'My confession, of course, although I do wish Suzanne would hurry up and get here. I know she'll have a fit if I tell you all this while she's not here.'
'Your confession to what?'
'To Don Wolf's murder, of course.'
I took a moment to assimilate that bit of information. 'Who's Suzanne?'
There was a momentary pause while Shelley herself stopped by our table and poured Grace Highsmith a flute of champagne. Grace took her time tasting it before answering my question.
'Suzanne Crenshaw,' she said finally. 'She's my attorney.'
Just then, as if on cue, the front door blew open and a woman rushed inside. Heavyset and flushed, possibly from a combination of both cold and overexertion, she was a thirty-something, dark-haired woman dressed in a navy-blue business suit. She paused in the doorway of the dining room, searching through the diners until she caught sight of Grace at the end banquette.
As soon as their eyes met, a look of intense relief washed over the younger woman's face. She made a beeline for our table. 'There you are,' she said, leaning down long enough to brush a glancing kiss across Grace's parchment-skinned cheek. 'I was afraid I'd be too late.'
'Oh, no,' Grace reassured her, 'you're right on time.'
'Is there some kind of problem?' Suzanne asked, eyeing me warily.
'No problem,' Grace said. 'Detective Beaumont is being the complete gentleman. Speaking of which, here I am, forgetting my manners. Suzanne Crenshaw, this is Detective Beaumont. Detective Beaumont, Suzanne.'
Suzanne Crenshaw held out her hand to shake mine, but the look she turned on me was anything but friendly. 'What's this all about, Grace?' Suzanne asked. 'What's going on here?'
'Nothing much so far,' Grace replied. 'We've only just ordered lunch, although I did give him my gun. I didn't like carrying it around in my purse. It could have gone off. Sit down now, Suzanne. As soon as you order your lunch, we'll try to bring you up to speed.'
With a single warning glare in my direction, Suzanne Crenshaw sat. 'Grace, what gun?' she demanded.
'Don't worry, Suzanne. Everything will be fine. I believe Detective Beaumont was about to read me my rights.'
'Read you your rights!' Suzanne Crenshaw exclaimed. Around the restaurant heads once again swiveled in our direction.
'Hush, Suzanne,' Grace ordered. 'Don't make such a fuss. Before we go into all that, why don't you order lunch. And for goodness sake, have a glass of champagne. They're giving away free samples today. It'll settle your nerves.'
While Suzanne Crenshaw stared at her client in what looked to me like thunderstruck amazement, an unruffled Grace motioned at the waiter, who came to our table at once. 'My guest here will need to place her order,' Grace said. 'And could we have another glass of champagne, please?'
She said all this without the slightest hint of awareness that the sensation created by her dumping a gun on the table in the middle of a crowded restaurant was responsible for the presence of 'sample' champagne. To his credit, the waiter didn't bat an eyelash, either.
'Of course,' he said. 'Right away.'
I don't believe I've ever met anyone quite like Grace Highsmith. She was a living, breathing personification of the term noblesse oblige. In other people, it would have been regarded as bullying or high-handedness, but there was such an air of graciousness about her that people tended to do what she wanted regardless of their own intentions in the matter. That went for me every bit as much as it did for Suzanne Crenshaw.
An uneasy silence existed around the table while the waiter returned with the champagne and took Suzanne's order. As soon as he was gone, the lawyer turned her attention on me. 'I suppose coming here was your idea?' she demanded, glaring at me.
'As far as I knew, all we were doing was coming here for lunch.'
Suzanne Crenshaw wasn't convinced. 'What's all this about ‘reading rights' then?' she asked.
'The Fountain Court was my idea, not his,' Grace interjected. 'I wanted to go somewhere nice so I could feel relaxed while I gave him my confession.'
Suzanne Crenshaw's eyes bulged. 'Confession to what?'
'Why, to Don Wolf's murder, of course,' Grace Highsmith said with a smile. 'It was premeditated, you see. I planned it well in advance.'
Suzanne Crenshaw's jaw dropped. 'Grace!' she exclaimed. 'You can't say that.'
'I most certainly can,' Grace Highsmith replied archly. 'Detective Beaumont hasn't read me my rights yet. As long as that's the case, I can say anything I please.'
Twelve
While Suzanne Crenshaw stared daggers in my direction, the waiter, with his continuing knack for perfect timing, returned once again.
'Have something nice, Suzanne,' Miss Highsmith advised. 'I ordered the grilled cheese because it happens to be my favorite. And since this may be my last meal on the outside, I'm going to have some dessert. You go ahead and have whatever you want. It's my treat.'
Suzanne perused the menu and settled on the grilled salmon, a mixed greens salad, and a flute of the free champagne. Once the waiter left with her order, Suzanne stood up. 'Come with me, Grace,' she said. 'I believe we both need to go powder our noses.'
Grace started to object, then didn't. The two women went off to the rest room together. When they returned, Grace was as sprightly as ever, while a tight-lipped Suzanne Crenshaw was even more grim.
'You can read me my rights now, Detective Beaumont,' she commanded. 'Let's get on with it.'
Obligingly, I pulled out my handy-dandy pocket cheat sheet and read Grace Highsmith her rights. The lack of privacy in the room disturbed me enough that I flubbed one or two of the familiar lines. That was no problem, however, since Grace knew the whole routine by heart and was able to prompt me with the correct verbiage whenever necessary.
When we finished with that, she gave me another cheery smile while I returned the card to my wallet. 'That wasn't so bad now, was it, Detective Beaumont?'
Doggedly self-conscious, I dragged my scruffy notebook and ratty pencil out of my pocket. Miss Highsmith frowned disapprovingly.
'You mean you aren't going to tape-record my confession? I thought all police officers carried those cute little miniature recorders.'
'We usually record confessions down at the department, so they can be properly transcribed and signed at a later time. At this point, I merely want to ask a few questions.'
'I see,' Grace sniffed. 'I suppose you'll do that after you take me in. I thought we'd be going straight to the confession right now. Otherwise, I wouldn't have bothered dragging Suzanne away from her office.'
Suzanne Crenshaw's mixed greens salad arrived at the table. 'Well,' Grace Highsmith urged the moment our waiter's back was turned, 'let's get on with it.'
'Where do you live?' I asked.
'I have a little place up above Juanita, just down the hill from Juanita Drive,' she said. 'It was our family's summer place when I was a little girl. Now I live there full time.'
Over a forkful of salad, Suzanne Crenshaw sent me a withering look. 'Miss Highsmith's home is on Holmes Point Drive on the shores of Lake Washington, between Champagne Point and Denny Park,' the attorney said.
The way Suzanne made that pronouncement implied that Grace Highsmith's Holmes Point Drive address alone should have commanded considerable respect from a lowlife homicide cop. I didn't really need Suzanne Crenshaw's help in that regard. I had pretty well figured out on my own that the lady seated in the booth next to me was an old-school, old-guard, old-money, and thoroughly remarkable woman.
'And what exactly was your relationship to Don Wolf?'
'Mine?' Grace hooted. 'Good gracious! How can you even ask such a dull-witted question, Detective
