him what a good boy he was, then led him to an empty metal-mesh run. Once the dog was inside the run with the gate closed she came back, folding the leash she’d removed from his collar.
“I have to admit I’m surprised you use runs,” Mike said as she rejoined him. “I was picturing at least one dog in your house, if not all of them.”
“Only someone who likes slobber keeps bloodhounds in their house,” she answered with a smile. “I consider my dogs wonderful people and I love them, but I don’t feel the same about slobber. Come on in.”
She showed the front door was unlocked by simply opening it and walking through. As he followed her, Mike was tempted to point out how dangerous a practice that was, especially with a murderer running around loose. Then he realized she might just have been out back with her dog, and decided to save the comment for another time.
“Can I offer you a cup of coffee?” she asked over her shoulder as he closed the door and followed her. The living room they passed through was plain but neat, a gold-and-brown flower pattern on the couch and chairs and drapes. The light gold carpeting and dark-wood furniture, along with the rest, gave Mike the impression that it was all a holdover from an earlier era, probably her parents’. Tanda Grail lived in that house, but hadn’t yet put her own stamp on it.
“I’ll have coffee if you’re having some,” he answered her offer as he followed her into the kitchen. “Which means yes, thank you, I’d love a cup, so I hope you are having some.”
“I admire a man who won’t drink alone,” she said with a small laugh, glancing at him as she headed for her kitchen counter. “Personally, I drink alone all the time, but then I’m not a man, so it’s all right. Have a seat.”
“You seem to be in a really good mood,” Mike said, going to one of the chairs around the heavy wooden table she’d gestured toward. “Has something happened to make you feel better than you were feeling this morning? If so, I could use some of the same myself.”
“I—just enjoy working with my dogs,” she answered without turning, all her attention on the mugs she filled. “It’s always such a pleasure, at least once they’re past the awkward-puppy stage. I’m afraid that’s all it is, so there really isn’t anything to share.”
She turned then with a coffee mug in each hand, and the direct way she looked at him told Mike immediately that she was lying. People who had no experience with lying always seemed to do that, look straight at you to show how sincere they were being. So something had happened, even though he couldn’t imagine what it might have been.
“Thank you,” he said as she set one of the mugs down in front of him, then headed toward the refrigerator for milk or cream. “Coffee usually helps me to think, but right now my thoughts aren’t cooperating. They insist on centering around how foolish Saxon was, especially for a supposedly experienced detective. If he’d had enough sense to think the thing through, he might not be dead now.”
“What do you mean?” Tanda asked, coming back with a creamer and sitting in front of her own coffee. “What didn’t he think through?”
“I mean, Ms. Grail, that he didn’t stop to remember that four people had been killed.” Mike spoke gently but stared straight at her, refusing to release that bright gray gaze. “When four people are stabbed to death by someone, that someone isn’t a person you want to fool around with. You can tell yourself they don’t know what you know, or that you can handle them if they find out—and that’s probably what Saxon did. He told himself those things, and ended up just as dead as the first four. If he’d gone to the police first thing, he might still be alive.”
Tanda’s gray eyes had widened, and she looked as though she ought to be biting her lip. Mike hadn’t enjoyed frightening her, but everything he’d said was the truth. He couldn’t force her to tell him what she knew, but if she didn’t speak up she had to understand and believe that she could end up like her brother. Indecision flashed in those eyes, and then she was staring at him in a totally different way.
“But if Roger had gone to the police, isn’t it possible he would have just put more people in danger?” she asked, leaning forward with the intensity of her feelings. “The police are just human beings, after all, and they can be killed as easily as anyone. Instead of one new body you could have had four or five, and most of them your own people.”
“But don’t you see that couldn’t have happened?” Mike countered just as intensely. “It’s possible to kill one person to keep a secret, but when a dozen people know, it’s no longer a secret. It would have been written down, put in the computer, mentioned to people on the phone…Once a secret is shared in that many ways, it’s no longer a secret that can get you hurt or killed. Sharing a secret keeps everyone alive.”
Mike knew he was repeating himself, but if it made Tanda Grail rethink her position, he was willing to say the same thing a hundred times. And she was thinking things through again. He could see that in her expression as she gazed down at the table and then she looked directly at him again.
“I hope you’re right,” she said, the words earnest. “I’d never be able to stand it if I caused the death of someone else. And I wasn’t being entirely truthful with you a minute ago. I discovered something I hadn’t expected, and although I’m sure it means something, I don’t know what.”
“Why don’t you tell me about it anyway,” Mike urged with a smile. “I can put my department to work on it, and that way we ought to come up with an answer.”
“I certainly hope you can,” she agreed, finally letting go of the creamer. “It occurred to me that my brother’s body was found only half a mile away from here. It might have been true that he was there to meet someone, but he also might have been there to go somewhere. To test the theory, I took Robby to the spot and gave him the scent from the shirt Don was wearing when he died.”
“Do you mean to say the dog actually found a trail to follow?” Mike demanded. “But it’s been a good week, not to mention that it’s rained at least once. How could there be anything left?”
“Are you asking if Robby only pretended to find a track?” she countered with a smile, clearly amused by Mike’s disbelief. “If he did, he’s better at pretending than anyone you care to name. He brought me here to the house, to the cellar stairs in back, and I found that the lock on the doors had been cut open. Apparently Don did come to the house that night, but not to see me. He came to leave something.”
She took a key from her jeans pocket and held it up, showing him the something she meant. Mike reached for it and she gave it to him, but looking at it more closely didn’t help.
“I can’t tell what this is a key to, and you don’t know either, do you?” he asked, getting her head shake to confirm his guess. “Well, as I said, I’ll get my people working on it. There are expert locksmiths who can tell you exactly what a particular key is for, and we’ll consult one of them. After that we’ll at least know what to look for.”
“It doesn’t seem to be a car key, a house key or a safe-deposit-box key,” she said, watching as Mike put it carefully in a small evidence bag and then into his inside coat pocket. “That leaves personal safes, strongboxes, secret caches or diaries.”
“Or one of ten thousand other things,” Mike returned with a faint sound of amusement. “I know you’re hoping it’s one of the things you mentioned. For that matter I hope the same, but let’s not set ourselves up for disappointment. This key could just be a duplicate to a lock box that has important business papers. Your brother
