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Again she paused. This time her lip seemed to curl in
contempt. "...An independent, self-contained."
    "What the hell does that mean?" Fiona snapped,
wanting to hear it said aloud.
    "She did not need men." She held up the vibrator
as if it were a weapon. "She pleasured herself."
    "Mistress of herself," Fiona snickered. Tells me
a lot about you, Evans, Fiona thought. To characterize the possession of such
an instrument as a total substitute for men was revealing. Fiona owned one, but
it was strictly an alternative, not a first option.
    "Maybe she didn't want complications," Evans
said, confirming Fiona's speculation.
    "Lot of good it did her."
    Evans activated the vibrator. A muted whirring sound cut
the air. Then she shrugged, cut it off, replaced it in its plastic box and
shoved it back where she had found it.
    They inspected the other rooms. Next to the bedroom was an
alcove, also neat as a pin, with everything in its place. There was a computer
and a printer on a desk and various plaques and prizes hung on the walls,
including a Pulitzer Honorable Mention.
    "Seems uncommonly neat for a journalist," Fiona
said.
    "Not for this lady," Evans said.
    "How so?"
    "She was obviously controlled, obsessively organized,
tightly focused, compulsively tight-assed and secretive."
    You must know the turf, lady, Fiona thought.
    "Did you know who she was?"
    "I read the papers."
    At that moment, there was a sound at the door and the
Eggplant strode in, looking surprisingly chipper, dressed to the nines in the
dark tan suit he wore for television appearances. He sported a beautiful blue
paisley tie on a light blue shirt and his shoes were mirror-shined.
    "What have we got, ladies?" he asked, his eyes
flitting from one face to another.
    "Polly Dearborn," Fiona said crisply.
"Female, about forty, Caucasian, prominent journalist. Looks like death by
hanging."
    "Self-imposed?"
    Fiona exchanged glances with Evans, who had remained
silent, deferring to Fiona, following the protocol of seniority.
    "Maybe," Fiona said hesitantly, quick to sense
what a bonanza this case meant for him. It could serve as a decoy, force
people's attention away from the killing fields of the drug wars. The deceased,
after all, was a prominent newspaperwoman who had thrown more people of
prominence into the garbage heap than any journalist around. In that respect, she
was the champ, the numero-uno nutcutter, a world-class investigative reporter.
Her death, any which way, had the makings of a media feast.
    The method of her demise was compellingly bizarre, the
image vivid. The bitch goddess of Journalism hanging from the balcony of
fucking Watergate, for chrissakes. Fucking Watergate, the physical place and
the genre, symbols of corruption and cover-up, the biggest political story of
the century, bar none.
    This eclipsed mere drug-related gang wars. This was
whitey's turf. No wonder the Eggplant looked as if the weight of the ages had
been lifted from his breast.
    "No note?" he asked.
    "None."
    "Any sign of foul play?" he asked hopefully,
looking around the room. His gaze rested on the overturned potted trees visible
on the terrace.
    "She could have done that herself," Fiona said.
"To get over the wall."
    "Or they could have fallen when she was thrown
over," the Eggplant said. From his point of view, murder would give the
story more legs.
    "This is a lady with a lot of enemies," Fiona
said, deliberately feeding the Eggplant's hope.
    He began to pace the living room floor. By now the sun was
poking above the horizon, throwing glints along the slate surface of the Potomac.
    "Somebody might have bit back," he said. He
suddenly stopped pacing and looked around the room. "Lady lived the good
life here. That's real money on the walls and you can't knock the view. Are you
dead certain there's no note?"
    She looked toward Evans for some support to buttress the
fact. She was used to Cates interjecting himself when the Eggplant interrogated
them. There was a faintest hint of a smile on