And now Officer Adkins was here to threaten him. Murphy sucked at his nicotine and sipped at his coffee and waited. As for Adkins, he finally gave in and settled into the other chair with more noise than a cavalry horse stopping from a dead run.

"You guys find anything out about it?" Murphy asked.

"The investigation is proceeding."

Well, that line hadn't changed since Jack Webb. It still meant they hadn't learned anything. After yesterday, Murphy wasn't surprised.

"I wanted to see if you might have remembered anything else about the shooting," Adkins said, pulling out a suspiciously clean notebook and flipping pages. "Any little thing, even something you might not have considered important."

Taking another hit of nicotine, Murphy shook his head. "Nope."

Adkins squinted hard, his jaw working. "You've been thinking about it?"

"Hard not to."

"You've been asking questions around town."

"Only to finish the piece I'd started on the benefit. The horses got two hundred words, the shooter got fifty. I think that's about fair, don't you?"

"You think this is all pretty funny, do you?"

Murphy shrugged. "At least I have some kind of reaction. I haven't heard anybody else in town even mention it."

"And you don't have anything else you want to tell me."

Murphy was thoroughly enjoying the officer's consternation. "No. Have you talked to that nurse who was there? Timmie Leary?"

"No. Why?"

"I just saw the guy. She damn near shared tonsils with him."

"And you don't have any thoughts about the incident at all?"

"Well, I'll tell you one thing," he said, balancing his coffee mug on his stomach as he leaned back even farther to stretch his feet out on the table. "I'm glad I'm not a conspiracy theorist. A good conspiracy theorist would figure that since nobody in town wants to talk about what happened, something nefarious must be going on you're all afraid of being found out."

Adkins twitched and then straightened, obviously going back to intimidation as an interview tool. "And you?" he asked. "Are you a conspiracy theorist?"

Murphy gave him wide eyes. "Me? Oh yeah, sure. I think Elvis was behind Kennedy's assassination and that the United Nations is going to invade Utah by reading the road signs backward." He shook his head. "Conspiracy theories are too exhausting, Officer. And that's not what I came to this town looking for."

"What did you come here for?"

Murphy lit a second cigarette from his first. "You want the truth? Peace and quiet. I was looking for a little R and R. Be a hell of a lot easier to do without people shooting at me, though. And then, on top of that, I hear the most disturbing thing yesterday. Can you believe it? I was told that the death rate has been skyrocketing around here... well, increasing, anyway. It's way up from last year." Murphy paused for another sip of coffee. "You got any ideas on why that's happening, Officer Adkins?"

Murphy knew damn well he was going to regret dicking around with this guy. But he'd never been able to resist the temptation to turn the tables on a bad interrogator. And Adkins was a bad interrogator.

So Murphy flashed him a big smile. "More coffee?"

Adkins sat so stiffly he damn near snapped the handle off the mug. His left eye was twitching, pulling at the acne scars on his cheeks so that they seemed to breathe. Murphy, knowing perfectly well where this was going, just sat back and watched.

Adkins fidgeted. He doodled as if he were writing down thoughts. He glared. And finally, just as Murphy knew he would, he edged up to his purpose with the hesitation of a man asking for his first paid blow job.

"You want to tell me why you're really here?" Adkins asked. "Award-winning guy like you?"

So there it was. It wasn't what Murphy had seen that had the officer here. It was what Murphy might have found out. Murphy and his reputation Sherilee so loved to trumpet around. Murphy and his goddamned, world-famous Pulitzer Prizes.

It didn't seem to matter to anybody that the last of those prizes was at least ten years old. Pulitzers, it seemed, were forever. Kind of like diamonds. Or herpes.

There was something going on in this town. Adkins knew it and Murphy knew it. And whatever it was, it almost certainly revolved around one of three things. Money or power. Money and power. Money and power and sex. Whatever it was, the people protecting it didn't want Murphy to find out. And Murphy wasn't going to be able to convince them that he didn't, either.

"Why am I here?" he asked, grinding out his second cigarette. "Got no place else to go. I burned my bridges at real newspapers a long time ago, but newspapers are the only thing I do. So when I got out of lockup this time, I accepted Sherilee's invitation to write about wine festivals and river towns."

"Lockup?"

"Rehab. Drying out. Straightening up. I am a twelve-step poster child who just wants to write about garden clubs and not be bothered by anybody."

"Then why all the questions?"

Murphy grinned like a co-conspirator. "How long you been a cop, Adkins?"

"Ten years."

Murphy nodded. "After you retire, how long do you think it'll take for you to stop checking plates and scanning crowds?" He threw off one of his more self-effacing smiles. "I'm not out of the habit yet."

Adkins teetered for a long time before falling for the reassurance. Finally he set the coffee cup down and lifted the manila envelope. "Could you tell me if you recognize any of these people, sir?"

Murphy put his feet down and righted his chair. "Happy to."

Adkins pulled out five photos. Black-and-white professional head shots, like for corporate advertising. White, upscale, silver-streaked middle-aged men. Respectable-looking. Forceful. Composed. Out of work, Murphy figured, and wondered which one of them was the father of Sherilee's best friend.

"Nope," he finally said, considering each of them. "I'm afraid not. I don't suppose you want to tell me who they are."

"I'm sorry," Adkins said. "No."

"Yeah, that's what I thought."

Gathering the photos back up, Adkins took a moment to consider Murphy in silence. "Since you don't want to be bothered anyway, I guess it's safe to assume that you won't be pursuing this matter on your own."

"Not likely. Sherilee has me on a pretty tight schedule. I'd be happy to help with a composite if you want, though."

Adkins nodded, and creaked and jingled his way to his feet. "Thank you for your time. And please call me if you remember anything. Anything at all."

Murphy followed him up, hearing his own creaks much too loudly. "I certainly will. And good luck. Puckett's too nice a town for problems like this."

He held out his hand. Adkins took it, but only so he could rotate the grip to get his hand on top. That kind of cop. Murphy let him. He might as well let him think he was big dog. God knows Murphy wasn't going to convince Adkins that he didn't want to know what had Adkins so nervous. What, evidently, had the town fathers so nervous. What they were so anxious to protect that they'd sent Adkins out here with veiled threats and questions.

"Yeah. Well, call me if you need anything."

"I will."

"And remember," Adkins advised portentously as he once again took hold of his utility belt. "Leave the questions to us."