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Madeline a kind word or a little encouragement. But there were a few who used this latest development to try to undermine her faith in the Montgomerys.
    Madeline would rather have skipped every one of those cal s in favor of some peace and quiet. It was difficult enough writing about her father without so many interruptions. But she was anxious to hear from Chief Pontiff, to learn if he or any of his deputies had managed to glean some evidence during their more thorough search of the Cadil ac. She knew they must be finished by now, couldn’t imagine why he hadn’t contacted her. So when a cal came in just as she’d settled down to work, she grabbed the receiver, despite the blinking curser on her computer screen that seemed to mock her lack of progress.
    “Hel o?”
    “Madeline?”
    Madeline paused, confused by the M. Ziegler that had appeared on her cal er ID. It wasn’t Chief Pontiff, cal ing her from some remote location. If she’d guessed correctly, it was Ray Harper. Before the fal ing out that had left him and her father estranged, he’d been Lee’s best friend. When Madeline was little, Ray had even worked for them, doing odd jobs around the farm.
    “Hel o, Ray. How are you?”
    “Good as ever. And you?”
    “Hanging in there.”
    “I heard about the Cadil ac.”
    Word traveled fast in Stil water. “Can you believe it was right there al these years?”
    “Who put it there?”

    “I have no idea.”
    “That’s got to bother you.”
    It did. But she preferred some development to nothing at al . Besides, she and Ray had both experienced a deeper kind of pain—she’d lost her mother and, a few years later, he’d lost his sixteen-year-old daughter, both to suicide. “I’m okay.”
    “Did they find anything—any answers?” he asked.
    “No, not yet.”
    “That’s too bad.”
    “I’m not giving up hope.” He didn’t say anything more, so she fil ed the silence. “I don’t see you around town much anymore, Ray. What’ve you been up to?”
    “I’ve been spending half my time in Iuka. My mother fel and broke her hip and she can’t live alone anymore. I’m with her now, moving her to my sister’s place.”
    That explained the strange name on her cal er ID. “I’m sorry to hear about your mother,” she said.
    “She’l be okay now that she’s with Patti. Anyway, I should be home later in the week. Let me know if anything changes, okay? Your father and I weren’t on the best of terms when he disappeared. But I think about him often.”
    “I appreciate that.” Her telephone indicated that she had another cal coming in. “Good luck with your mom,” she said and switched over. But this cal er wasn’t Pontiff, either.
    According to cal er ID, it was Clay. “What’s up, big brother?”
    “Nothing new,” he replied. “Just checking in.”
    She final y pushed away from her computer and swiveled her chair to look glumly out the large front window of her office, which revealed an entire block of Stil water’s most prominent businesses—L & B Hardware, Town & Country Furniture, Cutshal ’s Funeral Home, Lambert’s Auction Service and Let The Good Times Rol Bil iards and Bar. A corner of the police station was visible, too. Her eyes zeroed in on it as if she could see through brick and mortar.
    “I’m fine, just tired of the rain.” And growing more impatient by the minute, waiting for Pontiff to call.
    “You took yesterday pretty hard, Mad.”
    “He’s not coming back,” she said distantly. “I thought it’d be easier for me to know if he was…gone for good. But it isn’t. It makes me angry. And it makes me feel guilty, as if I haven’t done enough for him.”

    “You’ve published every possible lead, posted rewards to encourage people to come forward with information, fol owed up whenever and wherever you could. You’ve hung on, and you haven’t let anyone forget. You’ve done your best.”
    She knew her dogged persistence had created problems for Clay and his