The Body in the Bouillon

Dunne was trying very hard not to listen. It crossed his mind that he might have a difficult time conducting the investigation with Coffin in the same room, since at the moment he was ready to throw the chief up against the wall and listen happily to the sound of all his brittle bones breaking. One of the officers from Byford picked up on the mood. It wasn't hard.

“Chief, maybe the lieutenant could spare us for a minute and we could get a few winks out in the living room. I know I could use them, and we're going to have a lot to do in the morning.”

Dunne made a mental note of the man's name. He definitely deserved a promotion.

Faith felt like a schoolgirl as she drove home through the chill winter night in the Byford squad car. And tomorrow's detention was one she wasn't going to get out of no matter how many apples she brought the teacher. , They passed the spot where she had gone off the road and she pointed her car out to the officer, who told her he would get someone to take care of it the next day. She continued to think about what she would tell and not tell John Dunne in the morning. She knew it would be morning and as early as he could get there. She'd gotten to know him very well during what she chose to remember as the time she'd solved the case of Cindy Shepherd's murder with some help from the police. It was unlikely that this was how Dunne characterized the events.

Faith walked through the snow up the front path, or where she knew the path to be. The snow was piled high against the storm door and she tugged valiantly trying to get it open. Just as she was considering going around to the back, where the door was sheltered by a small porch, the tiny opening she'd achieved was widened by a mighty shove from inside. The Maine balsam wreath her friends from Sanpere, the Fraziers, had sent went flying off into the snow-covered bushes.

Tom. He was up. Granted, it was a rare husband who could sleep after learning that his wife had been about to spend the night with a corpse.

She was a little apprehensive. He might be annoyed, but she also knew he'd be so glad to see her that the annoyance would melt at contact.

“Faith! Are you all right! What in hell is going on!”

She was right—it was all mixed up together and she was in his arms for a long minute before he remembered to be upset again.

“Faith ..."

“I know what you're going to say and I'm as shocked and upset as you are. Let's go to bed and I'll tell you all about it, if I can keep awake. Besides, I've never been so cold in my life.”

Faith had been able to supplement Julia Cabot's nightgown and the blanket with her own parka, which she had found in the coat closet off the living room together with her shoes, but it was not enough. Something like what Admiral Byrd and his men had worn would have been a closer approximation.

At last nestled snuggly in their not-so-wee little bed, she found the more she talked, the wider awake she got. It was Tom who began to nod off.

“So you see, I'm not in any danger. Nobody except the Cabots and Leandra Rhodes knew I was sleeping in that room. Perhaps some of the people I saw at dinner assumed so, since it was the guest room, but they wouldn't have known for sure. Which means that I wasn't the intended victim, unless Leandra's kleptomania transforms itself into other aberrations."

“Leandra's what?" Light was beginning to streak in the window, and Tom realized he wasn't going to get any sleep. Maybe Faith would make waffles.

Faith told him about her conversation with Julia Cabot and moved on.

“Let's assume Eddie was the right person in the wrong spot—I'm sure the murderer would havepreferred the body not be found so soon—what was Eddie doing there and why two knives?"

“The what he was doing there is pretty obvious, don't you think? A tryst or whatever scumbags like Eddie call it. A quickie?"

“Yes. It must have been a quickie, because he was on top of the spread. He didn't want to mess up the bedding so someone would notice later. He probably used that room a lot. I hadn't gotten into the bed yet, so nothing was disturbed, and my clothes were out of sight in the closet.”

She remembered her purse was in the closet too and gave a thought to the contents, realizing that it was being gone over carefully and labeled exhibit something. She didn't think there was anything more incriminating than a Mass Millions ticket and a few cosmetics, which might suggest her natural look wasn't entirely due to the amount of time she seemed to be spending outdoors lately. She carried a knife, but it was the Swiss Army variety and not the kind sticking out of Eddie's chest and larynx.

“To be more precise, the question is why was he doing his kinky number there in the Hubbard House guest room and not in his own place or a motel in Danvers? The storm would have kept him off the roads, but his apartment was right there.”

Tom mumbled something in reply. He was dozing off.

Faith sat up abruptly. "I can't sleep after all, Tom. Besides, Ben will be up soon." They had been trying to put Benjamin on a more humane schedule, but no matter what time he went to sleep, he was still up with the chickens. Faith had given a passing thought to leaving out a bowl of cereal or some yogurt in his room next to his toys, but quickly abandoned it as she pictured the havoc a two-and-a-half-year-old could wreak on a house whilst his parents slumbered blissfully unaware.

Tom sighed. "I'll get up with you. In any case, our friend John should be dropping by soon too.”

Faith had told Tom about Detective Lieutenant Dunne, and Tom was pleased the detective was assigned to the case. Francis Coffin's reputation was not unknown in Aleford.

“I'll make some waffles. Put Dunne in a good mood."

“It will put me in a good mood," Tom said. Then, as he watched Faith pull her nightgown up over her head, added, "And speaking of moods ...”

There was the patter of little feet in the hall. "Damn. I swear that child is psychic."

“Really, Reverend Fairchild, I didn't know you believed in the supernatural. Anyway, I'll give you a raincheck. Ben does sleep sometimes.”

The Fairchilds were sitting down to waffles with blueberry syrup when the front doorbell rang.

“I'll go, Faith, and this isn't like the other time. We tell Dunne everything. Not that we know much.”

Not that you know much, Faith said to herself, but she had no intention of holding out on John Dunne. There wasn't any point, except for the fun of it, and that seemed a bit immoral.

Dunne walked into the kitchen, rubbing his hands together. Faith expected to see sparks. His dark curly hair had a few more strands of gray than the last time she'd seen him—he was in his early forties now—but otherwise he appeared much the same. He'd bowed to the season and traded his Burberry for an elegant, three-quarter-length dark-brown shearling—much like the one Faith was giving Tom for Christmas. He was wearing a well-cut Harris tweed jacket underneath and an old school tie far from De Witt Clinton in the Bronx, where Faith happened to know he'd prepped. She'd often wondered where he got his taste for elegant attire and decided it must be due to his size. If one was going to cut such a large figure, let it be in style. Besides, looking at his clothes kept people from looking at his face.

The Fairchilds had become close to Dunne during the investigation of Cindy Shepherd's murder. Faith felt an odd sense of kinship with this fellow New Yorker who also admitted to being still homesick after all these years, although it was corned beef, egg creams, and Orchard Beach he longed for. Faith liked a good egg cream herself and headed straight for the Carnegie Deli and corned beef sandwiches whenever she was in town, but she had a few more items—all located on the isle of Manhattan—on her list. She liked to think they were things such as the Metropolitan Museum, Lincoln Center, and MOMA. In reality she often skipped a visit to these venerable institutions in favor of a quick trip to Bloomie's, Bal- ducci's, and friends' galleries in SoHo or NoHo, or a few on Madison.

“Just what I had in mind. Breakfast." Dunne sat down at the table and had the grace to grin. "You can tell me everything while I eat. And you do make the best coffee I've ever had."

“Is that a hint?"

“Yes, even though I've consumed several gallons of Mrs. Pendergast's brew in the last couple of hours.”

Faith put a gigantic stack of waffles on a plate and poured him a cup of coffee. She settled down across from him. Ben had finished his waffles and was trying unsuccessfully to engage the detective's attention by waving his syrup-covered hands at him. Tom took a last mouthful, scooped his son up, and took him out of the room.

“All right," Faith said. "But if I tell you everything I know, will you tell me everything you know?"

“Probably not."

“Oh."

“Do I have to remind you that this is a murder investigation, not a game, Mrs. Fairchild?" Dunne assumed Faith had had enough of semiprofessional sleuthing after coming perilously close to being a victim the last time. Apparently not.

“Don't worry, even if you won't share, I will.”

Faith started with Chat's call and Howard Perkins' letter, then described how she had started working at Hubbard House and Farley Bow-ditch's death. She finished up with her impressions of various family members, Hubbard Houseresidents, and Eddie Russell from the Holly Ball. "Do you think there's any possibility that he knew you were sleeping in the guest room and was waiting for you?”

This had not occurred to Faith and she swiftly considered it.

“Somehow I don't think so. I hadn't gotten into bed, so unless he opened the closet and saw my clothes, he would not have known I was there. The room would have appeared unoccupied. And I didn't see him again after he came into the kitchen for coffee at around ten o'clock in the morning. No, I think he was waiting for someone, but not me. Besides, he couldn't have tied himself up."

“True, it would have been quite a trick, yet we can't rule any of this out completely." John paused and polished off the stack of waffles in a few bites. His teeth looked sharp and his mouth cavernous. "You still haven't told me where you went."

“I thought I might as well look around a bit so long as I was stuck there," Faith admitted. "I thought there might be something in Dr. Hub-bard's or Donald's office that might help me figure out what was bothering Howard."

“So what did you turn up?"

“Not much. Donald's office was locked and Dr. Hubbard's mostly ran to vintage copies of the New England Journal of Medicine. I did find out there is another child, though, a son—James. He was in one of the pictures on the wall."

“Dr. Hubbard mentioned him. He's the youngest. Works in Arizona. Okay, what else?”

Faith sipped her coffee. There really wasn't anything else, except James. And Leandra Rhodes, but she didn't think the poor woman's kleptomania was relevant.

“Nothing I can think of. Now it's your turn. What do you make of it?"

“Not much, yet. The guy had a reputation with the ladies—that's clear—and he may have been involved in some other enterprises. We're running a check on him in Florida. There's nothing on his sheet here. But screwing around doesn't usually get you killed, especially with two knives."

“Maybe whoever it was wanted to make sure he was well and truly dead."

“Oh, he would have been truly dead with one at least—the one in his throat—right through the trachea to the spine, according to the M.E.'s quick and dirty first look. I haven't heard about the other one in the chest yet. Two knives may have been insurance or—"

“It could have been two people!" Faith exclaimed excitedly. "Like what was it, Murder on the Orient Express?"

“As I was saying, it could have been insurance, maybe two people, which is getting pretty exotic, or some kind of message—like that damn rose you found the last time."

“Was there anything special about the knives? They looked like the kind hunters use to skin their prey."

“Among other uses, yes. Puma knives—available in every Army-Navy store from here to California. Don't suppose you have any more waffles?"

“No, but I can make some more, or I have some walnut bread."

“Jam?”

Faith brought the whole loaf to the table with butter and a full jar of Have Faith damson preserves. It was easier.

John sliced off a piece and slathered it with jam and butter.

“They were all there, you know."

“Who?"

“The family. Donald came over to check on things after he'd finished at the hospital. Had a patient in bad shape. Charmaine didn't want to be alone. In case the lights went out, she said. Once they were there, they decided to spend the night. Stayed in what used to be Donald's old room on the third floor and is always kept available for him."

“Did they know I was in the guest room?"

“Muriel said she had heard something about it, but the rest said no. Mrs. Pendergast thought you were staying on the other side of the house near the Cabots." He ate his bread in a ruminative manner. Faith was reminded of a cow. A whole herd of cows. "You know, what makes it tough is that there were so many people around. Usually someone gets killed in less crowded circumstances.”

It was true. There was an embarrassment of suspects.

“What about the towel? Did you find it? Was there blood on it?"

“Yeah, we found a bloody towel—five of them to be exact, mixed in with a couple of hundred others in the basement the laundry didn't pick up because of the weather. The lab will go over them, but I doubt they'll come up with much since they were with all the others and any hairs or whatever could have come from others on top of them. Not the kind of evidence the DA shouts hallelujah about. Anyway, if one matches Russell's blood type, we'll have something.”

Faith was disappointed. She'd considered the towel one of her contributions to the case and pictured it hanging on somebody's towel rack or stuffed at the bottom of a closet.

“Still, those might not be the right towels," she reminded him.

“Don't worry, we haven't stopped looking." Tom came in.

“Ben's watching 'Shining Time Station.' I get a shock every time I see Ringo Starr in that train conductor's uniform and about five inches tall, but then Ben didn't know him when. What about it—have you two solved this thing?" He sat down and sliced himself some bread.

“Not yet," John replied.

“And not 'you two.' I shouldn't have said that. As you know, my wife seems to have developed an unaccountable affinity for murder—investigations, that is—since we've been married. I like to think it's chance and not boredom."

“Probably both," Faith retorted, a bit put out at being discussed in absentia while sitting there.

John Dunne was looking slightly embarrassed. "Actually, Tom, one of the things r came to discusswith you and Faith was 'us two.' You see, Faith is in a position to hear a great deal. I am absolutely convinced she is in no danger, otherwise I would never suggest this. You know that. And we'll give her a wire if she likes. Everything to keep her safe and sound. But we'd like her to go back on Monday and keep her ears and eyes open. Nothing else." He looked pointedly at Faith. "We don't have much of a handle on this one, and though I hate to admit it, we need her help." The last words were dragged from him.

Tom looked incredulous—at the proposal, Dunne's admission, or both.

Faith looked thrilled.

She was going undercover.

Seven

Faith sat staring into the flame of the fourth Advent candle on the wreath. Next Sunday would be Christmas. She turned to look at the rear of the church as the choir started to sing "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel." Cyle was absent, and she didn't think it was her imagination that the faces in the loft were a bit more beatific than usual. Tom's was. He'd been in a good mood ever since Cyle had called early that morning to announce a slight cold, nothing serious. She looked back at the candles. The Alliance had embroidered a special Christmas altar cloth many years ago, and the gold threads glowed against the rose silk in the soft light. Ropes of pine twined around large pots of white cyclamen on either side of the altar. Christmas was indeed coming.

But first there was work to do. And she didn't mean last-minute shopping. After Dunne's invitation, she'd been delighted. They'd be a team. Then his next words had quickly dispelled any thoughts of Tommy and Tuppence or Nick and Nora. Watson was what he had in mind.

“Only for a day or two and only what comes your way. We'll handle the rest. We don't want you going around asking questions or opening up people's private file cabinets in the middle of the night.”

They'd talked some more. Tom was resigned and Faith felt like a woman with a mission. She'd dug out a notebook, sharpened a pencil, and gone over to Pix's, but learned nothing more than she had on Thursday. Pix was full of questions, though, not having heard about the murder. It was while talking to Pix that Faith first felt sorry for Eddie. She'd been so busy speculating, she hadn't given much thought to the victim. He'd been a lecherous creep, maybe worse, but he'd been young, full of life. She pictured him stretched out on the bed, waiting. She knew what it was he anticipated and it certainly wasn't death.

As though in answer to her inward musings, Robert Moore, today's lector, began to read the epistle from I Corinthians. Faith listened carefully and, when he got to the section about judgment, took special notice. It was a lesson she had been trying to learn for most of her life.

Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God.

One of the Sunday-school children read the second lesson from Mark remarkably well, and the service moved on to Tom's sermon. Faith gave him almost her full attention, wiping all thoughts of Hubbard House from her mind but occasionally straying to her gift and food shopping lists. Tom had wanted to give Ben trains—electric trains. Real trains. Faith had persuaded him to consider Brio wooden ones as more age-appropriate—for Ben, that is. She still had to pick them up. And order her goose from Savenor's market. She was startled as everyone stood for the final hymn and quickly joined the singing: "Veiled in darkness Judah lay, Waiting for the promised day....”

Back at the parsonage they ate a hasty lunch and Tom left to pay some calls. He was concerned about some of the elderly parishioners who hadn't been able to get to church because of the weather. Faith draped Benjamin in an apron, and the two set about making gingerbread dough. They were soon covered with flour despite the precautions, and Faith was enjoining Ben to stop eating the dough—"immediately!" He laughed mischievously and prepared to dip his finger in again. The room smelled like cinnamon and ginger. Yuletide smells. They were making the cookies to hang on the tree with bright red ribbons. If Ben keptsnatching at the bowl, the branches were going to look a little sparse.

“Oh no you don't. There won't be enough for the cookies, sweetie." She lifted him off the stool and went to the counter for an apple. She put it in his hand firmly, well aware that it was not the substitute he'd had in mind. He'd heard the magic word, and an apple was definitely not a cookie. But apple it was, and he was soon munching away at it and contentedly opening cupboard doors, dragging out the pots and pans.

Faith had started to roll the dough when there was a knock at the back door. It was Cyle. If you're sick, you're supposed to stay at home, she thought grumpily. He was the last person she wanted to see.

“Hello Cyle. How are you feeling?" She tried in vain to inject some genuine caring into her voice. "Tom's not home right now. May I take a message?" That should be clear enough.

It wasn't.

Cyle walked into the kitchen uninvited and sat down at the table. He looked terrible, although he didn't seem to exhibit any of the traditional cold symptoms—red, drippy nose, watery eyes, balled-up Kleenex in the palm. No, he looked rather as if he hadn't slept in several weeks. His face was pale and pinched with deep circles under his eyes.

“I'll wait," he said morosely.

“He could be quite a while. I can have him call you the moment he returns." Was this apparition going to encamp in her kitchen all afternoon?

“Still, I'll wait. I really need to talk to him." He lifted his eyes pathetically. Faith wasn't affected. She had the feeling that even if Cyle was terminally ill, she'd have trouble wrenching some good old-fashioned charity from her soul. He was that bad. Or she was.

“Ben and I are making cookies. You're welcome to just sit there if you want." She returned to her dough. Oh all right, she said to herself, and the better Faith asked him if he'd like a cup of coffee or tea.

“Tea. Earl Grey if you have it.”

He'd want lemon too.

She brewed him a cup of tea and went about her business. Ben tried to interest Cyle in some parallel play by dumping a bag of Duplos at his feet, but Cyle wasn't interested. Ben began to make a little car with the blocks by himself, and Faith was beginning to think they'd stay fixed in their various attitudes until Tom came when Cyle said bitterly, "Women. It's hard to believe someone you've loved so much could do this.”

An unhappy love affair, which was no surprise. Even though her curiosity was piqued, Faith had no desire to act as Cyle's confidante, so she said in what she hoped was a noncommittal way, "Problems, Cyle?"

“Problems! That's putting it mildly," he said angrily, and sat up straighter.

Well, I haven't done anything, you fool, Faith thought. No need to take it out on me, though this was without question the norm for this young man. Whoever happened to be nearest would get it full blast.

“You found him, didn't you? You were there Friday night."

“Eddie Russell? You mean what happened at Hubbard House?" Faith was surprised.

“Yes, Eddie—Edsel." He sneered. "What have the police been saying about it? Who do they think did it?"

“I don't think they have any idea at this point," Faith replied. This was getting interesting. "Why do you ask? Was he a friend of yours?"

“Friend! Oh yes, my friendly neighborhood blackmailer." The words poured out before he had a chance to stop them, and he looked around the kitchen quickly. Seeing only Ben, he seemed to be reassured. "What I said is in absolute confidence, Mrs. Fairchild. It's why I came to see Tom.”

Faith didn't think the confidentiality of the confessional extended to ministers' wives and Cyle knew that, but she agreed it would go no further. No further than Tom, since Cyle had been planning to tell him anyway.

“Why was Eddie blackmailing you?" she asked. One never knew. He might tell.

“It was Mother."

“Your mother!" Bootsie, the iron-willed Madame Alexander doll!

“I'm afraid mother was, well, indiscreet with Eddie when he first arrived to work at Hubbard House. Oh, he was good, very good. Told her he was leaving soon and how much a moment with a beautiful older woman would mean. Anyway, she tumbled." Cyle was starting to talk like a real per- son, Faith realized. "Of course, he had no intention of leaving. He was probably humping his way through the entire membership of the Pink Ladies and any other females around. Nice little sideline."

“And then he told her that unless she paid up, he'd tell everyone what the head of the Auxiliary was up to," Faith guessed.

“Exactly. Mother told me all about it last night. She's frantic. She thinks the police are going to think she did it.”

Bootsie or one of the other victims. It was getting harder to think of Eddie as the victim, even though he was lying on a mortuary table somewhere.

“Was she paying a lot of money?"

“Fortunately, father left us amply provided for." Stuffy Cyle had returned. "Eddie was smart enough not to bleed her. It was just a nice steady hundred here and there. Mother was actually grateful to him, she told me! Can you believe it?”

Faith could.

“You do know what she has to do, and I'm sure Tom will tell you the same thing."

“Yes, we've got to go to the police. But it's so humiliating.”

Light dawned. It wasn't that Cyle was worried his mother might be up for murder one, but that she had slept with the help.

“I'm sure she won't be a suspect. No one was traveling about much on Friday night. Besides, she has you for an alibi."

“I was in town Friday night. With a friend. Mother was alone, and of course she didn't goanywhere, but there's no one to prove it. And she has a four-wheel drive Bronco for bad weather.”

Leaving the Mercedes in the garage, of course. Well, Bootsie could have driven over to Hubbard House. Must have a key, and blackmail was a possible motive, yet Faith doubted the whole thing. She was pretty certain Dunne would too. Why would Bootsie Brennan jeopardize her social position for a paltry few hundred dollars, give or take? Besides, from the sound of it, she was still more than a little attracted to Edsel.

Faith gave Cyle John Dunne's number and promised that Tom would call him as soon as she had had a chance to fill him in on the perils of Bootsie. She bundled him out the door with what she hoped was not unseemly haste and then finished her cookies. She couldn't wait to tell Tom.

Tom was home in time for supper and, in between bites of the cassoulet, which had been filling the kitchen with fragrant aromas of duck, sausage, and beans since the day before, heard Faith's tale with astonishment and amusement.

“I know I shouldn't be laughing at all this, but when I think of that woman all dressed up in her buttons and bows at the Holly Ball parading around as the queen of Hubbard House being blackmailed for a roll in the hay with the handyman, I can't help it."

“Since when have you started using euphemisms like 'roll in the hay,' Tom?"

“Since people named Bootsie entered my life." Faith conceded the logic of that.

“If Eddie was blackmailing Bootsie, it stands to reason he was doing it to others as well, don't you think?" Tom asked.

“Yes, and it gives me something to go on tomorrow. I'll be on the lookout for furrowed foreheads. John is also going to be happy to have this lead. He seemed convinced that the murderer was someone in Hubbard House at the time, and this gives him a line to follow."

“I think I'll give Cyle a call now," Tom said, soaking up the last trace of sauce from his plate with a piece of crusty French bread. "Although I have no idea what to say. 'Sorry your mother is such a foolish and wanton woman' somehow doesn't sound very compassionate."

“You'll think of something. Just make those sympathetic murmuring noises you ministers are so good at."

“Ah yes, the murmuring noises, soon to be available on tape from your local ecclesiastical mail-order supply house.”

Tom returned shortly. "I didn't get to make many noises of any kind. Cyle was on his way out and almost cut me off. He did say they'd been in touch with Dunne and he'd come down to talk to them, so if not exactly public knowledge, at least it's police knowledge at present."

“I don't care much for Bootsie and family, but I still hope they don't find out about it at Hubbard House. She is a dynamo, and the Pink Ladies are essential to keeping the place running.”

They moved into the living room and sat before a fire reading Ben his favorite books of the moment, In the Night Kitchen and Katy and the Big Snow, until he dropped off to sleep and they carried him up into the hibernal regions of the bedrooms and put him in his bed. He had forsworn his crib at the beginning of the fall in favor of an old spool bed Aunt Chat had unearthed from her attic. They kissed him good night, slid the little bars into place that would keep him from falling out, and walked back downstairs arm in arm.

“At last," said Faith.

“At last," agreed Tom.

Monday morning was sunny and cold, but the roads were clear. The Byford police had had Faith's car towed to a garage in Byford center, and Tom was driving Faith over to get it. It was parked in front.

“I'll wait to make sure everything's okay," Tom said.

“Thank you, darling. I'll go ask in the office.”

It was, and she stuck her head out to tell Tom, waved good-bye as he drove off, then quickly went back in.

Scott Phelan was sitting at a battered gray metal desk leaning precariously back in the chair behind it. He had on grease-stained coveralls, and no amount of Lava soap would ever get his hands clean. He looked gorgeous.

“Nice to see you again, Mrs. Fairchild. Hear you found another body. Getting pretty good at this, aren't you?" He smiled, and for more than a fleeting moment Faith wished she didn't take her vows so seriously. Scott looked like the handsome one in Tom Cruise's family. They'd met two years ago when Scott had agreed to give Faith some information that gave one of the suspects in Cindy Shepherd's murder an alibi. She'd seen Scott several times since then at the Willow Tree Kitchen, a New England equivalent to a roadhouse—seedy, but with ruffled Priscilla curtains at the windows. Scott ate there every night and the Fairchilds went occasionally for the chowder and chili, which were excellent (in contrast to the rest of the menu and a wine list limited to two screw-top offerings—red or white).

“Still hanging out at the Willow Tree?" Faith asked.

“Yeah, but not for much longer. Trishia and I are getting married next spring."

“That's great, congratulations. She's a terrific girl." Trishia was the one who had led Faith to Scott.

Scott smiled slowly. It lit up the room. "Yeah, we're spending all our time together and I figured if we could stand each other this long, we're a pretty safe bet. She'll be graduating from Middlesex Community College over in Bedford then, so we'll have one party. Hope you can come—and the Reverend," he added after a distinct pause.

“We'd be honored.”

Scott stood up and sauntered around the desk.

“Your car is fine. Not a scratch on it. You were lucky. And it started right up. We didn't even have to tow it."

“That's great.”

As they headed toward the lot, it occurred toFaith that Scott might have heard something about Eddie Russell. Habitués of the Willow Tree knew most of what was going on in the area before it happened.

“Did you ever run into a guy named Eddie Russell in your travels?"

“You mean the stiff?"

“Yes. Did he come around the Willow Tree?"

“Yeah, old Edsel used to come around a lot. But not to eat. At least not lately. Wasn't good enough for him. No mixed drinks. Liked to impress the ladies."

“Well, what did he come around for then?"

“Look, Faith, think about it for a moment and then forget the whole thing. Eddie Russell was not a nice boy and he was into some pretty heavy shit."

“Drugs." As Faith said it, she mentally kicked herself for not thinking of it before. It fit so neatly into the rest of the picture. Dunne probably knew from the start. And it wasn't that she had led a particularly sheltered life.

“The man was a walking Rexall's. I asked him for Band-Aids once. He didn't get it. Pretty stupid for a guy who thought he was smart—but he also got himself killed, which is about as stupid as you can get.”

Faith had not regarded murder in this light, yet it made a certain amount of sense.

“So it was pretty well known that if you wanted drugs, you could get them from Eddie?"

“Everything from nose candy to weed. He wasn't a druggie himself, though. I heard him talking about some of his customers once. Thought they were complete losers. Trish and I laughed about it later. If anyone was a loser, it was Eddie."

“Why do you say that?"

“He was a type. Always wanted to be one of the big shots. But—what was he, thirty, thirty-one?—he wasn't anything but a handyman at an old people's home hustling on the side. I remember when he was first back from Florida. He was bragging about all the rich women he'd had down there. How he could have married any number of them—but you notice he didn't. A loser."

“Who do you think killed him?"

“Maybe he owed a lot of money to the wrong people and they wanted to make an example out of him. Maybe somebody's husband. Maybe somebody had just had enough of his face.”

Or his blackmail, Faith speculated to herself.

“Knifed, right?" Scott said with more than a touch of relish. "You have to be pretty strong to drive a blade in—and get it in the right place.”

Faith thought of the knives in Eddie's throat and chest.

“Oh, whoever it was got them in the correct places, all right."

“You mean there was more than one? Jeez, I hadn't heard that.”

Something to regale the bar with after work at the Willow Tree.

“Yes, two knives. Ordinary ones, like hunting knives.”

Scott reached into his pocket, produced a knife for her inspection, and flicked it open. The blade looked sharp enough to shave a peach.

“Like this?"

“Exactly.”

As she drove away from the gas station, she realized how difficult it was going to be for Dunne to trace the murder weapons if virtually every male—and no doubt a fair number of females—of a particular age and background carried the same knife. She turned her attention instead to what Scott had just told her about Eddie. It provided another possible motive, but what drug dealer was going to pick the first heavy snowstorm of the year and Hubbard House, filled with people, to kill Eddie when the task could be accomplished so much more easily on a long car ride to a deserted beach, for instance? And why the whips-and-chains accoutrements? Faith hadn't thought it wise to reveal too much to Scott. The number of knives had been in one of the papers, but so far nothing had been said about the cords.

She pulled into the Hubbard House parking lot, got out, and went into the kitchen. The only alteration in her routine was that she was going to stay for lunch. Tom had grudgingly agreed to get Ben at school and take him to Lizzie's house.

“This hasn't been the merriest of Christmas seasons," he had said sadly earlier that morning.

“It will be, darling. Don't worry. I'm only going to help for a day or so more, then we'll turn our full attention to the blazing hearth before us and sing Noël," she'd promised.

Mrs. Pendergast didn't hear Faith come in. She was running the enormous electric mixer. Faith walked over and tapped her on the elbow. She jumped a mile or the equivalent for a woman her size.

“What are you doing creeping up like that! Most scared me to death!"

“I'm sorry, but you didn't hear me with that thing going.”

Mrs. P. turned that thing off.

“I'm making a nice Lady Baltimore cake. People around here need something to lift their spirits." She looked at Faith darkly.

Faith had to protest. "Mrs. Pendergast, it wasn't my fault Eddie Russell was murdered. I just happened to be spending the night in that room. It could easily have been somebody else sleeping there. You, for example."

“Well, I stayed in my bed all night. That's all I know. And I never sleep in the guest room. It's too cold." She unbent a little. "Why don't you make up some frosting for the cake while I put this batter in to bake?”

Faith wondered if others at Hubbard House were blaming her indirectly. She supposed if she had stayed in her bed, Eddie and whoever would have seen she was there and the murderer would have canceled his plans—or pinioned Faith to the bed too for some knife-throwing practice.

It was a busy morning, and they were interrupted several times—first by Donald Hubbard, who was looking for his wife. She had been due to meet him in his office at ten o'clock.

“She's usually late," he said indulgently, "but not this late. I've already asked Muriel and some of the people Charmaine knows here. So far no one has seen her. Her car is in the parking lot, so she's around someplace."

“Did you try the Porters? She likes to go see Naomi's orchids, you know," Mrs. Pendergast offered.

“Good idea. I'll do that. Thanks, Mrs. R" Donald was in a good mood. The murder of Eddie Russell hadn't cast a pall on him. But his mood did have a thin overlay of concern, and Faith wondered whether it was totally due to the question of Charmaine's whereabouts. His next comment increased her doubts.

“I haven't had a chance to speak to you before, Mrs. Fairchild. It must have been a terrible shock for you to find poor Edsel. And then all the police interrogation."

“Of course it was horrible, but the police have been very kind."

“I don't suppose they've told you anything about a suspect," he said casually—too casually.

“No, I don't think there is one at the moment." She was about to ask him his opinion when Boot-sie Brennan came flying through the swinging door, and he wisely beat a hasty retreat.

She left as quickly as she had come after asking what "we" were giving them for lunch today.

Faith and Mrs. Pendergast looked at each other when she left and exploded in a fit of laughter.

“Someday I'm going to tell her 'we' are giving them bread and water today. Bet she says, 'That sounds yummy.' “

The next visitor was Denise. Faith hadn't seen her since the night of the Holly Ball, and the change was startling. Denise looked dreadful. She was wearing sweatpants and a worn Champion sweater under her fur coat. She didn't have any makeup on, and if her hair had been longer, it would have been unkempt. There were deep circles under her eyes, and the moment she entered the kitchen she reached into her bag and took out a cigarette. "I don't care what Roland says, I've got to have a smoke." They didn't stop her. She walked shakily over to the counter and sat down on one of the kitchen stools.

“Have you been ill? The flu?" Faith asked.

“Something like that," Denise said shortly. When she lit her cigarette, Faith noticed her hands were unsteady and several of her nails had been bitten to the quick.

“Where's Charmaine? She was supposed to meet me here. We're having lunch. Have you seen her?”

Faith was surprised. She wouldn't have expected the two ladies to be friends.

“Donald was just here looking for her too. He went out to the Porters' cottage to see if she was there."

“Then I'll go up to his office." She stood up and swayed slightly.

“Are you sure you're all right?" Faith asked. "I'm fine. Don't worry about me," Denise said with a flicker of her old grin.

The trays were done and Faith took her leave of Mrs. P.—Violet—and went upstairs to the dining room. Sunshine streamed in through the windows and there were yellow lilies in several large vases around the room. Sylvia Vale took care of the flowers, and Faith wondered where she'd found these gorgeous lilies in the midst of winter. The lady herself stepped through the doorway and Faith asked her.

“I really can't take any credit at all, my dear. Winston's sends me an assortment of cut flowers twice a week, and I simply put them in the containers.”

People began to take their places at the tables, and Faith stood and considered which group would provide the most fodder. She settled on the Cabots. There was another couple she didn't know at the table. Two places were left. She turned to Sylvia, "Would you like to sit with me? I'm staying for lunch today. We could join the Cabots over there."

“Oh yes, how lovely—and the Porters.”

So she'd be able to find out immediately if Charmaine had turned up, Faith realized.

The room was filling up rapidly. Dr. Hubbard sat at a table by the window, and Muriel joined him. She looked as imperturbable as ever and reached out to give her father's hand a reassuring pat as she sat down. Everything was proceeding normally at Hubbard House on the surface, anyway.

Mrs. P. was giving them beef pot pie today, which Faith had tried to bourguignonize a bit by adding mushrooms, diced bacon, and wine. It wasn't too bad.

She didn't have to worry about drawing people out. Eddie Russell's death was the topic of the moment. Julia seemed particularly upset that Faith had been in the same room.

“We have a couch that makes up into a bed. I should have had you stay with us."

“Julia, please don't trouble yourself about it. Who could possibly have predicted something like this would ever happen?"

“I feel responsible too," Sylvia said. "There are any number of other places you could have slept. I don't know why Leandra took you to that old guest suite—it's so cold and drafty in the winter too. It is where we put our notables though," she gushed on, "and I suppose she meant it to be an honor.”

Some honor, Faith thought, and stifled the urge she had to giggle or say something naughty that she had had ever since she sat down to eat with all these grown-ups.

“It is so sad," sighed Naomi Porter. "Danforth and I were very fond of Edsel. He was such a help to us in the greenhouse, carrying sacks of loam and really doing all the dirty work. It was lovely that he took such an interest in horticulture. He even had his own little section. Whenever I water his plants, I'll think of him.”

Faith made a mental note to tell John Dunne tomake a surreptitious raid on the Porters' greenhouse. She had a pretty good idea of what Eddie had been growing there, and it wasn't oregano.

“Be that as it may," Ellery Cabot was saying, "I hope the young man's death doesn't bring all sorts of negative publicity to Hubbard House. Let's hope the police clear it up quickly and we can go about our business.”

Julia looked less sanguine. "I have a feeling finding out who killed Eddie Russell could be very complicated."

“Why do you say that?" Faith asked.

“Because he was—" The rest of Julia's words were interrupted by Denise's frenzied entrance into the dining room.

“Dr. Hubbard! Dr. Hubbard! Come quickly! Someone's attacked Charmaine and locked her up in the furnace room!”

Roland ran out of the room, closely followed by Muriel. Everyone looked at one another in stunned silence for a moment before a general hubbub broke out.

Faith got up.

“I have to make sure Detective Dunne has been notified.”

She dashed down the corridor to the annex and took the elevator to the ground floor. She assumed the furnace was in one of the maze of rooms across from the kitchen, and as she drew closer, she heard voices. When she opened the door, she saw Donald and Roland Hubbard bent over Charmaine, who was stretched out on the floor. Her blouse was torn and there was a pil- lowcase lying next to her. She was moaning softly.

“Now, honey, the shot should take effect any minute. Be brave, my darling," Donald was saying.

“I'll call Emerson and we'll make arrangements to have her taken over there immediately," Dr. Hubbard said. He was leaning over her, prodding deftly at various parts of her body.

“No!" screamed Charmaine. "I hate hospitals! Don't make me go to a hospital!"

“Honey, it's just to make sure there are no internal injuries. We have to have some X rays." Donald talked in a soothing tone of voice.

Muriel stepped out of the shadows and spoke to Donald in a low voice. "Why don't we move her upstairs for now until she's less hysterical?”

Donald smiled at her gratefully.

Faith entered the room. She felt slightly awkward intruding on this domestic scene, but somebody had to.

“Has anyone notified the police?”

Donald looked up. "I asked Denise Samuelson to do that immediately, Mrs. Fairchild. We expect them at any moment."

“I know it's uncomfortable for her here, but I think they would probably not want her moved.”

Nobody likes a know-it-all, and all four Hub-bards looked at her with varying degrees of annoyance Charmaine's deathly pallor displaying the least.

“Do you happen to know if Denise was going to call the state police or the Byford police?" Faith asked.

“I didn't give her a list of telephone numbers." There was no attempt to disguise the exasperation now. "My wife had just been attacked. I told her to call the police.”

Faith was torn. She didn't know whether she ought to stay to make sure nothing was moved or go find Denise and make sure she had called Dunne. She decided to stay. If the Byford police arrived, she'd have to try to keep Chief Coffin from destroying whatever evidence there was. So far all she could see was the pillowcase and a piece of rope lying next to it. Presumably the attacker had pulled it over Charmaine's bouffant hairdo and tied it around her neck with the rope.

“Water, I need some water," Charmaine groaned, and tried to get up.

“Don't move, my dear. Mrs. Fairchild is unfortunately correct and we must let the police see exactly what happened," Dr. Hubbard advised. "I'll get you something to drink.”

It was sweltering in the furnace room, and Faith half-heartedly hoped Roland would appear with a tray of frosty glasses for them all, but he returned with only one tumbler for Charmaine, which he lifted to her parched lips.

A few seconds later John Dunne appeared with Detective Sullivan and his paraphernalia. The room suddenly grew too small for the assemblage, and Faith found herself wedged next to Muriel. But leaving was out of the question.

Dunne took a stride over to where the victim lay. Faith could have sworn Charmaine's skirt had been hiked up several inches in the interim.

“Mrs. Hubbard, can you tell me what happened?”

Charmaine's accent moved south from the Carolinas to Georgia.

“I arrived here at about ten o'clock. I was meeting my husband, but first I went to find Mrs. Samuelson. We were supposed to have lunch today, and I wanted to tell her I couldn't make it. I thought I'd look in the kitchen when I didn't see her upstairs, and when I came out of the elevator, someone put a bag on my head and everything went black. When I came to, I was in here. I got the bag off, then I must have passed out again. I don't know how long it's been." She looked up at Dunne piteously. He didn't budge.

“Did you get any impression at all of your assailant? Did he or she say anything?"

“Not a word. Whoever it was was taller than I am, though. I think it was a man. I tried to grab at the bag and I believe I hit a shoulder. I was knocked out right after that." She touched her head gingerly. "This is where I was hit."

“She has a sizable contusion and there may be some concussion," Donald said. "There don't appear to be any other injuries, thank God," he added.

“No indication of ..." Dunne glanced tactfully a little north of Charmaine's knees.

Donald choked slightly. "Absolutely not.”

“Who found her?" He looked around the room. "I did," Donald said. "Mrs. Samuelson and I were both beginning to get alarmed and were making a thorough search of the premises. My wife had made plans to meet each of us here, and her car was in the parking lot. And she's not a woman who breaks appointments.”

Faith bit her lip.

Donald continued, "I was checking all the rooms just opening the doors and looking in. Of course I didn't expect she would have any reason to be here, but there she was—unconscious on the floor.”

Dunne looked tired. Faith was surprised. Obviously the attack on Charmaine had to be connected with Eddie Russell's murder, and Dunne should have been pleased that more clues were turning up. Although, she reflected, this meant more questioning and investigating, and the most obvious tie-in was the suggestion that some sort of maniac was on the loose. Not an appealing thought.

Dunne cleared the room and told the Hubbards Charmaine could be moved in a few moments. He motioned Faith outside into the hallway.

“Go home.”

She was indignant. "Well—"

“I'll see you later.”

His left eye twitched. It might or might not have been a wink.

Faith went upstairs and got her coat. She still wanted to find out what Julia Cabot had to say about Eddie Russell, but she could see her tomorrow. Tom's "chestnuts roasting on an open fire" would have to wait a bit.

Chief Francis Coffin, supported on either side by trusty minions, was coming in the door as she was leaving. He stopped dead in his tracks. "Now don't tell me you were snuggled up with this one too!" He laughed so hard, he had to sit down to recover his breath.

“No," Faith replied frostily, "I did not find Mrs. Hubbard. Her husband did. I was merely here to help in the kitchen." He shook his head and his cap fell off. "Seems you have a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Better stay in your own kitchen. Bake some Christmas cookies." He heaved himself out of the chair and tottered out of the room. It was impossible to be angry at something so ludicrous.

She left quickly, got into her car, and was starting to back out of the space when Denise knocked at the window. Her face was blue with the cold and her teeth were chattering. She looked even worse than she had that morning.

Faith braked quickly and leaned across to open the door.

“Get in quickly. You must be freezing!"

“I am.”

Denise was immobile for a moment, staring ahead through the windshield. It was a beautiful winter landscape. The evergreens were frosted with snow, and in the distance the frozen Concord River slid like a silver ribbon under an old stone bridge. But Faith was certain Denise wasn't transfixed by the scene.

“Why don't you tell me about it?" she said gently.

Denise turned her head and considered.

“I suppose that's why I've been waiting. Is Charmaine badly injured?"

“I'm not a professional, but I'd say she was going to be fine." Surely Denise couldn't have been Charmaine's attacker, yet she was obviously relieved at Faith's words.

She shook her head slowly. "This whole thing is like a nightmare. And I didn't see how my life could possibly have gotten any worse.”

The car was warm and the windows had steamed up, making a kind of cozy cocoon, but the parking lot at Hubbard House didn't seem the best place for true confessions. "Look," said Faith, "let's go to my house and we'll get something warm to drink and sort things out."

“If we only could—but I'll come to your house, Faith. I have to do something.”

She slumped back in the seat and they drove to Aleford in silence. At one point Faith thought Denise might be asleep, but she opened her eyes again almost immediately.

Tom was in the kitchen. He started to say something jokingly to his wife when he saw Denise's face behind Faith and quickly pulled out a chair for her.

“Denise has come for some tea and sympathy," Faith told him.

“Then I'll leave you to it," he said tactfully.

“No, please stay, Reverend Fairchild. I'd like to have you here. I need—" She had trouble finishing her sentence. "I need some spiritual help.”

Faith put the water on, and soon a steaming pot of tea was ready. Denise was too. She sat up and looked better than she had since her arrival at Hubbard House earlier in the day.

“I have a problem with drugs." It was a bald statement and seemed to exhaust her, but she kept going.

“When I was married, my husband was heavily involved with cocaine—the recreational drug, you know," she said caustically. "It was one of the reasons I divorced him. His son, Joel, knew, and it was mainly why he wanted to stay with me, I believe." She took a large sip of tea. "Joel doesn't know about me. But Eddie Russell did. He was my supplier. I'm addicted to diazepam—Valium. My husband used to take it with the coke and there was always plenty around. At first I just took one or two when I felt stressed, and believe me there was a lot to be stressed about in those days. Then my dependency increased, and even after he was gone I couldn't function without it. I'd try to keep myself from taking one; then I'd have terrible anxiety attacks. I couldn't leave the house without my precious vial of pills. I had kept my eyes open at Hubbard House, so I knew Eddie." She looked straight at Faith. "And no, it is not why I went there as a volunteer—to score drugs. I went because I was trying hard to find some meaning in my life—through the temple and through my volunteer work. But things were too out of control. Eddie actually approached me. Maybe I looked like a user. Anyway, he said we could have a good time together and he had ways to make it even better. I wasn't interested in him romantically, but we did have a brief affair. Then the relationship was strictly business.”

Tom and Faith had been listening intently. The shadows were lengthening in the yard, but Faith didn't want to interrupt things by turning on the lights. Instead she reached across the table and put her hand on Denise's.

“Oh, Denise, I'm so sorry. I wish I had known you sooner. You've been in so much pain.”

Denise seemed to falter again, then resumed speaking. "At first it was simple. I'd give him the money and he'd give me the drugs. Then he began to increase the price, and finally he began to really do a number on me by telling me he couldn't get any for a few days before coming through. I knew it was blackmail and I knew he was a liar and a sadist, but there was nothing I could do about it. When I heard he was dead, I went crazy. Fortunately Joel is away on a school ski trip. I haven't slept and I've torn the house apart looking for places I might have stashed some.”

It was now so dark, Faith had to turn on the lights, and she took the teapot to add some hot water. Tom moved his chair closer to Denise.

“I was meeting Charmaine because I always assumed they were in it together. I'm pretty sure he got the stuff from her that night at the Holly Ball.”

Faith remembered the mystery of the missing pocketbook—that big pocketbook, big enough to hold several CVS branches.

“So Eddie had something to do with the lights going off?"

“He liked to be dramatic. Told me to meet him by the main switch, and when he pulled it, he handed me some pills. He was like a kid that way.”

Denise was talked out. She sat with her hands around the cup for warmth. Her face was lined and she looked about fifty years older than usual.

Tom spoke. "You know that Faith and I will do everything to help you. Which means talking to the police and then a treatment program, if that's what you want. The important thing for you to remember is you're not going to be alone.”

Denise put her head down on the table and sobbed like a child. Faith stood behind her and stroked her head.

A few hours later Dunne had left and Tom was driving Denise to McLean's Hospital. Faith was back in the kitchen waiting for her husband's return. She was idly leafing through her recipe file looking for something new to do with squash—squash tortellini in brown butter?—but her mind strayed to Hubbard House, as usual. She'd started to phone Aunt Chat earlier with an update and decided it was too complicated to explain except in person. Instead she'd written on a postcard of the Aleford green:

Think I know some of what was troubling Howard. Tell you all about it at Christmas.

Love and kisses

Faith

Denise's story had been deeply upsetting, but she seemed to sincerely want to end her dependency, and Faith sensed she had the strength to do so. It was impossible to avoid the thought that her relationship to Eddie gave her a strong motive for murdering him, but Faith pushed it from her mind. Denise had been at home on Friday night, no doubt in no condition to drive. Faith wondered when Joel had left for his trip. It would be nice if Denise could have a tidy little alibi.

Since she'd first heard that Eddie was a skilled practitioner in the art of blackmail, Faith had known other victims would surface. The question now was who next? She remembered the assurance with which Julia Cabot had spoken at lunch when she'd mentioned that it wouldn't be easy to solve the crime. What did she know? Faith closed her recipe file and decided to wait for Tom in bed. She was exhausted.

Upstairs she pulled the covers over her shoulders, leaving the light on so Tom could find his way. Just before she dozed off, she thought of what Dunne had said to her at the door away from the others as he was leaving. She'd looked at him quizzically. "So who's your favorite for the attack on Charmaine? Could be a pretty broad field.”

He'd laughed. "You don't really think Charmaine would let someone else mess up her hair, do you? The question is, why does she want us to think so? Now, say good night, Faith.”

And she had.

Down, down, down. Tumbling down until she came to a dead stop in a heap at the bottom.

Eight

Leandra Rhodes was almost late for dinner. Her husband, Merwin, was in town meeting an old classmate at the Harvard Club, and she'd been struggling with the zipper on the back of her dress for ten minutes. She refused to give in and finally pulled it up triumphantly with the aid of a safety pin and a long piece of string. She hurried out of her room and stopped for a moment at the top of the stairs to catch her breath. She put her hand out and stroked the smooth banister. She doubted whether there were many craftspeople left, even in New England, who could carve such a spiral. But it wouldn't do to dilly-dally now, and she looped the pocketbook that never left her side securely over her arm and started down.

Down, Down, Down. Tumbling down until she came to dead stopin a heap at the bottom.

“I don't like it. Sure it's possible that an old lady in a rush to get to dinner could trip over the pocketbook she's dropped, and fall down the stairs all by herself, but it's the timing. Too much going on at that place.”

Faith agreed with Detective Dunne, who had just called to tell her about Leandra's accident the night before.

“Leandra was not the type of lady who trips. She would never put a foot wrong, literally or figuratively. Has she been able to say anything about what happened?"

“No, it's a miracle she's even alive. She's in the intensive care unit over at Mass General and hasn't regained consciousness."

“Of course, if it wasn't an accident, it means she was pushed, which is a horrible thought. And why would anyone want to hurt her?”

Faith imagined Bootsie Brennan might have entertained less than charitable thoughts about Leandra from time to time, but as a sparring partner Leandra was without equal, and on some level Bootsie must have recognized that. Besides, noxious as she was, Bootsie didn't seem like the type of woman who attempts murder—unless it was for a very good reason, like someone maligning her son. All these types. It reminded Faith of those old Peck and Peck ads, "There's a certain kind of woman who ..." She and her friends at Dalton had had fun making up all sorts of lewd and, to eleven-year-olds, hysterical endings contrary to the image presented of the woman who chairs a meeting of the SEC but also bakes the best angel food cake in the neighborhood.

“All these types." Faith realized she was saying it out loud.

“What's that?" Dunne asked.

“I was just thinking about the cast of characters we're assembling."

“Look, why don't you go up again today and see what's in the wind? I'll try to come by your house later this afternoon.”

Faith had been planning to go to Hubbard House anyway and was happy to have the official blessing.

“Fine," she replied. "I'll see you later.”

She broke the news to Tom and set off on her familiar route. The snow hadn't melted much, and it was getting dirty only by the side of the road. If you looked beyond, it was still like a scene from the top of a fruitcake tin.

Faith walked into the kitchen and headed for the closet to get an apron. Mrs. Pendergast was stirring a huge pot of milk on the stove.

“Cup custard. That's the kind of thing they'll want today."

“Comfort food?" Faith remarked.

Mrs. P. patted her waist. "To me most food could be called that, but that's right. Nice, soothing food. Nothing complicated. Now say hello to Mrs. Fairchild, Gladys." She called over her shoulder.

Faith hadn't noticed that there was another person in the kitchen. A cheerful-looking, middle-aged woman, her hair imprisoned in a hairnet guarded by several dozen bobby pins, came bustling over with her hand outstretched.

“Glad to meet you. I hear you really held down the fort while I was sick. Feel fine now, but was I bad. I think I had all those flus at once—Hong Kong, Taiwan, whatever. Sick as a dog. Couldn't keep a mouthful down for over a week. I tell you—”

Faith wasn't sure she wanted to be told. "It's very nice to meet you. I was happy I could help." She looked at Mrs. Pendergast a bit wistfully. "I suppose you won't be needing me anymore, Violet." The name came easily.

Violet put an arm around Faith's shoulder while she continued to stir her custard. "Now, Faith, Gladys and I will manage. It's been a real pleasure to get to know you, and you come up whenever you want. I expect you need some time now to do all the things you should have been doing while you were here. Now, scoot and we'll see you Friday night."

“Friday night?"

“The Christmas party. It's lots of fun. And I'd say we could all use a little about now."

“I'll try to come. It depends on what my husband's commitments are. This is a busy time for him."

“Of course, but just come for a moment. I'm making all my specialties.”

Faith wasn't sure how much of an incentive Violet's specialties were—probably confections from the trusty cookbook like peanut penuche, marsh- mallow tea cookies, and mosaic finger sandwiches, besides all the regular Christmas favorites like nut balls—these last unknown to Faith until a parishioner had offered her one last Christmas saying ingenuously, "Have a nut ball? They're my husband's and they're delicious.”

She wandered upstairs in search of Julia Cabot. She'd talk to her, then get home before lunch. Tom would be pleased. What was in the wind was boiled dinner, and she didn't think she'd add to her knowledge of what was going on at Hubbard House by eating there. It would be more productive to sit down with John later and go over everything they knew so far—and she was pretty sure there was a lot he hadn't shared. Plus she had something to tell him too. She'd figured out a motive for the attack on Leandra.

It was possible that Leandra had dropped her pocketbook as she hastened to dinner, then lost her balance as she reached down to pick it up from the stair. But it was more likely that someone had grabbed the purse from her arm and pushed her. It would have been the only way to get it and its contents. Faith realized the unfortunate relevance of Leandra's kleptomania now. She had taken something that incriminated someone, and that person was prepared to murder again to get it back. Leandra never let the old black calfskin satchel—circa 1952, a testament to the importance of buying quality merchandise—out of her sight. It would have been too risky to try to get it at night with her husband in bed by her side, nor could the killer do what everyone else did, which was to ask Merwinfor whatever they were missing. "Have you happened to see my fountain pen lying around?”

So the murderer had to be someone who was at Hubbard House both nights. It was slim, but it was the only thing that made sense so far.

Faith decided to call Tom and tell him she would pick Ben up. Humming a few bars of "Deck Us All with Boston Charlie," her Pogo-loving father's favorite carol, she pushed open the door of Sylvia Vale's office. Muriel was on the phone.

“Now, James, you've got to go—" She looked up, startled. "I'll have to get back to you on that, I'm afraid. Why don't you give me a number where you can be reached?" She jotted the number on a pad. "Thank you very much. I'll call you as soon as I can. Good-bye." She hung up. Her cheeks were flushed. She tore the paper from the pad and pushed it into her pocket.

“I'm sorry to be interrupting," Faith said. "I wanted to use the phone, but I can find another one."

“Oh no, you're not interrupting at all. Just one of those hospital supply salesmen. They're so persistent. How are you, Mrs. Fairchild?"

“I'm fine, but I'm sorry to say this is my last day at Hubbard House. The kitchen staff is back in full force."

“Oh, yes, I heard Gladys was better. We're terribly grateful to you for pitching in, and I hope you'll join us on Friday for the Christmas party here."

“I'm going to try to come for at least a little while. I remember the last time I saw Farley, you were talking about it."

“Yes." Muriel's face darkened. "I miss Farley. It's always a problem with this job. You get so fond of people and then they go. But, of course, you will be back to see us often, I hope."

“Of course."

“I'll leave you to your call, then. See you Friday."

“Oh," Faith remembered as she was leaving, "I was sorry to hear about Leandra Rhodes' fall. Have you heard how she is getting on? And Mrs. Hubbard too?"

“It has been a dreadful week," Muriel said, obviously not a woman prone to exaggeration even when life around her was. "Charmaine is fine. Donald took her for X rays, but we don't have good news about Leandra. She's still in danger."

“Oh dear," Faith said.

“Perhaps we'll have better news by Friday." Little Muriel Sunshine brightened and left, closing the door behind her.

Left to go call James back, Faith thought. She took a pencil from the desk and drew lightly across the impression made on the rest of the pad when Muriel had written the telephone number on the top sheet. Faith had seen Cary Grant do it in North by Northwest about sixty times, and she was pleased to find it worked just as well for her as it did for him. She'd have to hope James was not holed up in Mount Rushmore or its equivalent.

Then she called Tom and left a message with the parish secretary. She'd wait until she got home to try to find James. The Hubbard House office was all too public.

Julia Cabot was not one of the people whilingaway the time before lunch reading m front of the fire in the living room. Faith remembered that she had said she was still working, but it might not be every day. There was a list of room and cottage numbers in the office by the phone, and Faith returned to see where the Cabots were. Number 20 in Nathaniel's house. She walked back to the staircase. It was hard to climb, knowing that Leandra had so recently made her descent here. Faith tried to block the picture from her mind of the old lady falling helplessly down the stairs, a well-groomed, well-bred rag doll.

Faith was glad to reach the corridor and soon found number 20, in the front of the house. She knocked on the door, which was immediately opened by Julia. "Why, Faith, how nice to see you. Please come in. Can you join us for lunch?"

“No, thank you, I have to pick Benjamin up soon. I just wanted to stop and say good-bye. The kitchen is up to full muster again.”

Faith entered the room. It was large and partially divided by open shelves that were filled with Staffordshire figures. One side of the room was furnished as a living room with beautiful antiques. On the other side Faith glimpsed an IBM PC perched on top of an ornate Louis XIV desk. Julia followed her gaze.

“It is a little mismatched, obviously. But it means I can work at home when I want to. And the china is a passion we share, although I think Ellery mostly likes to use it as an excuse to go to England." She glanced fondly at her husband, who had been sitting in a comfortable-looking armchair by the window reading the paper. A pretty little tree decorated with small colored lights and blown-glass ornaments was at his side. He'd sprung to his feet as Faith came in.

“I'm sorry you're leaving," Julia continued, "but I'm sure we'll see each other again. You and your husband."

“We'd like that."

“But do sit down for a moment, can you?"

“Yes," urged Ellery, indicating a chair. "Come here by the window. The view is splendid.”

Faith walked toward him. "I do have time to stay a few minutes.”

The view was wonderful, and Faith had a sudden desire to see what the fields and woodlands in front of her looked like with each season. In her other life she had been more than content to chart the changing solstices and equinoxes by Bergdorf's window displays. If she wasn't careful, she'd soon be taking long walks and starting a life list of birds.

“I suppose you've heard the terrible news about our friend Leandra Rhodes," Ellery commented.

“Yes," said Faith. "It's hard to imagine how such a thing could have happened.”

Ellery shook his head. "Fortunately she has a very strong constitution. Never known her to be ill a day in her life, and we have to pray it will carry her through."

“Darling," Julia said, "would you mind going to get the mail? I'm expecting A rather important letter.”

There was no question. Julia wanted to get her husband out of the room. He looked at her curiously and went.

“Not too subtle, I'm afraid, but it upsets Ellery to hear about all this, and that is why you came to talk to me, isn't it?”

Julia was wearing a red cashmere sweater and well-cut charcoal-gray pants. She crossed one leg elegantly over the other and folded her hands loosely in her lap. She looked more likely to be about to discuss the latest play at the Loeb or Ozawa's last performance—or from the look of her trim figure, the best time to go to Canyon Ranch—than murder.

“Yes, it is. You said the other day that Eddie Russell's murder would be a complicated one to solve. I wondered if you were thinking of something specific."

“You're working for the police, aren't you?" Julia said.

Faith's mother, Jane Sibley, was a lawyer too, yet Julia's manner, though equally direct, didn't have the same effect on Faith. Tête-à-têtes like this with Mom usually resembled the talking-tos of Faith's childhood. She had often wondered if it was why Jane was so successful in court. The old "Can you look me straight in the eye and say that" approach. Nevertheless, Faith felt compelled to answer Julia truthfully.

“I'm not really working for them, but I do know Detective Lieutenant Dunne, who's in charge of the investigation, and I've told him some of my impressions of Hubbard House. That doesn't mean that I have to tell him everything you choose to tell me." Faith spoke reassuringly. "Unless I confess I did it."

“You're one of the few people who have an unbreakable alibi. You and your husband. Both of you knew I was sleeping in the guest room."

“That's true. But I did want to kill Eddie. Many times. Fortunately—or unfortunately—I also believe in a few higher things that prevented me from acting on my impulses." Julia spoke very matter-of-factly. Faith didn't want to interrupt her train of thought and kept silent.

“Do you know that Eddie was a blackmailer?" Julia asked. Faith nodded.

Julia leaned back in her chair. "I don't know why it should seem so much worse to blackmail elderly people than another age group. It's the same crime. Yet somehow, preying on people who are at the ends of their lives does strike me as more reprehensible. They don't have time to recover. I know of three people Eddie was blackmailing here and I don't doubt there were others. You might be able to guess who one of them is—Merwin Rhodes. Eddie knew about Leandra's habit. When Eddie first approached him, Merwin confided in Ellery. Ellery has been his lawyer for years. Poor Merwin. He was afraid the knowledge would get beyond Hubbard House. People here have always been very understanding. Eddie was talking about telling the head of the Pink Ladies, Mrs. Brennan. Merwin feared she would insist that Leandra resign as head of the Residents' Council, and Leandra loves being in charge. He also thought thepapers might pick it up and make sport with it—'Brahmin Deb Turns to Pilfering in Old Age'—that sort of thing. Ellery advised him not to pay, but he did. He said it wasn't much money."

“And the others?"

“One of the others got out of it by dying. It was a man named Jim Keiller, a Scot, and very keen on golf. He and Eddie played together often and became friends. Eddie introduced him to a very nice, sympathetic young lady and then revealed she was a prostitute. Eddie had some naughty pictures and threatened to hang them on the bulletin board by the mailboxes downstairs."

“How did you find out about it?"

“After Jim died, a man who was here for only a short period of time told me."

“Not Howard Perkins!" Faith gasped.

“Why, yes, did you know him?" Julia was clearly puzzled.

“That's how all this started. He was a friend of my aunt's and wrote to her just before he died that he was uneasy about something that was going on here. She got in touch with me."

“And you turned up in the kitchen."

“Exactly."

“I knew Howard years ago when I was first practicing law in New York. The ad agency he worked for was one of our clients. We were very surprised to find each other here. He was a dear man."

“Yes," agreed Faith, "and a smart one. After Jim Keiller told him what Eddie was doing to him, he may have found out about some others."

“That's possible, yes."

“And who's the third?" Faith had a feeling she knew.

“Me. Or I should say Ellery.”

Faith had been prepared for what Julia was going to say. The whole conversation had had confessional undertones. Now she waited to hear what Eddie could possibly have unearthed about this nice couple.

“Eddie had a kind of sixth sense for certain kinds of behavior. Perhaps because he was so weak himself, he knew how to ferret out others' weaknesses. It was as if he was tuned in to some sort of special world cable channel broadcasting signals that indicated who would want to have an affair, who wanted to use a particular drug, or who wanted to look at smut. Because he was scum, he only saw the same.”

This was interesting and morally uplifting, Faith thought, but it wasn't telling.

“Ellery has always had a bad back. Disc trouble, and when the pain is too excruciating, he takes codeine. A year ago he developed a mild addiction to it, and I made the mistake of getting some from Eddie. I knew Dr. Hubbard was monitoring Ellery's drug intake carefully, and I couldn't get an increase from him. Ellery was begging me for more of the drug. It was incredibly stupid, but I was tired and strung out myself from taking care of Ellery. After it was all over, Eddie demanded payment. I had a choice." Julia's lip curled. "I could pay in cash or in kind. I suppose at my age he meant me to be flattered."

“What a creep!" The last vestiges of any sympathy she had entertained for Eddie slipped silently away.

“I didn't agree, though. Frankly, I told him to go fuck himself, because it was the only sex he was going to get—with me anyway. But I couldn't tell Roland without revealing Ellery's problem, and that was not my story to tell. He would not have been able to stay here if he'd thought Roland, who has been his close friend all these years, knew. He is very ashamed. Of course Eddie couldn't tell Roland either without revealing how he knew. If he told anyone else, I planned to deny the whole thing. I started watching him very carefully and told him if he didn't stop his activities, I'd go to Dr. Hubbard. This was last month."

“I don't see why the police have to know about Ellery, since he couldn't have killed Eddie. I would like to tell them the rest, though."

“Fine, if you think it will help. Anything to get this settled."

“And what about Leandra? Do you think it was an accident?"

“No. I wish I could. But I also can't think of any reason why someone would want to kill her or how it connects to Eddie's death."

“And how about the attack on Charmaine?" Dunne had told Faith to go along with Charmaine's version of the event, despite his own skepticism. They might get more information that way.

“It's very puzzling. Possibly someone Eddie was blackmailing. Wanted to scare her, so she wouldn't keep the business going.”

Faith looked slightly confused, and Julia said,

“Oh yes, I'm fairly certain that Charmaine and Eddie were partners in many ways. She's not as silly as she looks. But I don't think she'd commit murder. Too worried about her position, or hoped-for position, in society.”

Ellery walked into the room with a stack of letters.

“I hope what you're waiting for is here, my dear."

“Thank you, I think I have already found part of what I've been waiting for." She looked at Faith gratefully. "Do you know I'm suddenly very hungry. Are you sure you won't change your mind and join us for lunch, or haven't you developed a taste for New England boiled dinner yet?”

Faith did not know how to answer. What leaped to mind was scarcely polite—something like "only when old shoe leather and boiled dishcloths are not available." She rose and thanked them instead, then quickly went down the hall around the rear to the elevator. There was no way she was taking the stairs.

She picked Ben up at school and settled him at the table with a dish of applesauce while she made sandwiches for their lunch. Ben liked food to appear immediately. He wasn't much for deferred gratification at this stage. She was having some trouble with it herself. She wanted to call James' number, but she'd have to wait. The demands of a two-and-a-half-year-old boy were too unpredictable, and the last thing she wanted was to be interrupted in the middle of the conversation by Ben's newest activity—a manic imitation of a character he'd invented called "Super Dog." Super Dog could fly, leap tall doghouses at a single bound, and crush any number of dog bones in one bare paw. The furniture was taking quite a beating, and Faith was trying to restrict Super Dog to the yard, but it didn't always work.

By two o'clock, Ben was asleep surrounded by the several dozen stuffed animals he insisted on keeping in his bed. Faith hoped someone would simply give him some Gund stock for Christmas rather than another bear, irresistible as they might be.

She went downstairs and got the number from her purse. There wasn't any area code, which meant Muriel knew it or it was nearby. She dialed and it started ringing. Her lucky day.

A man answered. "Winthrop Chambers.”

“May I speak to James Hubbard, please?”

“Jimmy? He's not here right now."

“Do you know when I might be able to reach him?"

“It's kind of hard to say. He's usually here in the morning. Who should I tell him called?"

“That's all right. I'll call him back. Thank you.”

Faith hung up quickly. She went to get the Boston phone book from the closet. The Winthrop Chambers was on Beacon Hill—the wrong side, away from the common. It was probably a rooming house or some sort of resident hotel. She'd find out in the morning when she went there. Now that she knew where he was, it would be better to go in person. A phone is too easy to hang up.

She hoped John Dunne would come before Ben woke up, but time passed and he still hadn't arrived. It was after three and a shrill cry, "Mommee! Mommee!" meant Ben was awake and ready for more action.

She had no sooner set Ben up with gold twine and the box of wooden spools he had painted to make necklaces for Christmas presents when the phone rang. It was Detective Dunne.

“I'm up to my ears here, Faith, and I won't be able to get over today. Maybe tomorrow. Find out anything?”

Faith gave him a quick report on her conversation with Julia.

“The guy was a real operator," Dunne commented. "I'm not surprised he got iced. Now I've got to go. By the way, I don't think there's any point in your going back there."

“I thought I'd go to the Christmas Party on Friday night. Maybe someone will drink too much eggnog, break down, and confess."

“That would make life easier, but I doubt it. Still, going to the party is a good idea. Get your husband to go with you. No wandering around those halls in the dark.”

She remembered to tell him her theory about why Leandra might have been pushed, then they said good-bye and she hung up the phone with a slight feeling of annoyance. All these big—and in Dunne's six-foot-seven case, very big—overprotective males. She knew their attitude was supposed to make her feel cared for and cherished, but they wouldn't talk to Murphy Brown that way.

Ben was singing the Winnie-the-Pooh theme song over and over to himself and threading the spools. The capacity for endless repetition that children this age had always amazed Faith. Ben only knew the words "Winnie-the-Pooh," and it was beginning to sound like a mantra. She sat down next to him with her notebook. So far it didn't have anything written in it. She gave Ben a kiss on the top of his head, and he interrupted his tune to smile radiantly up at her. Maybe another child wasn't such a bad idea.

Time to play What Do We Know? she told herself—the "we" being Dunne and Fairchild, which sounded like something that ought to go public and make a bundle on the stock market.

She wrote "Edsel Russell" on the top of the first page and listed the following notes: "Thirty years old. Born in Aleford, left as teenager. Good-looking. Liked women. Liked kinky sex. Dealt drugs. Not a user. Blackmailer.”

Then she wrote: "Motives, Means, and Opportunity." It looked serious. She paused. She knew for certain that he was blackmailing Merwin Rhodes and Bootsie Brennan. He might have been planning to blackmail Denise, as well as sell her drugs. He'd tried to blackmail Julia. He'd blackmailed Jim Keiller, but Jim was dead and in no position to commit murder. Julia was out because she knew Faith was in the guest room. Merwin Rhodes was probably out for the same reason, but Leandra might not have told him. Bootsie was unlikely because of the weather. The same for Denise. Anyway, John Dunne said they hadn't turned up any tire tracks or footprints outside in the snow. She started to jot this all down. Somehow she couldn't envision any of these people tying Eddie up and then decorating his chest with knives. There was also the strong possibility that someone else at Hubbard House was being blackmailed.

Dunne had let her see a list of who was there that night. A few residents had gone away early for the holidays, but virtually everyone else was on the premises. Even Mrs. Pendergast. She had the strength. Faith had watched her knead dough, and the muscles on her upper arms stood out like brand-new tennis balls. But Mrs. Pendergast!

Then there were the Hubbards. They were all there, yet it seemed unlikely they would deal with their employee problems in quite this manner. She suddenly remembered the way Donald had looked at Eddie at the Holly Ball. There was no doubt he was jealous. Could Eddie have been waiting for Charmaine and gotten Donald instead? Who else? Sylvia Vale would do anything for Roland Hubbard and Hubbard House. If she knew what Eddie was up to, would she have resorted to murder to get him to stop?

She scribbled away, stopping to tie Ben's loops of spools. He insisted she put one on. She got him some cookies and milk, a shameless bribe to leave her alone for a while longer.

At the top of the next page she wrote "Leandra." She was sure whoever had pushed her had wanted something in her purse. John Dunne hadn't ridiculed the idea either when she'd mentioned it to him on the phone. But what? It wouldhave had to be something small enough to fit in Leandra's bag, which was big, but not more so than a breadbox. The bag wouldn't have held a three-volume novel or a baby, for example—however Ernest and important. The classic item would be incriminating letters, but she didn't think those were the kinds of things kleptomaniacs took, although she was by no means expert on this point. She made a note to ask Tom what he knew about the subject and then consult the Ale-ford library.

She turned a page and wrote "Charmaine." Dunne continued to be almost positive she had staged the attack on herself. That meant she was trying to divert suspicion away from herself, which revived the theory that Eddie was lying in state waiting for her. But what had she told Donald? Going out for some fun on a snowy evening, darling, don't wait up? She made another note reminding herself to find out if Donald's room had a bath attached or if an occupant would have to leave for his or her ablutions.

She leaned back in the chair and pulled Benjamin onto her lap. He had looped all the rest of the spool necklaces around his own neck. "Ben's a beautiful Christmas tree!" he chortled.

“You're my little tree," Faith said, and hugged him, mindful of the disparity of her actions and thoughts. While her arms twined around her adored son, all she could think of was whether Dunne had been able to trace the knives yet. She'd forgotten to ask him. She also wanted to know if they'd determined whether Eddie had been tied up before or after death. If after, it could have been an attempt to make it look like a woman did it—Eddie didn't seem to be the type to let a man tie him up for fun and games.

Ben struggled to get down, and as she got up to follow him, she was uncomfortably certain that she was a lot closer to the why of Eddie Russell's murder than the who.

Just before she started to put together the risotto coi funghi they were having with broiled bluefish for dinner, she called Millicent Revere McKinley. Millicent would know whatever there was to know about James Hubbard, and Faith was trying to fit him into the puzzle. So far there didn't seem to be a place for his piece.

Ben was watching "Sesame Street," which providentially popped up on the screen at all hours of the day, and Faith dialed the number, confident that she had a way to make Millicent talk.

“Hello, Millicent? This is Faith Fairchild."

“Oh?" Millicent managed to convey serious doubt with the interjection—as if perhaps it were someone pretending to be Faith Fairchild, God only knew for what reason.

“Yes," Faith declared emphatically. "I wanted to ask you something, and I also happened to remember you had asked me for my grandmother's recipe for the sherry nutmeg cake you enjoyed so much at our house.”

Enjoyed so much that she had devoured three large pieces. Faith had a sneaking suspicion that Millicent, bearer of the local WÇTU torch, had a weakness for any potent potable confections.

She'd also tossed back several helpings of a soufflé Grand Marnier at a Sunday dinner once.

“Of course, I'd love to have the recipe. So handy for the holidays." Millicent appeared to be weighing the question. She knew this wasn't a case of altruism but your basic tit for tat. Faith had politely but firmly told her the recipe was a closely guarded family secret when she had asked for it. This was partially true. It had been a family secret until one of Faith's cousins had submitted it to a contest in Family Circle magazine and, as third runner-up (twenty-five dollars), had it printed in the December issue a few years before. But with Millicent it always paid to have something in the arsenal, and Faith knew a good weapon when she saw it. Now the time had come to use it.

She brought out the Howitzer. "I'll be baking several later this week, and if you're pressed for time as we all are about now, I could make an extra one for you and tuck the recipe in with it.”

Millicent fell. "That would be lovely, dear. So thoughtful of you. Now what were you saying about a question?" There wasn't even the suggestion of a quaver in her voice. Millicent was indomitable even in defeat.

“When we were talking about the Hubbards the other day, you mentioned Donald and Muriel. I wondered if you had known James, the youngest?"

“Is this in connection with that shocking Eddie Russell business—in which I hear, incidentally, you've been rather intimately involved?" Faith had expected Millicent would make a comment like this. She had no doubt that Millicent blamed her for the whole thing, casting the shadow of scandal on such a noble edifice.

“It might be, yes. But I merely wanted to know a bit more about James Hubbard. f you know, that is.”

Millicent knew.

“It almost broke poor Roland Hubbard's heart when James ran away. He was only sixteen. He'd been a worry to his father for years. Couldn't seem to settle down like the other two. Always skipping school to go fishing or whatever. Maybe if his mother had lived, things would have been different. He was a sweet boy, never rude. But he just wouldn't listen to anyone."

“Where did he go?"

“I believe he went south someplace, Florida. The family never talked about him, of course, but every once in a while some friend would get a postcard from him, and then we'd know where he was and what he was doing.”

Faith could imagine. She knew from Tom that Hattie Johnston, the former postmistress, who had retired the year before Faith had arrived in Aleford, had had her own rules when it came to the U.S. mail. A postcard was public information and people who wrote them knew they would be read; otherwise they'd write a letter, which was sacrosanct.

“What was he doing? Did he stay in Florida?"

“I don't think I ever heard for sure what he was doing there—at first something with show business, I think. In later years he managed to get some training, and he worked as an aide in various hospitals. Mostly out west and in the south,but I did hear that he had come back to Massachusetts about two years ago."

“Anything else you can think of?"

“I asked Donald how James was when I heard he'd come back, but Donald said they knew nothing about it and that if James wanted to see them, he knew where to find them. I don't think any of them have been in touch since he went away originally. Roland felt it was up to James to make the first move.”

Millicent apparently thought she had given good value, and the tone of her voice changed slightly. "Would I be able to count on the cake for some friends I'm having for tea on Friday?" She didn't issue an invitation.

“Absolutely," Faith answered. "And thank you for all your help."

“Anytime, Faith dear. Now I must be going. Good-bye.”

Faith said good-bye and replaced the receiver. Anytime, ha. Unless Millicent wanted to start whipping up soufflés, in the future it would be back to groveling on the carpet if Faith wanted any information.

As she drove into Boston the next morning, Faith had a slight twinge of guilt over not having revealed James Hubbard's whereabouts to John Dunne yesterday. But it disappeared immediately as she turned up the volume on the radio and swiftly flicked through several oldies stations—New Englanders seemed particularly partial to them, and when she drove up from New York, she didn't have to look at the signs to know she had crossed the border. Whatever station she was tuned to immediately began to play "Time in a Bottle." Now she located WGBH, the PBS station, and Robert J. Lurtsema's plummy tones filled the air. He was giving a weather report and it sounded like Shakespeare.

Miraculously she found a parking space on Cambridge Street, walked up to Anderson, and started climbing the hill. She had no trouble finding the Winthrop Chambers. It was an old hotel that had been converted to a rooming house. There was a wreath on the door. Someone had stuck a Celtics pennant in it. She walked into the lobby. It didn't look like Hubbard House. There were two ancient Naugahyde club chairs and a scarred coffee table heaped with overflowing ash trays, old newspapers, and magazines. The windows were so dirty that it was difficult to see outside. No one appeared to be around, and just when she was wondering if she'd have to go buy a clipboard and knock on doors pretending to be doing a survey on wash-day detergent preferences, a door behind the desk opened and a man came out.

“Looking for somebody?"

“Yes. Is James Hubbard here?"

“You the same person who called yesterday?”

“Yes, I am."

“He said to tell you he'd be in the market.”

“The market?"

“Yeah, he's selling Christmas trees down by Faneuil Hall. He said he'd be looking for you.”

“Thank you very much.""No problem. Merry Christmas.”

Faith walked over the hill to the Faneuil Hall Marketplace—the old Haymarket. There had been a market in this spot for three hundred years. The long stone warehouses stretching toward the waterfront, once occupied by meat and dairy wholesalers with names like Capone and Sullivan, were now filled with stores like The Sharper Image, Ann Taylor, The Gap, and small boutiques selling things in the shape of hearts, stuffed animals, and every possible kind of earring yet devised. The food vendors offered a vast variety of comestibles—pizza by the slice, fruit kebobs, egg rolls, oysters and clams on the half shell. There were still pushcarts, a quaint reminder of the old days, but instead of the strident cries of "Open 'em up! Open 'em up! Best beans in the market! Best in Boston!" that had echoed in the streets, most of these carts were indoors and sold whimsical rubber stamps and tchotchkies made of dough.

It wasn't as hard to find James as she had feared. There were only three men selling trees in the square in front of a large glass-enclosed florist's shop. Two of them appeared to be in their nineties and were probably in their sixties. The one who looked like sixty would have to be James, aged thirty. The five-year-old in the sailor suit sitting on the steps at Hubbard House was now wearing two tattered coats one on top of the other, ancient running shoes, unlaced but not, Faith suspected, as a fashion statement, and a wool cap pulled low over his forehead. James had seen a lot of hard times.

She walked over to him. "James Hubbard? My name is Faith Fairchild. I live in Aleford and I've been doing some volunteer work at Hubbard House. Do you have some time to talk to me?”

James looked at her blearily. Faith was uncomfortable. The contrast between the two of them was enormous and even obscene—she was wearing a warm, clean, Thinsulate-lined coat. Her boots matched her purse and she had on a bright, spanking-new blue wool hat and muffler. She exuded the smell of Guerlain's Mitsouko, which she'd sprayed on after her shower that morning. He gave off a ripe aroma composed of cigarette smoke, the rancid grease of fast food, rum, and his own unwashed body. She wouldn't be surprised if he asked her with words or a look, "Who the hell do you think you are, lady?”

Instead he said, "Hubbard House? You're working at Hubbard House? Wouldn't do that if I were you. Place is dangerous." His speech was slurred. He looked over her shoulder as if expecting to see someone else with her. "You came alone? She didn't come?"

“I'm alone, yes," Faith answered, "Who were you waiting for?"

“Never mind," he said. "So what do you want with me?" He didn't say this in a belligerent tone, merely one of curiosity, even idle curiosity.

“I wanted to talk to you about Eddie Russell."

“Eddie? Good old Eddie. Got me away from the place. We joined the circus." He laughed, and the laughter ended in a fit of coughing. He reached into a pocket and took out a pack of cigarettes. Helit one. He didn't have any gloves on, and his hands were so chapped they were bleeding. "The circus?" Faith asked.

“Yeah, we were kids. The circus came to Lowell and we went up to see it. Stayed around and ended up going along. The old man was pretty p.o.'d. Said if I didn't come home, he wouldn't have anything more to do with me. That was okay. Eddie moved on, but I stayed with the circus a long time. Nice people. Nice places. Warm places. Not like friggin' Boston."

“So you never saw Eddie again."

“Why are you so interested in Eddie? You got a thing for him?”

Faith realized James didn't know Eddie was dead.

“No, I'm married—happily. I'm just interested, that's all." She hoped James' alcoholic stupor was thick enough to make this less-than-satisfactory explanation seem plausible.

“Yeah, well Eddie and I are buddies. We go way back. Joined the circus together, did I tell you that?"

“Yes, you did. Have you had any good times together lately?”

It was time to try to move James toward the present.

He looked at her cagily. "Why don't you bring Eddie down here and we can all talk.”

Faith thought quickly. Standing in the cold trying to parry his questions was not going to get her anywhere. Knowing that James had run off with Eddie and remembering that Millicent had said James had returned to Massachusetts two years ago, which was when Eddie had also come back, convinced her that James and Eddie had been buddies who stayed in touch. James had worked in hospitals, moving around. Had he been Eddie's inside man—supplying whatever the customers wanted? She decided to try to get James to go someplace warm for a cup of coffee. Maybe he'd talk more and let something slip.

“It's terribly cold here," she said. "Could you take a break and have a cup of coffee with me?" There was a place called The Bell in Hand across the street and down the block.

He smiled. He must have been good-looking at one time, but now several teeth were missing and his blue eyes were so bloodshot, they looked purple.

“Never turn down a free cup of coffee, especially from a beautiful lady. But I gotta stay here a while. Come back in a half hour. I can go then.”

Faith spent the next thirty minutes wandering around the marketplace. She bought a pound of the chewy black and red raspberry candies Tom liked so much and went back to the stand where they were selling trees. James was in virtually the same position as when she'd left. She wondered if he was doing any business.

He saw her approach and called to one of the other men, "Hey, Billy, keep my place, will ya? I'm going to get some coffee."

“Bring me a cuppa?"

“Sure," said James, and he followed Faith to the curb. The traffic was brutal as usual, and as theywaited for a break, James unaccountably started talking again.

“Thought you were Muriel when you first came. Best sister a man ever had. Like a mother. Never had a mother, did you know that? I mean I had one, but she croaked."

“I'm sorry. That must have been very hard."

“I don't even remember her. Muriel does. Muriel tells me about her.”

But Muriel hadn't told him about Eddie Russell. Or maybe that was what she had been calling about.

“Do you see your brother Donald often?”

James started to laugh, then his eyes filled with tears, "Dumb bastard. Wouldn't even write to me. Told Muriel I had to come apologize to Dad. Dad! He's a looney and that's his nuthouse out there. They don't know. I stay away. I'm not crazy.”

He reached out to grab Faith's arm to pull her across the street and darted into the break between cars. He missed her arm but kept on going. She started to follow, then saw a shiny new black Cadillac Seville bearing down on them with no intention of slowing down.

“James!" she screamed, drawing back. "Stop! There's a car coming!”

He turned and waved at her to come, giving her a lopsided smile.

The car hit him head on. The driver didn't even stop to look.

Nine

Faith dashed after the car to get the number from its license plate. She had been stunned when she had first arrived in Boston by the aggressiveness of its drivers and the apparent total lack of logic in its street signs, but this accident went far beyond a rude gesture. Or it was no accident.

The plate was obscured by layers of dirt, but she thought one number was an eight and another a two. It was a Massachusetts plate. She ran back to James. He wasn't moving. A few bystanders had gathered around him, and one was directing the traffic into a side street. Someone said a woman had gone for the police. Faith bent down close to him. There wasn't any blood that Faith could see. He'd been thrown almost to theother side of thestreet and was lying on his back; one arm was twisted underneath. She took off her coat and put it over him.

“James," she said, "James, it's going to be all right. Help is coming.”

She had no idea whether he could hear her. He opened his eyes and stared at her.

“Stan," he slurred.

“No, no, don't try to stand up. Just stay still. An ambulance will be here soon." She could hear the wail above the Christmas carols on the loudspeakers outside the market. She knelt down next to him. He looked very young; his eyes were pleading with her.

“Stan," he repeated, then seemed to make a colossal effort. "Stanley.”

It was a name. One of the men who had been with him selling trees? Billy was approaching, and Faith stood up and called to him, "Could you get Stanley? Is that the other man's name?”

He came closer. "That's Patrick. No Stanleys around." He crouched down over James and said tenderly, "Hey, pal, hang on. What do you want? Some of this?" He reached into his pocket and took out a bottle. James closed his eyes. The loudspeaker began to blare "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.”

A police officer was pushing his way through what had now become a crowd.

“Clear the way here. Stand back." He bent down over James' supine figure. His back was to the crowd. He turned and asked over his shoulder, "Anybody see what happened?”

Faith stepped forward. "Yes, I did. He was hit by a car—a black Cadillac Seville, fairly new I'd say. It had Massachusetts plates and I think two of the numbers were eight and two. It was coming from there"—she pointed back toward Government Center—"and it never slowed down. It went toward the waterfront down North Street.”

The ambulance had arrived, and suddenly there was activity everywhere. The policeman stood up and walked over to Faith. "You happen to know who he is?" There was no reason not to tell. "Yes, his name is James Hubbard. He was living at the Winthrop Chambers on Anderson Street. His family lives in Byford. His father, Dr. Roland Hubbard, is the director of Hubbard House, a retirement home there.”

The cop looked at her quizzically. "He a good friend of yours?" His inflection indicated his incredulity.

Faith was freezing. Her coat was being loaded along with James into the ambulance. She was in no mood to stand on the street corner chatting with one of Boston's finest about her taste in friends.

“I know the family. Look, can I give you my name and how to reach me? I really have to get home to pick up my little boy."

“Okay." He took out a pad. "We'll be in touch with you, and you'll have to come back and sign a statement. You've been a big help," he added. "Lots of people don't want to get involved in things like this.”

Well, she was involved, Faith thought. Involvedright up to her ice-cold neck. She took the card with his name and number and ran back toward Cambridge Street. Not only did she have to pick up Ben or have him suffer that worst of all fates, being the last child waiting for his mother, but her meter was about to run out. When she got to the car, she looked at her watch and shoved another quarter in, then went down the street. There was a phone by the curb, but she pushed open the door of a bar, The Harvard Gardens, in search of one with some warmth. She had to call John Dunne immediately.

“Stanley," James had said. "Stanley," and there was only one Stanley in this case, or rather two—senior and junior, but she was putting her money on Stanley Russell Senior. The bad husband with "flash," Dr. Hubbard had said. Her mind raced. It all fit together neatly. Eddie didn't have the brains for something big—witness his little blackmailing schemes and general gaucheness. No, somebody else was directing the drug business—overseeing the hospital thefts, the street sales, and—if someone began to look like a liability—arranging "accidents." But would he kill his own son? And why? Faith could imagine that James' obvious addiction was creating problems. He probably talked too much and was certainly eating into profits, if he was still employed by Stanley at all. When Faith had walked in on Muriel, she was saying "You've got to go—" Where? To the police? To get help?

By the time Faith found the phone through the hazy smoke in the bar, she was sure that Stanley Russell had tried to kill James, or have him killed.

What connection it had with what had been happening at Hubbard House she wasn't sure, yet there had to be one.

Surprisingly, Dunne picked up his own phone. She told him briefly what had happened.

“What's the name of the cop who took the information?" She gave it and the number to him.

“I was on my way to Hubbard House when you called. Turned up some interesting stuff, and I wanted to ask some people a few questions. Now we've got some more to ask. Want to meet me there? The police probably already called them, but you might want to tell them what happened in more detail, and I'd like to be there when you do. By the way, Faith, just to be sure. The car was definitely aiming for James Hubbard, right? It wasn't by any chance trying for you?”

Faith was stunned. "Of course not. Who would want to kill me?"

“Simply a thought. So you want to meet me in Byford, say in half an hour?"

“Yes," Faith agreed readily, dismissing the choice of targets from her mind. It merely muddied the waters. What this case definitely did not need was more options. Especially now when it seemed everything was coming to a head, and she had no intention of being left out, if that was what John was suggesting. This Safety First attitude was a bore.

Of course, she was gone for that half hour. James could have called someone. But whom? And why?

She hung up the phone and dug into her pursefor more change. Please, Pix, she prayed, be home. God was good and she was.

“Pix, something important has come up and I have to meet Detective Lieutenant Dunne at Hubbard House. Could you pick Ben up from school and hold on to him until I get home?"

“Sure, but he'll have to come with me while the Evergreens finish decorating Peabody House for the Christmas tea tomorrow."

“Won't he be in the way?" asked Faith, picturing Ben festooning himself with tree lights and ornaments under the eyes of the garden club members and the Peabody House residents.

“Of course he'll be in the way, but you know how much the people there love to see children. I'll manage. Now go off to whatever you and Dunne are up to and happy hunting.”

In another life she must have done something especially wonderful to end up in this one with a friend and neighbor like Pix, Faith thought. If the Millers ever moved, she'd have to go too.

No one in the bar had looked up when she had come in and no one looked up as she left. Out on the street it was as cold as a witch's—she paused mentally; she was a minister's wife after all—finger, and she hugged herself to keep warm as she sped to the car and its heater.

It didn't take long to get to Byford, and she was there before Dunne.

She waited in the parking lot and thought about the case. She'd been right. James Hubbard was the key. He must know all about both Russells' operations. f it hadn't been so obvious that he didn't know Eddie was dead—and was also clearly unable to negotiate a trip to Byford even in good weather—she might have put him on the list of possible murder suspects. She'd decided to add Stanley Russell Senior. He might not have had much paternal feeling for a son he hadn't watched grow up, especially if that son was starting to cut into his profits or threaten him with blackmail. Eddie was certainly dumb enough to do that. Wasn't that what Scott Phelan had pointed out—that he was stupid enough to get himself killed? If Stanley himself hadn't wielded the knives, someone in his employ might have. But the timing and locale didn't make any sense. Why not just wait for him to try to cross the street in Boston? Under ordinary circumstances, the car would have been long gone before anyone had tried to get the number. It was Stanley Russell's very unlucky day that Faith was there watching.

She thought some more about James. He knew about the Russells. What else did he know about Hubbard House? Maybe Dunne would be able to question him today. And where was the lieutenant anyway? She looked at her watch. She wanted to know what he knew and was willing to trade information. She looked in her rearview mirror, saw his car pull up, and stepped out to meet him.

He looked at her outfit—a black wool jersey DKNY skirt and top—chic, but chilly. "Where's your coat?" he asked.

“Gave it to James. Have you heard how he is?”

“Yes. He's dead, Faith. I'm sorry.”

Faith began to shiver even more. The little boyin the picture was dead. The man she had been talking to only an hour ago, the man who was looking forward to a hot cup of coffee, was dead.

“Do you think the Hubbards know?"

“Not yet. I asked Boston to hold off. But the family does know he was hit, and Roland Hubbard went in to the hospital. Muriel and Donald are here keeping everything going. Charmaine's here too, probably getting in the way.”

Faith thought of Dr. Hubbard, driving in to see the son he hadn't seen for sixteen years. What was he thinking? And when he arrived, it would be too late. Too late to say anything, or hear anything. It was heartbreaking.

“You were right, incidentally. Stanley Russell does drive a Cadillac, plate number MBA 802, although at the moment he says he wasn't driving it today.”

They entered through the front door of Nathaniel's house. Sylvia Vale was outside the office. She had been crying. She didn't seem surprised that Faith was there.

“I'll tell Muriel and Donald you're here," she said, and disappeared into the office.

“You haven't told me your news. What was so interesting that you had to come here to ask more questions?" Faith realized she'd gotten sidetracked by James' death and what she was sure was the involvement of Stanley Russell.

Dunne looked down at her and with a trace of smugness said, "We traced the knives.”

Traced the knives! That meant they had the murderer!

* * *

Donald and Muriel arrived together. Charmaine was a few steps behind. They looked as if a tiny spark would send them flying to kingdom come.

“Is there someplace private where we could go to talk?" Dunne asked.

“How about my office?" Donald was clearly trying to speak in a nonchalant tone, as if Dunne and Faith were coming to consult him about hangnails or persistent dandruff, but the words came out in four terse bullets.

They followed him through the annex hallway into the other house. Muriel was behind them and Charmaine was lagging far to the rear. Faith thought they might lose her before they reached their destination, but at one point John Dunne whirled around—thereby creating a small vortex—and swept her up to the rest of them with his firm eye.

Donald reached in his pocket, took out his keys, and opened the door. Faith stepped inside and was mildly shocked. Donald was evidently a devotee of the Bauhaus as opposed to the Adam school, the period to which the house belonged. He had retained the cherry wainscoting, as well as the long windows with their hand-blown glass panes that offered wavy views of the front lawn. Everything else was a minimalistic compilation of chrome, leather, black, white, or glass. The single note of color was a huge abstract portrait of Charmaine, in the style of Soutine, which hung in solitary splendor on one wall.

Donald automatically went to the other side of his desk and sat down. Faith took the chair in front. Dunne brought two chairs from the rear of the room and placed them next to Faith's for Muriel and Charmaine; then he went over to the wall and leaned against it next to Charmaine's portrait, where he could see them all.

Faith knew she was supposed to wait for Dunne to start, but he appeared to be in no rush, and it was all she could do to keep from saying something. She looked at Donald, Muriel, and Charmaine. Only Muriel was not visibly tense. Charmaine was chewing her thumbnail. Donald was tapping the top of his desk with a pencil. But Muriel—Muriel seemed to have gone someplace else. Her eyes weren't focused on the room or anyone in it. She sat absolutely still.

Dunne spoke in a deceptively mild manner. "When did you last see Stanley Russell, Charmaine?”

So he was starting there.

She lost the color in her face, which highlighted the artificiality of her blusher and foundation. She looked as garish as a hooker.

“I don't know anyone by that name," she answered defiantly.

“He knows you.”

She looked startled.

“I may have met him once in Florida with Eddie. I think Eddie said Stanley was his father's name, so that may have been who the gentleman was." Charmaine had dropped her southern accent and was trying Katherine Hepburn. Dunne wasn't buying it.

Donald was staring at her. It was hard to read his face—resignation, disappointment, fury. Muriel had turned her gaze to the windows. She wasn't even there.

“I believe you have seen him since then. Seen him in Boston both with and without his son present. Is this true?”

Donald spoke up. "My wife doesn't have to answer these questions without a lawyer present.”

Dunne nodded. "That's true. I merely thought she'd like to help us out here. Two people are dead and another in the hospital barely hanging on."

“Two!" Charmaine looked wildly about the room, as if expecting more bodies to materialize—or someone gunning for her.

The door did burst open, startling the rest of them. Francis Coffin doddered in, followed closely by several of his men.

“Have I missed it?" he shouted, then pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and waved it wildly.

He walked into the middle of the room and faced the desk. "Donald Whittemore Hubbard, I have a warrant for your arrest for the murder of Edsel Russell on December sixteenth. You have the right to ...”

John Dunne heaved a sigh, straightened up, and walked toward Donald, who appeared to have been turned to stone. It hadn't exactly gone according to plan, but it was too late now. Dunne placed his hands on the pristine surface of the glass-topped desk and leaned forward.

“We found out who bought thé knives, Donald.”

Donald's face crumpled. Charmaine started shrieking. Muriel stood up, went over to her sister-in-law, and slapped her across the face. Charmaine shut up instantly. Then Muriel sat down again in the same pose. The room was quiet. She reached up and fingered one of the earrings she was wearing. They had been hidden by her hair, and Faith noted how incongruous they looked with the rest of Muriel's prim outfit and indeed with Muriel's face dangling gold peacocks with tiers that moved provocatively as Muriel turned to Dunne and said in a level voice, "Put the warrant away. Donald didn't kill Eddie. I did.”

Sun streamed in through Faith's living room windows on Thursday morning. There had been a light snowfall during the night, and outside everything looked deep and crisp and even. John Dunne was sitting next to the Christmas tree with a cup of coffee and a huge cinammon roll, one of a dozen he'd brought with him in a large sticky sack. Tom had left reluctantly to keep an appointment. Faith had kept him up half the night with the story of Muriel's confession, but there were still some holes that only Dunne could fill in. Tom's last words had been "Take notes if necessary. I don't want to miss a thing. Promise?" Faith had promised. It was nice to have a husband who shared one's interests. Ben was in front of the TV with the sound turned low watching Big Bird wait on his roof to make sure Santa would be able to fit down the chimney. Faith hoped it wouldn't give Ben any ideas.

“Sure you won't join me?" John cajoled. "Best bakery I know around here, almost as good as the one on the Grand Concourse my mother used to go to when I was a kid.”

Faith shook her head. Maybe she'd have one later to keep him company, but now all she wanted was information, not sugar-covered fingers.

“Will you ever forget the look on Coffin's face? I thought he was going to pass out of the picture for good right there," Dunne said appreciatively.

To say that Francis Coffin had looked dazed and confused was an understatement akin to saying the Minotaur's labyrinth was tricky. Francis seemed to stop breathing for a moment, then shook his head. "No, sweetheart. It's your brother ...”

Muriel was annoyed. "I killed him. Tied him up. Two knives, one to his chest, one to his windpipe. Now leave Donald alone.”

Donald made a grab for his senses. "Muriel, what are you saying? Neither of us had anything to do with this. It's a ghastly mistake. They were my knives, but I have no idea how they got there.”

Muriel stood up and stared at Donald. "Et tu?" her expression said. "Donald, I killed Eddie. There's no mistake." And no mistaking the ring of pride in her voice.

“I'm calling a lawyer, Muriel. Sit down and don't say a word." Donald reached for his phone, "insanity defense" written all over his face.

She watched him dial. "Tell Mr. Horton to meet us at the police station. I assume that's where we're going? Unless you'd like me to tell youabout it here? It's certainly bound to be more comfortable." Her calm was staggering.

“Why not here?" Faith said, her one and only contribution to the events of the afternoon.

“Why not?" Dunne agreed, and read her her rights.

Muriel nodded in acknowledgment. "Then tell Mr. Horton to come here, Donald, although I don't know why he's bothering.”

She hadn't waited for the lawyer's arrival, despite her brother's adjurations. Muriel wanted to tell her story, and she wanted to tell it right away.

“Eddie and I were lovers. We have been since he came here." Muriel flung a scornful look at Charmaine. "This may surprise you. We were going to be married. He never cared anything for you. He was just flirting, so no one would suspect about us." Charmaine appeared dumbfounded, then started to say something, caught Donald's eye, and thought better of it. Muriel continued. There was no stopping her.

“We used to go to his apartment, but we liked the guest room too. The bed was so big." She smiled dreamily. "When he told me we had to stop seeing each other, that he was going away, I knew he'd meet me one last time. I was good, he said. The best he'd ever had.”

So it was love twisted into jealous hatred, Faith thought. As Muriel talked, she began to look almost pretty. What kind of a person uses a woman like Muriel? Eddie Russell—and Faith was pretty sure she knew why.

And so did Muriel. "You're all thinking I killed him because he was leaving me. As if I'd do something like that." She sounded genuinely indignant. "No, Eddie had to die because he was doing terrible things. James told me. He had done them to James. Started him on drugs. He stole my keys to the medications room and made copies. James told me. Eddie denied it, but I knew it was true." She was beginning to sound drugged hersef. Her voice assumed a flat tone, and the words blended into one another. "He was hurting Hubbard House. He was hurting all of us. He was hurting Daddy. I had to stop him from hurting more people. I had to stop him from destroying Hubbard House.”

No one heard the door open. Muriel had them mesmerized.

“I didn't know the knives would be missed. There were a lot of them—and so many other presents for your Scouts, Donald. And how else could I have done it?”

A voice called from the doorway, "Be quiet, daughter. That's enough.”

They all turned to see Roland Hubbard filling the doorway. He looked like something out of William Blake's Prophetic Books—larger than life, if not of some other world.

Muriel fell sobbing hysterically to the ground. "I'm sorry, Daddy. I'm very, very sorry.”

He walked over, knelt down, and gently put his arms around her.

After a few minutes, Dunne spoke to Roland Hubbard and the three of them left the room. Everyone else left too after that, and the last words Faith heard as she got into her car, her eyes brimming with tears, were Francis Coffins:' "Do you mean to tell me his sister did it? That mouse? Come on!”

Faith decided to join John in a cinnamon roll.

“So what happened at headquarters? And what about Leandra? I can't imagine Muriel had anything to do with that. Although I had narrowed my choices down to Donald and/or Charmaine, I never suspected Muriel. It just shows how clothes can create an image."

“She's only being charged with the murder of Edsel Russell. Leandra Rhodes regained consciousness yesterday and the first thing she said to her husband was 'Somebody pushed me.' That was another thing I wanted to talk about with the gang at HH, before Francis screwed things up—or didn't. I can't make up my mind."

“How did he get the warrant?" This had been nagging at Faith since Francis Coffin had swooped into Donald's office.

“Another snafu. It wasn't ready when I left, so I arranged for someone to follow me, and he thought I was bringing Donald into the Byford police station for questioning. So of course when he appeared there with a warrant, Coffin was like a puppy seeing his first red meat and took off before anyone could check it out."

“Okay, that clears that up, but what about Leandra?"

“I think it probably was Muriel who gave her a shove. When she gave us her valuables at the sta- tion, she handed over a silver locket with a picture of the two of them inside, and maybe it's what Leandra had appropriated—something that linked Eddie and Muriel as more than faithful servant and gentle mistress. Muriel seems to be someone who has been tuning in and out with greater and greater frequency lately, and I'm betting that in one of her more lucid moments, she began to feel a little desperate about getting caught for the naughty thing she did. We'd talked to a lot of the Hubbard House people, and you were right—Mrs. Rhodes never leaves home, or anywhere else, without her bag. The only way for Muriel to get it would have been to snatch it."

“I'm so glad Leandra is going to be all right. She is, isn't she?" And, Faith thought, how typical that Leandra's first words should be right on the mark. No "Where am I? Who am I?" for her. Just straight to business.

“She's going to be in the hospital for a long time while those bones mend, but they think she'll be fine. However, unless Muriel confesses or Leandra remembers something more about her attacker—which I doubt, otherwise she would have said—that incident as a police matter is shelved."

“I know we're wandering all over the place and I want to know what else Muriel said, but do you think Charmaine thought Donald did it and that's why she staged the phony attack on herself?"

“More likely she thought we'd trace the knives and think she did it, but possibly the other. He is her husband, and she may have figured she wouldn't be invited to many A-list events if hubbywas doing life. She recognized the knives right away, as Donald must have. He's on the area Scout council and every year gives the local troops gifts of knives, compasses, fancy canteens, whatever. We didn't have any luck tracing the knives through the local Army-Navy stores, so we began to check the distributors—see if anyone we knew had ordered them by mail. Donald had placed a large order with Gutmann several weeks ago."

“Poor Muriel wasn't very smart about all this."

“Oh, she was. f it hadn't been for the knives, we wouldn't have had much to go on." He smiled and took another cinnamon roll. "Want to hear how she did it? It's pretty funny in a weird sort of way.”

Faith waited politely for him to finish the roll, which took several seconds.

“She went to the guest room stark naked under the robe she was wearing in case she bumped into anyone. He'd been asking her to get into a little bondage, and she hadn't wanted to, but this time she said she would—told him it was a bon-voyage gift. The cords were his. He had a lot of stuff like that in his room. To continue—she told us she went into the bathroom, to pee I guess, and saw your watch and toothbrush by the sink, so she knew she had to kill him and get out of there quickly. She was pretty annoyed about that. I think she blames you for her not getting one last good lay. Although of course at the time she didn't know it was your watch. Just figured it must be someone stranded by the weather. She didn't know where that someone was—and wouldn't she have been surprised—but she ran from the bathroom, threw her robe or whatever off so she wouldn't get blood on it, and stabbed him before he had a chance to think what hit him. Then she ran back to her room. She had taken a towel from your bathroom in case she needed it, but she didn't. None of the blood on the other towels matched Russell's, incidentally. Lot of unsteady shaving hands at Hubbard House. Anyway, she put the towel with the rest of hers in her own bathroom. She never got a drop of blood on her and didn't leave so much as a hair on him. She used those thin disposable rubber gloves, which she flushed down the john back in her room. Pretty good thinking and a whole lot of luck, all in all."

“And she knew exactly where to put the knives from her nurse's training. But why two? One for her wrongs and one for James'?"

“Nothing so poetic. The first one in the windpipe was to shut him up and the second was the insurance. She said she was pretty sure one would do it, but she was afraid to take a chance."

“Was her father there during the confession?"

“No, he waited outside. It was just the lawyer, Muriel, Sully—Detective Sullivan, that is—and me. Fortunately we managed to lose Coffin on the way.”

Faith felt very tired. "I'm going to make some more coffee. Want some?"

“No, much as I'd like it. I have to get back to the store. Somebody found a body in the woods near Ashby when they were looking for a Christmas tree to cut down.”

He went over to Ben, who was sufficiently in awe of Dunne to look away from "Sesame Street." Dunne patted him on the head. Faith hoped it would not stunt his growth. "Say hi to Santa for me, kiddo.”

At the door, he gave Faith a kind of hug. "Put it behind you now. It's over. It's sad as hell, but it's got nothing to do with you. Throw a log on the fire, make Tom some wassail, and be merry."

“I will," she promised. "It's just that it's been so involved and it seemed relatively simple at first." At first—Chat's call seemed months ago.

“You did a good job, Faith. All the bad guys are rounded up. You'll probably get some sort of citation from Boston for getting Stanley Russell's license plate number. They've been trying to nail him for years and now they've got him on vehicular homicide, hit-and-run, you name it. He must have been pretty desperate to shut Hubbard up to take a chance like that. Whether we'll ever establish any connection between him and our friend Charmaine I doubt. In any case, there'll be no more blackmailing of the elderly by any of them. Hubbard House is safe.”

She closed the door behind him. He was right. This was where Howard Perkins' initial suspicions had led, and she knew he would have been pleased that the place he had grown to love was battered and bruised, but not broken. Chat, who was arriving on Saturday, would be pleased too.

Everyone was pleased, so she should be pleased as well and she would be if only she didn't feel so terrible.

The show was over. She flicked off the set, grabbed Ben before he could protest, and tried not to feel guilty at how often she had been resorting to the electronic baby-sitter lately. "Time to make the gingerbread house, my little gumdrop.”

The Hubbard House Christmas party was held right on schedule. Faith had been fairly certain it wouldn't be canceled. She hadn't lived in New England for this long without learning a few of the mores, and one of the biggies was "On with the show, keep dancing even though the ship has struck an iceberg, and above all, don't let the sun catch you crying.”

She planned to stay for only a short time—nibble a cookie, drink some punch, then race home to watch Tom watch the Celtics. It was amazing how frequently they seemed to play. When she told him her plan, he approved, except for the racing part.

“It's getting cold out, and the roads may ice up. And—"

“I know, I know. No more snowbanks. No more bodies. Don't worry, darling. See you soon." - She left him happily ensconced in what they called the "comfy chair"—virtually the only one in a parsonage filled with an orthopedic army of straight-backed, hard-seated varieties bequeathed by Tom's predecessors. Ben was snuggled in Tom's lap and Faith was sorry she had to leave.

As she drove up the winding drive, the twohouses sparkled ahead—lighted from top to toe. Inside, someone had completed the decorations started earlier in the week. There was an enormous tree in the living room covered with gold balls, a few discreet strands of tinsel, and small white lights. A large silver bowl of holly sat on the mantel and more sprigs of holly were tucked on top of the pictures on the wall. Faith could hear the sounds of merriment from the dining room, left her coat in the closet, and hastened in. A fire was crackling in the large fieldstone fireplace at one end of the room, and Faith felt drawn by its warmth.

Mrs. Pendergast, resplendent in a long dress of royal purple velvet, was presiding over the punch bowl. Faith was relieved to see it wasn't eggnog. One cup a season was plenty and she always had that at the Millers', where Sam ladled out a robust version for all the neighbors on Christmas Day.

“Faith, I'm so glad you came. Have some claret cup? It's one of Dr. Hubbard's family recipes." She handed her a brimming cup.

“Thank you and Merry Christmas, Violet. Your dress is beautiful."

“I wear it every year and have only had to let it out three times. It's my favorite color. Now do you think Mother knew somehow and named me after it, or did I get to like it because of the name?”

It was one of those metaphysical questions Faith preferred to avoid.

“Probably both," she answered, and took a sip of punch. "It's delicious."

“Now I want you to go over to the buffet and try my cream puffs—Dream Puffs, I call them. Even if you don't eat anything else, have one of those. I know you young people are always on a diet." She eyed Faith's slender figure, not in her red Mizrahi tonight but in a Scott McClintock Little Women update—midnight-blue velvet bodice and puffed sleeves with a short, full taffeta skirt. Faith thought it was very regional and felt she ought to have had a fitted coat, tippet, and muff to match for the sleigh ride home.

She left Mrs. Pendergast, got a Dream Puff—there was no way to avoid it—and strolled over to the windows. The lights in the room had been dimmed and candles were everywhere. Winston's and Sylvia Vale had done beautiful things with white roses, red amaryllis, boxwood, more holly, and yards of gold and silver ribbon. Carols were playing softly. The whole effect was of a beautiful stage set. Faith expected the woman sitting on the window seat to turn and start singing "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" to Margaret O'Brien. The figure turned, but it was Julia Cabot, not Judy Garland, and she didn't sing but waved. Faith sat down next to her.

“Merry Christmas, Faith. Ellery will be down in a moment. He always has trouble with his studs and insisted I go ahead.”

Most of the men were in black tie, elegant, courtly, and like the women in the pretty once-ayear Christmas gowns, very well preserved.

“Merry Christmas, Julia." Faith paused. It was hard to know what to say next. Since she hadwalked into the room, she'd had an odd sensation that none of the events of the past week had occurred. That Eddie, Leandra, Muriel—and maybe even James, the prodigal, would come through the door and it all would have been a dream. Something to mention briefly in the golden glow of the room, so whoever you were speaking to could laugh incredulously at such a phantasm and make it disappear.

Julia didn't laugh. She spoke into the pause. "It seems so odd to be here like this, yet there isn't anything else to do but go on. This is what Roland wants—and all of us agree. He spoke to Ellery and told him what had happened and asked that he tell everyone else. Poor Muriel. I had no idea she was so unhappy.”

Faith hadn't considered things from this angle, but of course Muriel was unhappy. Living in such isolation. Easy pickings for someone like Eddie Russell.

Julia continued. "Some of us knew about James. I did, because Ellery mentioned once that there was another child. Roland lost two children on Wednesday. I don't know how he can bear it."

“Where is he tonight?"

“Sylvia said he would look in later for a few minutes. She was able to convince him it wasn't necessary for him to be here all the time. That people understood."

“I was glad to hear that Leandra is going to be all right."

“Yes, I saw her yesterday. She's demanding to come home, so I'd say she's mending fast. I think I'd like to be like her—or like her in that way—when I grow up."

“Me too," Faith agreed, and the two women laughed.

Faith recognized some of the Pink Ladies from the Holly Ball. Denise wouldn't be waltzing in tonight, but she was going to be all right. Tom had been to see her on Tuesday and she had called Faith just this morning. Joel was staying with Joan and Bill Winter, Denise's neighbors, and visited her every day. The thing she had feared most—that he would hate and reject her—had not happened, and they were both going into therapy. She told Faith it was going to be the happiest new year of her life.

Faith finished her Dream Puff, aware of Mrs. P.'s eagle eye from across the room. She saw Sylvia Vale and excused herself from Julia to say merry Christmas. A few minutes more, then she could leave.

As she crossed the room, something that looked like a Christmas package all wrapped up in shiny paper and ribbons swooped down upon her.

“Mrs. Fairchild! So glad you could come, and I do hope we can keep you on our roster of volunteers?" It was Bootsie.

“I am going to be busy starting my catering business again, but I would be happy to help out if you get stuck." Faith was beginn'ng to count the days until Mr. Dandy—not his real name, she suspected and hoped—of Yankee Doodle Kitchens left for Florida and she could hang her toque out.

“That's so kind of you." Bootsie lowered hervoice and slipped her arm through Faith's, drawing her to one side, and enveloping her in a slightly nauseating cloud of Beautiful. The woman must bathe in it, Faith thought. Like mother, like son.

“And I'd like to thank you and the reverend for being so good to my boy. He's been having a hard time lately. Girl trouble, I suspect, but then a mother's always the last to know." Faith was fairly certain this was true in Bootsie's case.

The woman was still talking, and suddenly Faith's ears opened wide and it was all she could do to stop herself from bursting into the Hallelujah Chorus. "I'm not supposed to mention anything until he's had a chance to talk to your husband, Tom. I hope I can call him that. I always think of him that way, since that's how Cyle speaks of him. Maybe Reverend Tom, but that sounds like one of those TV shows. But Cyle has begun to have doubts. I know you'll be as shocked as I was, though I did wonder in the beginning when he had been an economics major why he wanted to go into the ministry. He's going to take some time off and think about it all.”

Faith wanted to get this straight. The torrent of words, the perfume, and maybe the combination of Dream Puffs and claret cup were starting to make her feel sick. "Are you saying that Cyle is dropping out of divinity school?"

“Well, maybe not permanently, but for now, yes." Hosanna.

Faith pried herself loose from Bootsie and went to find Sylvia. She definitely had to go home, or lie down, or find a bathroom, or throw up. The only other time she ever remembered feeling like this was before Ben was born.

She stopped dead in her tracks and did some counting. My God, she thought, I'm pregnant! She had never had morning sickness, just night. Her joy was slightly clouded by the memory. Then she felt happy—what a Christmas present for Tomconflicted—what about the business?—strongI'll manage—and terrified. She looked for a chair, then decided she'd better go call Tom to come get her. It was early and he could pop Ben in the car. There was no way she could drive feeling like this.

She left the room, which was now filled with all the residents, volunteers, family, and friends. There was plenty of laughter, and couples were starting to dance.

Tom answered on the fourth ring. It must be a close game.

“Honey, I'm sorry to bother you, but do you think you could come and pick me up? I'm not feeling well. A bit mal de mer."

“Faith! Do you think this could be—"

“Possibly" His elation leaped over the wires, but the room was beginning to spin and she wanted him to come quickly. "In fact, more than possibly. We'll talk about it later. I'm going to go upstairs and lie down until you come. I'll come down in, what, about twenty minutes? No, thirty—you've got to get Ben into his snowsuit."

“Oh, darling, this is the best news. I can't believe it. I won't keep you. Go take care of yourselfand we'll be there as fast as we can. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

Faith hung up the phone and staggered to the elevator. She'd go into the annex and find an empty room. The guest room had lost whatever appeal it might have once had. First she got her coat. She seemed to be freezing.

Upstairs nothing was stirring, not even a mouse. She opened a door and peeked into the darkened room. Something white and filmy was silhouetted against the window. It was hovering over the bed.

Farley's ghost!

She started to back out of the door and run. The ghost stood up. It wasn't Christmas Past. It was Roland Hubbard.

Roland Hubbard in a turn-of-the-century nurse's uniform complete with wimple.

Ten

Dr. Hubbard raced to the door, grabbed Faith, pulled her into the room, and pushed her down in a chair by the window. He had a syringe in his hand and was clearly not indulging in just a little harmless cross dressing.

“What are you doing here, Mrs. Fairchild?" he hissed angrily.

“I was feeling a—"

“Shhh, we don't want to wake the patient.”

Faith lowered her voice to a whisper. It wasn't hard. "I was feeling a little sick and came up here to lie down, but I'll go to another room. I'm sorry I disturbed you.”

She attempted to get out of the chair. He pushed her back down and kept his hand flat against hersternum. It was hard to breathe, and she thought she might be sick.

“What to do? What to do?" he was muttering to himself. He looked over at the sleeping figure in the bed. "The angels will come another night, my dear Geoffrey.”

The first shock had worn off, but Faith was still having trouble believing what she was seeing—Dr. Roland Hubbard, eminent physician, dressed as a nurse and nuttier than the fruitcake Mrs. Pendergast was pressing on one and all downstairs. James had said Hubbard House was a nut house and James had been right. Only she would have preferred to verify this knowledge second, third, or tenth hand.

“Dr. Hubbard," she whispered in what she hoped was a reasonable tone, "please let me up. You're hurting me.”

The pressure on her chest lightened, yet he didn't remove his hand. He looked about the room and darted over to the sink for a towel. She jumped up, but he caught her before she could reach the door.

“Now, you must do exactly as I say," he scolded her. "I don't want to be forced to use this." He waved the syringe in her face and she could see it was full—full of something that would not be terribly good for her, and he should know. He was the doctor.

He was tying the towel as a gag around her mouth before she had a chance to say—or whisper—anything to warn him.

There was nothing she could do. She threw up.

Dream Puffs, claret cup, the angel hair pasta with shrimp she'd had for supper—all came forth, most of it in the sink where he rushed her immediately, but some on herself and the floor. The room instantly took on that horrible odor parents have nightmares about—the odor preceded by a certain cough and cries for help, galvanizing the most deeply asleep mother and father to instant action. Faith's own mother was miles away, but Dr. Hubbard was doing his best to substitute.

She'd assumed he would be infuriated, but he was almost tender. He handed her a glass of water to rinse her mouth, helped her off with her spattered coat, and gave her a fresh towel.

“Feeling better?”

She looked at him in astonishment. It was Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy come to life.

“Yes, thank you."

“Can't use a gag," he said to himsef—or one of them. "Come on, then. If you make a sound, I'll use this." He held up the syringe again. Faith nodded. She had no intention of joining the angels.

They moved out into the corridor after Dr. Hubbard had opened the door and looked cautiously up and down. Everything was dark.

He pushed her along past the elevator and opened a door leading to the second floor of the next house. She walked as slowly as she dared. When Tom arrived and didn't find her in the living room or at the party, he'd come upstairs to look. It was too soon to expect him, but the knowledge that he was on his way was keeping her from total terror. She considered telling Roland shemight be pregnant, but decided to keep this news in case she needed to make a last desperate plea. Total terror began to manifest itself at the thought, and she closed her eyes and took a breath. Tom. Tom would be here soon.

They were near the staircase. Pale streaks of the waning moon caught the pattern of the oriental carpet tread. The chandelier glowed softly, and Dr. Hubbard was guiding her with a sure hand.

Please, Faith prayed, not the guest room.

It wasn't. They descended the stairs.

It was going to be his office.

He opened the door and turned on the light, then reached into his pocket for his keys and locked the deadbolt at the top.

“Sit down," he said in his normal volume. It sounded so loud, Faith was sure someone must hear it.

He took a seat on the other side on the desk and appeared to be lost in thought. Finally he pulled his chair in and leaned forward, bringing the fingertips of both hands together. She was ready for the prognosis.

“Unfortunately, it is sometimes necessary in life to sacrifice the needs and well-being of one person for the greater good of the community. When it is a young person such as yourself, a decision like this assumes tragic proportions. But you do see that I have no choice.”

Faith didn't see at all.

“I'm not sure I understand what you're talking about, Dr. Hubbard. Or, in fact, what is going on here at all."

“Faith," he replied sorrowfully, "put simply, you know too much." He should have looked more absurd in his outfit, but the solemn surety in his voice overshadowed all else.

She tried to reassure him. "I don't know anything. You've been under a great strain, which explains the way you're dressed, but—"

“Do you have any idea how much it costs to keep Hubbard House going, young lady?”

She was more than willing to change the subject—only she wasn't sure this was what was happening. Still, so long as he was on one side of the desk and she on the other, she was safe from that booster shot lying conveniently close to his hand on the desk blotter.

“No, I don't."

“A great deal of money." So this wasn't going to be an itemized rundown of all it took to keep Hubbard House going: Q-tips, baked beans, vitamin C pills. Faith was a little disappointed.

“For years we have sought to keep afloat with our fees, private donations, a grant here and there, whatever the government can occasionally spare. It hasn't been easy."

“I'm sure not," Faith murmured. Where was Tom?

“Not easy at all. But no one is turned out, and we have not relaxed our standards. Not for a minute.”

Faith thought of the flowers from Winston's. Maybe a few less posies and a few more pennies saved?

“We have established a certain quality of life here, and I intend it to remain that way so long as I'm here. Although Donald, of course, feels as I do and will carry on after me.”

Faith nodded. She didn't feel sick anymore. Just scared. She was pretty sure where this line of thought was going.

“That's why I had to do it." He stood up, remembering to grab the syringe, and went over to his wife's portrait. "A wonderful woman. The best wife any man could have had. She would have agreed with me completely." He swung around and looked Faith squarely in the eye. "I had no choice, don't you see?"

“Absolutely, whatever you did I'm sure you thought was for the best."

“It was for the best. I only picked people who were very close to leaving us anyway. In a few instances they were individuals who had expressed a wish to be relieved of their sufferings. And months would go by when I didn't have to make any night visits at all. But this fall has been bad. Contributions down. Expenses up. Of course it's a hard time of year in any case, lots of flu, pneumonia. Nothing odd about a ninety-four-year-old dying peacefully in his sleep.

“Farley thought I was a ghost. He would insist on keeping his window open and then kicking his covers off. I always checked in on him." He gave an affectionate laugh and reached up to remove his cap and veil. He unbuttoned the uniform, and Faith was obscurely relieved to observe that he hadn't deemed it necessary to wear ladies' undergarments as well. He had his own shirt and trousers on underneath. "This was Mother's uni- form. In case someone did wake up before the morphine took effect, I wanted them to be comforted and not startled.”

Not startled! At the moment Faith could think of few things less startling than seeing Dr. Hubbard in Florence Nightingale drag with an empty syringe in hand bending over one's bed.

“It was a painless and rapid method, a simple overdose."

“These then were residents who had left bequests to Hubbard House?" She asked more to keep the conversational ball rolling than from any lack of certainty, since as long as the ball was in play, the game wasn't over. She hadn't watched all those basketball games for nothing.

“Not all of them, of course. That would have been foolhardy. I had to help some on as a little window dressing, so to speak. Though until poor Farley fell into your bouillon, we haven't had an autopsy here for years. It's not the sector of the population that calls for them, you know, especially these days. There's barely money in the state for homicide victims.”

Faith wasn't interested in the always-dismal state of the state's coffers. "Farley!" She was genuinely indignant. Then there had never been any question of its being her bouillon.

“Oh no, my dear. Completely natural, although the morphine would have been hard to detect if it had been me. No one would have been looking for it, you see. No, Farley was his own doing. Nothing to do with either you or me." , Faith rubbed her eyes. She was very tired, andsitting with a madman discussing which of them might have killed someone wasn't alleviating her weariness. She suddenly thought of Howard Perkins. The start of this whole business. Had he been visited by this angel of mercy killing too? She had to know—or she'd never be able to face Aunt Chat again. Oh, that she could face her now!

“What about Howard Perkins?"

“Howard Perkins? Did you know him? Charming man and with us for such a short time. He should have moved here years earlier. It's very difficult for me to understand why anyone would want to stay in New York, but then he would go on so about his beloved opera and the museums. What about him?"

“Did you—rather, was he ... ?" Faith searched for some polite equivalent to "murder him.”

Roland caught her meaning. "Oh no, he had a very bad heart. Besides, he was leaving everything to some woman in New Jersey, and I certainly wouldn't have used him as camouflage when he had joined us so recently." Dr. Hubbard sounded offended at the kind of thoughts Faith had been harboring.

Her lassitude increased. She was almost beginning to relax. Tom would arrive, find her, and the good doctor would join his daughter in a nicely furnished padded cell.

Then Roland's next words sent a megadose of adrenaline coursing through her veins and any notion of fatigue disappeared at once.

“But we stray and time is passing quickly. I must put in an appearance at our little party, and this could take a while. I really am so very, very sorry that I have to kill you.”

He went to the closet and put on his coat, then reached up on the shef and took a gun from an ancient Wright's Arch Preserver shoebox.

“It will be much nicer for you if you cooperate and I can see you out the normal way, but I'll bring this just in case.”

Normal? Just in case? Did words have meaning anymore?

Faith began to think rapidly. She had no idea where they were going, but it was obviously outside. How would he explain her lack of a coat? Once again she was going to freeze because of one of the Hubbards. But she had underestimated Roland.

“I'm going to give you one of my overcoats. You notice I say 'give' and not 'lend.' I don't expect that I will get it back. I'll explain that I gave it to you to wear home, since yours was soiled. This was after I came across you being ill in one of the rooms. You insisted you were fit enough to drive and I didn't like to quarrel with a lady. Of course, I should have insisted, but then you are so stubborn.”

He was rehearsing and Faith's mind was suddenly blank. He was going to kill her and there was nothing she could do about it. f she screamed, no one would hear her, and he would kill her "normally" or not, before she could expect help in any case. She looked at him as he courteously held his coat out for her. He was over six feet and fit as a fiddle. There 'vas no way she could overpower him.

“Best give me your keys now, my dear. I'll be driving at first.”

She took them out of her prized Judith Leiber bag, which still swung from her shoulder. It had been an engagement present from Hope, and Faith had followed suit and given her one also. Hope! The wedding! She had one more fitting for her matron of honor dress! It wasn't your whole life that flashed before you in terminal moments, but ludicrous and totally inappropriate bits and pieces.

Dr. Hubbard unlocked the door and was reaching for the knob when a knock came.

It was Tom. It had to be Tom. She was safe.

Hubbard opened the closet door and shoved her inside. The same closet she had ducked into a week earlier. The same closet she'd been able to duck out of. A key was pushed into the keyhole, obliterating the light from the room. She heard it turn with a disheartening click. She started to scream and pounded on the door with all her strength. Why wasn't Tom coming? What could be happening? It seemed like hours and her screams were getting hoarser and hoarser.

The door opened at last and she rushed straight into the arms of—Dr. Hubbard.

“Dear Sylvia. Worried about me and wanted me to know I was missed. It sounds like a lovely party, but I told her I wasn't quite up to it. Of course she understood." He looked at his watch. "I just might be able to get back for some of my claret cup if we hurry. My great-grandmother's recipe. I do hope you had some.”

Faith was sobbing.

“This closet was the strong room. Tinned on the inside, you know. And these doors are very solid.”

He opened the door to the hall, closed it firmly behind them, and poked the gun in her back. It was obviously the signal to start walking, and she did.

They started down the corridor toward the rear of the house. He walked, as he always did, with a measured tread, head erect. His long overcoat billowed out behind him like the robes of some crazed medieval king.

Near the stairs Faith turned to him and said beseechingly, "Dr. Hubbard, I am going to have a baby." She was crying so hard she could barely get the words out.

“Are you, my dear? Congratulations are in order! How unfortunate that it should come at a time like this.”

There was no hope whatsoever.

He steered her to an outside door that she remembered led to stairs going down to the parking lot. She stopped crying. This was time not for Niobe but for one of her relatives—Athena or Hera.

At the top of the stairs Faith silently kicked off the high heels she had been wearing. The cold from the icy ground shot painfully through her feet to her legs. She walked on tiptoes, so he wouldn't notice the sudden change in her height. It was excruciating.

“Mind your step here, it's treacherous. We certainly have had a cold winter, haven't we?”

Roland sounded as though he were escorting her to the prom and worried she might turn an ankle. Faith didn't reply. It was one thing for the murderer to be so civilized; she the victim didn't have to follow suit. And she'd be damned if talking about the weather would be her last act.

It wasn't.

At the bottom of the stairs she took off, sprinted a yard or two ahead of him, tore off the coat and threw it over his head—she was close enough to aim correctly, but far enough away so he couldn't grab her. Then she sped off away from the lampposts toward the darkest part of the shrubbery.

“Faith! Faith! Come back here! You can't get away from me!" He was enraged. The last words were clearer, and presumably he'd gotten out from under the coat, but Faith didn't turn around to look.

There was a series of paths and small terraces that sloped down from the parking lot alongside the steep front driveway. She headed for these and the direction of the main road. Going down the drive itself would give him a clear shot, and she had no doubt that he would use the gun now, no matter who saw or heard. He was beyond what ever reason he'd managed to retain.

“Faith!" he screamed at the top of his voice. He wasn't far away.

She left the path and ran closer to the drive near the mountainous rhododendron bushes, bordered by Canadian hemlocks. There was only one thing to do. She dove into the center of the largest clump and ducked down in the middle of the branches.

They were covered with snow and ice, and as she pushed through, they rattled like castanets. The sharp needles of the hemlocks cut into her face, bare forearms, and legs, but her whole body was so numb from the cold, she could scarely feel the pain.

“Faith!”

She held her breath as he came closer and closer. The branches were silent. He was only a few feet away. Thank God she had worn the dark-blue dress.

“You can't hide from me. I know you're in these bushes someplace.”

She let out the breath slowly and took another. She was in a tight fetal position and dared not try to make herself yet smaller. The slightest movement would start the branches clacking together.

“Be reasonable, Faith! It's cold out here. I've changed my mind. I'm not going to hurt you, dear." His voice, calm now and almost convincing, came from farther away. Then there was silence. All she could hear was the hideously loud beating of her own heart.

Then a sharp crack followed by a regular thwacking noise. Dr. Hubbard had broken off a branch and was beating the bushes.

Thwack! Thwack! It was coming closer. She shut her eyes and pictured him bringing the stick down on her head with all his manic force.

Thwack! Thwack! He took his time. He was thorough. She opened her eyes. She wanted to see him coming.

She started to edge cautiously out from underthe bush to one farther along, and as she did so she heard a car coming up the drive. Scarcely believing, she waited until it was almost even with her hiding place, then she stood up and broke through the branches the short distance to the pavement.

It was Tom. He stopped the car abruptly and jumped out.

“Faith! What's—"

“Get down," she screamed as she ran out of range to the driver's side of the car. "He's got a gun.”

She flung hersef next to Tom. "It's Dr. Hubbard. He's trying to kill me. He's killed all these people. We've got to get out of here!”

Tom didn't hesitate. Without standing up, he opened the back door and pushed Faith in, then got in the front himself and started the engine.

Faith pulled Ben from the car seat where he had been obliviously sound asleep and shoved him beneath her on the floor. He didn't like it.

Tom executed a rapid U turn and started down the drive.

A few feet away Roland Hubbard came leaping from the bushes and froze in the car headlights like a deer straying at midnight from the safety of the woods. For an instant he stayed like that, then raised the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger.

Eleven

Tom put down the phone. Faith was putting the finishing touches to a platter of small open-faced sandwiches she was preparing for a high tea she was serving before the Sunday-school pageant. It was Christmas Eve.

She raised an eyebrow. John Dunne did it so well, she thought she might give it a try too. "You don't want to know.”

Faith sighed. "I already do and it's the bell all over again. It goes something like this: 'How is Faith and, of course, dear little Benjamin? It's too bad she had to bring about the collapse of a fine old institution like Hubbard House, not to mention bringing Dr. Hubbard to ruin as well, whybless me, the man delivered half the town.' Millicent has this all down pat, am I right?"

“Essentially, although I think even Millicent is having a little trouble reconciling Roland Hub-bard's rewrite of the Hippocratic oath with his otherwise impeccable reputation.”

Aunt Chat walked into the kitchen with Ben trailing closely behind. She'd arrived that morning along with reporters from every major and minor news agency in the northeast. Chat had immediately appointed herself Faith's public relations person and handled them all with great aplomb. They were gone now, and for the last half hour she'd been sitting by the fire playing an intense game of animal dominos with Ben. She was flushed, whether from the flames or her probable triumph Faith wasn't sure, though if childhood memory served, Chat had never let Hope and her win either.

“It's time to stop talking about all this and start a little holiday celebration. I know I started the whole thing, but you didn't listen to me, and if you had, you wouldn't have gotten into the mess you did." She was hugging Faith tightly as she spoke, which took some of the asperity away from her words.

“But Chat, if I—we that is—hadn't done anything, Dr. Hubbard could have continued for years." She shuddered.

“I know, you silly girl, and that's why this whole thing is such a mess. You ought to be spanked, yet you probably saved a good many lives. Besides, you're too grown up.”

Faith had heard from Julia Cabot earlier, and the reaction at Hubbard House the night before had been one of shocked disbelief accompanied by profound relief at having escaped alive. Geoffrey Gordon, who had been slated to join the angels, made a miraculous recovery and was leaving for the Riviera later that day.

Faith reluctantly left her aunt's embrace. After last night she had been spending most of her time hugging anyone in sight. But time and tide—or in this case hungry parishioners—wait for no one, and she had to get the rest of the food out. Tom was taking care of the libations—vin chaud, cider, and tea, definitely no claret cup. Or bouillon.

As she checked the phyllo triangles filled with ricotta and prosciutto browning nicely in the oven, she told Chat, "But there is a grain of truth in what Millicent is spreading all over town, though I will not admit it to anyone other than you two. Hubbard House was a wonderful place—save for that one little problem.”

Faith felt a bit giddy. What was she saying? It was the perfect retirement home, except you might be killed in your sleep?

She continued, "Obviously it got completely warped in his twisted mind, but Roland Hubbard did create a fine community. Do you think it can possibly keep going?"

“I don't claim to understand this part of the world very well," replied Chat, which was more than modest—she tended to view New England with great bewilderment as a place that banned books, probably still believed in burning witches, and elected some of the most liberal politicians inthe country with no apparent regard for consistency. "However, it's always been my impression that once an institution, always an institution here. I'd be willing to bet they won't even change the name, and in future only the most rude boor will ever mention Dr. Hubbard's peccadillo."

“Chat's right, and I have it on good authority. Cyle dropped by to tell me that he is taking a leave of absence, which news I was able to receive with a relatively sober face. Thank you, Faith." Tom kissed her and she kissed him back. They had slept very little the night before. In the midst of clutching each other and Ben in thanks at being alive, rejoicing at the news of the possible pregnancy, and starting Faith's circulation going again in various congenial ways, she'd almost forgotten Bootsie's blurted remarks. After she'd told him, Tom had leaped out of bed and done a jig.

“His mother had had a call from Leandra. It looks like the two pillars are going to indeed hold the temple up. The residents want to run Hubbard House as a cooperative and buy it from Donald, retaining him as chief physician.”

Chat nodded, "You see, just as I said. His whole family turns out to be certifiable, but until he starts talking to the furniture—although even then it might be dismissed as eccentric—no one would think of not retaining him." She deftly grabbed Ben's hand as he was about to reach for a bottom one of the Comice pears Faith had arranged in a pyramid next to a large wedge of ripe Stilton. "No, no, sweetheart, that's for the company. Aunt Chat will get one especially for you.”

Faith gave her a grateful look and took the tray into the dining room. The table looked very pretty. She'd covered it with shiny gold paper and put candles everywhere. She'd filled every vase she could find with greens and red carnations, then tied trailing gold moiré ribbons around the bases. The dining room had a fireplace too, and she went back into the kitchen to tell Tom it was time to light the fire.

She came in on the tail end of a joke. Tom, Chat, and Ben—who was joining in just to be merry—were in gales of laughter.

“Tell Faith," Tom said as he wiped his eyes. "She needs some comic relief."

“I told Tom that now there was absolutely no reason for you to feel guilty. Hubbard House was going on, and the next time Millicent said anything, you should look past her and say sweetly, 'I was merely finishing what I started two years ago—now I have the bats in the belfry.' “

Faith jotted it down next to the phone.

The Millers were the first to arrive, and Samantha promptly took charge of Ben and the children's table set up in the kitchen after first exclaiming how precious he looked. He did look pretty precious in navy-blue velvet short pants and a shirt with tiny trains embroidered on the collar that Chat had given him.

“What will I do when she discovers older boys?" Faith wailed to the Millers.

“Bite your tongue," said Sam. "Now we older boys"—he put an arm over each of his sons' shoulders—"want to know where all the edibles are.”

Faith steered them into the dining room, whereChat was doing the honors—a teapot in one hand, her own mug of vin chaud in the other. Pix followed her in, and followed her out again as the front doorbell sounded. She had been there for several hours earlier, but still appeared to need to shepherd her friend around.

The parsonage filled quickly, and soon guests were happily munching and sipping. Millicent had arrived, and Chat was managing to keep her away from Faith by waving a plate of brandy snaps someone had brought in front of her face. Millicent wasn't a member of First Parish—she was a Congregationalist, as were her ancestors back to the flood but she moved with ecumenical fluency from the functions of one religious institution to another, putting an oar in wherever possible—welcome or unwelcome.

Pix wasn't the only one attached to Faith, and she found that whenever she went into the kitchen to replenish supplies, she was accompanied by a dozen or so people who seemed not to want to let her out of their sight. This was terribly reassuring, though rather inconvenient. Tom and Charley MacIsaac had been among their number until Faith pulled them aside and swore she wouldn't even go to the bathroom without telling one of them.

The children were decorating gingerbread cookies under Samantha and Jenny Moore's watchful eyes. The Nutcracker was on the CD player and Faith took a moment to let the feeling of the holiday wash over her. It was Christmas Eve, a time of magic and promise. And despite a few scratches, she was here to enjoy it.

Two hours later she and Chat were sitting in the family pew waiting for the pageant to start. It was very cold out, and the few steps from the parsonage to the church had felt like the Iditarod. Faith hugged her coat close to her and moved an inch or two nearer to Chat's ample frame. The three Advent candles burned brightly on the altar. The choir began to sing "Silent Night" while the children walked down the aisle dressed in sheets, cut-down bathrobes, old drapes, looking for all the world like real angels, shepherds, kings, queens, and the Holy Family. Eight-year-old William Carpenter stepped forward and started to read slowly and clearly: "And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree ...”

Ben was one of the angels and did not fidget too much until it was time for him to appear to the shepherds keeping watch over their flock by night. Faith thought of her own public debut, a nonspeaking role as a tree in first grade. She'd felt she was destined for better things. Ben seemed to be handling his first foray with an equal lack of stagefright. The only hitch had been when he had removed his halo during the processional, saying loudly that it itched him. Tom was watching his flock while seated to one side of the pulpit, and his eyes searched for Faith's as Ben's group started to sing "The First Nowell." There seemed to be a tear or two in his and she knew there were in hers. Chat squeezed her hand.

It was a lovely pageant, and Pamela Albright, kneeling unobtrusively in front of the children and gently supplying a line here and there, deserved a medal. The kings arrived and the congregation welcomed them with a rousing rendition of "We Three Kings." More than one dear friend of Faith's seemed to stumble over the "Sealed in the stone cold tomb" line, and the lady herself skipped the verse altogether.

Near the end of the pageant the three Queens arrived, an addition Pamela had suggested after discovering Norma Farber's poem "The Queens Came Late." Samantha Miller stepped forward and read it now:

The Queens came late, but the Queens were there with gifts in their hands and crowns on their hair. They'd come, these three like the Kings, from far, following, yes, that guiding star.

They'd left their ladles, linens, looms, their children playing in nursery rooms, and told their sitters: "Take charge! For this is a marvelous sight we must not miss!”

Faith thought she would have felt the same way: not wanting to miss anything. It was what life was all about. She listened to the gifts the Queens brought—"a homespun gown of blue, and chicken soup—with noodles, too—and a lingering, lasting cradle-song." Then she heard the last lines:

The Queens came late and stayed not long, for their thoughts already were straining far—past manger and mother and guiding star and child a-glow as a morning sun toward home and children and chores undone.

Faith folded her hands over her for-the-moment flat belly and said thank you, then stood up with the rest of the congregation to sing "Joy to the World."

“How about Sophie?"

“How about Sophie who? Sophie Tucker? Hagia Sophia?”

Tom had been on the edge of sleep and he was tired. A few hours after the pageant there had been the candlelight service; then when they got home, Chat was waiting with champagne, ginger ale for Faith, and some caviar from Petrossian's she'd secreted in the back of the refrigerator. The three of them had sat by the tree talking and savoring until late. There was the Christmas Day service tomorrow and Ben would be rousing them in what seemed like a few minutes to see what Santa had brought.

“How about Sophie as a name for the baby? Like a little French schoolgirl? Or maybe Emma? Emma Woodhouse? Emma Bovary? Emma the Laura Ashley perfume?"

“What makes you so sure this is going to be a girl?"

“I don't know. It just feels like it's going to be a girl.”

Tom rolled over and drew Faith close to him. "Well then, why don't we name her Pandora after her mother and be done with it?”