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coordinates.”
    “Oh, that.” He seemed to pass it off with a
shrug. “The lake’s fed by hot springs. It’s got lots of hot spots
where the fish gather. He was always mapping them out for future
visits.”
    “Adam,” I held the letter up for his
inspection. “Would you mind if I borrowed this? I am hoping there
might be something in here that may lend a clue into your father’s
death.”
    He dismissed it with a wave. “Sure, if you
think it’ll help.”
    “Thank you.” I pitched an ear toward the
window and listened for the rain. It had let up significantly,
though I did not expect that to last long. “I suppose we should be
getting on now.” I glanced at Carlos. He could not have looked more
relieved. Adam got up and met me halfway across the room.
    “Detective?” he offered his handshake. I took
it. “If you find out anything about my father’s killer,
you’ll—”
    “I will let you know. I promise. In the
meantime,” I gave him my card, “call if you need us or want to
talk.”
    “I will.”
    “Oh, and one more thing. I have to ask you
this. I hope you don’t mind.”
    “Right here, Detective.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “That is what you were going to ask me, isn’t
it? You want to know where I was last night.”
    “Yes, of course.”
    “I was here the entire night.”
    “You can substantiate that?”
    “You can ask my girlfriend. We were
together.”
    “That’s Trish.”
    “Yes.”
    “Where is Trish now?”
    “Working.”
    “Where?” I saw Carlos reach for his
notepad.
    “Down at the Percolator. She’s a waitress
there.”
    “I see.” Carlos slipped his notepad back into
his pocket. “Just for the record, do you own a gun?”
    That seemed to catch him by surprise. “I hate
guns, Detective, even more so now.”
    “Then you don’t own one.”
    “No.”
    “All right then, I guess that’s it.”
    Adam Landau walked us to the door and saw us
out. As I suspected, the rain came in on a swell of cold air
pushing in from the Atlantic, soaking us to the bone on our run to
the car. I asked Carlos why it is that murderers cannot wait until
calmer weather to commit their crimes. He reasoned that crimes
usually take only an instant to commit, whereas solving one takes
the passage of time in which no weather can wait. I swear,
sometimes he is a philosophical whale in an ocean of minnows.
    “What do you think of Adam?” I asked.
    Carlos gave me a lazy shrug. “He seems all
right. What do you think?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “What? You don’t think he is mournful enough.
It’s not like he was that close to his father.”
    “No, that’s not it.”
    “What then?”
    “It’s probably nothing, but did you notice
when we first got to the house, he asked if his father had gotten
into trouble already?”
    “I remember.”
    “And then he said, ‘I told him last night not
to….’, but I interrupted him, telling him his father was dead.”
    Carlos started the car and backed it out of
the drive. “I don’t get it. What is so suspicious about that?”
    “Nothing, by itself. It is just that later
when I asked him when he last saw his father, he said noon
yesterday. Then he said after his dad called the taxi and left for
Stephanie’s, he never came back and they never spoke again.
Therefore, he could not have told him anything last night.”
    “So, he said last night when he meant
yesterday.” Carlos dropped the car into gear and headed east.
“What’s the difference?”
    “Okay, how `bout just before we left? In
talking about Stephanie Stiles, he said that if he found out she
capped his dad, he’d let us know.”
    “You don’t think he would?”
    “Oh, I’m sure he would. What I want to know
is how he knew someone capped his dad. I didn’t say he was
shot.”
    “I think capped can be used generically when
talking about someone getting murdered.”
    “Really?”
    “Tony, come on, the kid just found out
someone killed his father. Cut him some slack. You really do