“I was hoping you might have some ideas on that subject. Aunt Elsie and I are trying to dig up some new leads, looking for something-anything-to persuade the police to reopen the case.”

“But I don’t know anything about it!” she screeched. “I can’t even believe it’s true!”

“Yes, but there’s a good chance it is true,” I said. “And since Judy always told you everything, you probably know more about it than you think. For instance, have you ever seen this picture before?” I slipped the snapshot out from under my checkbook and handed it to Vicki. “Do you know the name of the man in the photo?”

Vicki gaped at the picture for a second or two, then handed it back to me. “Yes, I do!” she proudly announced. “That’s Jimmy. Jimmy Burgerham, or Hamburger, or-oh, I can’t remember his last name! He was Judy’s boyfriend for a while. The dog’s name is Otto. He’s a miniature dachshund and Jimmy takes him everywhere. He brought Otto up here once, hidden in a shopping bag, just to get a laugh out of Judy. She adored that dog.”

“More than she adored Jimmy?”

“No! She was crazy about Jimmy, too… Hey, what’re you driving at? If you think Jimmy killed Judy, you’ve got another think coming. He really liked her, and it really tore him up when she stopped seeing him. He told me so himself.”

“She stopped seeing him?” This didn’t sound like the Judy Catcher I had come to know and love.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t because she didn’t dig him anymore. It was because he had so many other girlfriends besides her. One or two would have been okay, but Jimmy is addicted to women-especially new women-and Judy just couldn’t stand being crazy jealous all the time. Jimmy never had enough time for her. She broke up with him to keep herself from breaking down.”

“Do you have Jimmy’s address or phone number? I’d like to talk to him.”

“He lives down in the Village somewhere, but I don’t know which street. I don’t have his phone number either. You could probably find him at the Village Vanguard, though. That really cool jazz place down on Seventh Avenue? Judy said he goes there almost every night and sits at the bar sipping beer, flirting with the chicks, just waiting for the chance to get up on stage and read his poetry.”

“He writes poems?”

“Yeah. He’s pretty good, too. At least that’s what Judy said. I wouldn’t know. I read mysteries, not poetry.”

A girl after my own heart.

“Aunt Elsie said Judy was involved with another man right before her death,” I said. “An older man named Gregory Smith. Do you know anything about him?”

“Oh, sure. He was the greatest love of Judy’s life! She said he was her lord and savior. But what he was, really, was her substitute father-she always called him Daddy-o. Or sometimes just plain Daddy. He was… oh, no! Here comes my supervisor again! Please put that picture away before she sees it. If she catches on we’ve been having a personal conversation, she’ll demote me to Accessories, and it’s pure hell to work down there during the holidays.” She folded a flap of tissue paper over Abby’s present and put the top on the box. “That’ll be seven eighty-five, plus twenty-four cents tax, for a total of eight dollars and nine cents,” she said in a booming voice. “Please make the check payable to Macy’s.” She gave me a big salesgirl smile and handed me a ballpoint pen.

I stuffed the photo back inside my purse and made out the check. “Thank you so much for your help,” I bellowed. “My friend is going to love this gift.” Then I lowered my voice and murmured, “I need to ask you some more questions, Vicki. What time do you get off work? Can we meet somewhere to talk?”

“Okay,” she whispered. “But I don’t get off till nine.”

I flipped a coin in my brain. Heads, I would stay to meet Vicki. Tails, I’d go home to meet Dan. It came up tails. Like I said, sometimes I’m lucky.

“Sorry, Vicki, I can’t wait till then. I have a previous engagement. But maybe you’ll give me your phone number, so I can call you later?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess that would be all right,” she said, looking kind of confused. “It’s Gramercy 4- 2244.” She wrote the number down on the back of my sales slip. “But make sure you call me before eleven or my mother will have a conniption.”

“Before eleven,” I said, nodding agreement. I gathered up all my stuff and put on my gloves. “Thanks again for your help.”

Giving Vicki a quick but significant salute, I turned and sprinted for the elevator. The perky carolers had launched into yet another Yuletide favorite, and I wanted to get out of there-fast. Instead of chestnuts roasting on an open fire, I was hot to have Jack Frost (okay, Dan Street) take a nip at my nose.

Chapter 9

DID YOU EVER HAVE THE FEELING THAT your life has a life all its own; that the most momentous occurrences of your pitiful earthly existence actually have very little-if anything-to do with you? Well, that’s the way it was for me that night, at thirty minutes after eight, on December 21, 1954, when I lugged my cold and hungry body up the stairs to the landing outside my apartment and started fumbling through my keys, looking for the one that would allow me to open my thoroughly inviting-but securely locked-front door.

All I wanted to do was go inside, check to see that the diamonds were still there, cram a few crackers in my mouth, guzzle a cup of hot cocoa, smoke a cigarette or two, fix my makeup, spritz on some Shalimar, and relax for a minute before Dan arrived. Not so much to ask for, right?

I’d have done better to ask for the moon.

Before I could even fit my key in the lock, Abby’s door banged open and she swooped like a vampire into the hall, the wide sleeves of her white painter’s smock flapping like the wings of an albino bat. “Where the holy hell have you been?” she shrieked, grabbing hold of my shoulder and pulling me around to face her. “You’re so late the Mai Tais are all gone! Now I’ll have to fix you a plain old rum and Coke!” Her bright red lips were pouting, her dark brown eyes were blazing, and her long black hair was loose and swirling around her head like a storm cloud.

I was unnerved by her troubled demeanor. “What’s the matter, Abby? There’s no reason for you to be so upset. It’s too cold for Mai Tais anyway. This is hot toddy weather.”

“That’s not the point!” she screeched, stamping one fuzzy pink slipper-clad foot on the bare wood floor of the landing. “The point is why are you so late? Where the hell have you been? We’ve both been going meshugge. We were worried about you!”

“We?” I said. “Who is we? Did Dan get here already, or is Tony the baker still here from last night, charming your pants off with his trick snake?”

“Hardeeharhar,” Abby said, relaxing her shoulders a bit, but refusing to smile. “You’re wrong on both counts. And I wouldn’t be making jokes if I were you. There’s nothing funny about murder.”

Now I was as upset as she was. “What murder are you talking about? And who are you talking about? Do you have somebody in your apartment? And, if so, who the hell is it?” I was too exhausted (okay, exasperated) to keep playing her little guessing game.

“Come see for yourself,” she said, turning aside and bowing low, gesturing with one sweeping, outflung arm for me to enter her mysterious domain.

I gave Abby a snotty look, then took a deep breath and stepped inside. I didn’t know what to expect, but I can truthfully say (and you should trust me on this), that if I’d walked in to find Vice President Richard Nixon himself lolling on Abby’s little red loveseat in a complete state of undress, it wouldn’t have surprised me in the least.

It wasn’t Richard Nixon, though. It was Terry Catcher, and I was shocked right down to my snowboots.

He wasn’t undressed, I’m happy to report, but he was lolling (well, sleeping, I guess I should say), on his back, on the love seat, with his lower legs hanging over the armrest like two large salamis strung from a delicatessen ceiling. One arm was folded over his chest, and the other was dangling over the edge of the tiny couch, fingertips grazing the floor.