They walked up to the main house. The door was open, and on the small stoop, awaiting them, was Dr. Julius Samuelson.
'Now you know who owns the Beetle,' Delaney said, sotto voce.
Inside, there was warmth, fragrance from scented pressed logs blazing in a fireplace, and redolent cooking odors.
'Ahh,' Delaney said, sniffing appreciatively, 'garlic. I love it.'
'You better,' Dr. Diane said, laughing.
'That's Beef Bourguignon bubbling away, and my cook has a heavy hand with the garlic. But there's fresh parsley in the salad, and that should help. Now let's all have a drink before I give you the grand tour.' She gestured toward a marble-topped sideboard laden with bottles and decanters.
The spacious living room had exposed 6ak ceiling beams… and a field stone fireplace. Floors were random- width pine planking. French doors at the rear opened onto a tiled patio and the swimming pool, now emptied and covered.
The master bedroom on the ground floor and the guest bedrooms on the second had individual fireplaces and private baths. The modern kitchen was fitted with butcherblock counters and track lighting. There was a small attached greenhouse.
The dining room was dominated by an impressive ten-foot table topped with a single plank of teak that looked thick enough to stop a cannonball.
There was no disguising the loving care (and money) that had gone into that home. Later, Delaney remarked to Monica that there wasn't a single piece of furniture, painting, rug, or bibelot that he didn't covet for his own.
But finally, what impressed the guests the most was the informal comfort: warm colors, glowing wood, gleaming brass and copper. It was easy to understand how such a place could serve as sanctuary from the steel and concrete city.
Looking around, Delaney could appreciate Dr. Diane's fury at her husband's murder and her desire for vengeance.
For he knew that possessions charm most when shared with others, and thought it possible that since Dr. Simon's death, all those lovely things had begun to pall. Now they were just things to Diane Ellerbee.
The women bundled up to stroll across the patio and inspect the design of the formal English garden. Dr. Samuelson stayed close to the living room fire, but Delaney and Boone took a turn around the grounds, admiring the view and imagining what a gem this place would be in spring and summer.
They wandered down behind the main house, beyond the swimming pool and garden. Hands in their pockets, shoulders hunched, they tramped to a copse of bony trees. And there they saw the stream, looking black and cold, with a lacework of ice building out from both banks.
'Fish?' Abner Boone said.
'D'you suppose?'
'Could be,' Delaney said.
'Depends on where it comes from. And where it ends up. I wonder if they swim in it in the summer.' He pried a small stone loose from the hard earth and tossed it into the water. But they could not judge its depth.
Back in the house, everyone had another drink and clustered around the fireplace. It was early afternoon, but already the day had grayed, the sun had lost its brilliance.
'I'm going to put out some hors d'oeuvres,' Diane said.
'Marta and Jan worked all morning on the food, but I let them go home.
We can serve ourselves, can't we?'
'Of course,' Delaney said with heavy good humor.
'We're all housebroken. What can I do to help?'
'Not a thing,' she said.
'Just eat. Julie, give me a hand in the kitchen.'
He followed her obediently.
There was a feast of appetizers: boiled shrimp, chunks of kielbasa, olives stuffed with peppers, sweet gherkins, smoked salmon and sturgeon, thick slices of sharp cheddar and Stilton, four different kinds of crackers and biscuits, chicken livers in a wine sauce, paper-thin slices of prosciutto, an brisling sardines in olive oil.
'Here goes my diet,' Rebecca Boone said, sighing.
'Just remember to leave room for dinner,' Diane said, laughing.
'Edward will do his share,' Monica Delaney said.
'He could live on food like this.'
'Live and thrive,' her husband agreed happily, sampling everything.
'This salmon makes me believe in God.'
Finally they were surfeited and sat back with glazed eyes, holding up hands in surrender.
'Julie,' Diane Ellerbee said crisply, 'let's clean up.'
But Delaney was on his feet before Samuelson could struggle out of his armchair.
'It's my turn,' he said to Samuelson.
'You just sit there and relax. I'm good at this; Monica trained me.'
So he and Diane cleaned up the living room, Delaney demonstrating his proficiency as a waiter with four or five plates laid along a steady, outthrust arm.
In the kitchen, he admired her efficiency. All the leftovers went into separate airtight containers. Plates and cutlery were rinsed in a trice and stacked in the dishwasher. She worked with quick grace, not a wasted movement.
She was wearing black cashmere-sweater and skirt-and her flaxen hair was coiled high and held in place with an exotic tortoiseshell comb. He saw her in profile and once again marveled at the classic perfection of her beauty: something chiseled-the stone cut away to reveal*the image. ,well!' she said brightly, looking at her aseptic, organized kitchen.
'I think that does it. Thank you for your help. Shall we join the others?'
'A moment,' he said, holding out a hand to stop her.
'I think you deserve a report on what we've been doing.'
She stared, the hostess's mask dropping, features hardening: the vengeful widow once again.
'Yes,' she said.
'Thank you. I was hoping you'd volunteer.'
They sat close together on high stools at the butcherblock counter. They could hear soft conversation and laughter from the living room. But the kitchen provided a sense of secret intimacy as he told her what they'd learned.
'In my judgment,' he concluded, 'Kane and Otherton are clean. That leaves four of the patients you gave us. Their alibis are still being checked. It's a long, laborious process, and we are still left with the mysterious second set of footprints.'
'What do you mean?' Diane said.
'There were apparently two visitors to your husband's office that night.
At the same or different times? We don't know.
Yet. Now I have a question for you: Were you surprised that your husband canceled all his patients' outstanding bills?'
She peered at him in the gloom, wide-eyed, her mouth open.
'Oh,' she said.
'How did you find out about that?'
'Doctor Ellerbee,' he said patiently, 'this is a criminal investigation.
Everything is important until proved otherwise.
Naturally we were interested in the probate of your husband's will, hoping it might give us a lead. Were you surprised that he forgave his patients' debts?'
'No, I wasn't surprised. He was a very generous man. It was entirely in character for him to do something like that.'
'Then you were aware of what was in his will before he died?'
