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here.”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œAnd you didn’t touch anything in this room, correct?”
    â€œYes. I mean, no, I didn’t touch anything. I knocked on the door, then I opened it.”
    â€œUh huh. Why did you open the door? Wasn’t it possible Mrs. Knoebel was just sleeping late.”
    â€œMrs. Knoebel never sleeps late. I always come up here first thing to see if she wants coffee or tea or something.”
    â€œYou notice anything strange in Mrs. Knoebel’s behavior lately?”
    She replied with a vacant look. “Strange?”
    â€œUnhappy, nervous, upset?”
    â€œNo sir,” she replied, her voice barely audible now.
    â€œAppear to you that anything is missing from the house?”
    She treated him to another blank stare. “I don’t know,” she said. “I didn’t touch anything.”
    â€œSo you said. Well, spend some more time with Officer Kovacevic here. Tell him anything you know about where the Knoebels keep their valuables, jewelry, silver. See if you notice anything that might have been taken. We’ll be in touch.”
    Nettie Sisson again nodded solemnly. Before she followed Kovacevic from the bedroom she bowed her head, crossed herself, and kissed her bent thumb.
    Walker watched her leave, then turned to the coroner. “What have we got?”
    Jake, a balding, bespectacled man wearing latex gloves and a grim expression, looked up from the notes he was making. “Time of death, sometime yesterday, probably afternoon or early evening. We can get more specific after the autopsy. One slug to the right temple seems to have done the trick.”
    As he listened, Walker moved back to the side of the bed, looking down again at the inert figure of Elizabeth Knoebel. He shoved his hands in his pockets and wordlessly surveyed the bloody death scene. “Go on.”
    â€œYou want some general observations?”
    â€œSure.”
    Jake used his middle finger to push his eyeglasses up the bridge of his nose. “Okay. Her body is in a strange position. She looks incredibly relaxed for someone about to have her brains blown out. The force of the gunshot snapped her head to the side, but otherwise she looks like she just laid down for a nap.”
    â€œYou think someone rearranged the body after she was shot?”
    â€œIf they did, it was only a minor adjustment. The blood pattern is consistent with her having been shot right here.”
    Walker nodded. “What else?”
    â€œWhy does she get undressed and go to bed in the middle of the afternoon?”
    â€œYou want me to take a guess?”
    â€œOkay, I’ll give you that. It just struck me as peculiar, is all.”
    â€œAny evidence of drugs or alcohol?”
    â€œThe autopsy will tell us. I don’t see anything to indicate drug use, but I assume you noticed the champagne.”
    â€œUh huh,” Walker said. He had another look at the bucket on the night table.
    â€œExpensive bottle of bubbly,” Jake said. “Unopened.”
    â€œRight,” Walker said with a sigh. Jake, master of the obvious. “Get me what you can on sexual activity before death. Or after, for that matter. I don’t see any signs of a struggle, although I noticed there are scratch marks on her neck.”
    â€œOld news,” the coroner replied. “Those marks are partially healed, had to be made at least twenty-four hours before death, probably more.”
    â€œAll right, do your thing. I’ll speak with you this afternoon.”
    â€œWe won’t have all the autopsy results done by then.”
    â€œThat’s fine, Jake, just call me with whatever you’ve got. I love the sound of your voice.”
    Kovacevic returned and reported that Mrs. Sisson was downstairs in the kitchen with Kevin Chambers.
    â€œAnything on the burglary angle?”
    Kovacevic shook his head. “She says there doesn’t seem to be anything missing. Silver in the dining