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wildness. “No. I’m fine. Everything would be perfect—I’d be on top of the world, the financial crunch behind me or soon to be, rich beyond most men’s dreams, blessed with a beautiful wife, ready to expand my empire”—he leaned toward me—“the next frontier will be the ultimate utilization of home computers for news delivery, information retrieval, books, purchasing, banking, you name it. It can be done, and I’m going to be there, Henrie O, I promise you…” He paused. The excitement seeped out of his face. “…unless someone, someone here on my island, kills me first.”

3

    C hase paced and talked, smoking one cigarette after another. It was as if a dam burst; a torrent of words and fears and passionate conjectures buffeted me.
    Finally, he slumped exhausted in a club chair and stared at me with desperate eyes. “You know a lot about murder.”
    Yes, I know a lot about murder.
    Murderers will often urinate involuntarily after committing the crime.
    Murder makes a killer hungry. Check the fast-food outlets close to the scene of a crime.
    Two to six hours after death rigor mortis begins, starting with the head and spreading clown the whole body.
    If the position of a body is changed after death, it will affect postmortem lividity.
    Toothlike projections from a bloodstain will indicate the blood fell from a moving body and will show the direction of movement.
    I could continue. But this knowledge was useless in trying to prevent a crime.
    I suppose it was a combination of fear and inadequacy that made me snap at him. “For Christ’s sake, Chase, why didn’t you call the police?”
    But I knew the answer to that. What good would it have done? Calling the police in the instance he’d described would have been about as effective as a battered wife getting a court order forbidding harassment. There are a lot of death statistics tied to the latter.
    “All right, all right.” I opened my purse, grabbed my notepad. “Let me see if I’m clear on the timing. And the people.”
    He bounded up from his chair. “You’re going to help.”
    “If I can, if I can. I’m not a sorcerer.”
    “You’re the smartest goddamn reporter I ever knew,” He was once again Chase-in-charge, Chase-on-top-of-the-heap.
    I won’t say the tribute didn’t please me. But what Chase wanted was a far cry from what I did best, ferreting out facts—gouging them out, if need be—and purveying information as clearly, cleanly, and justly as I could.
    I said as much.
    And the old Chase exhorted me. “But that is
exactly
what I want.” He was pacing and gesturing again, lighting one cigarette from the remnant of another, just as he had when I was a young reporter andhe was an intense, hard-driving bureau chief. Those days—I wrenched my mind back to the present; I don’t like the melancholy ache of remembrance.
    Chase gripped my arm, his hand warm against my skin. “Think of it as a story, Henrie O, the way you always have. Dig out the truth. That’s what I want: the truth.” His hand slipped away. His face was suddenly tight and grim. “Then I will deal with it.”
    “Deal with it? How?” I was still sorting out the implications of what he’d told me and what he wanted; I hadn’t given a second’s thought to what might be done if I figured out who the culprit was.
    He dropped onto the sofa and now he was relaxed, one arm flung casually along the back. He gave me an impish grin. “It will be fun.” But the grin abruptly tilted sideways and disappeared.
    I understood. Just how much fun would it be to discover who it was, among people whom you knew intimately, who actively, malevolently, stealthily wanted you dead?
    “Sort of fun,” he amended wryly. He reached for another cigarette but didn’t light it. “Also simple and foolproof. If you come up with the name, all I have to do is give a sealed envelope containing that information to my lawyer and to the executor of my estate—an envelope to be opened in the