“The police told me not to go into this room,” she said.

“Then maybe we should stay out.”

“No, thank you,” she said, unwrapping the tape. “I’ve lived in this house for more than thirty years. I won’t have anyone telling me where I can and can’t go. This way.”

She pushed open the doors, turned on the lights, led me into a spacious den with wood-paneled walls and beamed ceilings. It smelled a little damp, and a little rusty, and a little ill, like a sickness had come over the place. A large mahogany desk was set by the windows, a round green-felt poker table stood in the corner, and a huge flat-screen television hung over the marble fireplace. Surrounding the fireplace was a wall of bookshelves, covered with trophies on which little wrestlers were posed like bullies with back conditions, ready to strike. The walls and furniture were so highly polished the whole room gleamed. It would have been a room fit for Architectural Digest if it weren’t for the patches of dark powder over the walls and windows or the sprawled squat figure outlined on the bloodstained carpet.

“That’s where I found the doctor,” said Gwen. “Just like that. I wanted to clean up the blood, but they wouldn’t let me. I’m not going to wait much longer.”

“Where was he shot from?”

“Over there,” said Gwen, pointing to the end of the bookshelf in the rear corner of the room.

One of the wooden panels beneath the books in that corner was slightly off kilter. I stepped over to it, gently pulled. The false panel swung open to reveal a gray metal safe.

“They got that open this morning,” said Gwen. “Brought a man in from Ohio to do it. There were some papers, some baseball cards, stuff. But no money, when there was always money. Everyone’s wondering where the money got off to. And then, of course, the gun.”

“What gun?”

“He kept a gun in the safe, but that was gone, too.”

“Was that the gun that killed him?”

“That’s what they think.”

“And they really think that Julia killed him?”

“They do.”

“What do you think, Gwen? Did she?”

“Course she didn’t. Why on earth do you think I let you in here and stuffed you full of pecan pie?”

“Excuse me?”

“I made that one for Norman. With the last of the pecans, too, so he’ll be eating apple until I get a new batch. But when I saw you at the door, I knew right away the last pecan pie was going to you.”

“I’m missing something here.”

“I remember seeing Tony Taylor play at Shibe Park,” said Gwen. “Lithe and handsome, skin like polished ebony. He was dreamy. You, sir, are no Tony Taylor. But I knew who you were as soon as I opened the door, Mr. Carl. The missus had tracked your adventures in the paper over the years. We used to laugh at the stories. And then she mentioned you more recently. In fact, you were being discussed in the argument last night before Dr. Denniston was killed.”

I looked at the figure outline on the carpet. “Really? That’s not good.”

“Not for you, and I guess not for the doctor neither, the way it turned out. I figured you were here to help Mrs. Denniston, and so I decided to help you. You don’t think I thought you were an old friend from Princeton, did you?”

“Yes, actually.”

“My mama didn’t raise no fool, Mr. Carl.”

“Mine obviously did.”

“Princeton.” She shook her head. “But the missus called when they first took her to the police station and said that you were going to help her, and so I decided to help you.”

“With the pie.”

“There’s not much a dose of Karo and molasses can’t help. So, Mr. Carl, is there anything else you want to know?”

I looked around the room, thought about it for a moment. “I heard the alarm was activated when you came back last night.”

“That’s right.”

“Who knew the code?”

“The doctor and the missus. Me, of course. A few others. That Mr. Swift. A couple handymen that worked on the house. It wasn’t a well-kept secret.”

“Clarence Swift had the code?”

“Mr. Swift was almost family to the doctor. It was like he lived his life through the doctor and the missus. Mr. Swift was here almost as much as I was.”

“How about a guy named Miles Cave?”

“I never met him, but I think he was an old school friend of the doctor’s,” she said. “I told the police about him. Recently I had heard his name being discussed by the doctor over the phone. Something about money, I could tell. A lot of the doctor’s calls at the end were about money. The calls involving that Cave fellow seemed to be more heated than most. I’m no detective, Mr. Carl, but I told the police and I’m telling you: I believe this Miles Cave has more to do with what happened than the missus. You want to find out what happened, you ought to start by finding him.”

I looked at the safe, at the figure sprawled on the bloodstained carpet, at the big-screen television. I tried to figure out the scene the instant before the violence, the shooter there, the dead man standing there, the safe open.

“Is this just the way the room was when you found it?”

“Yes, sir. The police haven’t let me touch much of anything.”

“No struggle, then, no bashed pottery or books thrown?”

“No, sir.”

“What did the police take with them?”

“They cut some stuff off the carpet, they dusted the whole place.”

“Tell me about Julia. How has she been doing lately?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Carl. She seemed distracted the last few weeks. It’s always tough to get a grip on the missus. She keeps a lot to herself.”

“How about her health?”

“The same as ever, I guess.”

“Is she on any medications?”

“How would I know?”

“Oh, Gwen, my guess is there isn’t much you don’t know. I suppose you’ve cleaned up her medicine cabinet now and then.”

“There are some pills prescribed by the doctor. Women’s stuff, I think. And some Valium. For muscle pain.”

“I bet. Does she drink much?”

“Not as much as the doctor, but she has a glass or two now and then.”

“Anything more serious?”

“What are you getting at, Mr. Carl?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Is that her car in front?”

“That’s right. She called from jail and told me where she left it. I had Norman drive me over to pick it up.”

“Anything interesting inside?”

“No, sir. And the police went through it as soon as I brought it back.”

“I figured. Can you do me a favor? Can you call me when she returns home?”

“Sure I can. Anything else?”

“Only whether or not I can take the rest of that pie home.”

“I’ll box it up for you.”

“Why, thank you, Gwen.”

“You going to save her?”

“Maybe,” I said. “If she deserves to be saved.”

“We all deserve that, Mr. Carl.”

9

He was waiting for me in my outer office when I came to work the next morning, a slight, dome-headed man with outsize shoes and a striped bow tie. He leaned forward in his chair, his small mouth pursed with worry, his long, pale hands wringing one the other. He might have been my age, or he might have been fifty, it was hard to tell with his wispy red hair and wide forehead. When he saw me, he lifted his chin.

“Victor Carl, is it?” he said.

“That’s right,” I said.

He rocked to his feet, still bowed forward at the waist, as if in a perpetual cringe. His hands continued to rub each other strangely. It was an insectile gesture, calculating and submissive at the same time, like a male praying mantis wringing his hands before sex.

“Mr. Carl, hello. Yes. It is an honor to meet you, indeed. An honor.” His voice was whiny and dispirited, and the way he enunciated “honor,” he might as well have been telling me what a burden it was to be in my presence. “I apologize for dropping in unannounced like this. You can be assured that I wouldn’t bother a personage of your high status and accomplishment if it weren’t so vital. But could you possibly, perhaps, spare a moment in your busy day for me? If it is in any way inconvenient, we could do it at another time, certainly. Everything at your convenience, of course.”