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out into the white-and-turquoise building vestibule, To Cat, it felt like walking into an iPod. Granny Grace steered her over to a white leather bench perched on aluminum legs.  
    “There,” she said, pointing to the bench surface. “Take it out and set it there.”
    “We have two more people to interview on South Beach,” Cat protested.
    “Humor me.”
    “Fine.” Cat reached into the right pocket of her slacks, not expecting to find much, as they were warm-weather slacks and not appropriate for Seattle most of the year. She’d hardly worn them before this trip.  
    She turned out her pocket, and a scraggly array of fibers fell into her hand. She set them on the bench.  
    Granny Grace knelt to look at them closely, taking her smartphone and flipping to a light-bulb app, which illuminated the pocket lint. “Let’s see…” Amidst gray fibers from Cat’s pants, there was what looked like the corner of a dollar bill. Cat had to admit it was visually sort of interesting, but not earth-shattering or surprising in any way.  
    “A bit of money. Big deal.”
    Also caught up in the gray pants fibers was a crumb from the pastry they’d had that morning at the Cuban bakery on Calle Ocho. “Yeah, that’s a cool detail,” Cat conceded. “But art worth tens of thousands? Hardly.”
    “The detritus of everyday life,” Granny Grace pronounced. “It tells the story of what we do with our hands, and what we value enough to keep with us.”
    “Sure,” Cat said, smiling. “So apparently I value food and money. Can we go now?”
    “What’s in your other pocket?”
    “Really? We’re doing this?”
    “Yes,” her grandmother said, motioning to the bench.
    Cat emptied the contents of her other pocket.
    Granny Grace bent forward like a forensics examiner. “Oh, look at this,” she said. “It’s paper…” She unrolled a piece of paper fiber that had obviously been through the wash. Faded but still readable were the words Dave’s Drive-In and a logo of a frosty soda mug with a happy smiling face superimposed on the white mug froth.  
    Cat took it from Granny Grace’s hands. Seeing it instantly brought her back to the day that Lee had shown up in Missouri, worried about her, foolishly playing the white knight come to rescue her. She had no choice but to take him with her on a trip to Johnson’s Shut-Ins, where she found a clue, etched into the rocks there, that was relevant to her case. They’d stopped at Dave’s Drive-In for lunch on the way, and the two of them had scrunched up the papers around their straws and then siphoned soda onto them, watching them grow like worms. She’d felt like a kid again, laughing with Lee.
    Her eyes began to water.
    “What is it, Cat? Is it something from your trip back to St. Louis?”
    “Yes. I went there with Lee.”
    Cat felt her grandmother’s arms around her as the tears came. “Oh, my poor dear. You just got socked with the power of art.”
    Cat recovered, and, laying a hand on her grandmother’s shoulder, she said, “Gran. I need to ask you something. I hate to ask it, but I have to.” She cleared her throat. “Should we consider Uncle Mick a suspect?”
    “Certainly not!”
    “He doesn’t have an alibi….”
    “Yes, I know.” Her grandmother looked away. “He’s hiding something about that night. But he didn’t set that fire. He lost most of his art, not to mention his best friend, in that fire. So get that out of your head.”
    “It’s just…” Cat hesitated, swallowing hard.  
    “What, Cat? Say it.”
    “I, um, dreamslipped with him.”
    “On purpose?”
    “Yes.”
    Granny Grace silently regarded Cat.
    “I couldn’t help it… I wanted to know… And I found something. He dreamed—”
    “—Whatever he dreamed, it doesn’t matter.”
    “But what if you’re in denial because he’s your brother? He dreamed that he set his studio on fire and killed Donnie.”
    Her grandmother sat there for a long time, not saying anything. Then she