"One minute," Cambria said. "You may have evidence of drugs in this hotel, and it is possible that this young man and I came across a body in the kitchen and felt it would be more appropriate to place it elsewhere. You may discover fingerprints on the bags used tonight, and I may need to discuss this with my lawyer before I explain why I may have handled them at some point. What you do not have is any evidence that this young man and I shot the deceased. He was, in fact, a valued employee. Only today did we learn he planned to leave the country with certain items that did not belong to him."

"That's right!" Rick said. "He was the only one who could deal with the bookkeeping. I myself cannot make heads or tails of-" Cambria's glower was as effective as a garrote.

Neither spoke as McRowan escorted them out the door. Henbit ordered the rest of us back to our rooms, but like Manhattan in the middle of the night, the lobby remained lively. Geri was sobbing while Kyle tried to calm her down, Ruby Bee was raving about money, Estelle was doing her best to explain to anyone who would listen (no one would) that her purchase was nothing but a gag gift, and Frannie and Gaylene were unsuccessfully trying to rouse a comatose ex-contestant.

Therefore, only Durmond and I rode the elevator to the second floor, although it felt more like a decompression chamber than the wheezy product of Mr. Otis's imagination. He (Durmond, not Mr. Otis) invited me into his room, but I wasn't yet ready to see the steamy sheets and insisted we go in mine.

I went to the window and watched the cars crawling below. "I didn't think it made any sense for the two mobsters to have killed Jerome Appleton in the first place. I was surprised when you suggested it to the lieutenant."

"It's a good solution," he said, "and it's possible the weapons used on both Jerome Appleton and Craig Lisbon will turn up in Rick's room on the third floor. When the registration is checked, the police will discover it belongs to Rick, or Ricco, as his Floridian friends call him. He'll refuse to talk, of course, and deny it all the way to the pen. In the meantime, Cambria will be occupied with the drug problem. If I were in the mood for wild guesses, I'd say another bag of Krazy KoKo-Nut cocaine might show up in his penthouse on the very top of the hotel. I'd like to think the police will search the back shelf of the closet."

"How very wild, indeed." I turned away from the window and sat down. Durmond gave me a wry smile while I muddled over the remaining bugaboos that had been haunting me for several days. He looked as if he were encouraging me to come up with answers, which perhaps he was. "How did you know I saw Brenda at the Xanadu?" I asked him levelly.

"I was at the table when you told Lieutenant Henbit."

"You already knew it, blue dress and all, and if you didn't hear it from me, you must have heard it from someone else-or saw her there yourself."

"Through the same window you did, maybe," he said. I considered it, then shook my head. "Ruby Bee followed Gaylene, and you and your pal followed them, although they had a healthy headstart-and they didn't go all the way to the Xanadu. They staked out a spot in a stationery store around the corner. If you did go there, you did it of your own accord, not because you were following meddlesome broads."

"The problem with Craig Lisbon was that it always took him time to decide how to deal with situations that might disrupt his business dealings. He was the sort who might think for a day or two, then realize that Brenda Appleton posed a threat of enormous dimensions. She knew names and faces, dates and addresses, and she might decide to file for a divorce and name everyone, including Gabardi, as a co-respondent. Scorned women have been known to do such things."

"Wait a minute!" I said, aware I sounded as shrill as Geri. "Are you telling me that you went to the Xanadu and killed Lisbon? I really don't want to hear this." Especially, I added to myself, from a man with whom I'd had sex not six hours ago and no more than ten feet away (did I mention the size of the rooms?). "I'm not telling you anything," he said with a sigh that we both knew meant he was telling me everything-and reading my mind along the way.

"I heard the elevator last night," I said, "and I thought it was Ruby Bee returning from the kitchen. But she had come up an hour before she and Estelle cooked up an alibi and came to my room. How high's the penthouse?"

"Very high, and I'm still feeling the effects of the bullet wound. Don't ever get shot, Arly. It hurts like hell, and the scar never goes away."

"Why Appleton?" I asked, refusing to allow his words to get to me. I already knew more than enough about scar tissue.

"I was in the kitchen when he and Catherine appeared."

"So he was the one who had a copy of the key?"

"I would be more inclined to search Rick's pockets. Appleton didn't need one. The door was not locked when they tried it." He took a pick from his pocket. "I was a bit curious who might come prowling."

"Such as everybody in the hotel?"

"There was a lot of traffic," he agreed, "beginning with Jerome and Catherine. Although I'm not a parent, I could certainly see that what he was about to do would totally destroy the child's life. Three months and he would have abandoned her in Rio, possibly addicted to cocaine. She has some problems, including a violent mother, but I could not, in good conscience, allow him to take her with him. I sent her upstairs, and Jerome and I had a talk. He refused to listen to reason, I'm afraid."

"Why did Rick and Cambria come?"

"That was not my doing. I was hoping our Miss Gebhearn might actually produce reporters for the contest, and they would be present at the opening ceremony in the kitchen. In some situations, the media can be useful."

"Brenda was distraught about Jerome leaving her and also terribly chummy with members of Gabardi's big, happy family. She might have called Cambria to stop him."

"You're apt to be right, Arly. They came so quickly that I was barely able to duck into the office. Once they'd taken the four cases upstairs to switch the contents, I came out of the office and nearly encountered Lady Macbeth of Maggody in a flannel gown. Back into the office I ducked until I heard her running down the corridor to the elevator. I hoped she would call the police immediately, but she did not, giving Rick and Cambria time to clean up the blood and move the body outside. I was surprised she didn't, but I underestimated her determination to win the contest." He made me a drink and sat down on the other bed, carefully positioning himself so that our knees did not touch. "All in all, a busy night for everyone concerned."

"Yeah, the elevators really hummed." I assessed the distance between us. It wasn't quite two thousand miles, but it was damn close. "Sonny had a suitcase tonight."

"Cambria and Rick weren't aware that Jerome brought down three suitcases from his room, two with personal effects and one with an impressive quantity of cash. I felt it expedient to relocate the third one before they arrived on the scene to move the body and remaining suitcases to the alley. We did not feel Cambria would donate the money to a worthwhile charity. Besides, we're always mindful of overhead."

"So let me get this straight. Sonny's playing the psycho, and you seem to have decided on the role of white knight. You shot Jerome to save Catherine, and Lisbon to save Brenda. I sure hope you don't decide Ruby Bee's about to drive me crazy."

"I never shoot women," he said with a small frown. "None of us do. We do occasionally find ourselves frustrated in our inability to indict people who've murdered our agents."

"What am I supposed to do with this, Durmond? Try to convince Henbit that you and Sonny are responsible for the two homicides? That you're framing Cambria and Rick? That a government agency pays its utility bills with drug money?"