“Yes. How did Gus know that Jack Corrigan would be at Katy Ducane’s birthday party?”

“He said that she’d invite him because he was her uncle, and he thought that was funny, too, so I figured he was one of her mother’s lovers or something. And Gus had a couple of people watching a bar or two that he might show up in- if Corrigan did, they were supposed to call somebody else, and they would come and get us and we’d try the same thing at the bar. But Gus was pretty sure of the party, so he got an invite from someone, and Bo carried that in.”

“Did Gus know Rose Hannon, the nursemaid?” Frank asked.

“Not her,” she said. “I think he had dated that other one-the one that had the night off. I don’t like saying that, because it makes her sound bad, like she lied. But I don’t blame her for not figuring it out. Gus knew that sooner or later, the boss wanted him inside the Ducane place, so months before all this happened, Gus was trying to chat up that housekeeper. He took her out once. But she decided she didn’t like him, and he didn’t get her keys off her, like he wanted-I remember that made him mad. But he learned where the baby slept and where the nurse’s rooms were, and all of that.”

She halted for a moment, briefly losing her composure. Brennan asked her if she wanted to stop, but she shook her head, brushed away tears, and said, “I never-not in a million years-thought he was doing anything but getting set to rob the place. I swear that’s true. But I should have known, I guess. Somehow I should have known.”

Frank and the D.A. asked a few more questions, and it was agreed that Mr. Brennan would come with her to police headquarters the next day so that she could look through some mug shots to help identify other people who might have connections with Yeager.

“I hope I helped,” she said. “Did I?”

We all assured her that she did.

I wanted to talk to Frank, but that wasn’t going to work out with the lieutenant and the captain there, so we just said a quick, “See you at home,” and parted company. I could see that Hailey was anxious to talk to me, so as soon we were away from the others I said, “You’d better run if you’re going to get this in before drop-dead deadline. And before you get any big ideas, we need to make sure we don’t use Yeager’s name in a way that will get us sued. We may need to bring the company lawyers in on this one.”

“Irene-I’m really worried.”

“About the paper being sued? We’re threatened with it all the time.”

“No-”

“You’ll make deadline. I have faith.”

“No! Not the paper. I’m worried about Ethan.”

“Me, too. But now’s not-”

“Then you know?”

“Know what?”

“He was going to go over to Mitch Yeager’s house.”

64

“T ELL ME,” I ORDERED HER, WISHING FRANK HADN’T JUST LEFT WITH HIS bosses.

“I felt a little bad about what I had said. I saw him leave the building tonight, and I followed him out to this bar-” “Oh hell.”

“He didn’t go in. He kind of hung around outside it, then he walked down the street to this coffee place some of us hang out at sometimes-you know, people who were in J-school together. Anyway, I could see he was upset. He was calling someone on his cell phone, so I didn’t come too near him at first. I wanted to give him some privacy.”

“What happened?”

“He saw me and waved me over, said he had just been talking to his sponsor.” She blushed. “I thought he meant he had some kind of deal, you know, like an athlete with a shoe company. Then he told me it was a friend from AA. Anyway, I tried talking to him, because I could see he was still really bugged by what I had said to him. Things were going okay, he was cool-but then I don’t know, we got into it again. My fault, I guess. He was mad at me for saying we couldn’t do any good. He said, you know, ‘Then why show up for work at a newspaper, why tell anybody anything if nobody really cares…’”

“How did this lead to Mitch Yeager’s house?”

“He said that the only thing anyone needed to do was get DNA from Mitch Yeager.”

“And you told him that was a job for the police, right?”

She looked away, then said, “God, this is all my fault.”

“You can enjoy your guilt trip later, Hailey. What the hell happened?”

“I was, like, ‘Oh sure, just call him up and ask him for his toothbrush.’ He asked if I had Yeager’s phone number. I did. I had looked it up a few weeks ago, to try to get a comment from him for a story.”

“You’re telling me Yeager answered the phone and told him to come on over?”

“Ethan was awesome. He called and whoever answered said Mr. Yeager was with guests-some kind of party he’s having tonight. Ethan says, ‘Yes, I know, I’m supposed to be there now. Please ask Mr. Yeager to come to the phone. Tell him it’s Mr. Harmon from Eden Supply.’”

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph…”

“Yeager comes on and Ethan apologizes for getting him to the phone in that way, and quickly gives Yeager this story about how he-Ethan, I mean- was your worst enemy, and everyone on the Express hated Ethan because of what he had done, and how it made him feel sympathy for Yeager, because the Express was so unfair to both of them. If he could stay on staff, he’d try to tell some of these stories about Las Piernas’s past from a perspective Irene Kelly might not like, but he needed a really good interview to do that, and he was hoping Mr. Yeager would grant him that favor.”

“Yeager fell for that?”

“No. But then he kept him on the phone somehow, hinting around about a bunch of stuff, and ended up saying, well, okay, he probably wasn’t going to be able to continue to be a reporter, so he’d have to look for some other way to support himself. Which was too bad, because he was good at interviews and learned things that other people might not know. And oh-that reminded him that Bennie Lee Harmon said Eden Supply was a good company, and that Bennie Lee would give Ethan a reference if Ethan ever contacted his boss. Yeager told him that maybe something could be arranged, but he was entertaining some people this evening.”

“And that was that?” I said, hoping against hope.

“No, Ethan said matters were a little rushed, so Yeager said to come over at eleven, they could talk then.”

“Oh, shit…” I looked at my watch. It was eight-thirty. Still plenty of time to talk Ethan out of this.

“At first I thought he had faked the whole phone call,” she said. “I didn’t believe him-told him Yeager’s butler probably hung up on him two seconds into the call, and I was just hearing more bullshit from him. Ethan got really mad. He said fine, he’d tape-record the whole interview, and he’d get DNA from Yeager if he had to reach across the desk and stab him with his pen to do it.”

I resisted my own impulse to do the same to her. “Where is he now?”

“I’m not sure, but I think he’s at his place.”

“Do you know Ethan’s home phone number?”

“Not by heart, but it’s listed. I’ve got his cell number.”

“Okay, I’ll call information, you call the cell phone. If you reach him, hand the phone over. If you don’t, leave my cell number on his voice mail and tell him it’s urgent-that he must talk to me before he sees Yeager. Tell him it’s seriously a matter of life and death.”

She called. As I was reaching information, she got voice mail. She left a message. I could hear in her voice that she thought the life-and-death bit was overly dramatic.

I got Ethan’s number and asked if there was an address listed as well. “Oh yes,” the operator said, and gave it to me.

Oh hell, I thought, as I wrote it down.

I called. He answered. That in and of itself nearly made me speechless with relief. Nearly. “Ethan? Irene. Do you want to keep working at the Express?”

“Hailey is such a little-”

“Never mind that, and it really doesn’t matter who told me. You and I must talk face-to-face this evening. Immediately. No choice-you understand?”