"Are you saying he wasn't here, Howard?" I said. "That should be mighty easy to prove."

"Well-he wasn't prowling, that's a certainty! If-"

"Why is it?" I said. "If he wasn't prowling, what was he doing?"

His eyes began to glitter. "Never mind! Let that go for a minute! But I'll tell you this much. If you think you can get away with planting that money on him and making it look like-"

"What money?" I said. "I thought you said it was his wages?"

You see? The guy didn't have any sense. Otherwise, he'd have waited for me to mention that marked money.

"The money you stole from Elmer Conway! The money you took the night you killed him and that woman!"

"Now, wait a minute, wait a minute," I frowned. "Let's take one thing at a time. Let's take the woman. Why would I kill her?"

"Because-well-because you'd killed Elmer and you had to shut her up."

"But why would I kill Elmer? I'd known him all my life. If I'd wanted to do him any harm, I'd sure had plenty of chances."

"You know-" He stopped abruptly.

"Yeah?" I said, puzzled. "Why would I kill Elmer, Howard?"

And he couldn't say, of course. Chester Conway had given him his orders about that.

"You killed him all right," he said, his face reddening. "You killed her. You hanged Johnnie Pappas."

"You're sure not making much sense, Howard." I shook my head. "You plumb insisted on me talking to Johnnie because you knew how much I liked him and how much he liked me. Now you're saying I killed him."

"You had to kill him to protect yourself! You'd given him that marked twenty-dollar bill!"

"Now you really ain't making sense," I said. "Let's see; there was five hundred dollars missing, wasn't there? You claiming that I killed Elmer and that woman for five hundred dollars? Is that what you're saying, Howard?"

"I'm saying that-that-goddammit, Johnnie wasn't anywhere near the scene of the murders! He was stealing tires at the time they were committed!"

"Is that a fact?" I drawled. "Someone see him, Howard?"

"Yes! I mean, well-uh-"

See what I mean. Shrapnel.

"Let's say that Johnnie didn't do those killings," I said. "And you know it was mighty hard for me to believe that he had, Howard. I said so right along. I always did think he was just scared and kind of out of his mind when he hanged himself. I'd been his only friend, and now it sort of seemed like I didn't believe in him anymore an'-"

"His friend! Jesus!"

"So I reckon he didn't do it, after all. Poor little Amy was killed in pretty much the same way that other woman was. And this man-you say he had a big part of the missing money on him. Five hundred dollars would seem like a lot of money to a man like that, an' seeing that the two killings were so much alike…"

I let my voice trail off, smiling at him; and his mouth opened and went shut again.

Shrapnel. That's all he had.

"You've got it all figured out, haven't you?" he said, softly. "Four-five murders; six counting poor Bob Maples who staked everything he had on you, and you sit there explaining and smiling. You aren't bothered a bit. How can you do it, Ford? How can-"

I shrugged. "Somebody has to keep their heads, and it sure looks like you can't. You got some more questions, Howard?"

"Yes," he nodded slowly. "I've got one. How did Miss Stanton get those bruises on her body? Old bruises, not made last night. The same kind of bruises we found on the body of the Lakeland woman. How did she get them, Ford?"

Shrap- "Bruises?" I said. "Gosh, you got me there, Howard. How would I know?"

"H-how"-he sputtered-"how would you know?"

"Yeah?" I said, puzzled. "How?"

"Why, goddam you! You'd been screwing that gal for years! You-"

"Don't say that," I said.

"No," said Jeff Plummer, "don't say that."

"But"-Howard turned on him, then turned back to me. "All right, I won't say it! I don't need to say it. That girl had never gone with anyone but you, and only you could have done that to her! You'd been beating on her just like you'd beaten on that whore!"

I laughed, sort of sadly. "And Amy just took it huh, Howard? I bruised her up, and she went right ahead seeing me? She got all ready to marry me? That wouldn't make sense with any woman, and it makes no sense minus about Amy. You sure wouldn't say a thing like that if you'd known Amy Stanton."

He shook his head, staring, like I was some kind of curiosity. That old shrapnel wasn't doing a thing for him.

"Now, maybe Amy did pick up a bruise here and there," I went on. "She had all sorts of work to do, keepin' house and teaching school, and everything there was to be done. It'd been mighty strange if she didn't bang herself up a little, now and-"

"That's not what I mean. You know that's not what I mean."

"— but if you're thinking I did it, and that she put up with it, you're way off base. You sure didn't know Amy Stanton."

"Maybe," he said, "you didn't know her."

"Me? But you just got through sayin' we'd gone together for years-"

"I-" He hesitated, frowning. "I don't know. It isn't all clear to me, and I won't pretend that it is. But I don't think you knew her. Not as well as…"

"Yeah?" I said.

He reached into his inside coat pocket, and brought out a square blue envelope. He opened it and removed one of those double sheets of stationery. I could see it was written on both sides, four pages in all. And I recognized that small neat handwriting.

Howard looked up from the paper, and caught my eye.

"This was in her purse." Her purse. "She'd written it at home and was planning, apparently, to give it to you after you were out of Central City. As a matter of fact"-he glanced down at the letter-"she intended to have you stop at a restaurant up the road, and have you read it while she was in the restroom. Now, it begins, 'Lou Darling…'"

"Let me have it," I said.

"I'll read-"

"It's his letter," said Jeff. "Let him have it."

"Very well." Howard shrugged; and he tossed me the letter. And I knew he'd planned on having me read it all along. He wanted me to read it while he sat back and watched.

I looked down at the thick double page, holding my eyes on it:

Lou, Darling:

Now you know why I had you stop here, and why I've excused myself from the table. It was to allow you to read this, the things I couldn't somehow otherwise say to you. Please, please read carefully, darling. I'll give you plenty of time. And if I sound confused and rambling, please don't be angry with me. It's only because I love you so much, and I'm a little frightened and worried.

Darling, I wish I could tell you how happy you've made me these last few weeks. I wish I could be sure that you'd been even a tiny fraction as happy. Just a teens y-weensie bit as much. Sometimes I get the crazy, wonderful notion that you have been, that you were even as happy as I was (though I don't see how you could be!) and at others I tell myself… Oh, I don't know, Lou!

I suppose the trouble is that it all seemed to come about so suddenly. We'd gone on for years, and you seemed to be growing more and more indifferent; you seemed to keep drawing away from me and taking pleasure in making me follow. (Seemed, Lou; I don't say you did do it.) I'm not trying to excuse myself, darling. I only want to explain, to make you understand that I'm not going to behave that way any more. I'm not going to be sharp and demanding and scolding and… I may not be able to change all at once (oh, but I will, darling; I'll watch myself; I'll do it just as fast as I can) but if you'll just love me, Lou, just act like you love me, I'm sure- Do you understand how I felt? Just a little? Do you see why I was that way, then, and why I won't be anymore? Everyone knew I was yours. Almost everyone. I wanted it to be that way; to have anyone else was unthinkable. But I couldn't have had anyone else if I'd wished to. I was yours. I'd always be yours if you dropped me. And it seemed, Lou, that you were slipping further and further away, still owning me yet not letting yourself belong to me. You were (it seemed, darling, seemed) leaving me with nothing-and knowing that you were doing it, knowing I was helpless-and apparently enjoying it. You avoided me. You made me chase you. You made me question you and beg you, and-and then you'd act so innocent and puzzled and… Forgive me, darling. I don't want to criticize you ever, ever again. I only wanted you to understand, and I suppose only another woman could do that.