Bel-Air dead

I?”

“One of us would have to do the same thing in Virginia, but it would be good if he knew that we had more than a passing friendship.”

“I’ll give that some thought,” she said.

They dined well and returned to the house, the car still tailing them. They were greeted inside the house by Mike’s inside man, who took Stone aside when Arrington had gone to her room.

“I don’t want to trouble you, Mr. Barrington,” the man said, “but we had a little incident after you left for dinner.”

“Is something wrong?”

“I’m not sure; we had an alert from the security system, which showed a possible breach of the perimeter fence. We checked it out and found nothing.”

“Why don’t we take a walk around the perimeter?” Stone said.

The man spoke into a microphone dangling from his sleeve into the palm of his hand, and another man appeared. “All right, let’s go,” he said, producing a small flashlight and borrowing another from his colleague for Stone.

They walked down the driveway to the front gate, where another operative stepped from the shadows and checked them out.

“By the way,” Stone said, “thanks for the following car when we went to dinner. At first I thought someone was up to no good.”

The man stopped in the driveway. “Following car? We don’t have anyone in a car, just inside the fence, as Mr. Freeman directed.”

“Follow me,” Stone said, “and don’t wave your flashlight around.” He made his way along the wrought-iron fence to a point opposite where the car had been parked earlier, then peeked through the shrubbery. “There’s the car,” he said, “but we can’t get at him through this fence, and I don’t have a way to open the front gate. Let’s just give him a scare, and maybe we can get his license plate number. Get ready with your flashlight.”

“All right,” the man said, stepping forward.

The two of them parted the hedge, and on Stone’s signal, hit the car with both of their flashlights. A startled, wide-eyed man turned toward the light, then started his car and drove away at high speed. “Fortyish, graying hair, sideburns,” Stone said.

“Did you get the plate number?” the security man asked.

“No, the license plate light was out-deliberately, I’m sure.”

“Plain vanilla sedan,” the man said. “I didn’t even get a make.”

“Maybe we’ve scared him off for the night,” Stone said. “Come on, let’s walk the rest of the perimeter.”

They trudged on, lighting their way with the flashlights. As they were passing a point behind the guesthouse, the security man said, “Wait.” He pointed his flashlight at the top of the fence and spotlighted something hanging on one of the sharp spires that rose from the wrought iron barrier. “There.” He parted the hedge, pulled himself up on a crossbar, and retrieved the object. “Piece of blue cloth,” the man said, turning his light on it.

“Cotton,” Stone said. “Maybe from a shirttail.” Then, from behind them a shot fractured the silence. “Come on!” Stone said, drawing the pistol from his belt.

They both ran, flat out, toward the house. Stone opened the rear door and started to run down the central hallway. Then they saw a man crumpled on the floor. The other security man stepped from the living room into the hallway, weapon drawn.

“I hit him,” he said, keeping his gun on the inert figure. The first security man bent down, turned the man over, and kicked away a silenced, small-caliber pistol. He felt for a pulse at the neck. “Nothing,” he said. “He’s dead.”

The man was mid-thirties, dark hair, dressed in a tail-out dark shirt, jeans, and sneakers. The bullet had exited his chest near the heart.

Stone bent and found where his shirttail was torn, then went through the man’s pockets. “Nothing,” he said, “absolutely nothing-not a cent, not a wallet, nothing.”

“Get the fingerprint scanner from my car,” one security man said to the other. “We’ll get his prints before the cops get here. Then you can call nine-one-one.”

Arrington came out of a door across the hall and stopped.

“Oh, my God,” she said.

Stone led her back to her bedroom. “Everything’s all right,” he said. “You’re perfectly safe.”

“I wasn’t for a while, though, was I?” she asked.

Stone didn’t answer, just hugged her.