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I was seriously considering it.
    I looked at the clock. It was now 4:40. After five more minutes, another woman picked up. “This is Amy Small,” she said. “What can I do for you?”
    “Hi Amy, I’m with Duda Detective Agency, and—”
    Another click. No music this time, just a dial tone.
    Dang. I told Uncle Bob, Bob Duda, that is, he needed another name for his business.
    I dialed again. It was four forty-five.
    “Hello, Advanced Precision Technologies,” said the same receptionist. “Can you hold please?”
    “No!” I said, too late. Muzak.
    I hung up and redialed.
    “Hello, this is—” said the rapid-fire receptionist.
    “I have an appointment with Amy Small,” I blurted out.
    “Your name, please?”
    “Olive Ziegwart.” I knew better than to try Duda Detectives again.
    “I’m sorry, I don’t see that name.”
    “Robert Duda?”
    “You’ll have to call back on Monday and make an appoint—”
    “Ivy Meadows?”
    A pause. “Yes, Amy had you down for four thirty.” Of course. Marge only knew me as Ivy. “Unfortunately, Ms. Small had another phone appointment at four forty-five. She’s on the line with them now.”
    “I’ll wait.” My first stab at detecting was not going well.
    After another five minutes, the Muzak was interrupted with, “Hi, this is Amy.”
    “Hi, Amy, this is Olive. I mean, I—”
    “Hold on. From Doodoo Detectives?”
    “Yes.”
    I heard a sigh and could just tell she was getting ready to hang up. “Dud- a !” I practically shouted into the phone. “Dud a Detective Agency. It’s a Polish name that means one who plays the bagpipes badly.”
    “Is that supposed to make me think you’re not a crank?”
    “I’m not a crank, I’m a private investigator.” Yeah, I was exaggerating again, but this was an extenuating circumstance. “I’m Ivy, the one Marge recommended?”
    Silence.
    “Hello?”
    There was a noise I couldn’t identify muffled by a hand or something over the mouthpiece of the phone.
    “Ms. Small?”
    I heard the sound clearly then. It was weeping. Oh.
    Until that moment I hadn’t really thought of Charlie Small as a real person, just my breakout detective job. I felt my face flush with shame.
    “Ms. Small? I’m so sorry about your father.”
    “Thank you,” she said, snuffling. “I’m sorry. It just hit me again. I can’t believe he’s gone.”
    “Why don’t you tell me about him?” I asked as gently as I could.
    From Amy, who wept off and on throughout the interview, I learned that Charlie Small was seventy-eight years old. He’d been married to his wife, Helen (“his bride,” he always called her) for nearly fifty years until she died of lung cancer last fall. He’d been a loving father who sacrificed his dream of owning his own business in order to send Amy to MIT. He’d worked as an accountant with a midsized firm in Omaha until he retired at sixty-five and moved with Helen to Sunnydale.
    “I only saw him once since Mom’s funeral,” said Amy quietly, all done with crying for now. “Just once. I was so busy with work and…” She trailed off.
    “I’m sure he understood. I’m sure he was proud of the job you’re doing.” I don’t know why I said those things, but I did feel sure, somehow.
    “I hope so.”
    “And why…” I took a deep breath. “Why do you want us to look into his death?”
    “My father would never kill himself.”
    I waited. I’d learned from Uncle Bob not to fill the silences. He taught me that the best information came from letting other people talk. This aspect of detecting did not come naturally to me.
    “My father was a strong Christian. He believed that only God had the right to end a life. And now his pastor is threatening to not perform the memorial service because he doubts my dad’s faith.” Amy’s voice grew hard as she imitated the pompous-sounding pastor. “He said that he ‘rejected the lordship of Jesus Christ by taking his life into his own hands rather than submitting to