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Richard Dathan Morris was symptomatic of old-fashioned jealousy, just as Ron Peters had suggested. Nevertheless, I had a hard time using the word “jealousy” in a male-only context.
    I was so lost in thought that I drove straight by the address Tom Riley had given us. I made a U-turn and drove back to it, parking on the street in front of the house.
    The place was situated on Alki Avenue itself, far enough east of the lighthouse to be out of the high-rent district. Riley’s apartment turned out to be in the basement of a wooden house, living space converted from what had once been a two-car garage. There was a tiny deck outside the sliding glass door with hardly enough room for the single deck chair that sat there in isolated splendor. Only one person at a time could sit on the minuscule deck and view the northern tip of downtown Seattle across Elliott Bay.
    As I walked up to the door, I heard someone inside playing a piano. The tune was an old familiar melody, but it was too much like classical music for me to be able to identify it. When I knocked, the piano playing stopped abruptly and Tom Riley slid open the door. He was cradling his newly adopted blue-eyed cat.
    “What do you want?” he asked. His tone of voice, his body language, his manner all said he was not delighted to see me, but then I’m used to that. Being a Homicide detective would never rate high in a popularity contest.
    “I’ve got to talk to you, Mr. Riley. May I come in?”
    “Haven’t we talked enough already?”
    “No.”
    Reluctantly he stepped aside far enough to let me into the room. Once I was inside and the door was closed, he carefully put the cat down on the floor. The animal crouched on all fours and began scratching his chin on Riley’s shoelaces.
    “He’s not used to the neighborhood yet,” Riley explained, looking down at the cat. “I’m worried he might get out and run away.”
    As I glanced around the room, my first impression was that the place was both small and crowded. It was as though a whole houseful of furniture had been summarily jammed into one or two rooms. Chairs and tables and bookshelves had been crammed together with very little organization or planning.
    “You’ll have to excuse the mess,” said Riley apologetically. “I had hoped to get rid of my extra stuff after I moved here, but I haven’t had time.”
    The piano, a small, beautifully finished spinet, stood just inside the door. On it sat a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and a highball glass. It looked to me like Tom Riley was seriously nipping at the hard stuff. Early. It was still well before noon.
    “Want a drink?” he offered.
    “No thanks. Too early for me.”
    He picked up the bottle and poured himself a generous drink. Motioning me toward a couch in the middle of the crowded room, Riley sank into a swivel-based rocking chair and placed the half-empty liquor bottle on a glass-topped table between us.
    “So talk,” he said, downing his drink in a single swallow.
    “Drowning your troubles?” I asked mildly.
    Riley held up his empty glass and stared pensively through it toward the sliding glass door. The door framed a classic picture of a placid, dazzlingly blue Elliott Bay with the upper end of downtown Seattle gleaming in the background. The Space Needle hovered there like a flying saucer, its supportive tower almost invisible in the flawless sunlight.
    “Maybe,” he said at last.
    “Want to talk about it?”
    “Not particularly.”
    “Mr. Riley, I get the feeling there was far more than a simple nurse-patient relationship between you and Jonathan Thomas.”
    Raising his head, he looked at me intently, one eyebrow slightly arched. “Do you?”
    Riley wasn’t making it easy for me. In trying to sort out what had gone on among the three of them, I was already well outside my comfort zone. I had to take better control of the situation, put things on firmer ground.
    Without explanation, I reached into my pocket and pulled out the small