“So what’s the theory?”
She smiled. “You know our methods, Watson. Collect the evidence, see where it takes us, and leave the theorizing for later. And I’m afraid later has just arrived.”
Diane got up and came over and gave me a kiss to the cheek. I said, “How goes the wedding plans?”
“Oh, it’s on all right. This June. The social event of the year. Kara and I can hardly wait.” Diane pulled away and said, “How are you?”
“You know what I look like, Holmes. Any other questions?”
“Your nighttime visitor?”
I paused, thinking of what I could say to her.
“Lewis. The truth.”
“Came by last night.”
“How do you know?”
“Heard the door open and close. Heard footsteps.”
“Why don’t you have Felix sleep on your couch?”
“He’s already done that a couple of times, to no effect. Hey, I have an idea. Why don’t you sleep on my couch?”
Diane smiled one more time as she walked out of my bedroom.
“Don’t tempt me.”
Paula called at about five o’clock. She was desperately trying to finish a piece before she had to go to a selectman’s meeting at six. I told her to do her job and do her best to get the Pulitzer Prize committee’s attention. She laughed and said she might try sending the committee a photo of her in a new bikini, and would I be interested in helping her? I said yes.
Felix stopped by an hour later, as promised, carrying dinner and an on old cane. “Dinner is fettuccine Alfredo with lobster, and a salad,” he said, passing over a plastic bag. “Pretty warm so you should go right for it.”
“Thanks,” I said, putting it on the kitchen counter. “That I will.”
“And here’s Uncle Paulie’s cane,” he said, handing that over as well. The cane was dark brown, with a metal tip and a knobbed end that was carved in the shape of a wolf’s head.
I held it with both hands. It felt heavy, solid. “Nice to see Uncle Paulie was discreet in making a fashion statement.”
“Uncle Paulie’s statements were usually more direct and didn’t involve fashion sense.”
“Thanks,” I said, trying the cane out for size as I went down one length of the living room and then back.
Felix gave a slow-motion clap and said, “Work it, boy, work it. Show us what you got.”
“Thanks, old bean,” I said.
Felix nodded. “There’s a cool secret with the cane. You want me to show you?”
I hefted its weight again. “Nah,” I said. “Let me figure it out. Gives me something to look forward to.”
He checked his watch. “Sorry, friend, have to leave.”
“And where are you off to in such a hurry?”
“Lowell,” he said.
“Massachusetts?” I asked, surprised. Poor Lowell, a former mill town that had been struggling to recover for decades, had the unfortunate distinction of being a hub in this part of the world for cheap drugs and other nefarious dealings.
“No, silly boy,” he said. “Lowell, Alaska. What do you think?”
“What the hell are you going to be doing in Lowell?”
He smiled, but it wasn’t one of those cheery smiles that makes one think of sunshine and lemonade and listening to the Red Sox on my rear deck. It was a smile of a man going to a place where he’s well prepared and well armed, and has no qualms in doing what has to be done.
“Research,” he said.
“Okay, you got me there. What kind of research?”
“Finding out why a Toyota Corolla with Massachusetts license plates was seen departing the residence of Maggie Tyler Branch on the night of her murder.”
“Felix …”
“Yep, that’s my name, don’t wear it out.”
“The police have been chasing down leads, and last I heard there were no witnesses at the time of the murder, and definitely no sign of anyone leaving Maggie’s place that night. Not to mention a Toyota Corolla.”
“Did I mention a Toyota Corolla? Funny, I thought I didn’t.”
“You don’t have to worry,” I said. “Your dastardly secrets are mostly safe with me. Just be careful, and …”
“Yes?”
“Let me know what you find out. With all of this healing, I’m getting bored out of my mind.”
“Will do.”
One of my many faults is that I get impatient whenever friends or strangers come to me and are desperate to tell me about their dreams. “You see, it was my house, but it wasn’t really my house, it had a secret basement, and the property went down to the river, but in my dream, the river was an ocean and we never got down there as we should, and there was buffalo grazing on the front lawn and then the dump trucks arrived …”
And that’s when I usually nod politely and make an excuse to leave the room.
But tonight the dreams came back, and I woke up, trembling. It was like before. I was with Cissy, pretty fuzzy but … it wasn’t a dream. Like before, it was as if deep in my memory cells, a bit of videotape was replayed, and I was there. I swear to God, I was there, not only experiencing what I was experiencing with Cissy—and God, it was so good just to taste her, just to be with her—but also becoming the man I had been back then, young and cocky and full of confidence, sure that I was the person I was meant to be, in confidential service to my country, with the woman I was meant to love and be with for the rest of my life.
“Cissy,” I whispered when I woke up, sheets tangled around me, heart racing, wondering why in God’s name I was dreaming about those long ago days. Why? Was it the surgery that brought my past into rough view? Was my body—now cut free of tumors once
