When, not if. I liked the way Boomer thought.
“Thanks,” I said, but he’d already hung up.
I pocketed my phone and headed for the dressing rooms. But along the way I stopped, almost by force of habit, by the rack that usually held copies of the student newspaper. It was empty. Not surprising this late in the evening. Well, I could check their Web site tomorrow to see if they’d run an article on the show house, or for that matter, on the murder.
Wait—the rack wasn’t empty because of the late hour. We were on winter break. The newspaper wouldn’t be putting out another issue until the students came back, in two weeks. There might be a few students still hanging around for the holidays—students from the area, grad students, students on tight budgets who couldn’t afford the fare to go home for the holiday, and students who had something to do in town, like the ones working backstage at Michael’s show. Presumably Jessica was one of the few still here. Maybe she was whiling away the long dark days on the near-deserted campus by pursuing stories from the wider community. But by the time the paper’s next issue went out, the show house would be over, so an article wouldn’t do us any good.
“Blast!” I muttered. I remembered all the time I’d spent talking to Jessica—time I could so easily have spent doing something more immediately useful. And who knew how much of the designers’ time she’d wasted?
Ah, well. At least if she did the article it might get the decorators some publicity. And there was always the chance that once the chief caught up with her he might find something useful in the photos she took.
I ran into Randall in the throng of family and friends crowding Michael’s dressing room.
“Everything go okay at the house after I left?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. “Ivy was the only one still there when I left to come here. I’m going to drop by on the way home and make sure everything’s locked up.”
“I’ll do it,” he said. “You go home and rest.”
“I’ll think about it,” I said.
Jamie was asleep on Michael’s shoulder by the time we got to the Twinmobile. Josh was busily discussing the costume he needed to have for his Dickens show, and was so wide awake that I was afraid I’d have to start assembling his miniature Victorian dress suit as soon as we got home. But a few seconds after I strapped him into his booster seat, he fell silent and his head lolled to one side in the sort of awkward position that never seems to bother children, though any adult who tried it would probably end up with a semipermanent sore neck.
Michael took off with the boys, and I headed up the street to where I’d parked my car. The streets that had been lined with cars belonging to shoppers and people going to the theater were nearly empty now that the stores were closed and the show over.
I was enjoying the peace and quiet and the crisp night air until I suddenly noticed the sound of footsteps behind me.
Chapter 14
Was I imagining the footsteps? I stopped and bent down as if to adjust my boot fastening. I stole a look behind me. There was no one in the street. And I heard no footsteps nearby.
Yet when I walked on, I heard it again. My footsteps made just a little more noise than they should. And the noise varied ever so slightly, as if someone was walking behind me, taking a step every time I did, and almost—but not quite—disguising the sound of his footsteps.
I walked along at a slow saunter until I came to a corner. Then, instead of crossing the street as I’d originally planned, I ducked around the corner. Once I had a building to keep me out of sight of anyone following me, I sprinted till I came to an alley in the middle of the block. I ducked down the alley and hid behind some trash cans.
I waited there, peering out from behind the trash cans to the mouth of the alley.
It wasn’t my imagination. I could hear footsteps in the street I’d left. Soft footsteps approaching the mouth of the alley.
“Meg? Are you all right?”
I started, and whirled to find Muriel, owner of the diner, standing there with a full black plastic garbage bag in one hand. Not surprising, since this was the alley that ran behind the diner.
“You startled me,” I said, a lot more softly than Muriel had spoken. “I thought someone was following me.”
We both fell silent and listened while peering toward the end of the alley, but we didn’t hear anything. At least I didn’t, and after a few moments Muriel shook her head.
“You sure you’re not just feeling spooked?” she asked. “What with finding a body last night and all?”
“Could be.” I stood up and dusted my pants off. “Sorry if I startled you.”