But what does a simple cleaning person know?

Returning from the car, she looked up at the house with a stab of longing, dreaming how it would be to have that lovely apartment. The studio above could be rebuilt, with plenty of space for tool storage and building supplies, maybe room left over for a small rental.

Sure, just whip out the checkbook and plunk down half a million or maybe more, and it's mine. Molena Point property was incredibly expensive.

Back in the house again, she sorted through paint chips, India Ivory, Rich Almond, Pagan White, Winter Snow, Narcissus. She chose Pale Bone, matching it to a little patch of wall down behind the couch that seemed to have escaped smoke damage.

But when she checked the color with Beverly, Beverly huffed and had to try a dozen samples. She returned to the Pale Bone as if she had just discovered it. In a few minutes she was back in the bedroom. Charlie could hear her still rummaging, heard her open the closet door, heard the hangers slide, heard her unzip the suitcase, zip it up again. Whatever the woman was looking for, she hadn't found it yet.

Well at least the police knew she was there. If Harper didn't want her nosing around, he'd send a squad car.

In the kitchen cupboard she found a supply of cat kibble and a dozen small cans of gourmet cat food. Reluctant to move the bowls on the floor and generate questions, she dug out an aluminum pie tin and a chipped china bowl. Filling the bowl with water, she carried it all outside, poured kibble into the pie tin, placed it and the kibble box and bowl of water just under the deck. She could see, down the hill, the house she was now working on, just a few blocks south. She could run up to this house easily to replenish the food and water. If the cat did come back, she could see if it was hurt and take care of it.

Returning to the bedroom, she startled Beverly. The woman turned abruptly from the empty bookshelves. Having pulled off all the remaining books, she looked cross and frustrated.

"When you get Janet's clothes packed, get them off at once to the Junior League or the Goodwill, then take these albums and scrapbooks to her agent. It is the Aronson Gallery, on San Carlos."

Charlie nodded and held her tongue.

"Any of Janet's sketches, or sketchbooks-or any journals, are to be given to me. Pack them carefully in a large, suitably flat box. Don't fold the sketches, please. Anything drawn or written by Janet's hand must come to me. Bring them to my motel. Don't leave them in the house while you are working.

"The bedding and towels can go with the clothes and kitchen things. In short, everything to charity except albums, scrapbooks, diaries, or journals, and any remaining artwork. And of course the rugs and furniture, which I will sell."

For a woman whose sister had died so recently, and so horribly, Beverly Jeannot was maintaining a remarkable strength of spirit. Charlie pretended to take notes, but they weren't needed. Beverly's sharp instructions had etched themselves on each individual brain cell.

"You understand that you cannot start any work until the police legally remove the barrier," Beverly said. "I have no idea how long this trial will take. Once it ends, beginning the day it ends, when the premises are released, I want the work started immediately and done with dispatch. The living room cleaned and painted, the outside of the house scrubbed, the windows washed. The remains of the studio fire must be removed and the area swept clean so the builders can start, and the entire yard must be cleaned and raked." She looked Charlie over. "How long will that require? I hope no more than two or three days. Can you assure me that you have sufficient crew to handle the job expeditiously? If you cannot, I would like to know at once."

"My crews will be on the job the moment the police allow us to enter. I'll do the bid this evening, fax it to your motel. Will that be satisfactory?"

No other repair and cleaning service would put their jobs on hold in this way-a customer waited his turn. She wouldn't make this arrangement either, to be available at any time without notice, if she wasn't just getting started.

She hadn't told Beverly how short a time she'd been in business, and Beverly hadn't asked. She reminded herself again that she had better not lose her sense of humor. She prayed that she'd be able to find additional help for the job. One fifty-year-old, addle-brained cleaning lady and one male handyman of questionable skills were not going to cut it.

Under the bed, the cats glanced at each other. There was only one place Beverly hadn't searched. Her footsteps tapping across the tile were bold and solid.

She stopped beside the bed, her shoes inches from Dulcie's nose. Thick ankles in thick, pale stockings, burgundy high heels with wide straps across the instep. The springs squeaked and one burgundy foot disappeared upward, then the other, as Beverly climbed to kneel on the bed.

She had already pulled all the books out. Now a dry, sliding sound suggested that she was running her hand down the wall, maybe pressing along the moving shelf beneath which Janet had kept her tissues and clock and the missing journal. The springs complained as she shifted her weight.

They heard the movable panel rattle. Heard her suck in her breath, heard the shelf slide open.

They listened to her rummaging among the contents, but soon she closed the little niche again and eased herself down and off the bed.

When Beverly began to pull the sheets off, Dulcie snatched the diary in her teeth and they slipped out behind her, staying between the comforter and the wall. As she tugged at the bedding, jerking sheets and comforter onto the rug, they fled, streaking for the closet.

They peered out, ready to run again.

But she didn't turn, hadn't seen them. They watched her shake the bedclothes, drop them on the rug, then roll the bed away from the wall. As she searched behind it, her posterior bulged in the plum-colored skirt. At last she straightened up, brushed dust from her suit, and returned empty-handed to the living room.

The cats did not leave their shelter until they heard the front door close, heard the lock slide home, heard Charlie nailing up the plywood.

When an engine started down below they left the closet, trotted to the window, and watched Beverly drive away. Charlie left directly behind her, the Mercedes softly purring.

The apartment was still again, empty.

Crouching together on the rug with the diary lying between them, they pawed it open to the last pages.

Here were entries about the de Young opening, notes which Janet must have made only days before she died. Ironic that Kendrick is on the museum board which is giving me two awards. A jury with Kendrick on it wouldn't even have hung my work, so I guess he didn't have any say in the matter, it's the jury that decides, bless them.

She had tucked a clipping between the pages, a group photo of the board, taken a week before the opening. She had drawn beside Mahl's picture an owl that looked so like Mahl, Dulcie rolled over laughing. The dowdy bird had Mahl's hunched shoulders, Mahl's beaklike nose. Its eyes closely resembled Mahl's round, rimless glasses.

In the photo Mahl had his suit coat off and was holding a piece of clay sculpture, his white shirt cuff revealing, where it had pulled back, an expensive-looking watch, heavy and ostentatious.

Joe stared at it. "What kind of man would wear a watch decorated with cupids and those heavy wings sticking out. Pretty pretentious, for someone who's supposed to have the tastes of an artist."

"Where did you learn about the tastes of an artist?"

"Not from Clyde, you can bet."

The last entry in Janet's diary had been made the night before she died, a one-line comment which perhaps she had written just before she went to sleep.