swallowed. “Didn’t I talk to you about all that?”
“I don’t think you did, Alvin.”
“I meant to. I had a chat with Ray one night when he was looking for you. I don’t know where you could have been at the time.”
“Walking the Ferguson family dog, I imagine. That is the extent of my social life lately.”
“Whatever.”
“And what all did you work out with Ray? Be precise.”
“That they’d stay here, of course. What else would you plan to do with them? They’re practically family. That’s what I said to Ray. And he told me when they were coming and all that.”
“That must have been when you filled me in on the details.”
“Okay, okay. So I forgot. Lord thundering Jesus, Camilla, you always go on about everything. I have a whole lot on my mind lately. Now that you’ve shut down Justice for Victims, I have to find another job, and if you sell this house, I have to get another place to live. I’m working really hard to build my cooking skills and that’s taking a lot of time and psychic energy.”
“Spare me, Alvin.”
“Everything is not about you, Camilla,” he sniffed.
I have learned not to be distracted into losing my temper.
“But this is about me. Don’t you think I might want to know when they’re arriving, for instance?”
“I suppose.”
“So did you write down the arrangements?”
“I knew I’d remember them.”
“Fair enough. And do you remember them?”
I tapped my fingers on the table during the longish pause.
Eventually, Alvin said, “Not exactly.”
“Oh, great. Well, they’re going to be here sometime, so you’d better figure out what needs to be done and how you’re going to do it. Consider it a matter of life and death. I’d like a plan after I get back from my first meeting.”
Alvin said, “But you don’t have meetings any more.”
I met P. J. Lynch for breakfast at the Second Cup near the Courthouse. I was already waiting with an iced latte and a blueberry muffin when he blew in the open door. His carroty hair was a bit rumpled, as were his yellow T-shirt and his cargo shorts. Maybe he’d slept in that shirt. Or maybe not, as he cultivates a wrinkled style. Particularly on a Saturday.
He stood in line until he snagged a double espresso and three chocolate biscotti.
“Any word?” I asked when he sat down.
“About what?” he said when he had inhaled his breakfast, setting some kind of chocolate biscotti eating record.
P. J. was a reporter who put his nose for news above all else, including confidences from his friends. I definitely didn’t want to tell him about the lawyer joke that had preceded Rollie Thorsten’s demise or the note with Thorsten’s name on it.
I said, “I don’t know. Anything.”
“Could you be a bit more vague, please?”
“Hey, you’re the reporter, P. J. You tell me.”
“I gather you didn’t read my piece in the Citizen this morning.”
“It’s early, P. J. And I didn’t get much sleep. Oh, come on, don’t get sulky. Do you want me to run to Mags and Fags and buy a Citizen? I’ll do it if that means I don’t have to look at your protruding lower lip.”
“Funny. It was just about the weirdness of Rollie Thorsten dying right when Brugel’s trial is coming to an end.”
I feigned a total lack of interest. “Oh yeah?” I yawned to further the point.
“Am I boring you? I thought it was great human interest.”
“Hmm. Did you hear anything about how Rollie managed to drown himself?”
“No reports available yet, but there’s something funny going down. The cops aren’t saying diddly.”
“Really? Didn’t you get anything out of Officer Wentzell?”
P. J. shot me a dirty look. “Don’t mock me.”
I said, “She just seems like such a nice girl. I don’t know why they wouldn’t release the cause of death. He was supposed to have drowned, but I heard a rumour that he was shot.” I didn’t let on that a joke was the source of the rumour and that Mombourquette had confirmed it.
“I heard that too.” P. J. actually quivered. And he was lying. I can always tell.
“Maybe the cops are being cautious about information so the relatives don’t get upset.”
P. J. snorted. “Be serious. The path lab and the coroner might be discreet, but all the cops I know hated Rollie. They probably have a flock of plastic flamingos outside the station today.”
I thought of Mombourquette and his visceral reaction to Brugel and his lawyer. “I suppose they all did hate him.”
“Sure. He used to shred them on the witness stand. I know one guy had to take stress leave afterwards.”
I shrugged. “They’re trained to cope with that kind of treatment on the stand. They just say what they observed. They’re not being accused of anything.”
Unlike Laurie Roulay. She’d been accused of lying and of being in part responsible for the death of her daughter and that of the child’s father. Specious for sure, and the judge rapped Rollie’s knuckles for it, but the damage was done.
P. J. said, “Rollie had special talent.”
“So they all hated him.”
He narrowed his eyes, watched me with more suspicion than usual. “Do you know something about his death?”
“Me? What could I know?”
“My spider senses are tingling.”
“Really? Have you thought about getting a job in a comic book?”
“Funny. But if you did know something, you’d tell me.
Right?”
“Sure. And you’d tell me too, right? You want another espresso?”
“Nope. I’m heading out to dig up dirt. You better not be holding back, Tiger.”
“Me?
