His mother glanced out. “Uh-oh, he’s bringing Cora in. She looks upset.”

In a very few minutes after his father and Cora Gebhart joined them at the kitchen table, Neil understood why she was upset. On Wednesday she had sold her bonds through the broker who had been so persistent in trying to get her to invest in a venture stock he had recommended, and she had given the transaction a go-ahead.

“I couldn’t sleep last night,” she said. “I mean, after what Robert said at the club about not wanting another one of his ladies to lose her shirt… I had the awful feeling he was talking about me, and I sensed suddenly that I’d made a terrible mistake.”

“Did you call this broker and cancel the buy?” Neil asked.

“Yes. That may be the one intelligent thing I did. Or tried to do-he said it was too late.” Her voice trailed off and her lip trembled. “And he hasn’t been in his office since then.”

“What is this stock?” Neil asked.

“I’ve got the information,” his father said.

Neil read the prospectus and the fact sheet. It was even worse than he expected. He phoned his office and directed Trish to put him through to one of the senior traders. “Yesterday you bought fifty thousand shares at nine,” he told Mrs. Gebhart. “We’ll find out what’s happening to it today.”

Tersely he appraised his trading associate of the situation. Then he turned again to Mrs. Gebhart. “It’s at seven now. I’m putting in a sell order.”

She nodded her assent.

Neil stayed on the line. “Keep me posted,” he ordered. When he hung up, he said, “There was a rumor a few days ago that the company whose stock you purchased was being bought by Johnson amp; Johnson. But unfortunately, I’m positive it’s just that -a rumor intended to inflate the value of the stock artificially. I’m terribly sorry, Mrs. Gebhart; at least we should be able to save most of your capital. My associate will call us back as soon as he makes a trade.”

“What makes me furious,” Robert Stephens growled, “is that this is the same broker who got Laura Arlington to invest in a fly-by-night company and caused her to lose her savings.”

“He seemed so nice,” Cora Gebhart said. “And he was so knowledgeable about my bonds, explaining how even though they were tax-free, the return didn’t justify all that money being tied up in them. And some were even losing buying power because of inflation.”

The statement caught Neil’s attention. “You must have told him about your bonds, if he was so knowledgeable,” he said sharply.

“But I didn’t. When he phoned to ask me to lunch, I explained I had no interest in discussing investments, but then he talked about the kind of clients he had-like Mrs. Downing. He told me that she had had bonds similar to the ones many older people hold and that he made a fortune for her. Then he talked about exactly the bonds I hold.”

“Who is this Mrs. Downing?” Neil asked.

“Oh, everybody knows her. She’s a pillar of the Providence old guard. I did call her, and she simply raved about Douglas Hansen.”

“I see. Even so, I’d like to run a check on him,” Neil said. “He sounds to me like just the kind of guy our business doesn’t need.”

The phone rang.

Maggie, Neil thought. Let it be Maggie.

Instead, it was his associate at the investment house. Neil listened, then turned to Cora Gebhart. “He got you out at seven. Count yourself lucky. There’s a rumor just starting to circulate that Johnson amp; Johnson is going to issue a statement saying it has absolutely no interest in taking over that company. Whether the rumor is true or not, it’s enough to send the company’s stock into a tailspin.”

When Cora Gebhart left, Robert Stephens looked at his son affectionately. “Thank God you were here, Neil. Cora has a good head and a big heart, but she’s too trusting. It would have been a damn shame to have her wiped out by one mistake. As it is, this may mean that she’ll have to give up the idea of moving into Latham Manor. She had her eye on a particular apartment there, but maybe she’ll still be able to take a smaller one.”

“Latham Manor,” Neil said. “I’m glad you mentioned it. I need to ask you about that place.”

“What on earth do you want to know about Latham Manor?” his mother asked.

Neil told them about the Van Hillearys, his clients who were looking for a retirement base. “I told them I’d investigate that place for them. I’d almost forgotten. I should have made an appointment to see it.”

“We’re not teeing up until one,” Robert Stephens said, “and Latham isn’t that far from the club. Why don’t you call over and see if you can make an appointment now, or at least pick up some literature about it for your clients.”

“Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today,” Neil said with a grin. “Unless, of course, I can get hold of Maggie first. She must be home by now.”

After six unanswered rings, he replaced the receiver. “She’s still out,” he said glumly. “Okay, where’s the phone book? I’ll call Latham Manor; let’s get it out of the way.”

Dr. William Lane could not have been more pleasant. “You’re calling at a very good time,” he said. “We have one of our best suites available-a two-bedroom unit with a terrace. It’s one of four such apartments, and the other three are occupied by charming couples. Come right over.”

44

Dr. Lara Horgan, the new medical examiner for the state of Rhode Island, had not been able to figure out what was making her uneasy. But then, it had been a busy week for her department: extraordinary deaths had included two suicides, three drownings, and a felony murder.

The death of the woman at the Latham Manor residence, on the other hand, was to all appearances purely routine. Still, something about it was bothering her. The medical history of the deceased woman, Greta Shipley, had been perfectly straightforward. Her longtime doctor had retired, but his associate verified that Mrs. Shipley had a ten-year history of hypertension and had suffered at least one silent heart attack.

Dr. William Lane, the director and attending physician at Latham Manor, seemed competent. The staff had experience, and the facilities were first-rate.

The fact that Mrs. Shipley had had a weak spell at the funeral Mass of her friend, the murder victim, Nuala Moore, and a second spell only verified the tension she must have been under.

Dr. Horgan had seen a number of instances where an elderly spouse expired hours or even minutes after the death of the husband or wife. Someone horrified by the circumstances of a dear friend’s death might easily experience that same fatal stress.

As state medical examiner, Dr. Horgan was familiar as well with the circumstances surrounding the death of Nuala Moore, and she was aware how upsetting they might be to someone as close to the victim as Mrs. Shipley had been. Multiple vicious blows to the back of Mrs. Moore’s head had proven fatal. Grains of sand mixed in with blood and hair suggested that the perpetrator had found the weapon, probably a rock, somewhere on the beach and had entered the house carrying it. It also suggested that the perpetrator had known the resident of the house was small and frail, perhaps even actually knew Mrs. Moore. That’s what it is, she told herself. The niggling feeling that Nuala Moore’s death is somehow tied in with the one at Latham Manor is what’s sending alarm signals to me. She decided to call the Newport police and ask if they had turned up any leads as yet.

The newspapers from earlier in the week were stacked on her desk. She found a brief item on the obituary page detailing Mrs. Shipley’s background, her community activities, her membership in the DAR, her late husband’s position as board chairman of a successful company. It listed her survivors as three cousins, residing in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Denver.