"No."
"That"s what I thought. In that case, I"m going home. Let me know if you come up with anything."
Cora smiled and went downstairs.
Sam Brogan was standing guard or doing a great impression of a cow sleeping on its feet. Cora couldn"t tell which without snapping her fingers in his face, which seemed rude. She murmured, "Good night, Sam," didn"t wait for a reply, ducked under the crime scene ribbon, got in her car, and drove off.
Her hands were shaking.
What had she done? She"d withheld the fact that she"d called on the banker that very afternoon. She"d had every opportunity to mention it, and she hadn"t. Why? Why didn"t she tell Chief Harper? Because Dan Finley was there? That was a convenient excuse. You wouldn"t wanna spill your guts in front of a witness. But why not? It wasn"t as if she had anything to hide. She had nothing to do with the man"s death, and nothing she had to say could possibly incriminate her. She was absolutely, one hundred percent in the clear.
Except now.
Now that she"d left the scene of the crime, she was guilty of holding out on the police. That technically made her guilty of compounding a felony and conspiring to conceal a crime.
That was ridiculous. She wasn"t concealing a crime. The crime was murder, and it wasn"t concealed at all. Everyone knew about it. Paying a social call on the banker was not a crime, and failing to mention that fact, the fact that had absolutely nothing to do with the murder, could not possibly be construed as obstruction of justice.
Could it?
Cora considered calling Becky Baldwin. She wondered how the young lawyer would feel about being rousted out of bed in the dead of night. She"d probably be okay with it if Cora were a suspect offering a retainer. But Cora wasn"t a suspect. She was an innocent bystander, whose only mistake had been marrying the wrong man some umpteen years ago, an indiscretion for which she seemed destined to never cease being punished.
As far as Cora was concerned, the death of this banker was just one in a series of nasty manipulations engineered by Melvin in order to wreck her day.
Cora pulled up the driveway. The new addition flickered in the headlights like some huge monster lying in wait. Cora switched off the lights, went up the walk.
Sherry met her at the front door.
"What are you doing up?"
"I couldn"t sleep."
"Where"s Aaron?"
"He could."
"A murder, and your newspaper reporter hubby couldn"t care?"
"The Gazette"s a morning paper, and it"s already off the press. He figures there"s no point losing sleep for a story that won"t run for over twenty-four hours."
"Good G.o.d. Was he that jaded before he got married?"
"He"s not jaded. Just tired."
"Aren"t you tired?"
"Couldn"t sleep."
"You nauseous?"
"No, I am not nauseated. You need to practice your grammar."
"Not at three in the morning, I don"t. You were puking your guts out? That"s why you"re up?"
"I"m up because the guy who testified against you yesterday is dead. I wanted to be ready to go in case I had to post bail."
"I had nothing to do with the man"s death."
"Right. And innocent people are never accused."
"You think Chief Harper would arrest me?"
"He has before."
"Yeah, but he had cause. This time I haven"t done anything."
"Then why are you nervous?"
"What?"
"You"re irritable. Jumpy."
"It"s three in the morning."
"Even so. I know you. What did you do now?"
Cora took a breath. "I held out on the cops."
"What?"
Cora told Sherry about calling on the banker.
"Go back. Go back and tell him what you just told me."
"It"s too late. I already withheld it."
"You didn"t withhold it. You just didn"t mention it. In the heat of the moment. With so many things on your mind."
"Yeah. And if you believe that one..."
"You don"t want my advice? So call Becky Baldwin."
"I don"t think she"d be happy to hear from me."
"So what?"
"I"ll call her tomorrow." Cora flopped down on the couch. "Really, now. Why are you up? And don"t give me that about bail."
"I thought you might need me."
"Oh?"
"There wasn"t a crossword puzzle with the body?"
"No. There was a KenKen."
"Really. Did you solve it?"
"I can"t solve it till they give me a copy."
"Why didn"t they?"
"Kind of a low priority. Just a bunch of numbers."
"You think it means anything?"
"No."
"Then why was it there?"
Cora grimaced. "See, that"s the whole problem. That"s what I always get stuck with. "You"re the Puzzle Lady, here"s a puzzle, somebody must have left it for you." What rubbish."
"Why is that rubbish?"
"It"s ridiculous."
"It happens."
"It happened once. Now every time there"s a murder that"s what they expect."
"It happened more than once."
"Bite your tongue. It"s never happened with a KenKen. A KenKen is a number puzzle. It can"t possibly mean a thing."
"It happened with a sudoku."
"And the sudoku had a crossword puzzle attached to point me in the right direction."
"Actually..."
"Actually?" Cora looked at her niece suspiciously. "Did you just say actually?"
"When you were zooming out of here I noticed the flag on the mailbox was up."
"In the dark?"
"In the headlights."
"So Aaron was mailing a letter."
"Aaron wasn"t mailing a letter."
"You woke him up and asked him?"
"Aaron doesn"t mail letters. Not from here. Anything he sends goes out from the paper."
"That"s a h.e.l.l of a marriage. Aren"t you afraid he"s writing his mistress?"
"Aaron doesn"t have a mistress. You can"t judge all marriages by your own disasters."
"Disasters?"
"Would you consider Melvin a crowning achievement?"
"Point taken. What about the mailbox?"
"I found this." Sherry whipped out an envelope. Written on the front were the words PUZZLE LADY. "Guess what was in it?"
"You opened my letter?"
"It"s a fine line. On the one hand, you"re the Puzzle Lady. On the other hand, I do the work. And I open all the checks and bills."
"Yeah, yeah, fine. What"s in it?"
Sherry pa.s.sed it over.
Cora took the envelope, pulled out the paper.
It was a crossword puzzle.
ACROSS.
1 Where Pago Pago is 6 Island north of New Zealand 10 "Little Women" character 14 Vote into office 15 Knot-tying vows 16 K-12, in education 17 Big artery 18 Message, part 1 20 With 47-Across, where to look 22 Come before 23 Juror, in theory 25 Chow down 26 Message, part 2 30 Predicaments 34 Expert 35 Insecticide brand 36 Family name in baseball 37 Novocaine-treated 39 Acc.u.mulate 42 Use a teething ring 43 Sheltered, at sea 44 Barbershop spinner 46 Auction call 47 See 20-Across 48 Message, part 3 51 "___ Can Cook" (PBS show) 52 Story starter 53 Outdoors, to a diner 58 Become dotty 62 Message, part 4 64 Austerity 65 Tied, as a score 66 Conclusion lead-in 67 Baseball manager Joe 68 Benefit of clergy, e.g.
69 Kind of terrier 70 Flips out DOWN.
1 Wet septet 2 ___ vera 3 Certain Ford, for short 4 Squid relatives 5 Finished 6 Little white lie 7 Light bulb, in cartoons 8 Group seeker 9 Does not attend 10 Bit of sweat 11 Exile site of 1814 12 One of those things?
13 Make yourself scarce 19 Go fetch 21 Bing Crosby"s record label 24 Hotel unit 26 Tired and trite 27 Eyes 28 Mocha setting 29 Not fitting 30 Boxer"s punch 31 Accused"s excuse 32 Design idea 33 Blue shoe material?
38 Buzzer 40 Area near TriBeCa 41 Broken arm holder 45 Keeps company (with) 48 Converts to bills?
49 Pop open, as champagne 50 Military unit 51 ""Fine with me!"
53 Say it"s so 54 Clothier Strauss 55 Sweat it out 56 Chicago Cubs star Sandberg 57 Baccha.n.a.l 59 Taj Mahal town 60 Trail mix 61 Mars, to the Greeks 63 Time keeper, at times