and brick. I liked the brick unit best; it had character. But architectural detail wasn’t why I was here. I wanted to see if I could find Ken Mackey. Ken MACkey.

I walked to the front door of Martha’s condo, noting that only her name, not Ken’s, was on the mailbox. A white plastic basket filled with deep red petunias and blue lobelia hung from one corner of the small roof overhanging the front door. In a little patch of soil beside the concrete slab front stoop grew pink geraniums backed by blue salvia and fronted by white alyssum. My heart contracted at the signs of the care Martha had taken to turn her rather ordinary residence into her unique home.

I pushed on the doorbell to the right of the jamb but heard no answering ring. I frowned and pushed again. No trill. I pulled the screen door open and knocked.

And took a step backward as the door swung inward at my touch.

FOUR

I stared at Martha’s front door as it slowly creaked open. Not good.

“Hello?” I called into the shadowed front hall. “Is anyone home? Ken?” I knocked on the doorjamb. “Hello?”

I thought maybe I heard a quiet thud and a soft swish. My heart began beating so hard my ears rang. Someone was here. I swallowed and elbowed the door farther open.

“Hello?”

No answer.

Remembering William’s edict that I never touch anything at a crime scene—and it didn’t take many brains to figure that with the condo’s resident dead and the front door unaccountably open, this was probably a crime scene—I didn’t touch the knob in case the cops needed to check it for prints or something.

I supposed it was possible that Martha had hurried out this morning to go on her run without shutting and locking her door, but I doubted it. Even I, Merry the Forgetful, remembered to lock my front door. Not the car necessarily, but definitely the front door.

If Ken was still home, maybe she wouldn’t have locked up, but she’d have at least closed the door. I became certain of that as air-conditioned air swirled out of the opening to cool my face. No one was foolish enough to leave a door open with the air-conditioning on at this time of year. I pulled out my cell to call William.

“Martha’s not here,” said a voice behind me. “She’s at work down at the supermarket. You’d think people would realize that at ten-thirty on a Tuesday morning.”

I spun and found myself facing a stooped woman with the black hair of a bad home dye-job. Her blue eyes were bright in her wrinkled face and I guessed she was eighty if she was a day. As she gestured toward the house with her chin, her wattles swung gently.

“I guess you’ve got a key?” She gestured at the open door. “The others had one, too. They said Martha was going to meet them here, but they didn’t wait for her very long. When they left, they went out by the back door, sort of sneakylike if you ask me.”

They? “Who went out the back? Ken?” Maybe he didn’t want to see anyone in his grief. Or if he was guilty, maybe he was grabbing his stuff and getting out while the getting was good. Maybe he thought I was the police.

She nodded her head vigorously and her hair moved not one millimeter. “Ken was first. Then the new boyfriend.”

“The new boyfriend?” What new boyfriend? I couldn’t believe I was learning something Jolene had missed. “Ken’s no longer Martha’s boyfriend?”

The woman bent and twisted a dying flower from one of Martha’s geraniums. She straightened slowly, vertebra by vertebra. “Not for a couple of months. Good riddance, I say. Hated his motorcycle.” She curled her lip. “Loud, smelly thing.”

I smiled. “Motorcycles can certainly be loud.”

“Not the bike. Him.” She gave a sniff. “He was loud and smelly. Never could figure out why she let him stay with her.”

I decided I liked Martha’s neighbor. “So this is Martha’s condo, not Ken’s?”

“Oh, yes. Before he came, she lived here alone. Then after he moved out, she lived here alone. The new boyfriend doesn’t live with her.”

“Who’s the new boyfriend?”

“Don’t know his name. Tall, but then everyone looks tall to me. Very handsome, at least what I can see of him. He always comes late and I don’t see as well as I used to at night or even at twilight. He always wears a cap with some logo on it. I looked at it through my binoculars once.” She made a face. “Oops. You didn’t hear that, now, did you, dear?”

I laughed. “I didn’t hear a thing. Did you figure out what the logo was?”

“It was a bird.”

“A bird? Like he was wearing an Eagles cap? Was it dark green and white?”

She thought for a minute. “It could have been dark green. It was certainly dark in color. But the bird didn’t look like any eagle I ever saw, but then, what do I know of logos? One thing I will say for the guy, though—he is always very polite. Nods to me whenever he comes. Makes Ken look like a Neanderthal. He never paid any attention to me.” She pointed proudly to the baby-blue unit next door. “I live right there.”

“Very nice,” I said as I looked at the big pot of yellow daisies and blue lobelia on her doorstep. I could see the lace curtains covering her front windows were parted a couple of inches in the center. The better to use those binoculars?

She frowned thoughtfully. “Though come to think of it, I never saw the new one come in the daytime before today. You’d think he’d know Martha’s at work.”

I looked at the woman, who obviously didn’t yet know about Martha’s death. I decided not to tell her. I’d been through enough emotional drama and I had no desire to face more. Besides, she might be more open and spontaneous this way, telling me things I wanted to know. I stuck out my hand. “I’m Merry Kramer.”

“I’m Doris Wilson, dear. Nice to meet you.” She smiled happily as she took my hand. Her gnarled fingers gripped more strongly than I expected.

“Was Martha a good neighbor?” I asked, then kicked myself for using the past tense. I peered at Mrs. Wilson. Maybe she wouldn’t catch it.

“Was? Oh dear. Are you telling me she’s moving? When Ken left, I thought she might move to get away from the memories, you know? Then she didn’t and I thought she was going to stay.” Mrs. Wilson sighed. “The nice ones always leave. Sergeant Major Wilson was in the army for many, many years and the nice ones always got reassigned just when we got to know and enjoy them. Or we got reassigned. Are you a real estate lady come to check over the place?”

“No, no, not at all,” I hastened to assure her. “I was just asking a question.”

Mrs. Wilson absently twisted her wedding ring around her finger. “She’s a very nice person. Smokes like a lot of foolish young people, but she’s nice. She never hesitates to come over if I need help with something like climbing on the step stool to get a special dish off a high shelf. Oh my.” She looked distressed. “If Martha moves, I would be very sad.”

A faint ringing sounded and Mrs. Wilson went on point like a bird dog taking the scent. Her nose actually quivered. “That’s my phone.” She turned eagerly toward her unit. “Nice to meet you, uh—” She gave up trying to recall my name. “I’m sorry Martha’s not home.”

As soon as her white door closed behind her, I elbowed Martha’s door all the way open. In spite of Mrs. Wilson’s assurances that “they” went out the back door, I called, “Hello? Hello? I’m coming in.”

And I did, pushing the door not quite shut behind me so I could make a quick exit if I needed to. I paused in the hall, listening. The house had that empty feel to it and I decided it was quite safe to look around a bit.

I could just imagine Curt’s reaction if he’d been here. “Merry, what are you doing? This isn’t your house. You can’t just walk in.”

Then there was Mac’s way of seeing things. I knew he’d say, “Good initiative, Kramer. I’m proud of you. What’d you find?”

As to William, I didn’t think he’d see my walk-through as breaking and entering. I wouldn’t touch anything and I certainly wouldn’t take anything.

All in all, I felt good to go.

Martha’s living room looked like it came from an IKEA catalogue, all blond wood and bright cushions. Several inexpensive but attractive framed posters of colorful gardens hung on two of the walls; a flat-screen TV hung on a third over a long entertainment center. Two tall windows looked out on the small front lawn and the parking lot, filling the fourth wall.

Cat stuff was everywhere—pillows sporting cats lined the sofa, two stuffed cats sat in one of the chairs, ceramic cats sat on end tables amid framed photos, a calico fabric cat lay beside the magazine basket. And when I glanced at the gardens on the wall again, I saw they all had cats sitting among the blooms.

I made a mental note to ask Mrs. Wilson if Martha had a live cat or two who needed care now that their owner was dead.

The only jarring note in the room was the disarrangement of the cats and the framed photos that sat in groups on the end tables and the top of the entertainment cabinet. Martha smiled out of several pictures, standing arm in arm with people I didn’t know. In three of the many pictures the same young man stood with Martha, his arms wrapped around her. Ken? If so, he didn’t look dirty or smelly to me. In fact, he looked pretty good to me. An adorable little girl with blond ringlets grinned from a frame that had been knocked over. A niece? A friend’s child? A couple who must be her father and stepmother sat in a rather rigid studio portrait. Beside them a ceramic cat that was washing an extended back leg lay toppled on its side.

On the floor, beside a stone cat sitting with his tail curled about his paws, lay a picture, facedown. Much as I was dying to see the photo since you never know what might be a clue, I didn’t touch it. I hoped William would appreciate my discipline.

In the neat, white kitchen a copy of today’s Philadelphia Inquirer lay on the table, opened to the puzzle page. Someone had begun working the Sudoku with a mechanical pencil that had a very worn eraser. The only other item not tucked away in a cupboard was a small glass with orange juice residue in the bottom. The back sliding glass door stood open, the screen pushed to the side.

Can you say escape route? I was willing to bet this was the swishing sound I’d heard when I first arrived. I gave a little shudder. I had scared someone off, someone I was very glad I hadn’t met, given today’s circumstances.

I peeked in the single bedroom where a faux brass bed stood, neatly made and covered with an Amish quilt in shades of blue and yellow. Blue and yellow curtains hung at the windows and once again everything was neat as could be—except for the night table whose drawer was wide open. An alarm clock and a book lay on the floor beside the toppled bedside lamp.

I looked in the bathroom last and there the mess left no doubt that someone had taken things or at the very least been looking for something specific. The medicine chest had been emptied into the sink, its door left gaping. Bottles, toiletries and a box of bandages lay in a heap; the toothbrush holder lay on the floor.

I wondered which one of Mrs. Wilson’s they had made the mess.

I went back to the kitchen and stared at the open sliding door. Hot, humid air poured in, melding with the crisp air-conditioning. The view out the door was the backs of another five-condo unit, separated from Martha’s by a row of conifers that had grown both tall and thick. I wondered if people were at home in those units and if one of them had looked out at the right time to see who had run from Martha’s place.

I stepped outside and felt my ankle turn again. At this rate I’d be walking down the aisle with a cane.

I looked down at the concrete slab that passed for a patio and saw I’d stepped on the edge of a book. I bent and picked it up without thinking. I grimaced, but the damage was done. My fingerprints were stamped on the red leather cover with or over someone else’s, someone besides Martha.

I grabbed my shirttail and held the book in it. Using the material to protect the pages, I riffled through it quickly. It was a diary or a journal, the kind with all blank, lined pages. Its pages were more than half filled with a pretty, straight up and down penmanship. By the dates marking each new entry, I could see Martha wrote in it frequently rather than daily. When I glimpsed the name MAC, I knew it was time to call William and grabbed my cell.

I’d just pressed the 9 of 911 when the glass door on the powder-blue unit slid open, and Mrs. Wilson stepped out.

Without a thought, I dropped the journal into my purse. No way did I want her to see it and ask questions about it, maybe even demand I leave it here. It was something for William’s eyes only.

I needn’t have worried. She didn’t see me. Her eyes were red, and she kept sniffing and wiping her nose with a crumpled wad of tissues. She stood staring at the conifers for a few minutes. Then she took a long, shuddering breath.

“Are you all right, Mrs. Wilson?” I asked.

She jumped and turned, her eyes wide and fearful. Her hand came up to cover her heart when she saw it was only me.

“You scared me out of ten years,” she gasped. She patted her chest rapidly. Then as fear fled, I could see suspicion replace it.

“What are you doing here? Why are you in Martha’s house?” She began to move slowly backward toward her door. “I never saw you here before.”

“Sure you did.” Maybe she wasn’t as sharp as I’d thought. “We talked out front.”

She shot me a scathing look. “I know that. Before today. And you shouldn’t be here. No one should be here. Martha’s dead.” It was a wail. Clearly she’d cared for Martha. “I called the police and told them there had been people here. I told them you were here.”

“Good,” I said, holding out my phone. “I was about to do the same thing.”

She blinked, uncertain what to think of me. I couldn’t blame her.

“How did you learn about Martha?” I asked.

“That phone call? That was my friend Jennie. She heard about it on the TV.” Tears filled her eyes and rolled slowly down her wrinkled cheeks. “She was so nice.”

“That’s what I hear.” I smiled sadly. “I wish I had known her.”

Mrs. Wilson drew back like I’d slapped her and I knew I’d said the wrong thing.

“If you don’t—didn’t know her, what are you doing here?” She shook her finger at me. “You go away. Right now.”

“I want to wait for the police,” I said.

“No. You go. Now.” Her voice quavered with distress, but her eyes were determined. She stepped back until she was at her door. She leaned, clearly reaching for something just inside. When she drew her hand out, I stared in disbelief at the object she held. She clutched the burglar bar for her slider and she swung it through the air with all the panache of a knight wielding his broadsword.

“Go,” she ordered as the rush of air from her mighty swing brushed my face.

“But—”

“Go!” She took a step toward me, her weapon raised. Clearly her years with Sergeant Major Wilson and the army had rubbed off on her.

Feeling like a Great Dane being chased by a miniature dachshund, I went.

FIVE

Being chased by an amazingly spry eightysomething-year-old lady was very unnerving, especially by one as intent on bashing me as Mrs. Wilson. When I jumped into my car, I half expected her to use her burglar bar on my windshield.

Instead she stood panting on the front walk and I had visions of her keeling over on the spot from a massive coronary; all the blame would be mine.

“But, honestly, officer, she came after me.”

“Yeah, right. Hands behind your back.” Snick, snick clicked the cuffs. “You have the right…”

As I drove away, I watched her in my rearview mirror in case she did collapse. The last I saw of her before a curve in the road hid her from view, she was giving the bar a final shake in my direction.

Now that I was safe, I became very curious about the man who had lived so many years with a woman as feisty as Mrs. Wilson. Had the sergeant major been Special Forces or some such highly trained group? Had he come home from work each day and taught her all he knew? Was their home life the Wilson version of Clouseau and Cato in the original Pink Panther series as they stalked each other from room to room?

I had just taken my seat at my desk back at the newsroom when my phone rang. William to tell me off about Mrs. Wilson and Martha’s place?

“Is this Merrileigh Kramer, award-winning journalist?” a man asked, his familiar voice booming down the line. Though he was reticent by temperament, he always projected on the phone like an out-of-work actor auditioning for a last-ditch opportunity at a starring role.

I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at it in disbelief. Why was Ron Henrey, my former editor back in Pittsburgh, where I had cut my reporting teeth first as an intern, then as a staff reporter, calling me?

“Are you still there, Merry?”

I jammed the phone back against my ear. “I’m here, Mr. Henrey.”

“Surprised you speechless, eh?”

“Something like that,” I admitted. He was certainly high on my list of People I Never Expect To Hear From.

“Congratulations on winning that Keystone Press Award. We taught you well, I’d say.”

“I’d say,” I agreed.

There was a little silence while I tried to imagine why Ron Henrey was contacting me. Certainly he wasn’t calling to interview a hometown girl made good. That would be an assignment given to a features reporter, the Chronicle’s equivalent of someone like me or Edie. Besides I hadn’t made good enough to be worth an article.

“I bet you’re wondering why I’m calling,” he said.

I made a little agreeing noise, which proved to be all the encouragement he needed.

“We’d like you to come back to the Chronicle, Merry. We’d like you to write two or three features a week and have your own column.”

Then he named a salary that made me blink in astonishment. I wouldn’t exactly be rich, but from my present perspective, I’d be close. The cynic in me, rarely used, kept looking for the catch, but I couldn’t see one. Since I’m not a very practiced cynic, it’s often hard for me to find the fly trapped in the ointment. However, the rose-colored glasses I wear with practiced ease illuminated a wonderful vista.

My own column! Real money!

I’d been asking Mac for a column for the past several months. He only looked at me and, cynic extraordinaire that he was, said, “In about ten years, Merry. When you finally grow up.”

I glanced at Mac, sitting at his editor’s desk by the great glass window that looked down from his second-floor perch onto Main Street. He was typing away on his PC, and I felt like a traitor to The News with Mr. Henrey trying to lure me away.

Suddenly Mac looked at me. “Hey, Kramer, when you’re finished, I need to see you.”

As I waved acknowledgement, I tried to imagine Mr. Henrey yelling across the Chronicle newsroom at me. Never happen. First off, the room was too big. Secondly Mr. Henrey, for all his booming phone voice, was a model of propriety. He would either IM me or give me a discreet bring on my desk phone.

“What do you think?” Mr. Henrey was still speaking, booming as ever. “Interested?”

I realized I was smiling. I also realized Jolene was watching me smile and would demand to know why as soon as I hung up. No way was I telling her. I might as well stand on my desk and emote like Mr. Henrey because everyone would know before nightfall.

“May I think about this?” I asked. “You’ve taken me by surprise.”

“You have a week,” Mr. Henrey yelled genially.

Long enough to develop an acid stomach as I debated the pros and cons, but not long enough to get an ulcer. “Sounds fine.”

I hung up, still not believing the offer. Jolene, dressed in a yellow narrow-strapped cami top and a denim miniskirt in spite of the scraped knees, pounced.

“What? Why were you smiling? And don’t try and tell me it was Curt whispering sweet nothings in your ear. He doesn’t yell in the phone.”

Curt! I blinked in disbelief. I’d been so caught up in the unbelievably good offer and so busy being impressed with myself that I hadn’t even thought of my fiancé. Granted I’d moved to Amhearst to learn to be independent, to stand on my own two feet, but a girl should at least wonder what the man she plans to marry in less than two weeks would think about moving.

Probably not much. He was as much Amhearst as Jolene and Mac.

There was nothing for it. I’d have to call Mr. Henrey back and decline his offer.

Maybe not, kid, the perverse part of me said. He’s an artist. Artists can paint anywhere, right?

Hmm, thought the nicer me, jumping much too quickly to agree. That’s true.

“Come on,” Jolene prompted. “Give.”

I tried not to look guilty as I scrambled for something to say that wasn’t a lie but wasn’t exactly the truth, either. I squirmed under her relentless gaze.

She stood and walked across the narrow aisle that separated our desks. I half expected her to stick her index finger under my nose and demand an answer. Instead she spun the little basket of cheery flowers that sat on my desk, checking for dead blooms among the pale yellow double begonia, the miniature pink rose, the crimson geranium and the pale blue dianthus. A regular Gertie the Gardener, Jolene focused the same intensity on her plants as on her insatiable curiosity. As a result the newsroom resembled a nursery with greenery on every available flat surface and a row of the healthiest African violets I’d ever seen lining the sill by Mac’s great window.

Suddenly Jolene turned and stuck that index finger with its lethal nail, today a deep crimson, right under my nose. I noticed that her broken middle nail was already repaired. “Talk, Merry. I’m not your best friend for nothing.”

Paralyzed, I stared at that nail.

“Kramer,” Mac called. “I asked to see you when your call was finished. Remember?”

“Gotta go, Jo. The boss commands.” With great relief I rushed to Mac’s desk.

“You owe me one,” he said as I stood at parade rest before him.

“What?”

“I saw that bit of action.” He jerked his head in Jo’s direction. “I saved you from a fate worse than death.”

“It’s not quite that bad.”

“Ha! I’ve known her longer than you have.”

“Yeah, yeah. The exclusive Amhearst club.”

“You’re just jealous because you didn’t grow up here.”

I thought of Martha Colby who had. “I’m sorry about your friend.”

Mac turned grim. “Thanks. Me, too. She was a special girl.”

“Did you know she had your name tattooed on her shoulder? In a heart?”

“My name?”

“MAC. You can see it clearly in one of the pictures.”

He rustled through the printouts of all the pictures I’d taken with Jo’s phone until he found the one I was talking about. He touched the tattoo with his forefinger and shook his head. “I didn’t know.” He looked out his window, his eyes vague.

I waited, feeling somewhat awkward.

Two things happened at once. Mac’s phone rang and the back door opened. Curt strode in.

Mac, all business once again, waved toward Curt as he reached for the phone. “Go assure him you’re all right while I take this call. Then come back here. I’ve got a feature assignment for you.”

As I went toward Curt, I was sure I was wearing a goofy grin. I still had a hard time believing that this tall, wonderful man loved me. Really loved me. At times my past “romance” with Jack came back to haunt me, bringing with it all the doubts it had created. I was learning to take Curt at his word, but sometimes it was hard. Right now it was easy because of the look of concern in his eyes.

When he pulled me into his arms, I melted. I wrapped my arms around his waist and rested my cheek against his chest. Thank You, Lord, I thought for the many thousandth time. When I recalled my previous relationship and what I had thought was love, I was appalled at my stupidity. The real thing with Curt made Jack appear a foolish narcissist and me an immature idiot in love with love.

“Are you okay?” Curt asked, his voice gruff with emotion. His cheek rested against my hair.

“I’m fine,” I said into the placket of his white knit polo. “Really.”

“That’s what you always say,” he growled. He kissed the top of my head. “As you race into danger.”

An old argument. I saw my experiences as my job. He saw them as my disregarding danger and being impulsive. He was doing better at learning to accept the situations reporting sometimes put me in than I was at learning to curb my fools-rush-in-where-angels-fear-to-tread tendencies, such as going in Martha’s place.

“No danger this time,” I assured him.

“You always say that, too.” His arms tightened.

I pulled back and looked up at him. “I’m okay. Really.”

“Yeah, yeah. Like finding someone dead is just an everyday occurrence.”

A picture of Martha flashed as quickly as a hidden subliminal ad might and I felt tears gather. Curt saw them and leaned down, giving me a brief, hard kiss.

“My tough little reporter,” he muttered in my ear.

A very loud throat clearing made me glance at Mac, who was standing pointedly at his desk, looking at us. I also noticed Jolene watching with great interest. At least Edie made believe she was working.

Curt waved at Mac and stepped back. “I can take a hint.”

Mac nodded and took his seat.

Curt grabbed my hand and gave it a squeeze. “I’ll see you tonight.” He grinned and for the first time I noticed the suppressed excitement simmering about him. “I’ve got the most incredible news!”

“What?” I asked eagerly. “The big commission for a new painting?” I knew a large corporation was talking with him about an original work that would be reproduced as the cover of their annual report. The huge painting itself would hang in their corporate headquarters.

He shook his head. “I’ll tell you tonight. But think about how you like North Carolina.”

“North Carolina,” I said to his departing back, visions of the Outer Banks rising with memories of a camping trip with Mom and Dad and Sam when I was a kid. Or were they in South Carolina? Or both? I never could keep those two states straight. “I thought we were going to the Pacific Northwest for our honeymoon.”

SIX

“Are you familiar with Good Hands?” Mac asked me.

“As in the insurance people?” I held my hands together. “You’re in good hands with—”

“No, not them. The guys in town who do stuff for people.”

I felt a very faint flicker of memory, but nothing I could grab hold of. Can you have senior moments in your late twenties? “Stuff like what?”

“Repair houses for needy people. Fix cars for single moms and widows. Do minor plumbing and home decorating.”

“Guys do home decorating?” Now there was an interesting picture—guys hanging pictures and putting up curtains. No, no, Ben. You know orange doesn’t go with purple. Try it with the chartreuse.

“There are women who do that, I think.” Mac thrust a brochure at me. “They’re celebrating ten years of doing stuff and I’d like an article about them. Profile the guy who runs the organization, name of Tug Mercer. Get interviews with some of the people who work with him and quotes from some of the recipients of their help. You know the drill.”

I glanced through the brochure and noted Pastor Hal’s name as a member of what was called the Board of Overseers. Then that faint flicker burst into a full memory of a few months back when the Good Hands director had given a talk one Sunday morning, a combination testimony and pitch for more workers. I’d liked his enthusiasm for what he clearly saw as a mission from the Lord.

Senior moment survived.

“Sounds great, Mac. I’ll get right on it.” I turned to leave.

“Wait.” Mac shuffled through the stacks of papers on his desk. “Another assignment for you.” He pulled out a public relations article, the kind organizations and businesses regularly sent to us, hoping for coverage about some aspect of their activities. Usually the articles didn’t provoke much of a response, but every so often one was worth a follow-up. Obviously Mac felt the sheet he held represented one of those.

“They’ve finally hired Trudy McGilpin’s replacement at Grassley, Jordan and McGilpin.” He thrust the paper at me. “Guy named Tony Compton. Do an article on him.”

Trudy had been a hometown girl who grew up to be Amhearst’s mayor as well as a very good attorney. Her death had rocked the town. Taking her place would be a very hard job. Tony Compton better be tough, savvy and able. He needed to be able to live up to the near sainthood status now conferred on Trudy. I half expected that any day I’d receive word that she was about to be beatified, Amhearst style.

As I took the paper on Tony Compton, I saw that Mac had Dawn Trauber’s picture taped to the outside of the top drawer of his desk, a good place for it since it would be buried if he tried to set it on his littered desk. She was laughing, her eyes slightly squinted against the sun, her hair blowing in the breeze as she tried to hold it off her face. She looked absolutely lovely. And she was, inside and out.

What would be her reaction when she learned MAC was tattooed on the shoulder of a dead ex-girlfriend? I didn’t think she had any illusions about Mac, but emotions and intellect often don’t march in step. The hearts of smart people who should know better are regularly broken. I know that from experience.

Mac saw me looking at the picture and glanced at it himself. With a sad smile, he reached out and traced her cheek with a finger.

“It’ll all work out, Mac,” I said earnestly.

He didn’t exactly roll his eyes, but he came close. “Thanks, Pollyanna.”

“Pollyanna wasn’t an idiot, you know. She was just optimistic. I’m optimistic, is all. I’m hopeful.”

“She wasn’t a real person, Merry. And she was treacly sweet.”

“Sure she was real. As real as any other fictional character. I read all her books when I was a kid. My grandmother had them.” I smiled at the memory. “I loved them.”

He smirked. “I’ll bet.”

“And what’s wrong with being sweet? Or optimistic?”

He glanced back at Dawn’s picture. “Dawn’s sweet and she’s an optimist.”

I thought about Dawn and the work she did with girls in trouble. “I agree she’s sweet and optimistic, but she’s also a realist and a woman of faith.”

“Faith is just optimism by a different name,” he said.

“Oh, no. Faith is knowing things you can’t see and being certain of things you can’t touch. And it’s believing even when you don’t understand.”

He shook his head. “That’s too vague for me, but if it works for you…” He gave a cynical smile, grabbed a piece of paper and began to write.

I recognized dismissal when I saw it. I returned to my desk and called Tug Mercer, asking for an appointment at his earliest convenience.

“The News is going to do an article on Good Hands?” I could hear the pleasure in his voice. “How cool is that! How’s ten tomorrow morning?”

Wednesday, 10:00 a.m. I noted it on my calendar.

Before I called Tony Compton, I did a quick computer search on him. There was lots of material on everything from his education (Bucknell University, University of Pennsylvania Law School) and his past employment (Harrison, Ritter, McCorkle and Compton in Harrisburg) to the shockingly sad death of his fiancée, the daughter of state representative Martin Gladstone. Valerie Gladstone had been found stabbed to death three years ago, her body found in her apartment, apparently the victim of an unknown intruder. Congressman Gladstone and Tony Compton had offered a substantial monetary reward for any information leading to the apprehension of the killer, but there were no results.

Immediately my heart bled for this man and his loss, and when I called him, I almost apologized for bothering him. I had to remind myself that three years had passed. Though his pain would never go away, my mentioning it would seem strange so long after the horrible event.

“Wonderful,” he said when I told him what I wanted. If his strong, authoritative voice was any indication, he was a man comfortable with himself and life, a man recovered from the depths of his grief. Maybe he could deal with Trudy’s legacy. “How about tomorrow? Say, four-thirty?”

After I hung up, I turned to Jo. Before she could nail me about the phone call from Mr. Henrey, which I knew she had not forgotten because she never forgets anything, I said, “So tell me about Ken Mackey.”

She made a face and blew a raspberry. Since Jolene tended to look at most people with some degree of contempt, her response didn’t surprise me. What surprised me was the obvious depth of her dislike.

“Pretty bad, huh?”

“Worse.” Her lips compressed.

When she said nothing more, I held out my hands toward her. “So give.”

“They say he’s reformed.” Her skepticism was evident. “But I have my doubts. If there was ever a poster child for recidivism, he’s it. I couldn’t believe it when I heard he was living with Martha.”

“Recidivism?” Was that really the word she wanted?

“Yeah, you know. Sent back to jail or wherever. Back to your old bad ways.”

It was the word she wanted, all right. “He’s an excon?”

She nodded. “He’s got a rap sheet as long as my arm. In and out of juvie for years, then a five-year stint for robbery and another for vehicular manslaughter, though to be honest, I don’t think he’d have been convicted in that accident if it weren’t for his previous problems with the law.”

“Good grief!” Why would a woman live with someone like that? No wonder Mrs. Wilson hadn’t taken to him. “Was he known to be violent?”

Jo shrugged. “No more than other guys like him. Too many beers and they’ll go at it with their fists over some imaginary slur. He went at it once with Reilly back in the old days.” She shook her head. “Pitiful.”

“Who won?”

She looked at me as if I were nuts. “Reilly, of course.

Of course. The fists comment made me think, though. “Did you ever hear that Ken hit Martha?”

She shook her head, obviously disappointed that she had to admit something positive about him. “He’s always had a short fuse and I’m sure his time in jail didn’t help that any, but he liked to think of himself as a charmer.” She grinned. “I used to call him Charm Boy. He hated it. But he must have been doing better if someone as nice as Martha was willing to live with him.”

“Would he take advantage of her, do you think? Let her pay the bills, buy the groceries, stuff like that?”

“Probably. Thick on charm, thin on responsibility and reliability.”

Thoughtfully I began a Google search to see what more I could learn about Martha and about Ken Mackey. There was next to nothing about Martha, but I was surprised at the amount of material on Ken. He even had his own blog where he generously shared his views on the problems of the world. Every so often, he said something unexpectedly profound or insightful. Whatever else Ken was, he wasn’t stupid.

When the back door of the newsroom opened and William Poole entered, his craggy face set in determined lines, I smiled at him, assuming he wanted to talk to Jolene and me about finding Martha. I hadn’t yet stopped to give my statement.

He nodded briskly at us and continued past our desks to stop beside Mac’s.

“Uh-oh,” Jo muttered.

The tattoo, I thought. MAC. That was why William was here. Oh, Lord, please don’t let it be my Mac who killed Martha!

Mac offered William a seat, something he never did for me or the others on staff. William sank down, his back to the newsroom, and the two began talking quietly, William writing Mac’s comments in his notebook.

“It’s only because they knew each other,” I said to Jolene. “That’s all.”

“Huh.” Grabbing her watering can, she rose and began moving around the room, watering her thriving jungle. I noted that each plant took her closer to the two men and that the closer she got, the less water the plants demanded. She had just gotten close enough for some really good eavesdropping when William stood abruptly.

“We’ll talk again later,” he said and strode from the room.

We all watched him go, Jolene with speculation, me with anxiety, and Mac with a frown and a touch of what looked to me like distress or maybe worry. Or fear?

He blinked and became all business. “Jolene, you’re drowning that poor philodendron and watering the floor. Since there’s nothing to hear anymore, I’d suggest you get back to work. Or go home and bother Reilly.”

Totally unintimidated at being caught redhanded, Jolene walked slowly, gracefully, to the shelf where she kept her watering can. She put it away and grabbed a handful of paper towels, returning to the scene of the inundation and mopping the puddle that had formed on the floor.

Mac pushed back his chair, rose and made for the rear door. His posture was rigid, his lips pursed. “See you tomorrow,” he muttered.

I watched the door close behind him. “He’s upset.”

“Wouldn’t you be if the police came to interview you?”

“The police have interviewed me lots of times.”

“Yeah,” Jo agreed, “but your name wasn’t tattooed on a murdered woman’s shoulder.”

SEVEN

By the time I walked from The News to Ferretti’s to meet Curt for dinner, I had regained most of my tattered self-esteem lost during the chase by Mrs. Wilson, eightysomething terrorist. After all, Mr. Henrey wanted me. And Curt wanted me.

I couldn’t wait to tell him about my job offer. He was always so supportive and encouraging, I knew he’d be delighted for me and would find the prospect of starting our marriage in Pittsburgh exciting. New horizons. New possibilities. The Steelers instead of the Eagles. The Pirates instead of the Phillies. The Penguins instead of the Flyers.

The Chronicle instead of The News.

And I’d be back in familiar territory again, no longer the outsider trying to find my place among the raised-in-Amhearst crowd. We could buy a house not too far from my parents. Curt could get to know my brother, Sam, a sophomore at Penn State. I could take Curt to my old church and show him off to all the people I’d known most of my life, especially to Jack, the old boyfriend. Of course, Jack already knew Curt, but still it would be sweet for everyone to realize I had chosen Curt over Jack. I could show Curt all my favorite places and take him to eat in all my favorite restaurants. We could ride the Duquesne Incline and I’d show him the sparkling city by night from the top of Mount Washington. I’d show him the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers as they formed the Ohio. I’d take him to the Carnegie and Andy Warhol museums. And the zoo. I loved the zoo.

When we had kids, they could go to the same schools I attended and I could still work because Curt would be home to watch them. Not that I expected him to be Mr. Mom, but after all, he was going to be there.

He’d already visited home with me several times. Mom and Dad really liked him as a person and as their son-in-law-to-be. We’d gone back two weekends ago and he’d had a great time playing golf Saturday afternoon with Dad and Sam while I was the guest of honor at a wedding shower thrown by all my old friends. Establishing ourselves would be quick and easy; our life would be built on a firm foundation of love, friendships and church. It didn’t get much better.

When Curt walked in the door, all tall, gorgeous and wonderful with his black curly hair and broad shoulders, I was feeling very, very good about our future. God was definitely smiling on us.

Curt leaned down and gave me a quick kiss before he slid into the booth across from me. When he reached for my hands, I gladly reached back.

When Astrid appeared to take our order, she looked at me with a mix of commiseration and curiosity. “Merry, you poor thing! I read about Martha Colby in the paper. It must have been so traumatic finding her.”

I knew Astrid was fishing—she was always fishing. She saw herself as Amhearst Central—but I liked her anyway because she was so here-I-am-people-take-it-or-leave-it. I, on the other hand, always felt like shouting, “Here I am. Please like me.”

“I’ve had better mornings,” I agreed.

“I’ll bet.” Astrid now oozed sympathy. “Any idea who did it?”

“Not a one.”

“Huh.” Obviously disappointed, she pulled out her tablet. “What can I get you?”

We both asked for spaghetti with meatballs and parmesan peppercorn dressing on our salads, another sign of our similar outlooks on life. I gave Curt’s hand a little squeeze.

“So how come you’re serving?” Curt asked the brassy blonde who usually worked as hostess.

Astrid’s smile was sour, as far from her usual sunny expression as could be. “Since Annie quit. She’s leaving town to go to college and needs extra time to get ready, whatever that means. She gave us two days’ notice—two days! What is it with people today?—and we haven’t found a new server yet.”

I smiled at her. “Well, think of the tips you’ll be getting.”

“Oh, yeah,” she said. “Ferretti’s is a hotbed of high rollers.” She turned to leave, then stopped in her tracks, staring at a thin woman with dark hair too long for her age and dark circles under her eyes. The woman was sliding into a booth, newspaper in hand. “Well, well, so it’s true. She’s back in town.”

The woman looked up, saw Astrid staring at her and gave a tight smile.

“What’s she doing here tonight?” Astrid frowned. “You’d think she’d be too cut up to go anywhere.”

I looked at the woman as she laid the menu aside, began to unfold her paper, a copy of today’s The News, then paused to pull a pair of glasses from her purse. “Who is she?”

Astrid leaned on our table with both hands and dished. “Esther Colby. Or used to be Colby. I don’t know what her name is now. She disappeared a long time ago, thirty years or something like that. Quite a scandal when she walked out on her family.”

Astrid shook her head as if she didn’t understand such behavior. “I always felt sorry for Steve Colby, who’s a nice guy, if you ask me. Left him with their little girl. Of course, he eventually married Nanette, and they have kids, too. But I don’t think he ever heard from Esther after she took off.” Astrid glanced surreptitiously at Esther. “And now that little girl is dead. Esther should just leave again and let Steve and Nanette grieve in peace.”

“Esther Colby?” I watched in fascinated horror as the woman began reading the paper. “As in Martha’s mother?”

“Yeah. Quite a homecoming present, huh?”

The dark-haired woman gave a sudden cry. She was staring at the front page of the paper and I knew exactly what she was reading because I had written it.

Her hand went to her mouth as her face became a mask of horrified disbelief. “Oh, no!”

Astrid paled. So, I’m sure, did I.

“She didn’t know,” Astrid said. “Now I feel terrible dissing her like that.”

I nodded as I watched Esther Colby grab her purse and bolt for the door, the paper fluttering to the floor forgotten. Of course the police hadn’t notified her. They probably didn’t even know she was in Amhearst. Maybe Steve Colby didn’t, either, or, if he did, didn’t know where to reach her.

Astrid shook her head. “I guess your daughter is still your daughter, even if you did abandon her.” Looking thoughtful, she wandered off toward the kitchen.

I stared at Curt, trying to imagine what it was like to find out your daughter had been murdered by reading about it in the paper.

Curt was watching me, concern evident in his eyes. “Are you okay?”

I nodded. “I just feel bad for her.”

He shrugged. “I feel worse for Steve Colby though. And Nanette. Astrid’s right. They are nice people.”

“How do you know them?”

“Steve was my high school math teacher, believe it or not. Then when I taught, he became a professional friend. Since I stopped teaching, we haven’t seen much of each other, but I’ve been thinking of him all day.”

“Did you know Martha?” He hadn’t mentioned knowing her earlier today when he stopped at work.

He nodded. “Not well, though. She ran with a different crowd than I did.”

“With Mac and his friends.”

He nodded. “All of them nice enough in their own way, but too wild for me, especially back then.” He grinned. “I was a good kid.”

I had to laugh. “I bet.”

Astrid showed with our iced teas, salads and crusty Italian bread. When she left, Curt asked, “Is there anything new on the murder?”

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