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squad had attacked the telephone directory and come up with addresses
for two of the three. The third, Oblinsky, had an unlisted number, but a
half-hour’s argument with a supervisor had finally netted an address for him.
The completed list was now on Carella’s desk together with all the canceled
checks. He should have begun tracking down those names, he knew, but something
still was bugging him.
     
    “Why
did Courtenoy lie to me and Meyer?” he asked Cotton Hawes.  “Why did he lie
about something as simple as what Claudia Davis was wearing on the day of the
drowning?”
     
    “How
did he lie?”
     
    “First
he said she was wearing yellow, said he saw a patch of yellow break the surface
of the lake. Then he changed it to blue. Why did he do that, Cotton?”
     
    “I don’t
know.”
     
    “And if
he lied about that, why couldn’t he have been lying about everything? Why
couldn’t he and Claudia have done in little Josie together?”
     
    “I don’t
know,” Hawes said.
     
    “Where’d
that twenty thousand bucks come from, Cotton?”
     
    “Maybe
it was a stock dividend.”
     
    “Maybe.
Then why didn’t she simply deposit the check? This was cash, Cotton, cash. Now
where did it come from? That’s a nice piece of change. You don’t pick twenty
grand out of the gutter.”
     
    “I
suppose not.”
     
    “I know
where you can get twenty grand, Cotton.”
     
    “Where?”
     
    “From
an insurance company. When someone dies.” Carella nodded once, sharply. “I’m
going to make some calls. Damnit, that money had to come from someplace.”
     
    He hit
pay dirt on his sixth call. The man he spoke to was named Jeremiah Dodd and was
a representative of the Security Insurance Corporation, Inc. He recognized
Josie Thompson’s name at once.
     
    “Oh,
yes,’ he said. “We settled that claim in July.”
     
    “Who
made the claim, Mr. Dodd?”
     
    “The
beneficiary, of course. Just a moment. Let me get the folder on this. Will you
hold on, please?”
     
    Carella
waited impatiently. Over at the insurance company on the other end of the line
he could hear muted voices. A girl giggled suddenly, and he wondered who was
kissing whom over by the water cooler. At last Dodd came back on the line.
     
    “Here
it is,” he said. “Josephine Thompson. Beneficiary was her cousin, Miss Claudia
Davis. Oh, yes, now it’s all coming back. Yes, this is the one.”
     
    “What
one?”
     
    “Where
the girls were mutual beneficiaries.”
     
    “What
do you mean?”
     
    “The
cousins,” Dodd said. “There were two life policies. One for Miss Davis and one
for Miss Thompson. And they were mutual beneficiaries.”
     
    “You
mean Miss Davis was the beneficiary of Miss Thompson’s policy and vice versa?”
     
    “Yes,
that’s right.”
     
    “That’s
very interesting. How large were the policies?”
     
    “Oh,
very small.”
     
    “Well,
how small then?”
     
    “I
believe they were both insured for twelve thousand five hundred. Just a moment;
let me check. Yes, that’s right.”
     
    “And
Miss Davis applied for payment on the policy after her cousin died, huh?”
     
    “Yes.
Here it is, right here. Josephine Thompson drowned at Lake Triangle on June
fourth. That’s right. Claudia Davis sent in the policy and the certificate of
death and also a coroner’s jury verdict.”
     
    “She
didn’t miss a trick, did she?”
     
    “Sir? I’m
sorry, I ...”
     
    “Did
you pay her?”
     
    “Yes.
It was a perfectly legitimate claim. We began processing it at once.”
     
    “Did
you send anyone up to Lake Triangle to investigate the circumstances of Miss Thompson’s
death?”
     
    “Yes,
but it was merely a routine investigation. A coroner’s inquest is good enough
for us, Detective Carella.”
     
    “When
did you pay Miss Davis?”
     
    “On
July first.”
     
    “You
sent her a check for twelve thousand five hundred dollars, is that right?”
     
    “No,
sir.”
     
    “Didn’t
you say ...