The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK TM(3)

                He led me back into the kitchen, then opened a door into a large pantry. Canned goods lined the walls. A single 40-watt bulb illuminated the entire space.

                My stomach clenched. I had no idea what he was doing, and I wasn’t the most flexible person around cops.

                He pulled the pantry door closed, then moved past me and pushed on the far wall. It opened into a book-lined room with no windows at all. Mahogany shelves lined the walls. The room was wide, with several chairs for reading and a heavy library table in the middle, stacked with volumes. Those volumes were half open, or marked with pieces of paper.

                Beyond that was another open door. Kaplan led me through it.

                We stepped into one of the prettiest—and most hidden—offices I had ever seen. The walls were covered with expensive wood paneling. A gigantic partners desk sat in the middle of the room. The flooring matched the paneling—no shag carpet here. Instead, the desk stood on an expensive Turkish carpet, of a type I had only seen in magazines. The room smelled of old paper, books, and Emerude. I couldn’t hear the officers in the other part of the house. In fact, the only sound in this room was my breathing, and Kaplan’s clothes rustling as he moved.



                             An IBM Selectric sat on the credenza beside the desk. Behind it stood a graveyard of old typewriters, from an ancient Royal to one of the very first electrics. Above them, files in neat rows, with dividers. The desk itself had several open files on top, and a full coffee cup to one side. I wanted to touch it, to see if it was still warm.

                “This is what you wanted to show me?” I asked.

                “I think you’ll find some interesting things here,” he said, nodding toward the floor. Against the built-in bookshelves in a back corner, someone had placed dozens, maybe hundreds of picture frames.

                I crouched. Someone had framed newspaper and magazine articles, all of them from different eras and with different bylines.

                “What is this?” I asked.

                “Her life’s work,” he said.

                “Her,” I repeated. “I’m not even sure whose house this is.”

                He looked at me in surprise. “I thought you knew everything about this town.”

                “Not even close,” I said.

                He sighed softly. “This house belongs to Dolly Langham.”

                “The philanthropist?” I asked.

                He gave me a tight smile. “See? You do know her.”

                “I don’t,” I said. “Some of my volunteers kept trying to contact her for help with fundraising for the hot line, but she never returned our calls or our letters.”

                A frown creased his forehead. “That’s odd. She was always doing for women.”

                I frowned too. “I take it she’s the woman in the living room?”

                “That’s the back parlor,” he said, as if he knew this house intimately. Maybe he did.



                             “All right,” I said slowly, not sure of his non-response. “The back parlor then. That’s her?”

                He closed his eyes slightly and nodded.