Mary Jane actually blanched. "Run off the road?" she asked. "Intentionally?"

Timmie didn't know how to react. "Looked that way to me."

It seemed to take Mary Jane a few moments to process that kind of information. Timmie saw a range of reactions, from confusion to disbelief to revulsion, chase across those perfect blond features. Which meant one thing. Mary Jane was more surprised by the incident than Timmie had been.

"I didn't know," she all but stammered. "I took a holiday, you know?"

No, Timmie didn't. Timmie wasn't sure she was following any of this. Mary Jane was standing flat-footed in front of her, one hand rhythmically clicking a pen, the other rubbing against her thigh as if wiping a damp palm. Definitely upset. Definitely surprised.

"You have to understand," she said, clicking faster, "that some people might not understand... they... might feel... threatened..."

Timmie wasn't sure what Mary Jane wanted her to say She opened her mouth to at least agree when the administrator simply turned away. And then, ten feet down the hall, turned back, looking more frantic than ever. "Just remember this," she said. "Alex is your friend. He's the best hope these people have, no matter what." She paused, seemed to gather purpose. "No matter what."

And that was it. Timmie was left behind with the most unholy feeling that not only did Mary Jane know nothing about whatever that guy had been after in her car, but that she did think she knew who did. And that she thought Alex Raymond was somehow involved.

If not responsible.

* * *

"You're not helping at all," Murphy accused her when she told him about it the next morning.

Timmie shoved a cup of coffee at him and poured her own, not yet prepared to trust her own reactions. She'd managed only a few hours sleep the night before, and dreamed all night of being chased down the hall by every one of those poor old gomers she'd cared for the night before, stalking her, arms out, tubes dangling, all crying out in their individual gomer voices.

"Nurse, nurse, nurse..."

"Help me, please, oh help me, please, somebody..."

And interspersed in there somehow, Mary Jane. "He's their only hope."

It didn't take a shrink to figure that one out. It didn't help Timmie get any rest, either.

"I thought you said the golden boy couldn't be behind this," Murphy said, leaning against the kitchen doorway as he drank his coffee.

"He can't."

"But if he is—"

"It's too early for that, Murphy," she threatened. "Why don't we just go see families?"

"You want to separate these or see 'em together?" he asked, keeping a careful distance.

Timmie slammed down the rest of her coffee, hoping for a miracle of coherence, and sighed. "Together. I'm not in a careful interrogation kind of mood."

He lifted an eyebrow. "Does that mean you'd like me to drive?"

"Since Bobby's Garage is still picking soybeans out of my transmission, and I don't want to drive a Lexus, yes."

Murphy didn't say anything. He just walked into the kitchen and came back with the bottle of acetaminophen. "Here."

Timmie tried not to laugh. "Shut up."

She took the medicine. Then she grabbed the list of surviving family members Barb had handed off the night before like the plans for a nuclear sub and walked out the door.

There were ten names on the list. Timmie decided on the places to go and Murphy asked the questions. Nonthreatening general information on care given, benefits derived, family's reaction to the patient's disease, deterioration, and death.

They stuck to that plan of attack at the first three homes and learned nothing. The children and spouses of Mr. DiSalvo, Mrs. Frieberger, and Mrs. Rogers, respectively, were saddened by the deaths, but not surprised. Relieved, a few admitted, considering what their loved ones had gone through. Getting on with life, eternally grateful to Restcrest, Dr. Raymond, and Memorial Medical Center for everything they'd done for the person in question. Not one mentioned Joe Leary because Timmie had introduced herself as Annie Parker, which kept the interviews properly focused. Not one had offered any surprises, either.

Limping up the steps to the fourth door, Timmie asked Murphy to let her try her hand at the questions. She was feeling a bit more alert, and with it, a bit more patient.

Their target here was Mr. Charlie Cleveland, son of Wilhelm "Butch" Cleveland, seventy-eight, who had died of cardiac arrest the morning Billy Mayfield had come in. Mr. Cleveland lived in a nice neighborhood of two-story brick bungalows with mature trees and carefully pruned hedges. Lots of effort, little imagination. Butch had lived with him and his wife, Betty, until admission to Restcrest two years before his death.

As she waited for Mr. Cleveland to answer the bell, Timmie wondered what the poor man would think when he opened the door to catch a pair of bruised, battered creatures waiting to ask him about his father.

It was nothing to what Timmie thought when the man finally opened the door on the second ring. But Murphy said it first. "Oh, my God."

Mr. Cleveland just stood there, morning paper still clasped in his hand, a finger tucked into the page he'd been reading. He was wearing half reading glasses on a chain around his neck and a carefully pressed cotton shirt and slacks. A handsome man with dignified wings of gray hair and a ruddy complexion.

His complexion this morning was pale, though, his eyes wide. Stricken was the word that came to mind. Timmie knew how he felt.

"Mr. Cleveland," she greeted the man who had tried to shoot Alex Raymond at the horse show. "Can we talk to you?"

Chapter 17

Murphy expected just about any reaction but the one they got.

"Well, it's about time," Mr. Cleveland said. Then he laughed and shook his head. "Listen to me. I'm about to be taken in on attempted manslaughter charges, and I'm saying it's about time. Well, it is. I've been sitting in this living room for two weeks waiting for that doorbell to ring."

He looked nice. Nice. Now there was a word Murphy hadn't thought to use in connection with that guy with the gun. Standing here in his own doorway, though, Mr. Cleveland looked as if he belonged right here, reading his morning paper in his boring, predictable living room, not in a police lineup. But Murphy had done enough of these interviews to know just how many people in police lineups looked just the same.

"We're not the police," Murphy assured him. "We're from the paper. My name is Daniel Murphy, and this is—"

"Annie Parker," Leary interjected, just like the other three times. And damn if she didn't look more like Annie Parker than Timmie Leary, her short hair curled and her usual tights and long sweaters traded in for tailored blouse, vest, and slacks. "We wanted to ask you about Restcrest, if you don't mind."

They couldn't seem to surprise the guy. "Of course you do," he said. Carefully folding his paper out of the way, he pushed open the door.

As Murphy stepped in, he catalogued the house. Not much more imagination inside than outside. Solid pastel furniture, beige rugs and curtains, walls decorated in stiff family portraits and framed pastoral prints. The smell of Pine Sol, old coffee, and pipe tobacco. All well cared for, all showing wear and tear, as if the budget had been stretched to the limit a long time ago.