She shrugged. “Maybe cash was taken, I don’t know. I don’t think so because the moment Dad had any extra cash, like from his military pension, he banked it.”

Murphy slowed her pace and Petra adjusted. Traffic on Sunset was fast and thunderous and the two of them swerved to avoid some construction workers who’d blown a hole in the sidewalk and set up orange-and-white sawhorses.

Murphy looked at the hardhats. “Dad did that. Worked construction, after he left the Marines. Then he had his own business. A tire store in Culver City. When that went under, he was sixty-five, said he’d had enough. Mostly, he watched TV.”

“You’re pretty specific about which food was taken,” said Petra.

“Because it was my food. I bought it the day before. Dad was more of a chorizo-and-fried-potatoes kind of guy. He made fun of the way I ate. Called it rabbit chow.”

Pain in her eyes said there’d been more than dietary conflict between father and daughter.

“Your food was taken,” said Petra.

“It couldn’t mean anything. Could it?”

“Is there anyone who’d want to get back at you through your father?”

“No,” said Murphy. “No one. Since the divorce, everything’s been smooth. Dave and I are friendly, we talk all the time.”

“Any kids?”

Murphy shook her head.

Petra said, “Tell me about the cable call and why you think it could’ve been phony.”

“That day in the morning, when I left for work- Dad told me the cable company was sending someone out to work on the set.”

“At what time?”

“Late afternoon, early evening, you know how they are,” said Murphy. “Dad sometimes napped at that hour, wanted me to wake him by seven.”

“Were you having transmission problems?”

“No, that’s the thing,” said Murphy. “Supposedly it was something to do with the neighborhood lines.”

“He wanted you to wake him,” said Petra. “So you were home by late afternoon?”

“No. I called at three, told Dad I’d be home late. He asked me to call again.”

“At seven.”

“Yes.”

“Did you?”

“I did and he was up.”

“How did your father sound?”

“Fine. Normal.”

“Then you went back to work?”

Murphy touched her finger to her jaw. “Actually, I’d left work early. It had been a tough afternoon, shuttling back between Dave and Bella. When I hung up with Dad, I was in my car. I took off and went to see Bella. We had dinner, went to a club, did some drinking. Neither of us was in the mood to dance. She wanted me to come home with her but I wasn’t ready for that, so she drove back to her place and I drove to Dad’s. Walked into the house and smelled food- cooked food, bacon and eggs. Which was strange. Dad never ate late. He’d have a beer or two, maybe some chip-and-dip while watching TV, but never a hot meal at that hour. If he ate heavy food too late, he had indigestion.”

Maria Murphy stopped walking. Her eyes were wet. “This is harder than I thought.”

“Sorry for bringing it all back.”

“I haven’t thought about Dad for a while. I should think about him more.” Murphy pulled a hankie out of a dress pocket, patted her eyes, blew her nose.

When they resumed walking, Petra said, “So someone had cooked.”

“Breakfast food,” said Murphy. “Which was also weird. Dad was a very disciplined person- ex-Marine, very regimented. You ate breakfast food in the morning, sandwiches at lunch, a main meal at supper.”

“You don’t think he cooked the food.”

“Scrambled eggs?” said Maria Murphy. “Dad didn’t like scrambled eggs, he always had his eggs fried or soft-boiled.”

She burst into tears, walked faster, at a near-run.

Petra caught up. Murphy threw up her hands and ground her jaws.

“Ma-am- ”

“His brains,” Murphy blurted. “They were on the plate. Along with the eggs. Pilled on top of the eggs. Like someone had added lumpy cheese to the eggs. Gray cheese. Pink… can we please turn around, now? I need to get back to work.”

Petra waited until they were back at Kaiser to ask her if there was anything else she remembered.

“Nothing,” said Murphy. She turned to go and Petra touched her arm. Solid and sinewy. Maria Murphy tensed up. Rock-hard.

Looking at Petra’s fingers on her sleeve.

Petra let go. “Just one more question, ma’am. The date of your father’s murder, June 28. Did that have any significance to you, or to anyone in your family?”

“Why would you ask that?”

“Covering bases.”

“June 28,” said Murphy, weakly. “The only thing significant about that is Dad was murdered.” She sagged. “It’s coming up, isn’t it? The anniversary. I think I’ll go to the cemetery. I don’t go very often. I really should go more.”

Interesting woman. Going through major life-stress at the time of her father’s murder. Not getting sympathy from the old man, quite the opposite. Pulled in all directions, having to return to the old man’s house. A father with whom she’d never been close. An ex-Marine whose sensibilities she’d recently offended.

It had to have been a tense situation.

From the feel of that iron-arm, Murphy was a strong woman. More than enough strength to bring a stout piece of pipe down on an aged skull.

Murphy’s food, taken. Healthy stuff that the old man ridiculed.

Maybe the old man had humiliated her one time too many. Dumped lesbian daughter’s victuals in front of lesbian daughter and that had driven her over the edge.

Petra had seen people killed with a lot less provocation.

She pulled into the station parking lot, sat there imagining.

Murphy comes home from a self-described rough day- driving back and forth between hubbie and lover. Calls dad, allegedly to wake him from his nap, but he gives her flack. She hangs up, goes dining and clubbing, has too much to drink. Returns home, craving a one A.M. nosh, finds dad up, waiting for her.

They argue. About her alternative lifestyle.

Her rabbit chow.

Dad scoops up the nutritionally virtuous stash, tells her what he thinks about it.

Murphy was a dietician. The gesture would have been laced with extra symbolism.

An argument ensues.

He screams, she screams. She picks something up- maybe a spare pipe, who knows what. Brains the old guy, sits him at the table. Cooks up some of the high-fat crap he calls food.

Pushes his face in it. Eat that!

Then she makes up a phony cable story to distract the easily distracted Jack Hustaad.

Some melodrama. And no evidence.

And if Maria Murphy had murdered her old man, what did that say about Marta Doebbler and the other five June 28 killings?

She’d follow up on Solis, talk to Murphy’s ex-husband, the long-suffering Dave. But something told her it would be a waste of time.

Kurt Doebbler for his wife, Maria Murphy for her dad.

Meaning no connection.

No, that felt wrong. If Isaac was right, and she was moving toward confidence that he was, this was something quite different from family passion gone bad.

A woman lured from the theater. A hustler pulverized in a back alley. A little girl brutalized in the park. A sailor on leave…

Eggs and brains on the plate.

This was calculated, manipulative.

Twisted.