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“What are you doing down there?”

“Arghhh!” I yelled and turned my head to see Bill at the entrance to Walter's office. “Don't creep up on me like that.”

“Sorry,” he said. “Why is your arm inside the desk?”

“There's something blocking the drawer,” I said between gritted teeth.

I extended my fingers and shifted the object just enough to be able to grasp its sides. “It's a bottle.” I withdrew an empty pint of alcohol and studied the label. “Chivas Regal.”

“Walter was drinking on the job?” asked Bill.

“Walter doesn't drink. But this was the only liquor Jerome drank.”

Bill's eyes constricted. “Where's Walter?”

“He left with Lola a few minutes ago. I sent him home to sleep and said I'd lock up.”

He reached for the bottle. “I'd better take it. Have CSI guys check it out at the lab. I'll give Walter a call in the morning.”

“I can't believe that Walter would have had anything to do with . . .” I stopped myself from finishing the thought.

“We're done upstairs. Do you need a ride home?” he asked kindly.

I shook my head. “I'm good.”

“How about I follow you home? You've had a . . . busy night.”

“Thanks, but I'm okay. Really.” I forced a smile, my face muscles worn out.

Bill stared at me. “Come on. I'll be right behind you.”

I was too tired to argue.

He hesitated. “About the other night . . .”

“I get it. No problem.”

I locked up, Bill trailing behind me as I tested the door handles to make sure all was secure. I waved good-bye, climbed into my Metro, and pulled out of my parking spot. Bill's cruiser kept pace until I turned into my driveway; then he waited until I was in the house before he drove off.

I
f I thought Etonville was abuzz over the break-ins, it was nothing compared to the hullabaloo that erupted the next morning. I was awake half the night, and when I finally nodded off, I dreamed of a large black hole, like a swimming pool, that I dove into, completely unaware of what I would hit when I landed. Exactly how I felt upon awakening and remembering the events of the previous evening. Jerome dying at the theater and the future of the ELT in question. The only comforting thought was that I had the day off. Benny would take over as assistant manager and handle the bar. Gillian and Carmen would take care of the dining room.

The appointment at Forensic Document Services was at eleven so I had a couple of hours to relax yet. My head was still firmly planted on my pillow when my cell phone vibrated. I closed my eyes and toyed with the notion of pretending to be asleep. But curiosity got the better of me and I rolled out of bed. “Hello?”

“Hi, this is Maggie Hemplemeyer from the
Etonville Standard
.”

“Who?”

“I'm writing about the Jerome Angleton murder at the ELT.”

I blinked my eyes and tried to clear my head.

“I understand that you discovered where Jerome was murdered.”

“Not really. I mean, it's still—”

“Look, we know about how you found the broken window and the book in the attic and the liquor bottle.”

“I think you should talk with the police department before you—”

“The
Standard
already published a story on the ELT being the location of the murder. Just hit the stands. I'm talking about a follow-up article. Kind of a human interest thing. You know, local gal thwarts crime spree.”

Huh?
“Maggie, I'll get back to you.”

“But—?”

I clicked off for one second and it buzzed again. I answered without looking at the screen. “Look, I told you . . .”

“Dodie, it's Carol. I'm looking at the paper. What's going on?”

“What's the headline?”

“Windjammer Manager Locates the Scene of the Crime.”

“Okay.”

“The subheading is ‘Artistic Director's Involvement Questioned.' It says you found a Scotch bottle in Walter's desk drawer that belonged to Jerome?”

“I found the bottle, but I'm not sure what it says about Walter's involvement.”

“Just a minute, Dodie.” I could hear a tumble of voices in the background; Snippets must be beside itself. “Okay, okay, I'll ask her.” Then a rustling on the receiver. “The shampoo girls are wondering if they will arrest Walter?”

“Carol, I have to go.”

“Okay. I'll check in later.”

I was about to jump in the shower when my phone dinged with a text. “Are you up? Call if you are.” It was Lola. I punched in her number.

“The town's going berserk. You wouldn't believe what people are saying,” she said. “What happened after we left?” She sounded scared and upset.

“I found an empty pint bottle of Chivas Regal in Walter's desk.”

“Walter didn't drink,” she said.

“But Jerome did and that was his brand, and he was almost legally drunk the night he died.”

“What was it doing there?” she asked.

“I don't know. I was getting the show budget out of the desk drawer and—”

“You were what?”

“Whatever. The drawer stuck, and when I took it out to see what the problem was, I found the liquor bottle shoved in the back,” I said.

There was silence while Lola processed everything.

“This is a nightmare. One problem after another.”

“Lola, Bill took the bottle to be checked out by the CSI unit. But it probably means nothing.”

She hesitated. “I've been troubled by Walter lately. His financial issues, the way he's been treating the cast, his fighting with Elliot. But I would never think he'd . . . have anything to do with Jerome's death.”

“There's no point in jumping to conclusions,” I said hastily. “There has to be a logical explanation. Bill is going to speak with him this morning.”

“This seems so trivial, but I guess we should think about the show,” she said.

“Maybe Walter needs an assistant.”

“He knew Shakespeare was going to be a challenge, but he wanted to put the Etonville Little Theatre on the map,” Lola said.

It was on the map all right.

I let the hot water ping on my face and cascade down my body. How had things gotten this out of control? I forced myself to step out of the shower, towel off, and dress. It was 10
AM
when I backed my Metro out of my yard and onto Ames Street. Across the way, my neighbor Mrs. Dugan waved and smiled her approval. She'd obviously seen the paper. I was a reluctant local celebrity, starting to feel as if the citizens of Etonville needed to get a life.

I craved the anonymity I'd enjoyed down the shore. Too many people and too much happening there for anyone to care what I did with my time. Of course, I hadn't been smack in the middle of a murder investigation. After my appointment this morning, I had to make a decision. To tell Bill what I'd learned or not. My great aunt Maureen called indecision the graveyard of good intentions. I didn't want to end up with my name on a tombstone.

Piscataway, New Jersey was a forty-five-minute ride from Etonville by way of the Garden State Parkway, U.S. 1, and 287 North. It was a large township by New Jersey standards, fifty thousand people and a mix of ethnicities, with a full range of suburban neighborhoods, corporate parks, strip mall businesses, and light industry. I'd had a couple of occasions to visit Piscataway when I was in college and dating a guy from Rutgers University whose family lived there. I spent an agonizing Thanksgiving around a formal dining room table listening to conservative political ranting. We split up by Christmas.

Even with traffic on Route 1 and 287, I arrived on time at ten-fifty-five. Forensic Document Services was located on a busy street a mile outside downtown Piscataway. Set back a hundred feet from the road, the office was a single-story, yellow-sided building, modest in appearance, with a row of parking spaces adjacent to the front entrance. I pulled into an empty space and shut down the engine.

I entered a reception area—really just a row of red molded plastic chairs and a matching coffee table covered with
People
,
Time
, and
Car Mechanics
. There was a reception desk, but it was unoccupied.

I wasn't sure what I had expected, maybe something a little more refined, academic, or artsy. After all, the business was probably dealing with historical documents, books, and other printed materials. From the look of things, this could be the generic DIY office of an accountant, credit counselor, or small-time lawyer. Maybe even a private investigator. I could hear a voice rising and falling from somewhere further inside the building.

“Hello. Anybody here?” I called out.

There was a scuffling from a hallway behind the desk. A bald, overweight guy in the middle of a cell phone call rolled himself out of a room in an office chair and waved for me to come on back. I followed the man in the chair to an office on the left.

“Jay, Marshall here. Woody had a stroke last night. Yeah. Too bad. Right. Anyway, you need to send Harry to Plainfield to cover for him, and tell Marge to get out of Edison and go to New Brunswick. When she gets there, she can send Al to Jersey City. What?” He glanced at me and waved to two chairs, one of which was buried in files and papers. I sat down on the other one.

I saw a series of business cards slotted in a holder on his desk: besides Forensic Document Services, there was ABC Trucking and Sam's Auto Body Repair.

“Listen to me,” he yelled into his cell. “We can't afford to wait and see if Woody survives this. I mean, we all want him to, of course, but meantime, chop chop. Get on the horn and get this stuff in motion.” Marshall clicked off. “Sorry. Busy morning. Can I get you something?” He stuck his head out the door. “Angela?”

“She's not here yet,” I said.

“Hard to get good help. Even if it is your sister-in-law.” He giggled in the high-pitched titter of a young girl. “So?”

“As I mentioned on the phone, I'm Dodie O'Dell. My uncle was Jerome Angleton.” I waited to see any flicker of recognition. Nada. Marshall pursed his lips and crossed his arms on his ample chest. “Maybe you heard about his death? He was murdered in Etonville two weeks ago.”

“Murdered? I don't know nothing about any murder.”

“Well, I'm following up on his business affairs . . . after his untimely passing.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And I noticed that he was in email communication with you about a document.”

Marshall blinked. “What kind of document?”

“I'm not sure,” I said. “There were four emails from February 20 through April 12.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I reviewed the correspondence. It looks like he was interested in hiring your company to do an authentication.”

“Maybe.” Marshall tilted his head, then stared up at the ceiling. Thinking. “I might remember the guy. Seemed to me he was asking about prices and how authentic our authentication service was, and how long it would take.”

“There wasn't any specific information about the process or the cost—”

“Look, we never say too much in an email. I don't trust the Internet and some of the stuff we work on is very valuable, if you know what I mean.” He giggled again.

“You didn't meet with him?” I asked.

“Nope. Only contact was through email.”

“So you never found out what the document was?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Never thought he was serious. Every once in a while we get a joker who cleans out an attic and thinks we're
Antiques Roadshow
. Just wants free information.” He leaned in. “I'm not in the business of handing out freebies.”

I nodded at the business cards. “You're in a lot of businesses,” I said and smiled.

Marshall studied me. “You could say that.”

I looked around. “So is this where the authentication process happens? Testing paper and dating the ink?”

Marshall barked a short laugh, this one from his gut. “Nah, that's done in Woodland Park. My brother runs the lab.”

“Interesting mix of companies. A document service and a car repair.”

Marshall squinted at me. “And trucking. And a few others.” His cell rang and he examined the caller ID. “Anything else? I need to take this,” he said in a hurry.

“Could I get the name and address of the lab? Maybe your brother's contact information?”

“Hang on, Jay.” Marshall grabbed a business card stamped with F
ORENSIC
D
OCUMENT
S
ERVICES
and scribbled a phone number on the back. “That's Morty's office number. But he won't be able to tell you anything. Like I said, we never made personal contact with the guy.”

I took the card. “Thanks.”

He waved good-bye. As I moved down the hallway, I could hear Marshall shriek into the phone, “Jay, Jay, I don't care what Woody's wife wants. Business is business.”

Charming guy
, I thought as I exited the building. I wondered if he was on the level. If he was telling the truth about not meeting with Jerome. Or if his brother knew anything.

I took my time driving back to Etonville. The temperature was rising so I wound down the window to let the gusts of warm air circulate through my Metro. I felt elated that I'd made an actual connection between Jerome and the document service but disappointed that I'd gotten so little information. Nothing, really, that I hadn't known before. Other than the fact that Marshall's brother was responsible for the actual authentication in another location.

My stomach growled, reminding me that I had bypassed breakfast and almost missed the lunch hour. A stop at Coffee Heaven was in order. I left my Metro in a parking space and walked the half block to the corner of Amber and Main. I pushed on the glass door with the O
PEN
sign displayed prominently and was greeted by a wall of noise. The place was full—which meant that I would probably have to sit at the counter.

Jocelyn looked up from pouring coffee for a customer and gave me a big grin. “Dodie!”

Her voice was loud and it reverberated around the diner. Within seconds, the room went still as people twisted in their seats and looked to the door, where I stood like a deer in the headlights. Then, one by one, they started to applaud. One thing you had to say about Etonville: it was a grateful town.

I nodded self-consciously, slipped onto a stool, and picked up a menu as the clapping died down.

“Coffee's on the house,” Jocelyn said. “You're a regular hero, investigating that prop place and finding that liquor bottle.” She leaned in close. “Tell me, did Walter have anything to do with it? I always thought he had shifty eyes.”

“I think the chief's still investigating,” I said softly. “And I'll take two eggs over easy.”

“Gotcha,” she said.

As I waited for my food I texted Lola to see how she was doing. I was feeling bad for Walter. I couldn't imagine he'd had anything to do with Jerome's murder, even if he was nipping at the box office till.

Ten minutes later, Lola called my cell.

“Where are you?” she asked.

“Coffee Heaven, having a late breakfast.”

“Can you talk?”

A large woman on my right was borrowing half of the stool next to me, in addition to her own, and the man on my left had tilted his upper body forty-five degrees so that his armpit was dangerously close to my whole wheat toast. “Let me call you back in a few.”