“This is Kate Mahoney,” Molly said. “She found the body.”
“I’m Jesse Stone,” he said.
“The police chief,” the woman said.
“Yes,” Jesse said. “How are you?”
The woman nodded. She was holding a middle-aged bea gle in her lap.
“I’m okay,” she said.
Jesse looked at Molly. Molly nodded. Yes, she was okay. Jesse scratched the beagle behind an ear.
R O B E R T B . P A R K E R
“Tell me what you saw,” Jesse said.
“I just told her,” the woman said.
She was probably thirty, brown hair tucked up under a baseball cap. Blue sweatpants, white T-shirt, elaborate running shoes. Jesse nodded.
“I know,” he said. “Police bureaucracy. You were out running?”
“Yes, I run every morning before I have breakfast.”
“Good for you,” Jesse said. “You usually run up here?”
“Yes. I like the hill.”
“So you came up here this morning as usual . . .” Jesse said.
“And I saw him. . . .” She closed her eyes for a moment.
“Hanging there.”
Jesse was quiet. The woman shook her head briefly, and opened her eyes.
“See anybody else?”
“No, just . . .”
She made a sort of rolling gesture with her right hand. The beagle watched the movement with his ears pricked slightly.
“Just the man on the tree?” Jesse said.
“Yes.”
“You know who he is?” Jesse said.
“No. I didn’t really look. When I saw him, I ran off and called nine-one-one on my cell phone.”
“And here we are,” Jesse said.
“I don’t want to look at him,” the woman said.
6
H I G H P R O F I L E
“You don’t have to,” Jesse said. “Is there anything else you can tell us that will help us figure out who did this?”
“ ‘Did this’? It’s not suicide?”
