A Whisker Оf Trouble

Chapter 4

Mr. P. drove home with Rose and me at the end of the day. They were planning on working on the case for a while after supper.

“Did you make Alfred a cake?” I asked as I fastened my seat belt in the parking lot.

Beside me Rose looked a little confused. “No,” she said. “But I have some oatmeal raisin cookies.”

“They’re my favorite,” Mr. P. chimed in from the backseat. Elvis meowed his agreement.

“I meant, did you make a cake to celebrate him getting his investigator’s license?”

Rose had the good grace to blush. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

I glanced over at her and then put the SUV in gear and started across the lot.

“That was my suggestion, Sarah,” Mr. P. said from the backseat. “It’s been a while since I was a student. If I hadn’t passed the certification exam and we’d had to work under the radar, I wanted you to have plausible deniability.”

“I appreciate that,” I said. “Thank you.” This wasn’t the first time I’d hoped I’d have plausible deniability when it came to something the Angels were up to.

I looked both ways for traffic and then pulled out onto the street. When I stopped at the corner I held up my right hand, palm facing Rose. It only took a moment for her to get the significance. She high-fived me. I turned my arm and got a high five from Mr. P. as well.

“It’s not that I don’t love Nicolas,” Rose said, hands folded primly in her lap again. “It’s just that he seems to think because we’re old we’ve taken leave of our senses. I suppose it was wrong of me to spring the whole license thing on him.”

I shot her a quick glance. “Maybe just a little.” I took my hand off the steering wheel long enough to hold up my thumb and forefinger about half an inch apart. “He loves you, too,” I said. “That being said, I know that he can sometimes be a gigantic pain in the—”

Behind me Mr. P. cleared his throat.

“Neck,” I finished. I glanced in the rearview mirror and Mr. P. smiled approvingly at me.

“Would you like to join us for dinner, dear?” Rose asked.

A loud meow came from the backseat. The meat loaf from Charlotte was in a canvas bag on the seat next to Elvis.

“Thank you,” I said. “But as Elvis just pointed out, we have Charlotte’s meat loaf.”

“What are you having with it?” Rose asked.

“Ummm . . . ketchup probably.” I did a mental run-through of the contents of my refrigerator. “Or mustard.” I was pretty sure there was a half-empty bottle in the door.

Rose sighed softly. That was the wrong answer.

“And salad,” I added. There was at least one limp carrot and a couple of wrinkled grape tomatoes in the fridge, too. The two of them could be salad if I sprinkled a little of the fancy balsamic vinegar Liz had bought for me on top.

I pulled in to the driveway at home and Mr. P. climbed out and handed me the bag with Charlotte’s casserole dish of meat loaf. Elvis jumped out, his green eyes never leaving the bag. I unlocked the front door and gestured for Rose and Mr. P. to go ahead of me into the hall, but Alfred moved behind me and put a hand on the painted wood.

“Go ahead, my dear,” he said.

I smiled. “Thank you.” Mr. P. was what most people would consider an old-fashioned gentleman, and while I was perfectly capable of opening my own doors, jars and shrink-wrapped packages, I was charmed by his thoughtfulness.

I set the tote bag and my briefcase by my front door. “Have a good night, you two,” I said.

Rose reached up and patted my cheek. “You, too, dear.”

They headed down the short hallway to Rose’s apartment and I let myself and Elvis into my—our—place.

I’d owned the house for several years now. It was an eighteen sixties Victorian that had been divided into three apartments by a previous owner. The house had been an incredibly good deal, run-down but structurally sound and an easy walk to the harbor front. I’d been able to buy it before it went on the market, because the owner was interested in the tiny one-room cabin that I’d owned and that Jess and I had lived in and fixed up during our last year of college.

At first I’d told myself and everyone else that I’d bought the house as an investment. But the truth was, even though I hadn’t grown up here, North Harbor felt like home to me and deep down inside I guessed I’d always known it was where I’d end up.

My dad and my brother, Liam, had done almost all the work on my apartment and the one on the second floor where my grandmother had lived until she remarried and went off on an extended honeymoon cum road trip around the country. Mom, Jess and I had foraged through every thrift store and flea market within about sixty miles of North Harbor to furnish and decorate the place.

I’d been working slowly on the third small apartment at the back of the house for close to a year. It had been livable—it was where my parents or Liam stayed when they came to visit. When Rose had been asked to leave her apartment at Legacy Place, the seniors’ residence in the refurbished Gardener Chocolate Factory, I’d offered the little apartment to her and Mac had helped me get it ready.

I liked having Rose around. Once the snow had cleared, she and Alfred started working in the backyard. Mac had built a couple of planter boxes for them and I was looking forward to tomatoes and zucchini in late summer. I hadn’t realized just how much I missed my grandmother until Rose moved in. I liked knowing there was someone else in the big house, other than Elvis, who at the moment was at my feet looking impatiently up at me.

I set the bag with the meat loaf on the counter and held up one hand. “Five minutes,” I said to the cat. “And then we’ll eat.”

Elvis jumped up onto one of the stools, made a sound a lot like a sigh and sat, staring at the bag. I reached over and scratched the top of his head. “You’ll live,” I said.

I changed into leggings and a T-shirt and was retrieving the two tomatoes and the sad carrot from my fridge under the watchful gaze of the cat when there was a knock on the door. He looked at me and lifted one paw.

“No, no, you’re all comfortable. Let me get it,” I said.

He tipped his furry head to one side and almost seemed to smile at me. Sometimes I had the feeling that he did get sarcasm.

It was Mr. P. at the door holding a small bowl. “Rosie sent this,” he said. The dish was full of steaming rice with onions, mushrooms and some kind of leafy green.

“Let me guess,” I said, smiling at him. “She made too much food.”

“That is her story,” he said.

I took the bowl from him. “Tell her thank you and give her a kiss from me,” I said.

He smiled at me. “It would be my pleasure.” He headed back to Rose’s apartment and I realized that he was wearing her fuzzy slippers.

I warmed up a couple of slices of the meat loaf in the microwave and settled at the counter with my plate and the bowl of rice. Elvis hopped back up on the other stool and I fed him a couple of bites of the meat.

“So, did you know that Mr. P. was getting his investigator’s license?” I asked.

The cat stared at me for a moment and then licked his whiskers. I decided that could be a yes. Or a no. Or “more meat loaf.” I gave him another bite just in case it was the latter.

The Angels spent the next day doing what Rose called “background work.” That seemed to involve Mr. P. spending a lot of time on his computer using my Wi-Fi. I fervently hoped everything he was doing was legal.

“Would you like a ride home?” I asked Rose at the end of the day.

“Alfred and I were thinking about walking,” she said.

I leaned over and kissed her cheek. “Think about driving. It’s going to rain later. The walk might be a bit much for Mr. P.’s knees.” I’d noticed Rose rubbing her left hip earlier in the afternoon when she thought no one was looking. She’d never admit the damp weather was probably making it ache, but I knew she’d agree to driving with me if I couched it in terms of being good for Alfred.

“You’re right, dear,” she said with a smile. “His knees have been sounding a lot like someone deboning a turkey lately.”

Elvis sat in the back with Mr. P. and I could hear them having a murmured conversation all the way home. The cat didn’t have a lot to say, but he made a few agreeable murps from time to time.

Elvis jumped down from the backseat of the SUV as soon as Mr. P. opened the car door. He followed me inside, but instead of stopping at our apartment door he headed down the hall behind Rose and Alfred.

“Where are you going?” I said.

Mr. P. stopped and looked back at me. “I’m going to Rosie’s apartment,” he said. “Is that a problem?”

I shook my head. “I’m sorry. I was talking to Elvis, not you.”

At the sound of his name the black cat looked toward the door to Rose’s small apartment, then turned to look back at me—almost as though he was saying that he was going to Rose’s apartment as well.

Rose was already at her door, fishing for her keys in her voluminous tote bag. “Elvis is having dinner with us,” she said. “I invited him.”

“You invited my cat to dinner?”

“Yes,” she said. “It’s Thursday,” as though that explained everything, which it didn’t.

“Is Thursday Invite a Cat to Dinner Day?” I asked.

Rose crinkled her nose at me. “Don’t get saucy with me, young lady. Aren’t you going to Sam’s for Thursday Night Jam?”

By Sam’s she meant The Black Bear Pub owned by Sam Newman. Sam was like a second father to me. On Thursday nights his band, The Hairy Bananas, played, and anyone and everyone was welcome to sit in. Most Thursdays Jess and I were in the audience.

“Yes,” I said.

“Well, Elvis was going to be all by himself.” Rose looked at me as though the rest was self-explanatory.

I could have pointed out that we were talking about a cat, but half the time the cat in question seemed to think he was a person anyway, and I knew if I tried to argue the point with Rose I’d be late meeting Jess.

“Okay,” I said.

“I’ll just let him in to your apartment when he’s ready to come home, if that’s all right,” she said.

I nodded. “That’s fine.”

Liz had told me that I was out of my mind for giving Rose a spare key to my apartment, but Rose hadn’t abused the privilege so far. Then again, I had her key and I was careful not to abuse that privilege, either. Seeing Mr. P. in her fuzzy slippers was all the information that I needed to have about Rose’s private life.

Jess was at a table to the left of the stage when I got to the pub. She was wearing jeans and a plaid shirt with her long hair loose on her shoulders. Instead of bringing our usual basket of nachos, a waiter slid a bowl of Sam’s chili in front of me as soon as I sat down. Jess was working on a plate of fries and an egg over easy.

“How did you know I didn’t have supper?” I asked, snagging a french fry and dipping it in my chili before eating it.

Jess pressed two fingers to her right temple and squinted at me. “I’m getting an image of a dark, empty place. It’s very cold . . . it looks like . . . the inside of your refrigerator!” She grinned at me, blue eyes sparkling.

I made a face at her. “What do I owe you?”

“You can get us some nachos at intermission.” She looked around. “Is Nick coming?”

My mouth was full, so I shook my head.

“Still got his knickers in a knot over being bested by Rose and her crew of supersleuths?”

“It wasn’t like that.”

Jess raised an eyebrow.

I set my spoon down and gave her my full attention. “C’mon, Jess. Charlotte’s his mother and Rose and Liz are like family. He doesn’t want anything to happen to them, so no, he doesn’t like the idea of them playing detective.”

“From what I’ve seen they’re not playing detective. They’re actually pretty good at it.” She speared a forkful of egg and two french fries and dipped the whole thing in ketchup. “So are you, for that matter.”

“No, no, no,” I said, shaking my head. “I am not getting involved in another one of their cases. Not going to happen.”

“Famous last words,” Jess said, blue eyes sparkling.

“Not-going-to-be-changing last words,” I said firmly.

She laughed and we ate in silence for a couple of minutes. “He seemed like a nice man, you know,” she said as I reached over to swipe another french fry from her plate before they were all gone.

I gave her a blank look. “Who seemed like a nice man?”

“Ronan Quinn.”

“Wait a minute. You knew him?” I said. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that there were almost no empty chairs now in the pub.

“I didn’t know him, but I did talk to him. I was buying a bottle of wine for Josh. He helped me get that problem with the streetlight outside the shop fixed.”

Josh was Josh Evans, a lawyer I’d known since we were kids. He’d helped the Angels more than once.

“And?” I prompted.

Jess shrugged. “And I know nothing about wine. I was standing there holding a bottle wondering how to tell if it was any good. Quinn was behind me. He said, ‘Don’t buy that.’ I asked him why. He said wine was his area of expertise. It didn’t seem as though he was trying to hit on me, so I got the bottle he suggested.”

“When was this?”

“Last Monday afternoon, sometime just after four o’clock.” Before I could say anything she held up a finger. “Yes, I know that’s the day before he was killed and yes, when I saw his photo in the Globe this morning I called Michelle and told her.”

“She’s probably trying to put a timeline together,” I said. Jess talking to Ronan Quinn confirmed what Ethan had said, that he and Quinn had left the house together the day before the murder.

Jess picked up her cell phone, which had been sitting on the table next to her now-empty plate. “I have a voice mail from Rose. She asked me to call her.”

I couldn’t help laughing. “How does she do that?” I said. Actually I was pretty sure that Rose had gotten her information via a certain geriatric computer whiz.

“You think Rose knows I saw Mr. Quinn just before he died.”

“I can promise you she does.” I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “And it doesn’t matter because I’m staying out of it.”

The crowd began to clap and cheer as Sam and the rest of the band came from the back of the pub and made their way to the same stage. Jess smirked and said something that got lost in the noise. I was pretty sure she’d said “famous last words” again.

Elvis and I left the house early the next morning. I’d found him asleep at the top of his cat tower when I got home. Rose wasn’t due in until lunchtime. I had no idea what time Mr. P. had left or if he even had. It was none of my business and since they were consenting adults and then some, I didn’t want to know.

Elvis sat on the passenger seat watching the road. The cat was a backseat driver no matter where he was sitting, turning to look over his shoulder when I backed up and intently watching the lights when we were stopped. He’d even protested loudly when I ran a yellow light, much to the amusement of Jess, who’d been in the passenger seat that day.

We stopped at McNamara’s Sandwich Shop to pick up the rolls for the elementary school’s hot lunch program. Glenn McNamara was in the kitchen stirring a huge pot of soup. “Banana muffins just came out of the oven,” he said, dipping his head in the direction of two wire racks on the long stainless steel counter. “Try one and tell me what you think.”

I picked up a muffin, broke off a bite and popped it in my mouth. “Oh, that’s good,” I said after a moment. “Do I taste walnuts? And nutmeg, maybe?” As part of my cooking lessons, Rose was teaching me about spices and herbs.

Glenn grinned and nodded. “Very good. I was getting tired of the same old thing, so I wanted to change it up just a little.”

“I’d buy them,” I said, breaking off another piece. “And what do I owe you for this one?”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, moving to the large sink to wash his hands. “I needed a taste tester.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“I heard you found a little more than you bargained for when you went to clear out Edison Hall’s house,” he said, reaching for a paper towel to dry his hands. “He was a nice guy, Quinn, I mean.”

“You met him?”

“He was in here maybe half a dozen times altogether. Twice for lunch and the rest for coffee. He always took a table right in the center of the room and he’d sit there and work on his tablet.” He leaned against the counter and crossed his arms over his white apron. “He knew a lot about wine, obviously, but the guy wasn’t a snob. He got talking to Carmen about Feast in the Field and he made some suggestions for this year. She said they weren’t all that expensive.”

Feast in the Field was a festival of fine wine, food and spirits held in the fall, a fund-raiser for charity. We’d had tourists from as far away as Oregon. Hotels and bed-and-breakfasts were booked up months in advance. The festival got its name from the open field where it was staged, a place where local lore held that a farmer and his two sons had held off a British garrison with nothing but pitchforks and an ornery bull.

According to Charlotte, who had taught history among other subjects before she became a principal, the real story was that the farmer had found two British soldiers, no more than fifteen years old, who had somehow gotten separated from their comrades hiding in his barn, hungry and half-frozen from the early winter, one of them with an ugly wound on his leg.

The farmer’s wife, mother to two boys close to the same age, had insisted on feeding the two young men and bandaging the wound before sending them on their way.

“Did you ever see Mr. Quinn with anyone?” I asked Glenn.

He shook his head. “Aside from Ethan Hall, no. He made small talk with a couple of people while he was having coffee, but nothing more.” He made a face. “It’s hard to believe his old man got conned. Edison Hall wasn’t a stupid man, you know. He only went as far as sixth grade in school, but he got a job with the railroad and worked his way up to supervisor.” He shrugged. “He’d come in sometimes. He liked my coffee. Said it was strong enough to float an iron wedge.”

“That’s why I like it,” I said.

Somehow I’d managed to eat the entire muffin. I brushed the crumbs off my fingers. “What was he like?” I asked.

Glenn gave a snort of laughter. “Edison Hall was a stubborn cuss, no doubt about it, but he was different when his wife was alive. After she died he didn’t go out as much and he got kind of sour about people, about life, it seemed to me.”

He pushed off from the counter. “I saw Edison just a couple of days before he died. He was moving a little slower, but hell, aren’t we all?” He grinned at me and I thought how creaky my own back and shoulder had been when I got up.

“There was nothing wrong with his mind,” Glenn said. “He was sharp as a tack to the end, so if someone managed to con him into buying all those bottles of wine that turned out to be worthless, whoever it was ran a pretty good con. Ronan Quinn said pretty much the same thing.”

A timer buzzed then. “That’s my cupcakes,” Glenn said.

“And I better get going.” I grabbed the bags of rolls. “Thanks,” I said, heading for the back door.

I dropped the rolls off at the school office and then drove over to the shop. There was a light on in the old garage and I found Mac there sanding the arm of an old church pew.

“Good morning,” he said, pushing his dust mask up onto the top of his head.

“Hi,” I said. “How long have you been out here working?”

Mac shrugged. “A while. An hour, maybe” He gestured to the empty coffee mug sitting on top of an old wooden trunk. “That’s my first cup.”

“You want another one?” I asked.

He rubbed the side of his neck. “Please. Sanding these arms is turning out to be trickier than I expected.”

The wooden pew was almost twelve feet long. It had come from an old country church that was being torn down. We were restoring it as a gift for a retiring Episcopal bishop who had begun his ministry in that little church. We didn’t usually take on commissions like this, but the bishop’s friends who were planning to surprise him with the pew had been persistent. They’d kept offering more and more money until it seemed silly to keep saying no.

Mac and I had wanted to leave the bench the way it was and just strengthen and rebrace the bottom, but our clients had insisted the pew be stripped and refinished. They wanted it to look the way it did when it had first been installed in the church more than eighty years ago.

The wood was beautiful under several coats of paint and varnish, but I still wished we’d left the old finish intact. I walked the length of the piece, trying to imagine it being built all those years ago.

“What’s the bishop going to do with this?” I said to Mac.

He got to his feet, brushing the dust off his jeans. Elvis made a face and took a couple of steps backward. “I don’t know,” Mac said. “Maybe he’ll stick it in his living room and use it as a sofa.”

“It doesn’t look that comfortable.”

“I don’t think it’s supposed to be.”

I looked at the long expanse of wooden seat and the unyielding rolled armrests. “It needs Jess,” I said to Mac.

He wrinkled his nose at me. “I don’t know how we’d wrap her.”

I made a face back at him. “I mean we need Jess to make some pillows and maybe some kind of long cushion to sit on.”

“That’s a good idea,” he said.

“I’ll call her later on and see if she can stop by later today or tomorrow.” I yawned. “I’ll go start the coffee and then I’ll come back and give you a hand.”

“Sounds good,” Mac said. “Did Rose come with you?”

“She’s not working until this afternoon. I think she and Mr. P. are working on their case.”

“Did you talk to Nick last night?” Mac asked. He was wearing a long-sleeved, paint-splattered T-shirt and he pushed the sleeves up his arms, showing off the dark skin of his forearms.

I shook my head. “I called, but all I got was his voice mail and I didn’t know what to leave for a message. ‘Sorry you got bested by a bunch of senior citizens’ seemed a little mean.”

Mac laughed. “Has he always been such a . . .” He hesitated.

“Tight-ass?” I finished. I laughed. “Don’t worry. I’ve called him that a couple of times to his face when he was driving me crazy.”

“I was going to say responsible person, but I guess in some ways it’s the same thing.”

I stuffed my hands in the pockets of my red hooded sweater. “Yeah, he has. He was a kid when his dad died. It wasn’t as though Charlotte had any expectation for Nick to be the man of the house. You know Charlotte. She’s very capable.”

Mac nodded.

“But Nick seemed to think he had to take on that role. He cares about people very, very deeply. And sometimes that comes across as though he’s trying to tell us all how to live our lives.” I felt a twinge of guilt. I’d been a bit hard on Nick lately.

“He wasn’t going to college, you know,” I said to Mac.

“I bet that didn’t go over well with Charlotte.”

I could still see Charlotte standing next to the dining room table in my gram’s old house, back and shoulders rigid, hands clenched as Nick explained, at dinner to celebrate my brother Liam’s college acceptance, that he hadn’t been accepted anywhere because he hadn’t mailed any of the applications.

I gave Mac a wry smile. “No, it didn’t. Gram had a little sunroom on the back of the house. She marched the two of them back there, told them to work it out and then stuck the back of a chair underneath the doorknob so they had to stay in there and talk.”

“I take it they worked it out,” Mac said.

“They did. But that doesn’t mean Nick is good at compromise.”

Mac laughed. “Neither is Rose. And she’s been at it a lot longer.”

Elvis stayed out in the workshop while I went inside and got coffee. Mac and I spent about an hour working on the church pew. Finally I sat back on my heels and pulled off my dust mask. “I think that’s it,” I said.

“I’ll get the dust cleaned off and I think I’ll be able to do a coat of stain this afternoon.”

“I’m going to go change my clothes. It’s almost time to open.”

“Yell if you need me,” Mac said.

I stepped outside and rolled my neck from one side to the other to work out the kinks. Then I brushed the dust off my sweatshirt and old jeans. I’d covered my hair with a thin knit beanie and I pulled it off and gave it a shake.

I started for the back door of the shop and caught sight of Charlotte coming up the sidewalk. I detoured and met her at the bottom of the parking lot.

“Good morning,” she said. She was carrying a large, crazy quilted tote bag. I took it from her and we started up the slight slope to the back door.

Charlotte had always had beautiful skin. This morning her cheeks were touched with a slight flush of pink from her walk and her brown eyes sparkled.

“Isn’t this a beautiful day, Sarah?” she said, looking up at the cloudless sky.

Before I could answer she took in my dusty sweatshirt and jeans. “Have you been working already?”

“Yes and yes,” I said in answer to her two questions.

“You work too much,” she said with just a touch of reproach in her voice. “You know what you should do?”

“Meet a nice young man and make babies,” I answered, holding the back door for her with my free hand. “I wonder where I’ve heard that before?”

Charlotte smiled back over her shoulder at me. “I was going to say you should take a morning off and sleep in, but if you’d rather not do it by yourself, that would be fine.”

“Charlotte Elliot!” I exclaimed in mock outrage, putting one hand on my hip and frowning at her.

She gave a snort and rolled her eyes. “Isabel is never going to be a great-grandmother at this rate,” she said. “And don’t waste your time giving me that speech about staying out of your love life. You don’t exactly have one, dear.”

I put my arm around her shoulders. “I have all of you. Why do I need a man?”

She struggled to keep a straight face, but I could see a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “If you’re asking that question, then you clearly weren’t paying attention in your personal development classes.”

I laughed and gave her a hug. She smiled back at me, and then her expression grew serious. “Sarah, have you talked to Nicolas?” she asked.

“Not since he was here yesterday. Why?”

She sighed. “To quote Rose, Nicolas has his knickers in a bit of a knot.”

“Did you know what she and Alfred were up to?” I reached over and flipped on the light switches as we stepped into the shop.

“Not for a long time, no,” she said. “I just can’t seem to get it through to Nicolas that we don’t want to spend whatever time we have left just organizing bake sales and growing roses. He’s hardheaded sometimes.”

I smiled and set her bag down by our feet. “When he makes up his mind about something it is pretty difficult to get him to change course.” I tipped my head to one side and studied her face. “I wonder where he got that?”

“It comes from the Elliots,” she said, straight-faced. “They’ve always been a stubborn bunch.”

Charlotte was wearing caramel-colored pumps with her dark brown skirt, which made her several inches taller than I was. I stood on tiptoe and kissed her cheek. “I love you and your britches are starting to smoke,” I whispered.

She smiled and I started for the stairs.

“I’ll open up,” she called after me.

“Thank you,” I said without turning around.

I changed out of my dusty clothes, touched up my makeup and went into the tiny staff room for another cup of coffee. When I went back downstairs, Charlotte had put on her apron and unlocked the front door.

“What do you want to do with the rest of these books?” she asked me.

I’d purchased a box of old hardcover books for two dollars at a yard sale to “stage” an old bookcase I’d bought from one of my regular trash pickers. We’d ended up selling half of the books, but we still had the bookcase.

“I don’t know,” I said. “What do you think?”

Charlotte cocked her head to one side. “What if I rearrange the remaining books and add a few other things?”

“Go ahead,” I said.

“I’m going to take a look at the lamp shades that Avery got started on,” I said to Charlotte. “If you get customers, call me.”

I had Avery covering a collection of mismatched lamp shades with some old classroom maps that Charlotte had found in her basement. Avery had a good eye for detail and a surprising amount of patience for this kind of project. She’d covered one small and one large shade and done a meticulous job.

The bag filled with felted wool sweaters was still on the end of the workbench. It reminded me that I needed to call Jess. I pulled my cell out of my pocket and leaned against the side of the bench.

“Hey, Sarah, what’s up?” she said when she answered. Her voice was slightly muffled.

“Those sweaters are ready for you and I need a favor.”

She muttered something I didn’t catch.

“What are you eating?” I asked. “You sound like you have a mouthful of marshmallows?”

“I’m not eating,” she said. “I’m pinning.”

“Tell me you don’t have a mouthful of pins?”

She gave a small grunt and I pictured her leaning across her worktable. “Not anymore,” she crowed.

When Jess was sewing she had a habit of sticking pins in her mouth for a moment instead of back in her pincushion—a purple octopus with sparkly false eyelashes and a black boa. I thought it made her look like Jaws from the James Bond movies.

“So, what do you need?” she asked.

I explained about the church pew.

“One cushion would be too long. You need at least two, or maybe three would be better. I need to see it before I can tell you.” We agreed that she’d try to come by the shop late in the afternoon and I said good-bye.

I was just about to go back out front to help Charlotte when Mac came in the back door. He was carrying his coffee cup and walking quickly. “Don’t laugh,” he stage-whispered as he came level with me. There was a touch of urgency in his voice, but a smile played across his face.

Rose and Mr. P. came in the back door behind Mac. Rose was carrying one of her huge bags as usual. I knew there was a good chance that there was a cake or some ginger cookies inside. My attention, however, was totally focused on Mr. P. Now I understood why Mac had warned me not to laugh.

Alfred was wearing a toupee. It was the color of oxblood shoe polish, which meant it wasn’t anywhere close to the color of real hair. And it was curly. What little natural hair Mr. P. still had was gray and straight.

“Oh my,” I said almost under my breath. I couldn’t look at Mac, because I knew if I did I would laugh.

“Good morning, dear,” Rose said, bustling over to us. “I’m just going up to put the kettle on.”

“I’ll do that for you,” Mac said. “I’m on my way upstairs.”

“Oh, thank you,” she said. She seemed a little frazzled this morning. The edge of her collar was caught in the neck of her jacket.

Mac disappeared into the shop.

“Hold still,” I said, reaching over to fix Rose’s jacket.

“Heavens,” she said. “I’m a little addled this morning.”

“What’s going on,” I asked. “Why are you here so early?”

“Elizabeth has an emergency board meeting,” Mr. P. said.

Don’t laugh, I told myself sternly as I turned to look at him. Up close his hairpiece was even more . . . alarming than it had been at a distance.

“Is everything all right?” I asked.

For many years Liz had run the Emmerson Foundation, a charitable organization started by her family, and she was still active on the board of directors.

“Yes,” Rose said, unzipping her jacket. “They have a new offer from the developers for those buildings the foundation holds the mortgages on down on the waterfront and they need to discuss if they’re going to accept it or not.”

“That’s good news,” I said. Over the winter, there had been a development proposal for a section of the downtown waterfront. The deal had fallen apart after the death of Lily Carter, who had lobbied against the plan, but now a new group was floating a similar idea for retail units, a small hotel and some residential space built in an environmentally responsible manner. The first step was to secure all the property they needed.

Mr. P. nodded, which made his “hair” bounce gently on his head. “It is, but it means Liz won’t be available to interview Edison Hall’s neighbors with us.”

“I know Ethan thinks Mr. Quinn’s death is connected somehow to his father’s wine collection, but we can’t afford to get tunnel vision at this point in the investigation,” Rose said.

“I agree,” I said.

She turned to Mr. P. “Alfred, show Sarah your suit.”

“Ah yes,” Mr. P. said, unbuttoning the jacket he was wearing. “Rosie and I are having a bit of a disagreement about my tie. I’d like a second opinion.”

“Um, all right,” I said, wondering what was wrong with the offending piece of clothing.

Alfred’s suit was dark gray with a fine blue check. His shirt was pale blue and the tie they were disagreeing about was a conservative blue stripe.

“What do you think, Sarah?” he said, tipping his head to one side, which made the hair slip a bit to the left as well.

I kept my gaze locked on his face. “I think it’s fine,” I said. I turned to Rose. “What’s wrong with Alfred’s tie?”

“Well,” she sighed softly. “It’s a little . . .” She hesitated.

“The word Rosie is trying not to say is dull,” Mr. P. said.

“I just think Alfred should wear a tie that goes with his personality, something that has a little flare like he does.”

They both looked at me.

Great. How was I going to get out of this without hurting someone’s feelings?

I took a deep breath and hoped for the best. “Rose, I see your point,” I said. “With the tie that Alfred has chosen, we don’t get a hint of the more playful side of his personality.”

She beamed at me.

I held up a hand.

“However.” I made a point of clearly enunciating the word. “You haven’t considered that perhaps today he wants to showcase his serious side.”

Mr. P. gave me a small smile. “Exactly, my dear.”

“I hadn’t considered that,” Rose said, her expression thoughtful.

He reached over and patted her arm. “I’ll go up and make the tea for you.”

“That would be lovely,” she said. She handed him the oversize tote. “The oatmeal cookies are in the blue tin.”

Alfred took the bag and headed for the shop. Once the door had closed behind him, Rose turned to look at me. “I suppose you think that thing on his head looks fine, too?”

“No comment,” I said, doing my best to stifle a smile and pretty much failing.

“When I went to the door to let him in this morning, I was afraid for a moment that I’d had a stroke,” she said. “My next thought was that a bird’s nest had fallen on his head on the walk over.”

A bubble of laughter escaped. “I’m sorry, Rose,” I said. “It’s just that I never thought Alfred was the type of person who felt the need for extra hair.” I struggled to get the urge to keep laughing under control. “It’s not that I think a hairpiece is a bad idea. I just didn’t think being bald bothered him.”

Rose played with the zipper pull on her jacket. “As far as I know, it doesn’t. He’s just gotten this idea that he should look a little younger, for professional reasons.”

I rubbed the space between my eyes, trying to come up with something helpful to say. “Did you point out that in the investigation business being older equates with wisdom and experience?”

Rose’s eyes lit up. “That’s so true. Would you tell Alfred that, please? We already quarreled about his tie. I don’t want him to think I’m criticizing all his choices.”

I blew out a breath. “I’ll tell him,” I said.

She reached up and patted my cheek. “I don’t know what we’d do without you,” she said. She pointed back over her shoulder in the direction of the old sunporch. “I’ll be in the office.”

“I’ll tell Mr. P.,” I said.

Out front Charlotte was showing a customer a china tea set and Mac was lifting an upholstered slipper chair out of the front window.

I walked over to him. “Is Mr. P. upstairs?” I asked, keeping my voice low.

He set the chair down on the floor between us. “He’s making Rose’s tea and another pot of coffee.”

I leaned over and brushed a bit of lint off the back of the chair. “Where did that hair come from?”

Mac gave me a half smile. “I’m not clear on all the details, but late-night TV and a credit card were involved. Be glad he didn’t order something called the Blond Bombshell.”

“Please tell me you’re joking,” I said.

“Sorry.”

I shook my head. “Somehow Rose roped me into talking to him about it.”

“What are you going to say?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I guess he doesn’t want to look old. I don’t want him going out looking foolish instead.”

Mac reached for the vintage teddy bear that had been sitting on the chair when it was in the window and set it back in place. “Did you know they’re planning on walking over to Edison Hall’s neighborhood to talk to people?”

I shook my head. “I knew they were going. I didn’t know they were planning on walking.”

Mac looked at me without speaking.

“No,” I said.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“I’m not driving them. I said I wouldn’t try to stop them from being detectives if that’s what they want to do. But . . .” I held up both hands. “But I’m not getting involved. Not this time.”

“Okay,” Mac said.

“I’m serious.”

“I believe you.”

We just stood there for a moment. I gestured in the general direction of the stairs. “So I’m just going to go now,” I said.

“I’ll just put this chair over there,” Mac said.

I found Mr. P. in the small staff room on the second floor. “I made a fresh pot of coffee, Sarah,” he said. “Would you like a cup?”

“Please,” I said. I was stalling. Alfred was a good man, despite his propensity for hacking into other people’s computer systems. He adored Rose. How could I tell him his hairpiece looked like a piece of shag carpeting from the nineteen seventies?

I took the mug he held out to me and added cream and sugar.

“Thank you for getting Rosie on my side over my tie,” he said, reaching for a cup on the shelf over the counter. “Could I trouble you for your opinion on something else?”

“Of course,” I said, taking a sip of my coffee. I was all for stalling a little while longer.

His chin came up. “What do you think of my new hair?”

So much for stalling.

“What made you decide to . . . invest in some new hair?” I asked. The lame question made me cringe, but Mr. P. didn’t seem to notice.

“Rosie and Elizabeth and Charlotte put a lot of faith in me when they made me the de facto head of Charlotte’s Angels,” he said. “I don’t want to let them down. I didn’t want anyone to think I’m too old for the job.”

I smiled at him. “You’re not too old. You know your way around a computer better than Avery does and you can find things that no one else can find.” I held up one finger. “And I don’t really want to know how you do that.”

He smiled back at me and a touch of color flushed his cheeks.

“I also think you’re forgetting that in this case, being older, looking older suggests maturity, wisdom, experience.”

He didn’t say anything for a moment, but I could see that he was turning over my words in his mind.

I wrapped both hands around my cup. There was one more thing I wanted to say. “Rose and Liz and Charlotte all knew how old you were when they asked you to be the face of their agency. I’ve known them a long time and they have pretty good judgment.”

Mr. P. raised a hand to his toupee and then dropped it. “I wouldn’t want Rosie to think I was questioning her judgment,” he said. He took a deep breath and slowly let it out. Then he lifted his hand again and grabbed the hairpiece to pull it off.

Except it didn’t come off. He pulled harder, but the only thing that achieved was to show that the toupee had the stretching ability of a piece of Silly Putty.

“Sarah, I think I need a little help,” he said.

In the end it took the two of us and some nail polish remover to unstick Alfred’s new hair from his head. The “handy gripper pads” left red marks on his scalp, but I put a little antibiotic cream on them and arranged his own hair so it more or less covered everything.

“You look nice, very professional,” I said. “Make sure you take a look at yourself in that cheval mirror Mac just brought in from the workroom.”

“I will, my dear,” he said. “Thank you.” He patted my hand and then he picked up Rose’s tea and went downstairs.

I went into my office. Elvis was sitting in my desk chair as though it belonged to him. “Up,” I said, making a move along gesture with one finger.

The cat didn’t so much as twitch a whisker.

“This is my office,” I said.

Elvis looked all around the room and then his green eyes came back to me. It seemed, at least in his kitty mind, that there was some dispute as to whose office it was.

I picked him up, claimed the chair and set him on my lap. He made an elaborate show of getting comfortable.

“Rose and Mr. P. are going to talk to Edison Hall’s neighbors,” I told the cat, leaning back in my seat.

He didn’t really seem interested. Instead he butted my hand with his head, cat for “scratch behind my ears.” I began to stroke his fur and after a moment Elvis began to purr.

“I don’t really have time to drive them,” I said.

“Mrrr,” Elvis said. That might have meant “sure you do,” or it might have meant “don’t stop.”

“You know Rose has some arthritis in her hip and Mr. P.’s knees aren’t good.”

He didn’t say anything other than to keep on purring.

I’d meant it when I said I didn’t want to be involved in another one of the Angels’ cases. Two was more than enough, thank you very much.

But.

“If I don’t drive them I’ll be worrying about them the entire time they’re gone.”

Elvis leaned into my hand and looked up at me, green eyes blissfully narrowed almost to two slits. I folded my free arm behind my head and stared up at the sloped ceiling over my head.

“On the other hand, if I take them it’s a slippery slope down to getting pulled into their investigation. It’s like sitting at the top of the Poseidon’s Plunge slide at Splashtown water park. I’m going to end up barefoot and rump over teakettle, trying not to upchuck, asking myself what the heck I was thinking in the first place.”

“Mrrr,” Elvis said.

I picked him up, got to my feet and set him back in the chair. He shook his black furry head and made a face at me. I kissed the top of his head, just above the bridge of his nose. “I have things to do,” I said. “Guard the office.”

Rose and Mr. P. were in the sunporch office, their heads bent over the laptop. I knocked on the doorframe. They both looked up at me.

“Hi,” I said. I hesitated. “I need a favor.”

“Of course, my dear,” Mr. P. said.

“What do you need?” Rose asked.

My head examined, was what I wanted to say. “I’d like to come with you,” I said.

Rose looked at Alfred and then she got to her feet. “Why?” she asked, a challenge evident in her eyes. “Do you think Alfred and I aren’t capable of talking to witnesses?”

“I think you’re capable of talking to anyone about anything. I’d like to come because I think I owe it to Stella. We said we’d help her and I want to do that.”

As I said the words I realized they were true. I liked the way Stella stepped up, first by hiring us to clear out her brother’s house and make things easier on Ethan and his wife. And how she was still trying to help them, trying to somehow salvage some money from Edison’s estate so Ellie could have the surgery she needed. It was the kind of thing my grandmother would do—had done more than once.

“She reminds me of Gram,” I said.

Rose smiled then. “Yes, she does.” She looked at Alfred.

He nodded.

“Of course you can come with us,” she said.

I glanced at my watch. “Does half an hour work for you?”

“That would be lovely,” Rose said.

Mac was at the workbench, searching through a container of metal wall hooks.

“I called Jess,” I said, leaning against the bench. “She has some ideas for cushions for the bishop’s pew. She’ll probably be here sometime this afternoon.”

Mac shook the Mason jar, made a face and then upended it onto the painted wooden surface.

“What are you looking for?” I asked.

“Those two brass hooks with the lion’s face.”

I looked up at the row of glass canning jars on the long shelf behind the workbench. “Try that one,” I said. “Four from the end.”

Mac reached for the container I’d indicated and unscrewed the lid. The two hooks he’d been looking for were on top. “Thanks,” he said. “How do you do that?”

I put my fingers up to my temples. “It’s my superpower.”

“I thought your superpower was the ability to spot a decent piece of furniture under nine coats of old paint.”

“That, too,” I said with a grin. “Superpowers don’t just come one to a customer.”

Mac laughed. He put the lids back on both jars. “Are you leaving soon?” he asked as he leaned over and set them back on the shelf.

“What do you mean?” I said, feeling my face begin to get warm.

“Are you and Rose and Alfred leaving soon?”

I scuffed one foot against a small divot in the floor. “How did you know?” I shot him a sideways glance.

“You care about them,” he said, dipping his head in the direction of the sunporch. “And you like Stella Hall. You gave her a good deal on clearing out the house.”

“Gram asked me to help, if I could. She and Stella go way back.”

“I saw your face the first time she came in here to talk about the job. You would have given her a deal whether Isabel was friends with her or not.”

I sighed. “It’s not much of a way to run a business, is it?” I said.

Mac picked up the two hooks and gave me a thoughtful smile. “I think it’s a good way to run a life,” he said. He turned and headed for the back door.

Mac and Charlotte were arranging different versions of our current chair collection around a long trestle table for a customer when I came downstairs with my coat and purse about twenty-five minutes later. I raised a hand in good-bye. Charlotte smiled and mouthed, Good luck.

Rose and Mr. P. were waiting by the back door. In his long jacket over his gray suit, he looked almost distinguished. Rose looked equally polished in a blue coat over a black skirt and jacket.

“What’s the plan?” I asked as we walked across the parking lot to the SUV.

“We’d like to talk to the neighbors on either side of Edison,” Rose said. “As well as the people across the street.”

“The police already talked to them and didn’t come up with anything,” Mr. P. said, “but I think it’s worth a second conversation.”

“As usual, I’m not going to ask how you know that,” I said.

He gave me an enigmatic smile. “Sometimes talking to somebody other than the police is a lower-pressure situation and people remember things they didn’t know they knew.” He raised an eyebrow. “I know that from my psychology class.”

“Remind me never to do anything illegal when you’re around,” I said.

Mr. P. gave the slightest of shrugs. “I’m afraid it’s too late for that, my dear. You forget that I’ve driven with you more than once.”

Rose started to laugh. I had a bit of a lead foot when I drove, although I tried very hard not to speed when I had anyone other than Elvis in the car.

It was a beautiful spring morning and I cracked the driver’s window of the SUV just a little as we drove over to Edison Hall’s neighborhood. I parked at the curb in front of the house. Maybe it was just knowing what had happened in the little bungalow, but the place seemed to have an air of sadness about it. I hoped that once the investigation was over and we’d cleared out the place, a family would move in and fill the little house with happy memories.

Rose was on the front passenger side and she turned to look at Mr. P. “Where do you think we should start?” she asked.

I shifted in my seat to survey the area. The houses were a mix of small bungalows and equally tiny Cape Cod–style houses and there were large trees along both sides of the narrow street. It was a beautiful neighborhood.

Diagonally across the street from us, a gray Cape Cod with sea blue shutters caught my eye. “May I make a suggestion?” I asked.

“Of course,” Mr. P. said.

“I think you should start with the gray house across the street.”

They both turned for a look and then Rose looked at me again. “Why there?” she asked.

“Because I just saw a man with a little kid head into the backyard and I’m pretty sure I know him.”

“Splendid!” Mr. P. said from the backseat.

“I’m almost certain it’s Paul Duvall,” I said. “He was friends with Josh when we were kids. He’d be a couple of years younger than I am. He’s a townie.”

Josh was Josh Evans, a local lawyer who had helped us out a couple of times. He’d grown up in North Harbor just a few houses from my grandmother’s, which was how we’d gotten to know each other, even though I was just a summer kid.

Rose frowned. “Tall and skinny? Delivered the newspaper?”

I nodded. “That’s Paul.”

“He had lovely manners as I remember,” she said approvingly. She looked from me to Alfred. “Everyone ready?”

We climbed out of the SUV. Rose patted her white hair and smoothed the front of her skirt. She reached over to adjust Mr. P.’s collar, giving me a quick appraising look as she did so. I had changed out of my jeans into a pair of gray pants and my favorite black boots. Rose didn’t say anything, so I assumed she’d decided I looked presentable.

We crossed the street and followed the interlocking brick path around the side of the house to the backyard. It was deeper than I expected, rimmed with evergreen trees that provided lots of privacy.

Paul was pushing a blond, curly-haired little girl on a swing. He frowned, squinting as he first caught sight of us, and then the frown turned to a smile. “Sarah?” he said.

I nodded, returning the smile.

He said something to the little girl, then came around the swing set and met me in the middle of the lawn.

“Josh told me you were living here now,” he said. “The repurpose store about halfway up the hill—it’s yours?”

“It is,” I said. I had to look up to meet his gaze. He was easily a good six inches taller than my five foot six, towering over me even with the extra couple of inches my boots gave me. He was wearing glasses with thin wire frames, and his egg-shaped head was shaved smooth. He still had the same intelligent blue eyes behind those glasses.

I looked around. “How long have you been here? I thought you were in Oregon.”

“We were,” Paul said. “We’ve been back about three months and we moved into this house about six weeks ago.” He half turned and smiled at the tiny blonde slipping off the swing. “That’s Alyssa.”

The preschooler ran over to us, stopping beside her father. She looked up at me, curiosity in her blue eyes that mirrored her father’s. “My name is Alyssa,” she said. “What’s yours?”

I leaned forward and smiled at her. “My name is Sarah.”

“Sarah and I were friends when I was a little boy,” Paul told her.

“That’s a long ago time,” she said, the expression on her tiny face grave.

Paul laughed, smoothing a hand over his scalp. “That it was.”

Alyssa turned her attention to Rose and Mr. P. “Are they your mommy and daddy?” she asked.

“No,” I said. “They’re my friends, Mrs. Jackson and Mr. Peterson.” I looked at Paul. “Actually we were hoping you could answer a couple of questions for us about the house across the street.”

Alyssa had let go of her father’s leg. She walked over and looked up at Mr. P., tipping her blond head to one side. “Are you a papa?” she asked.

“Yes, I am,” he said.

“Can you push me on my swing?”

“Alyssa,” Paul said, a slight edge of warning in his voice.

She glanced back at her father for a brief moment. “Please?” she said. She reached for Mr. P.’s hand and gave him a smile that I knew I wouldn’t have been able to resist.

“I’d love to,” he said, clearly enchanted by her. He looked at Paul. “As long as your daddy says it’s okay.”

“It’s okay,” Paul said.

“I like to go high,” I heard Alyssa say as she pulled Mr. P. across the grass.

Paul shook his head. “Sometimes I think she’ll run the world someday.”

“Then it will be in good hands,” Rose said. She smiled at Paul. “You probably don’t remember, but you were my paperboy a good many years ago.”

“I do remember, Mrs. Jackson,” he said, his blue eyes twinkling. “You made the best oatmeal cookies with raisins and walnuts. You used to leave a couple in a little bag on the doorknob for me every Saturday.”

Rose beamed back at him. “And you never just threw the paper on the lawn. You always put it between the doors.”

Paul laughed. “Well, I have to admit those cookies were a pretty good incentive.” He looked over at the swings where Alyssa and Mr. P. were talking as he pushed her.

His gaze came back to me. “You said you had some questions, Sarah, about the Hall place across the street?” He swiped a hand across his mouth. “The police have already been here asking questions. You know someone found a body over there?”

I nodded. “I’m the one who found it.”

His eyes widened. “You did? Wait a minute, you’re the people who are going to clear out the house?”

“Yes. The family hired us.”

He looked past us toward the street. “I didn’t make the connection. I’m sorry.”

“Paul, Rose and Mr. Peterson are private investigators. They’re looking in to what happened.”

If Paul was surprised, it didn’t show.

“Did you see anything?” Rose asked. “Or anyone hanging around that you hadn’t seen in the neighborhood before?”

Paul shook his head. “I’m sorry. We weren’t even here most of that day. We drove down to Portland to see my sister and we stayed the night. My wife had a meeting.”

“What about the week before? Did you see anyone then?”

“No, I mean except for Ethan Hall and the man who died—Quinn, I think his name was.”

I nodded but didn’t say anything.

“I saw them several times in the past couple of weeks.” He ran his hand over his smooth scalp again. “I’m sorry I can’t tell you anything that will help.”

“It’s all right,” Rose said.

He looked over at his daughter and Mr. P. again. “It’s a pretty quiet neighborhood. That’s one of the reasons we bought this house. You could talk to Sharon Marshall, the blue house across the street. She’s been around a lot more in the last six weeks. She had hip replacement surgery. I’m not sure if she’s home right now. She has physio a couple of mornings a week.” He bent down to pick up a lime green pail and shovel on the grass at his feet. “Although I think if she’d seen anyone around other than Ethan, Mr. Quinn or the recyclers, she would have mentioned it.” He straightened up and smiled at us.

“Recyclers?” I said.

“That’s what we call the trash pickers. It’s just a nicer word. I don’t want Alyssa to think reusing things is a bad idea.”

Rose and I exchanged a look. “Who exactly are these recyclers?” I asked.

“It’s just one, really,” Paul said, brushing a clump of mud off the side of the little pail. “I saw her a couple of times the week before last, you know, when it was the spring-cleaning pickup.”

Once a year North Harbor did a recycling and garbage pickup. There were rules about what could be put out at the curb, but in theory if two people could move it, the town would pick it up to be either recycled or taken to the landfill. In practice, most things didn’t spend very long curbside and didn’t usually end up at the recycling center or the landfill, either. People came from other towns to cruise around looking for freebies.

Mac and I had come across some great finds that week and had bought a few more from the pickers we regularly did business with.

“Can you describe her?” I asked.

Paul frowned and looked at me. “I’d say she’s a bit shorter than you, swimmer’s build—you know, wide shoulders and strong legs.”

“Long curly hair?” I finished.

“You know her?”

“We do,” Rose said.

“Her name is Teresa,” I said. “I’ve bought some things from her for the store. Do you remember when you last saw her over at the Hall house?”

I shifted a bit uneasily from one foot to the other. I hated to think that Teresa Reynard might be involved in Ronan Quinn’s death. I didn’t know her well, but she’d always brought me good-quality items—no junk—and she’d always been fair in the prices she asked.

Paul blew out a breath. “Let me see. Four or five days before . . .” He paused. “Before, you know, what happened, I saw her with Ethan. She was putting a couple of concrete planters and a small concrete statue—I think it was a lion—in the back of her van. It’s an old Volkswagen van. Blue.”

It was definitely Teresa whom Paul had seen. She called her old van Mitch. It always made me think of the little clown cars at the circus when she started unloading it. She somehow managed to put far more inside than the laws of physics decreed should fit.

“Was that the last time you saw Teresa around here?” Rose asked.

“Actually no,” Paul said. “That morning we drove down to Portland, I saw her van go by. Sometime before six.” He glanced over in the direction of the swing. “Alyssa is an early bird. She was in the living room watching a video. I’d just slipped into the kitchen to make a cup of instant coffee.” He rolled his eyes. “My wife thinks I drink too much coffee.” His expression grew serious. “You don’t think this Teresa person killed that man, do you?”

“Heavens, no!” Rose gave her head a slight shake. “But she might have seen something when she was in the neighborhood.” Her eyes darted to me for a brief second. “We’ve taken enough of your time, Paul. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” he said.

Rose looked in Mr. P.’s direction and raised a hand. He nodded, then said something to Alyssa before giving her one last push. He walked over to us.

“You have an enchanting daughter,” he said to Paul.

“Thank you for entertaining her,” Paul said.

“The pleasure was mine.”

Alyssa was still swinging, pumping now with her legs to go higher. She waved at Mr. P., who waved back.

There was no one home at the blue bungalow that belonged to Sharon Marshall or at the white Cape Cod on the other side of Edison Hall’s house.

We walked back to the SUV.

“Sarah, do you have an address for Teresa Reynard?” Mr. P. asked once he was settled in the backseat.

I was buckling my seat belt and I half turned to look at him. “Don’t tell me you can lip-read at that distance?” I said.

He frowned and looked a little confused. “I can’t lip-read at all, my dear,” he said. “Although I can read upside down, which has proved very useful a time or two. Why do you think I was lip-reading?”

Rose was smiling. “The little one told you, didn’t she?”

Mr. P. smiled back at her, the puzzled look gone from his face now. “And her father told you,” he said.

“Yes, he did,” Rose said. “He’s a pleasant young man, but I’d forgotten how literal-minded he could be.” She gave Alfred an inquiring look.

He held up a hand before she could speak. “And before either of you worry that I interrogated that lovely child, I didn’t. I just happened to notice that she had one of those little old wooden toy jeeps that you”—he tipped his head in my direction—“bought from Teresa about two weeks ago. All I did was ask her where she got it.”

“Teresa gave it to her,” I said.

He nodded. “She said the nice lady with the rolly hair gave it to her.”

“Rolly” was a good description of Teresa’s mass of dark curls. I checked for traffic and pulled away from the curb.

“Then she asked me if I liked to play hide-and-seek,” Mr. P. continued.

“Children that age have a very short attention span,” Rose said. Rose had been a teacher for a lot of years. Not only did she know a lot about kids, but she also knew pretty much every scheme or scam a kid between the age of five and eighteen could come up with.

“Alyssa is very bright for her age,” Mr. P. said. “And very observant.”

I glanced in the rearview mirror and he gave me a Cheshire cat smile. “For example, she noticed Teresa, over at the Hall house the morning of the murder, playing hide-and-seek. Or to be more exact, hiding by the side of the garage.”