“But he was a religious leader.”

“He was the freak headliner in a road show called the New Church. Babe’s only publicity is a mention in Betty Hale’s tour ramble for the guests at the bed and breakfast. Now that does sell a few souvenirs at the drugstore, and I’m sure Betty gets her cut.”

How embarrassing for Mallory to be embroiled in a mediocre murder. “I’d like to see this woman now, if you don’t mind.”

The sheriff accompanied him out to the reception room and handed him into Lilith’s care. Charles followed her up the stairs and broke the uncomfortable silence as she opened the door for him. “Aren’t you going to check me for dangerous weapons?”

Her expression was insulting, only because it obviously never occurred to her that he would know the barrel of a gun from its butt end. The deputy hung back by the door at the end of the cell block as he walked down the narrow corridor.

He had been prepared to see Mallory languishing in a cold impersonal cell; he had never imagined anything like this. On one wall was the print of a quaint landscape in a gilded frame, and a braided rug sat at the foot of a stuffed armchair. Her bed was decked with a colorful patchwork quilt, and fresh violets sat in a mason jar on a small chest of drawers. But for the iron bars of door and window, it was all rather charming.

How she must hate this.

Her own tastes ran to stark simplicity in her surroundings and superb tailoring in the blazers she wore with her blue jeans. That gingham dress must be humiliating. But when she looked up at him, she was only angry.

He stood with his back to Lilith Beaudare, his body blocking her sight of Mallory. “Augusta Trebec has asked me to ascertain whether or not you’re the legal heir of Cass Shelley.” His hands said, “I only want to help. Tell me what I can do for you.”

“Go away,” Mallory said. And then her hands said, “Go away.”

“I’d appreciate it if you’d at least hear me out.” He restricted his sign language to finger spelling to conceal the movements from the deputy at his back. “Let me call Riker or Jack Coffey. They can do something.”

“No,” she said, and “No way,” said her hands and her angry face. “Are you nuts? They’re both cops.”

“But, you’re a cop.” Or was she? Though she had neglected to do the proper paperwork for separating from the police department, she had left her badge behind in New York City, along with the police-issue.38 revolver. She had always preferred to carry her own personal weapon, the cannon of a gun that so intrigued the sheriff. If she was not a cop anymore, then what was she?

The term “rogue” came to mind. The word suited her on so many levels.

“Just go away and leave me alone,” she said.

“No, I won’t leave you sitting in a jail cell.”

“I won’t be here for long. Go away.”

Aloud, he said, “I could hire an attorney for you.”

“I don’t need one. Get out,” she said, rising, walking to the bars. “They can’t prove motive. But I think the sheriff might be working on that. He’s smart. Don’t underestimate him. I don’t.”

“Well, that’s high praise, coming from you.” He handed her the garage bill for an oil change and the warranty on his car’s new transmission. “This is the paperwork on your estate. It’s an affidavit of inheritance. Will you please read through it and sign it?”

She put the papers down the front of her dress to free her hands for speech. “You have to go now. You can’t help me. Everything will go sour if you stay in Dayborn.”

He knew what she meant. Mallory was predicting that he would botch every attempt at deception with the inexperience of an honest man. So she didn’t trust him to do anything base or even remotely shady, but he was not offended by her confidence in his good character.

“I just put a lie past the sheriff,” he signed hopefully, offering this act of gross wrongdoing as a sign of improvement.

Mallory winced, going beyond mere skepticism to near pain. She was probably wondering how much damage he had already done.

She handed the papers back to him. “I’ve read it, okay? Now get out!” She brought her face closer to the bars, her hands extending through them to touch his own hand, and then she signed, “You haven’t asked me if I killed that man.”

In her expression, there was the slight suggestion that she might have done it. Perhaps it was that unwholesome smile of hers. And now there was a question in her eyes.

One would not say of Mallory, she couldn’t possibly do murder. However, because he took his friendships so seriously, if she had set fire to a school bus full of nuns and orphans and pushed it off a cliff, he would have assumed that she was merely having a bad day.

Charles was leaving the municipal building when he saw the woman emerge from the alley and stop a few feet from the stone steps. Her hair was what he noticed first. It was a black dye job gone awry and turned to purple in the highlights. The thin middle-aged woman revolved slowly, eyes wide with confusion, looking now to heaven for some sign to point her in the right direction. There was time to note that her slip hung below the hem of a dress that needed washing; that her face was wet with tears and deep etched with agony lines. Her mouth hung open in an eerie prelude to a scream as she bolted to the far side of the square.

A tall stocky woman, wearing an apron and carrying a covered tray, appeared on the steps of the municipal building beside Charles.

“Alma!” she called out to the running woman, but the purple-haired Alma never looked back. The stocky woman shrugged and carried her tray across the square to Jane’s Cafe, where Darlene had gone with Ira.

Charles turned back to the alley in time to see Henry Roth emerge. The mute was smiling at the running woman’s back, as though pleased with some handiwork of his own. Charles had the feeling of something gone terribly wrong with the universe today. In the face of that woman’s extreme distress, Henry Roth’s smile was unnerving. This was simply not in the artist’s character, or what Charles had surmised of it.

Henry discreetly signed his farewell to Charles and walked off in the direction of his truck. And now it was the sculptor’s back that was marked. His departure was followed by the eyes of the man on the bench, the one who so resembled the late Babe Laurie. This man now turned his gaze back to Charles, and with only a nod, he renewed his invitation to sit down and pass the time.

But something was different. The man’s aspect had altered. Now the eyes were far from serene; they were alive with light. He wore the winning smile of a wild and handsome child. A lock of hair strayed over one eye, and he grinned to say he had a card trick Charles might like to see, or a secret he might want to know. Come to me, said the disarming face of a charming, barefoot boy of ten. We’ve got games to play, places to go.

So compelling was this silent call, Charles was made young again, and he was moving slowly toward the bench.

Then he stopped, as though he had met with a wall.

This was no shoeless, artless boy, but a grown man with heavy boots and an agenda involving subterfuge. Here was a polished actor with at least two personas.

Charles thought he had done well against the sheriff, but elected not to press his luck with a man who made an art form out of guile. So he nodded an acknowledgment, shrugged his apology, and turned toward Jane’s Cafe.