"Maybe." Mary nodded vigorously. "It was a funeral. He wasn't in the best shape. None of us…" Her voice choked for the first time, her head bobbed back down. "None of us were."

"Mary, are you sure you want to stick with this story? That your best friend got loaded on her own. Drove home on her own. Mowed down an old pedestrian on her own."

"I'm telling you what I know to the best of my knowledge – "

"It's not what you said four weeks ago at the funeral."

"It is, too! Mr.Quincy got it all wrong! I don't know, maybe he's even more grief stricken than we thought so now he's grasping at straws and twisting what I said. Who knows what grief-crazed fathers do!"

"Grief-crazed?" Rainie echoed skeptically.

Mary finally flushed. She looked away. On her lap, however, her fingers were tangling and untangling furiously. Rainie figured it would be a miracle if they didn't end up with whiplash. Rainie took a deep breath. She nodded at Mary thoughtfully. She took her time and paced the room.

"Beautiful furniture," she commented.

Mary didn't say anything. She looked now as if she would cry.

"Must have cost your husband a lot of money."

"Mark inherited most of it," she murmured.

"Still makes quite an impression. Must have blown you away the first time you saw all this. Cinderella, entering the castle."

"Please, I'm telling you the truth about Mandy."

"Fine. All right, you're telling the truth. I haven't denied it. I mean, I wasn't around a year ago. How do I know what your best friend drank on your last night together? How do I know if she laughed honestly while playing cards with you, or if it was some kind of drunken stupor? Hey, I don't even know if she hugged you before she left, thanked you for a great evening and for keeping her busy on the long nights when she was doing her best not to drink. Quitting cold turkey is tough. I've been there. It's tough and good friends make all the difference."

Mary bowed her head again. Her shoulders had started to shake.

"You're pretty lonely, aren't you, Mary?" Rainie said bluntly. "You're sitting in the house you always thought you wanted, and it's a prison cell. The proverbial gilded cage."

"I don't think I want to talk to you anymore."

"Your best friend's dead, your husband works all the time. Yeah, if I were you and I met the right man, someone who told me I looked pretty, someone who complimented my smile, I'd pretty much do whatever he wanted."

"This is crazy! I don't know what it is you think you're doing, but we're through. I mean that." Her head came up. She said sternly, "Get out."

And Rainie replied with the same artlessness Mary had employed before: "You mean you're not looking for a new best friend, Mary? You're not looking for anyone new to betray?"

"Damn you!" Mary sprang to her feet. "Harold!" she yelled. "Harold!"

The butler came scurrying into the room, his eyes wide at the hysteria percolating through his mistress's call. Rainie feigned a yawn, while Mary stabbed a shaking finger in her direction and screeched, "Get her out. Out, out, out!"

The butler looked at Rainie. He was middle aged, and his bald head and gaunt features really didn't make him the intimidating type. Rainie, on the other hand, lounged against yet another side table with her right hand positioned strategically on a heavy gold candelabrum. Poor Harold didn't know what to do.

"Do you miss her?" Rainie asked Mary. "When Wednesday night rolls around, do you miss Mandy at all?"

"Get out!"

"The irony is," Rainie persisted softly, "that Mandy was the drunk, but I'm willing to bet she would've missed you. If your positions had been reversed, she would've missed you badly."

"Harrrrrooooold! "

The butler finally edged his way over to Rainie and put a hand on her arm. His touch was light, but firm, and she gave him credit. He managed to holdhimself with regal dignity, when God knows the rest of the situation had clearly moved beyond that.

Rainie gave in to the light pull of his hand, and let him lead her back into the foyer toward the door.

Mary, oddly enough, followed right behind them, her features still distorted and her right hand pressed protectively against her belly.

"Thank you for the coffee," Rainie said politely to Harold. "I'm sure I'll be in touch," she added to Mary, before heading down the broad steps.

Her last view, as she opened the door of her rent-a-wreck, was Mary Olsen standing in the grand entrance of her enormous mansion, screaming, "You have no idea what you're talking about, lady. You have no fucking idea!"

Two miles from the Olsen residence, Rainie pulled over her car and killed the ignition. Despite her earlier composure, her hands had started trembling. The adrenaline was ebbing from her bloodstream, leaving her light-headed in its wake.

"Well," she murmured, all alone in her tiny car, "that wasn't what I expected."

She thought of Mary Olsen's furious features and final taunting remark. She thought of Quincy, and the host of phone calls he'd received last night. She heard an all-too-familiar ringing in her ears.

Rainie leaned forward and rested her forehead against the steering wheel. She was suddenly very tired. Last time she'd heard ringing in her ears, small children had died. And things had gotten even worse from there.

She took a moment. Then two and three. Okay, she had a plan. She pulled back onto the windy country road and since she hadn't had the funds to buy a cell phone yet, she drove until she found a gas station with a pay phone. From there, she called her new partner in crime, Virginia PT Phil de Beers. She was lucky that he was in. She was even luckier that he was currently in between cases, and if she was willing to pay his rate to tail Mary Olsen, he was more than willing to do the work. That took care of merry Mary for a bit.

Hoping her luck would hold out, Rainie tried Officer Amity next. The officer on duty informed her that Big Boy was on patrol. Rainie asked to be switched to dispatch, whom she sweet-talked into transferring her to Amity's car. Dispatch did her the honor of introducing her, and Officer Amity picked up the radio receiver already sounding unhappy.

"What d'you want?"

"Officer Amity! How's my favorite state trooper?"

"What d'you want?"

"Oh, just thought I'd see if you'd had any luck locating that vehicle we spoke of."

"You mean in the twelve hours since we talked?"

"That would be what I'm going for."

"I have a job, ma'am."

"So the answer is no? Officer, you're breaking my heart."

"I sincerely doubt that," Amity said dryly.

"What are the chances of getting that information sometime today?"

"I don't know. Ask the broader civilian and criminal community. If enough drivers promise not to rear-end each other and enough reprobates cease breaking and entering, I may have a shot."

"So if I douse the entire state in Valium…"

"I like the way you think."

Rainie sighed heavily. Apparently that was the right tactic; Officer Amity sighed heavily as well.

"Thursdays are my day off," he told her. "If it doesn't happen today, I'll make sure I get to it tomorrow."

"Officer Amity, you're super!"

"Wonderful," he grumbled. "I finally impress a woman and she lives three thousand miles away. Talk to you later, ma'am."

He clicked off before Rainie had a chance to reply, which also saved her from dealing with that last statement.

She returned to her car. She got out the police reports of Mandy's crash. Then she got out her newly purchased Virginia state map.

Forty minutes later, she found the bend in the road where the accident had happened. Quincy had been right. This wasn't on any direct route from Mary Olsen's mansion and it wasn't on any direct route from Mandy's apartment. In fact, this place wasn't any direct route to anywhere. It was a narrow country road leading from nowhere and going to nowhere with lots of twists and turns in between.