A phone call this late at night wasn’t likely to be a casual “hi” or a quick chat to set up a lunch date. Or Cindy at Cooper’s in Benicia calling to tell me the miniature armoire and new brand of glue I’d ordered had come in. I’d already returned Richard and Mary Lou’s call. Who else was left?

I recognized Skip’s cell phone number, then his voice.

“Remember I told you I’d have more evidence soon?” he said. “Well, that’s what the meeting was about this afternoon. So, now I really need to see Rosie, and if you really don’t know where she is, I’ll have to put out a warrant to bring her in for questioning.”

My heart skipped. “What’s the new evidence, Skip?” “What does it matter?”

“Skip?”

He let out a loud sigh. “It’s about the glue.”

“The glue?” Was this, after all, a call from Cooper’s?

“We believe that the glue Rosie used on the things in the little box matches the glue used… elsewhere.”

Things in the little box? When this case was closed, I’d have to give Skip a refresher course on miniaturists’ jargon. “Elsewhere? You mean at the crime scene?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

Something was off about my nephew’s communication skills tonight, but that conversation, too, would have to be put on hold. There were more pressing questions. “How in the world did you get that information so fast? You’re always reminding us how crime labs are understaffed and underfunded, how they don’t come up with results in a jiffy like on television or in crime fiction.”

“That’s absolutely true. Some of the fancy equipment you see doesn’t even exist, let alone in regular police labs. And the backlog is beyond anyone’s imagining.”

Uh-oh, I opened one of Skip’s favorite topics. I had to move fast. “So what happened here? It’s Sunday night, maybe forty-eight hours since David was murdered and you have a DNA match for glue?”

“Cute, Aunt Gerry. Glue DNA. But, hey, go figure. They train the lab rookies on weekends and this looked like a more interesting, quick little task than the other three hundred jobs in backup. That’s why it’s preliminary, but it’s enough to pick Rosie up for questioning. Now, do you or do you not know where she is?”

“I don’t, honestly. But…”

“But?”

I couldn’t take the chance that Rosie wouldn’t show up tomorrow afternoon as she promised. She wasn’t herself. “I know where she’ll be tomorrow,” I said. “And you probably do, too.”

“Why would I?”

“I assume you’re going to the memorial for David? I thought cops always went to memorial services, expecting the killer to show up. Or is that another myth like the modern crime lab with instant turnaround time?”

“The funeral’s not until Saturday.”

I told him about the special service on Monday, to give out-of-town classmates the chance to pay their respects.

“You’re going to earn a badge, yet,” Skip said.

“Not if it means working this late all the time.”

Chapter 13

What grandmother takes advantage of a little girl?

Much as the idea appealed to me, I stopped short of withholding breakfast from Maddie if she didn’t tell me what it was she’d held back from her uncle Skip.

“Remember, just before you fell asleep you told me you discovered something else while you were searching the Internet?”

Maddie grinned, sedately, since her mouth was full of a very bad sugarcoated cereal that Mary Lou would never buy. “I was going to use it later.”

“You mean to strike a better bargain?” I asked, working my tickling magic on her skinny torso at the same time.

My finger work had the desired effect. Maddie went to her room and came back with a sheaf of papers that looked like e-mail printouts. A quick look showed they were all from David Bridges, to various contractors and subcontractors. I recognized some of the same names that were on the material she’d given to Skip. I tried not to show my disappointment that what Maddie had kept from Skip, to give to me, was just more of the same, except that it was correspondence about the contract awards.

I asked my routine question of the whiz kid. “How did you get these?”

Maddie shrugged. Just another day in the life of a young detective. “It was part of what was there, like official correspondence for the awards, I guess. I figured if I gave some to you and some to Uncle Skip, we’d all be working together,” she said. “That’s the only reason I didn’t give everything to the same person.”

Awkwardly put, but on further thought, I realized Maddie wasn’t trying to get even with me for dumping her at a pool every chance I had since Friday; she wanted to be seen as helpful to all.

The family that investigates together, stays together?

“Thanks, sweetheart,” I said. “This is very useful.”

I pulled out of the Rutledge Center at eight in the morning, after dropping Maddie off for day camp. She was excited about what she was learning, but vague about the details.

“We’re making up games. You’d be bored,” she’d said.

By which I guessed she meant I wouldn’t get it, as I’d demonstrated all month. I shuddered to think what she’d be able to pull off with even more computer knowledge.

My cell phone rang, throwing me into confusion about how to access the call. I had a new Bluetooth contraption on my ear and could never remember the sequence of pushing buttons to answer a call.

It had taken three tries to find a design that fit and I still couldn’t use it with the abandon I saw young people using it. The robot-like units on their ears seemed to survive stretching over the counter for their lattes or bending to pick up a dropped set of keys, whereas I could barely move my neck and still keep it on. But “hands free” was the California driving and calling law and I was nothing if not law-abiding.

Most of the time.

I was pleased to hear Henry Baker’s voice, though any voice would have spelled my success at using the new technology.

“I hope I didn’t wake you up,” he said.

“Not at all. I’m downtown in my car.”

“I was thinking-why don’t I pick you up and we can go to David’s service together?” Henry said. “I don’t have grandfather duty today and it seems silly for us to drive separately.”

Which we’d been doing the last few decades, I thought. I liked the flexibility of having my own car, in case… well, in case something came up on The Case.

“It’s a great idea, but I have some errands to do before and after,” I said. Errands. The term I used on Maddie. Maybe I should think of another term for adults.

“Right,” Henry said, as if he didn’t believe me.

“Otherwise, I’d love to,” I said. “Some other time.”

He laughed. “Sure. Some other memorial service, okay?”

“I didn’t mean that.”

We hung up on cordial terms but I had the feeling I’d disappointed him. Too late I remembered that it was Henry who’d first mentioned that Rosie’s father was a subcontractor with Callahan and Savage. Maybe he knew more. I was sorry I’d missed an opportunity to talk to him about that.

And maybe other opportunities as well, but I was busy enough as it was.

On the way home I did the one legitimate errand I had for today and drove through the Lincoln Point Library book drop station. I’d checked out several history and English books to review for Lourdes’s use and I wanted to return the ones I thought were inappropriate for her current level. It gave me some measure of satisfaction that I was doing my unquestionable duty for my GED student, as opposed to the wild physical and mental meanderings I’d been involved in, in an effort to free my friend from suspicion of murder.

I always craned my neck when I passed Sadie’s Ice Cream Shop. Even at this hour of the morning, milk shakes beckoned. Milk was a breakfast food, was it not? Sadie’s looked dark, however, as on most days before ten o’clock. I considered stopping and looking in the window. I knew from previous experiences of these off-hours cravings that, if she or Colleen were working in the back, there was a chance I could rouse them and gain admittance.