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laughing.
    “Wasn’t it on the billboard out by the highway?” she asked, tongue firmly in cheek, and joined in the laughter.
    “So,” I said, “what’s new in your life?”
    “Lots,” she replied, then became conspiratorial. “I have a new beau.”
    “So I’ve heard,” I said.
    “How did you know already? Did Kathy tell you?”
    “No. Must have been on that same billboard. Tell me about him.”
    “He’s quite a guy, maybe a little old for me but in good shape. He exercises regularly and—”
    “And?”
    “And he’s loaded. He said he made his fortune in the commodities market. Not that I know anything about how that works, but he obviously does. He’s thinking of buying a house in Clamshell Cove. He keeps his houseboat in a slip there. He’s living on it until he decides which house to buy.”
    Clamshell Cove was a relatively new and expensive gated community overlooking the water on the northern edge of town.
    “He says he has a house in Florida, too, and just sold a villa in Monte Carlo.”
    “Marital status?” I asked.
    Her eyes saddened. “Widowed, poor thing. Cancer. She died more than a dozen years ago. Can you imagine that he’s decided to spend his summer retirement years here in Cabot Cove?”
    “I don’t know what entertainments we have to compare with Monte Carlo,” I said, “but I’ll have to remember to ask when I meet him.”
    As it turned out, I didn’t have to wait long for that to happen. A nattily attired gray-haired man came through the door with a flourish, surveyed the restaurant, spotted us, and made his way to our table. In contrast to the less colorful garb of the other customers, he was dressed in a double-breasted blue blazer, sported a red ascot and matching pocket square, and wore his tasseled loafers sans socks.
    “Hello there,” he said in a deep voice, leaning to kiss Wilimena on the cheek. “How’s my favorite lady?”
    “Your favorite lady is fine,” she said. “You haven’t met my friend Jessica Fletcher.”
    “No, I haven’t, but I’ve been looking forward to the pleasure of meeting this bestselling author for some time now.”
    I took his extended hand, taking note of a large diamond-and-gold pinkie ring and his lacquered nails.
    “Well,” he said through a satisfied smile as he pulled up a chair, “you don’t mind if I join you for a moment, do you?” He tugged on the razor crease of his gray slacks, and sat heavily, his knees grazing mine.
    I moved my chair to give him more room.
    He leaned forward, eyes on mine, and said in a voice that was easily heard several tables away, “Willie has told me how you came to her rescue in Alaska, like the cavalry.”
    “Kathy and I had been searching for Willie. We were fortunate it turned out the way it did,” I said.
    “Ah yes, you were with Willie’s lovely sister, Kathy. Didn’t mean to omit proper credit.”
    “I’m the one who’s fortunate,” Willie said. “I’d be dead now if it wasn’t for Jess and Kathy.”
    “We couldn’t have that, now, could we?” he said, laying his hand on hers.
    He turned his attention back to me. “I’d love to discuss writing with you, Mrs. Fletcher,” he said with a smile. “I’ve done quite a bit of writing myself.”
    “Really? What sort of writing?”
    He leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs, resting a tasseled loafer on his knee. “A lot of it’s technical—I was involved in the commodities market for many years—but I also write poetry and short stories, and I’m thinking about starting a novel.”
    “That’s terrific,” I said.
    “You’ll enjoy reading some of my works. They’re quite good, if I say so myself, and I’m my severest critic.”
    “I—ah—I would enjoy that at some point when things are a little less hectic.”
    “Jessica is trying to finish her latest novel, Archer, but she’s got writer’s block.”
    “I don’t know if calling it writer’s block is accurate,” I said, irritated at my need to