“Privileged,” she said, keeping her voice as polite and cool as possible.

“Privilege is for lawyers, priests, and doctors,” one of the homicide cops said.

“I work for one.”

“Which one?”

“A lawyer, for Christ’s sake. Do you think I had my gun drawn because I was attempting to convert Devon Whittaker to Catholicism?”

The Philadelphia cops enjoyed her sense of humor about as much as the Baltimore cops did. But given that they had one, maybe two less homicides to solve because of Tess, they grudgingly relaxed their hard-ass routine. So she unbent, too, telling them enough to seem almost co-operative.

“I came to see Devon Whittaker because phone logs indicated she had been one of the last people to speak to a woman connected to a case.” All true, and straightforward. Trying to explain Gwen Schiller, the Jane Doe murder, Henry Dembrow’s sudden demise, and her whole family history wouldn’t have shed any more light on the matter.

They seemed somewhat mollified, but they didn’t let her go. Left alone with her own thoughts-always a dangerous combination-Tess puzzled over the day’s events. Had she been followed? No, she would have noticed a two-hour tail, she was sure of that. From eavesdropping on the cops, she knew Hilde had been dead for a while by the time they entered the apartment. At least, she thought that was what was meant by lividity. Maybe she just couldn’t bear to believe that Hilde had been shot even as she sat outside, waiting for Devon to come home from her classes.

Tess had been sitting with her left leg curled beneath her, and it had gone to sleep, all pins and needles. She stood up and stomped Frankenstein-style around the room, not caring if this made for a comic show for the cops on the other side of the one-way glass. She wondered if she was going to have to tell them more before they let her go. She had called Tyner, and he was sending a friend, a local attorney. They had agreed this would be quicker than waiting for him to head up I- 95 in his van. Besides, Tyner and Kitty had tickets to the opera that night. Tosca.

“I find Puccini the most sensual of all the composers,” he had told Tess. “As I told Kitty in bed last night-”

Tess had told Tyner she really didn’t need to know where he and Kitty had their conversations, or if they were vertical or horizontial at the time. Really, Tyner was such an adolescent. He wanted the whole world to know that he was in love and, better yet, having sex. To Tess, this fell into the same category as the President’s sex life, Bob Dole’s Viagara habit, and Larry King’s insistence on procreating well into Methuselah-hood. It was beyond too much information, it was instant Ipecac.

But she couldn’t help noticing that Tyner’s friend, when she finally arrived, was a striking woman in her fifties, with dark hair slicked back in what Tess thought of as a Mexican movie star bun. Very Delores del Rio, even if her name was decidedly unexotic: Ellen Cade.

“I work for one of the big boy firms here,” she told Tess, offering a soft, cool hand.

“Criminal law?” Tess asked her.

“Constitutional. But I know enough to get by. Besides, it was my impression that you’re not going to be charged with a crime. You just want to know how much you have to tell these guys, if you can claim privilege as a contractual employee of an attorney.”

“Something like that.”

“Let me play devil’s advocate: Why not tell them everything?”

Tess thought about this. She was, by nature, a wary person, stingy with what she knew and suspicious of anyone in authority. It didn’t help that she wasn’t sure what she knew, and if it had any bearing on what had happened today. But a woman had been killed, and Tess was not inclined to solve the crime herself, so perhaps she should cooperate a little.

“I’m investigating…I’m not sure what I’m investigating. A girl was murdered in Baltimore a year ago. Her killer died in prison. There are some loose ends around the case, and I’m looking into those for the killer’s sister. The dead girl called Devon Whittaker the day before she died-a fact that Devon hid from me when I talked to her earlier this month. I came back today to find out why.”

Ellen Cade ran her hands across her head, smoothing her already smooth hair. “The police think Devon was being targeted for a kidnapping. Her family’s rich, and quite prominent. She made an attractive target, living off campus, with so few people around her.”

“Then why fire at her from the apartment? The gunshots are on the 911 tape and they know from looking at my gun that it wasn’t fired today. Why kill Hilde?”

Ellen Cade’s shrug was as throwaway elegant as the rest of her. These were not flesh-and-blood people to her, just names in a theoretical case one might study in law school. “If you want to go argue with the police, feel free. But in my opinion, our strategy should be all or nothing. You can’t tell them just what you feel like telling them. You want to say what you know is privileged, I’ll back you up on that. If you want to talk to them, I’ll stay with you, make sure you don’t incriminate yourself in any way.”

“What I really need is to speak to Devon.”

“When you’re a Whittaker, and the potential victim in a crime, the Philadelphia police don’t keep you all night. She was on her way out when I came in-her parents on one side, the family lawyer on the other.”

“Do you know how I can find them?”

Ellen Cade’s eyes were a dark, rich brown, the color of good milk chocolate, yet devoid of warmth. “I’m not here to broker your dealings with the Whittakers. I’m the go-between for you and the Philadelphia Police Department. The way I see it, you could be out of here in an hour, or you could stay considerably longer. Which do you choose?”

“Where do the Whittakers live? The Main Line, right?”

“Short or long?”

Tess sighed. “Short. I have nothing to say to them. Everything I know is privileged.”

“Good girl. I hope you understand I am billing you for my services. Tyner and I ended on friendly terms-but not such friendly terms that I give it away. The way I see it, I gave quite enough while we were dating.”

Great, another factoid about Tyner’s sex life. This day kept getting better and better.

Ellen Cade overrated her abilities. Two hours passed before the Philadelphia cops sent Tess off into what was now night. Tess would have liked to crawl into the back of her Toyota and sleep, but that wasn’t an option. Instead, she dialed Whitney’s house. Not the guest cottage, but the main house.

“Tesser!” Mrs. Talbot’s voice was mellow with tiny cracks in it, like good whisky being poured over ice. “We’re just sitting down to dinner. But Whitney’s at a holiday party held by one of her classmates from Roland Park Country Day.”

“That’s okay, Mrs. Talbot. I really wanted to talk to you.”

“To me?” She sounded at once surprised and flattered.

Tess paused, trying to think of a polite way to ask Mrs. Talbot if she knew the Whittakers of Philadelphia. It would sound as if she assumed all rich, blueblood types knew one another. Which was exactly what she assumed.

“Mrs. Talbot, is your family in the Social Register?”

“Tess, you know I’ve never cared about such things.”

That would be a yes. “Does the Social Register include addresses?”

“Yes, winter and summer. And the yachts, sometimes, if the family uses one.” If there was any irony in Mrs. Talbot’s voice, Tess missed it. “Why do you ask? Certainly, you know where we live.”

“I’m trying to find a home address for the Whittakers of Philadelphia. They’re not in the phone book.”

“Which Philadelphia Whittakers? There are several.”

“The parents of Devon Whittaker.”

“I may have the Philadelphia book around. It’s an excellent resource for fund-raising, and you know how many committees I serve on.”