"It's been here for ages," I reassured them. "There're pine needles and bird poop and dirt all over it."

The two faces upturned to me relaxed somewhat.

"What do you think it is, builder's material?" Martin asked. "Well, I'm going to find out." I maneuvered a turn in the little valley in which I found myself. A gutter had been installed in this valley, to carry off rainwater, and the covered bundle had been shoved just clear of it under my bedroom window. In fact it was so closely packed into this one straight stretch of roof that I knew why I hadn't ever noticed it: It was so close under my window that I would have had to stick out my head and shoulders out and look down to see it.

The tarp was stiff and crackly with age and exposure. It was weighted down with bricks. When I shoved one off the tarp and raised one corner, the whole thing moved, and I was treated to a comprehensive view of what lay beneath. It took me a moment to understand what I was seeing. I tried to believe that someone had been up on the roof eating ribs and had thrown the discarded bones in a heap after he was through. Maybe lots of people; there were so many ... I saw the ribs first, you see. They weren't pretty and white: they were yellowish and had little bits of dried dark stuff on them. But there were other bones, tiny and large, one whole hand with a few strings of tendon still holding it together... the skulls had rolled a little, but I counted them automatically. "Roe?" Martin called from below. "What's happening up there? Are you okay?" The breeze was gusting again. For the first time in over six years, it wafted under the gray plastic. The hair on one of the skulls lifted. I wanted off this roof.

I flung myself upward, swung my legs over the peak, and began backing down in record time.

"Roe," called Martin again, definitely alarmed. My feet hit the first rung. It seemed like long minutes before my hands could grasp the metal and then my feet flew down once I was totally supported by the ladder.

Martin and Angel were both asking me questions at once. I leaned against the metal, my feet finally on the ground, a safe distance from the horror on the roof.

"They're there," I managed to say at last. "They've been there all along." Martin still looked blank, but Angel, who had helped me look, got the point immediately.

"The Julius family," she told Martin. "They're on the roof."

We did have to tell the police about this. Angel stored away the shotgun and made the phone call. Then I saw her bounding up her apartment steps, presumably to wake Shelby.

We were sitting on the porch in one of the chairs. I was folded up on Martin's lap.

"Martin," I whispered. "She still had on her wig. But there was just a skull underneath it."

Everyone came. It was like a lawn party for law enforcement personnel in Spalding County.

Our house was just within the city limits, so the chief of police came first. Padgett Lanier was sharp-nosed, tall, with thinning blond hair and nearly invisible eyelashes and eyebrows. He had a paunch, and a mouth that was too small for his face. He had been chief of police of Lawrenceton for twenty years. I'd met him at various parties while I was dating Arthur Smith. I was sitting in a separate chair by then, but still on the porch, hoping to keep everyone out of our home. Martin had pulled his chair over by mine and was holding my hand. Shelby and Angel were sitting on the porch itself, blocking the front door, watching the activity with impassive faces. "Mrs. Bartell?" Lanier asked from the front lawn.

"Ms. Teagarden," I said.

"You the one that found them?"

"Yes. They're up on the roof. Under the plastic." "The picture man should be here in a minute," he said. It sounded as though he were talking about Mr. Rogers; Padgett Lanier was one of those people who think because I'm small, I'm childlike. "I'd better let him go up first. Did you touch anything while you were up there, honey? How'd you happen to go up on the roof? Wait, here comes Jack; you might as well tell both of us at once." Detective Sergeant Jack Burns came next, and I heaved a sigh when I saw him emerge from his car. He hated my guts. On the other hand, he treated me like an adult. Burns was wearing one of his hideous suits, which he apparently bought at garage sales held on dark nights. He stood looking at the ladder with a face even grimmer than usual. He did not relish making the climb. His no-color hair was scantier than when I'd last seen him, and the flesh of his face was sagging. Lynn Liggett Smith was right behind him, looking as slim, tall, and competent as ever, and she had the "picture man" with her. Several other cars pulled in after Lynn's, and it began to seem that whoever was off duty or had decided they weren't needed at the moment had driven out to the Julius place to see what was happening. It was the place to be if you were a cop. Martin murmured, "Is there no other crime in this town that needs investigating?

Surely somebody is running a stop sign somewhere."

"Most of them, probably, were here six years ago," I said.

After a thoughtful moment, he nodded.

Padgett Lanier conferred with Jack Burns, and the picture man was dispatched up the ladder first. Lynn went up after him to help carry his equipment. Fortunately, she was wearing slacks. She looked through the rungs at me on her way up. She shook her head slightly, as if I'd gotten up to another naughty trick.

The yard fell silent. All the policemen—and aside from Lynn, they were all male—looked up at the roof above our heads. I could hear the scrape of the photographer's shoes as he scrambled up the roof; the pause as he reached the top, saw the tarp. He said something to Lynn; I heard her reply, "Here," as she handed him his camera from her place on the ladder. I could only see her feet from my chair. Presumably he took a few pictures. I heard him say, "Lift the tarp for me, Detective," and then Lynn's progress across the roof. I swear I heard the rattle of the stiff, cracking plastic as Lynn raised it. "They're stacked on top of each other, Martin," I murmured. "I guess it's all three of them."

"Mostly bones, Roe?" Martin asked. His face was calm, and I knew he was being matter-of-fact because he knew I needed it. And because he had seen death far more often than I.

"Yes... mostly. The wig is on her skull. I told you that. I don't understand about the wig."

"Probably a synthetic."

"No, no. It's the wrong wig."

His eyes were questioning and he leaned closer, but at that moment Lynn came down the ladder, turned to her superiors, and nodded curtly. "Three of them," she said. "Three skulls, anyway."

A collective sigh seemed to go up from the people on my front lawn. "Jerry's going to pass the tarp down," she said. "Then he'll take more pictures." She went to her car and got a large plastic garbage bag. She beckoned to a patrolman. He sprang to help, and they spread the mouth of the garbage bag wide. There were a series of scraping sounds as the photographer/policeman removed the tarp.

"Need someone up here to pass it down!" he called. Jack Burns shambled forward to the foot of the ladder and began to climb heavily. He had pulled on plastic gloves.

They made an effort to pass the tarp down folded, so nothing would spill from its surface, but it was cracking with age and a few pieces had to be retrieved from the bushes around the porch. Finally it was sealed in the garbage bag and placed in Lynn's car.

"Get whoever's on dispatch to call Morrilton Funeral Home to come out here. Tell them what to expect," she told the patrolman who'd helped hold the bag. He nodded and went to his patrol car radio.

Some of the men approached Lynn with a request, and after a moment's thought, she nodded. They converged at the foot of the ladder. One by one the men climbed up. We would hear the scrape of heavy official shoes, a silence as he peeked over the porch roof, then he would come down. The process would be repeated. While that was going on, Lynn and her two superiors congregated on the porch.