The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK TM(264)

                I don’t know why I felt so nervous, but somehow I was afraid of what he was going to say.

                “Farmer made a full confession,” he said. “He even admitted that you were right when you accused him of harassing you two years back.”

                I looked up. “He did?”

                “He did. That was then, though, and this is now. Now, he wanted to go after you for assaulting him the other night—he never touched you before you hit him, he says, and he wound up with a broken nose—but I, ah, convinced him to let the matter drop.”

                “If I hadn’t hit him, he might have killed me, too!”

                Branigan sighed. “That’s speculation on your part, Max. He says he was going to the phone to call the police and turn himself in.”

                “That’s a lie! He told me he couldn’t let me tell on him. He said it would ruin his career!”

                “Your word against his. He’ll deny it in court, and there’s no way to prove it.”

                I shook my head at the insanity of it.

                “What’s going to happen to him?” I asked.

                “Given the fact that he undressed her and moved her body, I would love to go for Murder One, but I don’t think we can make that stick. I’ll fight for it, but I’m guessing the DA will charge him with involuntary manslaughter and a couple other minor things, and he’ll plead it all down to one lesser charge. I don’t think he’ll do any time, but—”

                “No time! That’s crazy! He killed Katie!”

                “He killed her, sure, but it wasn’t murder, Max. It was an accident: she took a swing at him, and he acted in self-defense. At least that’s his story, and I don’t think we’re going to be able to prove otherwise. In any case, he’s finished at Middlebury, probably in academia altogether.”

                I picked up my mug and sipped, but the coffee tasted like nothing.



                             All around us, students were talking in little groups, doing homework, opening packages from home. Professor Griffen, hunched over a table with a man who looked enough like him to be his younger brother, spotted me and waved. Katie was dead, but life at Middlebury went on.

                “I’m sorry about your girlfriend,” Branigan said.

                I looked up sharply. “My—she wasn’t—I mean—how did you—?”

                He got up from the table and patted my shoulder. “I may be old, Max, but I’ve been a cop for a long time. I can see when somebody’s reacting to the death of a—”

                “You can’t tell anyone,” I said in a rush. “If they find out, I’ll—”

                He put up his hands in surrender. “Your secret’s safe with me,” he said. “It’s got nothing to do with the investigation—never did. I won’t tell a soul.”

                “You promise?” I said. “You have to promise! You have no idea how much trouble I could—”

                “Cross my heart,” he said, “and hope to die.”

                He turned, then, and went away. I watched him disappear through the Juice Bar door, and when he was out of sight I sighed and reached for my headphones and slipped them on. I hit the Play button on my iPod, and the stuttering opening guitar chords of “Both Hands” filled my head with sound.