She looked puzzled. "You get all the way back here with those mutts, then you turn 'em loose. Why did you do that, Sam?"

"Getting too big to handle. Got loose the morning I-the morning Torres wrecked his car. They were wild, jumped out of my car, ran down the road. I figured to hell with 'em, let 'em go. They'd make their way, someone down in the village 'ud feed 'em-and someone did," he said. "Anyway, I decided I didn't want to be hauling them around, right in Newlon's face. Keep reminding him, keep him all shook up. Not too swift, was Newlon."

"And that old couple, Sam. That George Chambers. You botched that one, too. Don't you think the cops-"

"Someone was coming, Cara Ray. Right up the street headed right for me. I thought-Chambers didn't move. Went limp as a rag. I thought he was dead, Cara Ray."

"Trouble with you, you try to do someone, and you panic. Decide they're dead when they're not. Why do you do that, Sam? We could've just skipped. Now you've got two men dead and two wounded, and don't you think the cops-?"

"You do one man, Cara Ray, you might as well go for it. The ones after that don't count. Besides, the Fulmans and Greenlaws never get caught. Well, caught maybe once in a while, but we always walk. Worst that can happen, the family goes bail and we skip, lose the bail money."

Fulman smiled. "It's in the family, Cara Ray. Luck. Plain Irish luck"

Cara Ray watched him nervously. Her scrubbed face was not glowing now; she looked pale, as if she was having doubts about Fulman, as if she was losing her nerve.

But then her eyes narrowed. "I want my share of the money, Sam. I don't need all this grief for nothing." Her gaze widened. "Are you sure there ever was any money in that bag? Or was the old woman making an ass of you?"

"Shamas always buried money, Cara Ray. Everywhere he lived. The other women never knew- you're the first he told."

"Maybe he was getting senile," she said, laughing. "I would have sworn Lucinda never knew."

Cara Ray rose, poured herself another drink, found a box of sugar, and stirred two heaping teaspoons into the vodka-laced orange juice. "You never make it sweet enough."

She turned on him suddenly. "Maybe Shamas took it all with him on shipboard. Maybe you have it all, Sam." Leaning over the table, she pushed her face close to his. "How much money did you get, Sam? How much of Shamas's tax-free stash, as he called it?"

"Don't be stupid, Cara Ray, you know I wouldn't cut you out."

She sat down again, ran her hand down her leg, smoothing her Mickey Mouse tights. "Far as that goes, maybe Pedric and the old woman and their sweet little early-morning walks, maybe they carried the money away then, a little at a time."

"And hid it where, Cara Ray? In Pedric's trailer? He's not that stupid."

She shrugged. "Maybe buried it, maybe down the hill somewhere, under those rocks."

She lifted an eyebrow. "And why not his trailer? Brought it right on up here and hid it somewhere in there that even you wouldn't think to look-maybe inside a wheel? In the water tank or something."

"I don't know, Cara Ray, that's-"

"And now with the old man in the hospital, and his trailer empty, I'd think you'd-"

Fulman rose. "He wouldn't hide it there, Cara Ray. He'd know we'd all look there. Me, Dirken, Newlon…"

He stood watching her. "But I guess it wouldn't hurt to smoke it over-now, while he's out of the way."

Snatching his jacket from the chair, he headed out the door. Cara Ray gulped her drink and followed him.

And Joe and Dulcie abandoned the closet, intent on their own hurried agenda.

22

FULMAN HAD left the kitchen light burning; it cast a greasy yellow glow across the gold-and-black decor and the fake mahogany paneling. The plastic bag was no longer on the table; only wet rings remained where Fulman and Cara Ray had set their glasses. Sniffing at the glasses, Dulcie lifted her lip in disgust. "Take the paint off a fire truck.''

"It's here," Joe said from beneath the table. He backed out, pulling the bag. Peering inside to be sure the papers were still there, he left it in the middle of the floor and galloped to the bedroom, where he had seen a cell phone on a shelf beside the bed.

"Joe, Cara Ray left her purse, they'll be coming back."

Joe paid no attention. Pawing open the phone, listening for the dial tone, he punched in the number. The phone's small buttons made it hard for a cat to hit the right digit. These manufacturers that called their products user-friendly didn't have a clue.

Lieutenant Brennan answered, evidently relieving the dispatcher. Brennan didn't want to put the call through; he said Harper could not be reached.

"This is really urgent. There's no time-"

"He's on a missing person call-possibly a drowning. That is extremely urgent," Brennan said coldly, and he again refused to contact Harper.

Well, he needn't be so surly. But maybe he'd had a bad night. Maybe he had stomach gas, with all the fried food he ate. Hanging up, Joe dialed Harper's cell phone. He hadn't memorized Harper's several phone numbers for nothing; though sometimes the connection on the cell phone wasn't too good.

Harper answered; he sounded gruffer than usual, short-tempered and preoccupied. Joe described the papers and ledger they had found that linked Fulman to Shamas Greenlaw's scams and maybe to his death. "Most of the papers are in a hole behind his closet, you have to pull the wallboard off. But the ledger and the most important letters, Fulman put in a plastic bag- meaning to take them with him. He'll be back here any minute, to get them."

"What do you mean, linked to Shamas Greenlaw's death?"

"Fulman and Cara Ray Crisp pushed Shamas overboard; I heard them talking about it. And with Cara Ray's help, Fulman killed Raul Torres-caused the accident that killed him."

"You'll have to give me some facts," Harper snapped. Joe could picture the captain in his squad car, scowling at the phone as he drove. Joe would not, at one time, have made so bold as to expect the police captain to act on his word alone, without proof. But since the first murder that the cats had been involved with, all the information they had passed to Harper had resulted in arrests and convictions. Every phone call Joe had made had helped the department; he and Dulcie had furnished Harper with information from conversations that the police would not be in a position to hear, discussions the police had no reason to listen to, and for which they would have had no legal right to employ sophisticated electronic equipment-yet conversations that held the key to solving the crimes in question.

"I can't give you any proof, Captain. From what I overheard tonight, Shamas Greenlaw didn't pitch over the boat's rail unassisted. Fulman and Cara Ray did the job; then, because Raul Torres grew suspicious, Fulman set Torres up to die. Fulman stabbed George Chambers and left him for dead. He killed Newlon Greenlaw-hit Newlon with a rock, and he injured Pedric Greenlaw, went away thinking he'd killed Pedric."

"That's a long list. Who is this? I can't run an investigation on anonymous tips like this," Harper said irritably.

"My tips have been useful in the past, Captain."

"Will you give me your name, give me a number where I can reach you?"

"You know I can't do that. Never have, never will. But I just witnessed, in Sam Fulman's trailer, a direct confession that incriminates both Fulman and Cara Ray Crisp. You'll have to take my word.

"However," Joe said, loving to play Harper along slowly, "there is a bit of proof. Fulman's shirt, a red-and-brown plaid flannel, that is wadded up in his laundry on the closet shelf, is spotted with tiny flecks of dried blood. I'm willing to bet it'll turn out to be Newlon Greenlaw's blood.