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journal."
    "The girlfriend is Millie
Longacre. The guy across the road is Bob Barney. You're not familiar with this
area, but Portwood lived way out in the country, at the end of a dead-end road,
and almost on top of the Ohio
River . I know both
of these people, and both of them are part bloodhound. The only way anyone else
got near Portwood's house was if they were on foot or came down the river on a
boat. The river is roughly a quarter of a mile from Portwood's house, which
means it was far enough away that a boat couldn't have been heard, but there
aren't any good landing places near his house. And either of those two
neighbors would have heard any car coming down the road. Especially since I
doubt if over a half dozen cars go down that road in a month. Well, a half
dozen other than the three of them, and I doubt if anyone else drives it in the
winter. Period. Of course this didn't happen in the winter."
    "Any idea where the Colonel's
brother and sister live? The ones he doesn't speak to?"
    "Well, he never talked about
them, but I'm pretty sure neither of them moved away from Frankfort ."
    I thanked Herb and hung up. I
would be heading somewhere near Westport , Kentucky and to Frankfort for sure. I wasn't sure where
else I would be going. I planned to talk to anyone mentioned in the journal,
and see about talking to someone who had something to do with the Kentucky Book
Fair. I know those events don't happen by themselves, and someone had to invite
the Colonel and all those other authors. I wanted to know how well any of them
knew Portwood, and if any of them were disgusted enough with him to murder him.
     
     
10
     
     
    I picked up Lou early Tuesday
morning. We stopped for breakfast at Jerry's Drive-In Restaurant in Paris . We could both remember when you
could find a Jerry's in many towns, and all over Lexington . My parents talked about spending many a night at
different Jerry's when they were teenagers. They would drive to one nearby town
or another. They would have spent more nights at Jerry's if we had had one in
Hilldale.
    We left Jerry's and took the
picturesque drive from Paris to Lexington, past a few horse farms, although
none of the famous ones are on that road.
    "What's today's clue? Or did
you get another one?"
    "Of course I did. It's a huge
chunk of change."
    "A huge chunk of
change?"
    "Who do you think you are? Carnac the Magnificent?"
    "No, he's the only person I
know who's smarter and funnier than I am."
    "He died, you know."
    "I wonder if he saw it
coming."
    "I don't know, but I heard
Aunt Blabby warned him."
    I'm sad that most of the truly
funny people are no longer living. At least we have DVDs to help people today
know what real humor is like.
     
    +++
     
    According to Portwood's journal he
left home late on Tuesday morning and checked in the Capital Plaza Hotel that
afternoon. He spent the rest of the day in his room and ate dinner in the hotel
that night. I was sure that Lou and I wouldn't be able to finish our
investigation and get a confession in one day, as magnificent as we are. So, we
too would take a couple of rooms at the hotel and check to see if anyone in the
capital city noticed anything out of the way regarding Portwood's demeanor the
first couple of days. I had already called a couple of people and lined up my
first two interviews. I figured others would stem from those.
    We arrived at the hotel and were
told that our rooms wouldn't be ready for a few minutes. I asked if I could
speak to anyone who talked with Cyril Portwood when he checked in a few days
earlier. A couple of minutes later Lou and I were face to face with the
manager. I explained why we were there. The manager left, then returned a
couple of minutes later.
    "You're right that Cyril
Portwood, the author, stayed with us last week, but I spoke to the person in
charge of booking the authors' rooms and found out that he called on Monday,
said that he was ill and wouldn't arrive until Thursday. I checked and he did
check in