The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK TM(17)

                Kaplan was still wearing his heavy police jacket, and his galoshes. His black pants were stained with snow and salt along the hems.

                “C’mon in,” I said, standing back.

                He nodded, stamped his feet, and entered. He stopped as I closed the door, a look of surprise on his face. “This is your place?”

                “Yes,” I said.

                “I expected—”

                “The hot line, I know,” I said. “We don’t let strangers in there.”

                “I remember,” he said grimly. He took off his jacket, put his gloves in the pocket, then ran a hand through his hair. He slipped out of the galoshes as well.

                He was wearing a rumpled suit coat under the jacket. “You see the 10 o’clock news?”

                “No.”



                             “Open and shut. Burglars surprised her, knowing what was in the house. Now we’re having an all-out manhunt which will, of course, fail.”

                I opened my hand and gestured toward the sofa. His gaze passed over the materials that I had left on the table. “Coffee?” I asked. “Water? Soda?”

                “Coffee,” he said. “Black. Thank you.”

                I went into the kitchen and started the percolator. Then I hovered in the archway between the kitchen and the living room.

                “How do you know it wasn’t burglars?” I asked.

                “You mean besides the fact nothing was stolen? Oh, that’s right. I forgot. She surprised those burglars, so they viciously attacked her. The odd thing was there was more than one of them, and still they didn’t have time to take her purse or the diamond earrings she wore or the gold bracelet around her wrist.” He leaned his head back. “There’s so much not right here, and I can’t tell anyone.”

                Except me. The tension had left me, and I actually felt flattered, although I knew better than to say so.

                “You knew her, didn’t you?” I asked quietly.

                He raised his head, and looked at me. “She called me her disappointment.”

                I raised my eyebrows. At that moment, I heard the percolator and silently cursed it. “Coffee’s done.”

                I poured filled two large mugs, grabbed the plate of five raisin cookies that I had stolen from the volunteers two days ago, and put it all on a tray that had come with the kitchen. I brought the tray into the living room and put it on the end table near him.

                I sat across from him on the matching chair that faced the window. “You were a disappointment?”

                “Yeah.” He grabbed two cookies, but he didn’t eat them. “Among the other things she did, Dolly Langham gave out two full-ride scholarships every year to the University of Wisconsin. She gave them to the best students from Madison area high schools, no matter the gender.”

                “Wow,” I said. “You got one?”



                             He nodded. “Four years at our greatest state institution.”

                “And then you became a cop,” I said.