“That’s true,” I said. “A lot of people have trouble digesting it.”

“But turkey’s so bland.”

I wanted to say “that’s why we put gravy on it,” but I held my tongue.

“Maybe I should have both.”

“That’s an excellent idea,” I said. “That should keep both parties happy.”

“Not the vegetarians,” she said. “But I’ll worry about them later. Oh, by the way—do you really want an Xbox for Christmas?”

“No,” I said. “I can’t say that I do, and Michael and I agreed that we don’t want the boys exposed to video games this young.”

“I thought as much,” she said. “So I told Jamie that I couldn’t help him buy you one for Christmas.”

With that she hung up.

Should I warn Michael that Jamie was trying to do an end run around him on the present-buying front?

No time. Mother and Eustace were waiting to ask me something. And one of Randall Shiffley’s cousins was standing behind them. And Vermillion was peeking through the railings from the upstairs landing as if waiting for a time to get my attention.

I took care of Randall’s cousin first, because he appeared to be in the middle of doing actual physical labor. Not that I didn’t think what the designers did was work, but as a blacksmith I suppose I was ever-so-slightly more sympathetic to work that produced sweat. Then I had to listen to Mother and Eustace explain something that they felt was essential to do to smooth the flow between their two areas. After twenty minutes I finally interrupted them.

“Let’s cut to the chase—does this involve knocking down any load-bearing walls or otherwise threatening the structural integrity of the house.”

“Of course not, dear.”

“Will what you’re doing intrude on or inconvenience any of the other decorators?”

“Of course not, dear. You see, all we really want to do is put a little bit of crown molding right here—”

“Do you need any supplies or workman other than what Randall has already provided?”

“No, dear.” Mother was starting to look a little provoked.

“Then make it so,” I said. “I approve with all my heart.”

As I strode back toward the hall, I heard Mother murmur softly to Eustace. “Clearly not quite herself again.”

I climbed upstairs—noting, to my satisfaction, that the chief had finished with Sarah and was interviewing Ivy. Her tiny, brown-clad body looked oddly out of place against the rich red velvet of Sarah’s armchair.

Upstairs, I found Vermillion wanted me to solve a dispute over what color to paint the door between her room and Martha’s bathroom. Vermillion had painted her side glossy black, to match everything else in her room. But when the door opened, it looked like a blob of ink against the white tile, white walls, white shower curtain, and white towels of Martha’s spa décor. Martha, of course, wanted to paint it white.

“The door will be open most of the time, which means it will be in my room,” Martha said, tapping her paintbrush against the lid of the can of Benjamin Moore “White Dove” that she was holding.

“But when it’s closed, it will look as if a polar bear has landed in my room,” Vermillion wailed.

We went back and forth about that for half an hour or so. Neither of them would budge an inch.

Suddenly inspiration came.

I pulled out my phone.

“Randall,” I said. “Can you come up to the back bathroom?”

“On my way.”

When Randall arrived, I let him watch Martha and Vermillion going at it for a couple of minutes, just so he could see what we were dealing with. He glanced at me uneasily. Settling catfights between the designers was supposed to be my job.

“Ladies!” I shouted.

They both subsided reluctantly and glowered at me.

“Randall, you see the problem.”

He nodded, and looked a little wild-eyed, as if trying to beg me to leave him out of it.

“Can you build us a door that will solve this problem?”

“A door that looks white when it’s in one room and black in the other?”

“One of those doors that disappears into the wall when it’s open instead of swinging one way or the other.”

“A pocket door.” Randall and Martha said it in unison.

“Yes,” Vermillion said. “That would work.”

“I’ll get right on it,” Randall said. “You ladies hold on to your paint cans for a little while. Help is on the way.”

I fled the room, and he followed.

“Ingenious,” he said. “Of course, it’ll cost money.”

“I will gladly pay for it myself if it shuts them up,” I said.

“On the contrary, it will be my treat, on account of you took this job and kept me from having to deal with all of them.”

“Of course, even once the pocket door is in, they won’t get along,” I said. “They’ll each complain that every time the door opens, the other one’s room will spoil the look of their own.”

“Then I’ll nail the damned door shut if that’s what it takes,” Randall said. We had reached the top of the stairway, right outside the door to Clay’s room. Both of us couldn’t help staring at the door for a few minutes.

“Puts it all in perspective, doesn’t it?” Randall said.

I nodded.

He went downstairs, and I pulled out my notebook to see what other tasks awaited me.

Sammy came up to fetch Vermillion for her interview. As they went downstairs together, Martha came out into the hallway and started after Vermillion.

I decided that if she made another complaint about Vermillion, I’d tell Randall to forget the pocket door and paint the whole damned door black.

But she stopped beside me.

“Why’s he spending so much time interviewing us?” Martha said.

I suspected this was a rhetorical question rather than a real one.

“Because all of us had access to the crime scene,” I said. “And some of us could have a motive to kill Clay, and any of us could have seen something that would give him a clue to who did it.”

“And they took all our fingerprints,” she said. “Took me forever to wash that nasty stuff off. Even those of us with alibis.”

“For exclusionary purposes,” I said. “I expect all of us have been in Clay’s room at one time or another, touching stuff. They need to identify our fingerprints so they’ll know if there are any outsiders’ fingerprints in there.”

“Well, that makes sense,” she said. Her tone implied that few other things the police were doing did. “And I suppose the police will have a better idea who might have done it once they trace the gun.”

“First they’ll have to find the gun,” I said.

“What do you mean, find the gun?” she asked. “Haven’t they searched Clay’s room?”

“Yes, but apparently the killer took the gun with him.”

“Took it with him? Are you sure?”

“Reasonably sure,” I said. “I was there, remember?”

“Sorry,” she said. “Yes, you should know. Well, that stinks.”

“Why?”

“Means the gun is still out there somewhere,” she said. “On the loose.”

“Yes,” I said. “Just like the killer.” Was it just me or was it weird for her to be more focused on the missing gun than the missing killer?

“I felt a lot better thinking the police had the damned gun.”

Did she think it was the only gun in the state of Virginia?

“Great,” she went on. “We’re stuck here in this house, sitting ducks, with an armed killer on the loose—maybe even among us.”

“Well, that’s why the chief is checking out everyone in the house pretty carefully,” I said. “And what makes you think the killer was after anyone other than Clay?”

“Till we know why he killed Clay, we don’t know that he isn’t. Maybe we should ask for police protection.”

I reminded myself, not for the first time, that Martha was a bit of a drama queen.

“I’ll let you take that up with the chief,” I said. “I just plan to be careful until the police catch the killer.”

“With any luck, that will be soon,” she said. “He must be a pretty stupid killer, taking the gun with him like that. If the police catch him with it, that will pretty much prove he’s the one, won’t it?”