Silvestri looked at the older woman and smiled.

"It's a beautiful home you have here," Mary said. "Really. I wouldn't even know how to begin to keep up with a place like this."

"It takes a great deal of time and work," Alison Walker said in an accent so bland and flat, one would never know she was the only child of a New Jersey fisherman.

"And money too, right?" Mary said.

"That goes without saying," Walker said, her manner finishing-school calm, her clear blue eyes devoid of emotion. "There isn't much one can can do without money." do without money."

"Mind if I light one up?" Russo asked from the other end of the couch, trying hard not to polish off the entire tray of cookies.

"Yes," Walker said, eyes never moving from Mary. "I do mind."

"Thanks for nothin', then," Russo muttered, tucking his smokes into a shirt pocket.

"Did you know a man named Jamie Sinclair?" Mary asked.

"What do you mean, did?" Walker asked.

"He's dead," Russo said. "Someone used him as a coat hanger a couple of days ago. Other than the cookies, that's why we're here."

A hand went over Walker's mouth and her eyes did a slow, calculated twitch.

Mary glared at Russo. "I'm sorry," she said, turning to Walker. "Did you know him?" she asked again.

Alison Walker stood from her chair and walked toward the front door of her brownstone. She kept her head up as the sounds of her heels echoed on the polished wood floors.

"You both must leave," Walker said without turning, the door now open to outside sunlight. "Immediately."

"We'll only have to come back again," Russo said, tossing two cookies into his jacket pocket. "Or have somebody bring you down to us."

Mary took a napkin off a pile next to the teapot, filled it with cookies, and folded it. She handed the napkin to Russo.

"Wait for me in the car, Sweet Tooth," Mary said to him. "I'll be there before you polish these off."

"You sure?"

"What, you want milk too?" Mary said. "Now, go."

"You gonna be okay here with her?" Russo asked. "Alone, I mean."

"She whips out a corkscrew, I'll scream for you to come get me," Mary whispered. "Until that happens, be a good boy and go eat your cookies."

"If she made these," Russo said, "she ain't that bad a cook."

"Lizzie Borden liked to bake too," Mary said, watching as her partner walked out the door and down the front steps of the brownstone, his pockets lined with cookies. Then she turned back to the older woman.

"You knew him," Mary said, now sitting next to Alison on the couch. "You didn't kill him, but you did know him."

The woman nodded her head slowly and took in a deep breath. "Yes," Walker said, avoiding eye contact, staring instead at a crystal vase in the center of the coffee table, a fresh rose dangling off its edge. "We were friends."

"And you knew he was dead," Mary said, her voice soft and warm, two women talking about the demise of a mutual friend and not a cold-blooded murder. "Even before we knocked on your door."

"How do you know that?" Walker asked, moist eyes now looking over at Mary.

"Most people are surprised when two cops show up at their door," Mary said. "They go against normal behavior. You almost seemed happy to see us. You let us in without even asking what we wanted."

"Next time I'll know better," Walker said, trying to manage a smile.

"Were you and Sinclair lovers?" Mary asked, leaning closer.

"No," Walker said. "Jamie wasn't interested in the physical. At least he wasn't with me."

"Sounds like any other husband," Mary said with a smile.

"I wouldn't know," Walker said. "I've never married. Jamie was my last chance for that. At my age and in my position, most men are interested in only one thing. And it isn't s.e.x."

"How much money were you giving him?"

"I gave what I wanted to give," Walker said, a hint of defiance to her words.

"And how much was that?" Mary asked, pressing the issue.

"Two, sometimes three thousand dollars," Walker said.

"A week?"

"He earned it," Walker said.

"Doing what?" Mary asked, looking around the room. "You've got a housekeeper, you do all the cooking, and the place doesn't look like it needs a paint job."

"Jamie was very good with numbers," Walker said. "He helped me with my investments, paid my bills, arranged my taxes. I trusted him. And he never gave me reason to think I shouldn't."

"How long was he helping you?"

"Almost three years."

"And you were paying him that kind of money all that time?" Mary asked. "Three thousand a week?"

"Yes."

"How did you pay him?" Mary asked. "Check or cash?"

"Cash," Walker said. "As organized as Jamie may have been for me, that's how disorganized he was with his own life. He didn't even have a checking account."

"Where'd he keep the money?"

"I never asked," Walker said. "I just know he never spent much of it, if any. Jamie didn't seem at all interested in money."

"Interested enough to charge a few thousand a week to cook your books," Mary said, standing and folding her notepad.

"Will I have to answer any more questions?" Walker asked, tilting her head toward the detective.

"Just one more for now," Mary said.

"What?"

"Who else knew about you and Jamie?" Mary asked.

"I never told any of my friends," Walker said. "People gossip about me as it is. They always have. And I wanted to keep what Jamie and I had special and private."

"What about him?" Mary asked. "Did he tell anybody?"

"Just his brother," Walker said. "They were very close."

"Did he tell his brother about the money too?" Mary asked.

"No," Walker said. "I don't think so. It's not the sort of thing Jamie would talk about. With anyone."

"You take care of yourself," Mary said, heading for the front door. "I'll be in touch."

"Is there anything I can do?" Walker asked, sadness breaking through the solid shield. "For Jamie, I mean."

"How'd you find out he was dead?" Mary asked. "It barely got a mention in the tabloids. And they don't seem your kind of reading anyway."

"His brother, Albert, told me," Walker said. "He called and told me when and how Jamie died."

"Did Albert tell you anything else?" Mary asked.

"Not to talk to anyone," Walker said, head bowed.

When Walker looked up again, she found herself staring at a closed door.

THE BAR WAS crowded despite the hour and the heavy rain pelting the streets and causing the windows to steam. They sat at a circular table in the back, away from the jukebox. The table was crammed with beer bottles, shot gla.s.ses, crumpled napkins, and bowls of salt pretzels. The place was dark, like most cop bars, scattered overhead lights giving off more shadow than glow. The four men and one woman around the table, members of the North Bronx Homicide Unit, were in a festive mood, their work for this day brought to a successful end. crowded despite the hour and the heavy rain pelting the streets and causing the windows to steam. They sat at a circular table in the back, away from the jukebox. The table was crammed with beer bottles, shot gla.s.ses, crumpled napkins, and bowls of salt pretzels. The place was dark, like most cop bars, scattered overhead lights giving off more shadow than glow. The four men and one woman around the table, members of the North Bronx Homicide Unit, were in a festive mood, their work for this day brought to a successful end.

Mrs. Columbo had solved another homicide.

"Took less than a week," Russo said, washing down a Snickers bar with a slurp of Bud. "Mary spots the bottle of wine, squeezes the spinster, and nabs the brother. We coulda called this one in from home."

"I like the we we part," Stanley Johnson, senior detective on the squad, said to Russo. "What'd you do? Drive?" part," Stanley Johnson, senior detective on the squad, said to Russo. "What'd you do? Drive?"

"Brother break easy?" John Rodriguez asked. He was the new badge, working Homicide less than a month, promoted from the pickpocket division in Midtown South.

"He cracked in the car," Mary said, sipping from a scotch straight. "Cried all the way to the station."

"You gotta really hate your brother to slice him like that," Captain Jo Jo Haynes, precinct commander, said. "Corkscrew the throat and then then cut his feet off. Christ! And I thought my family was f.u.c.ked up." cut his feet off. Christ! And I thought my family was f.u.c.ked up."

"If I got a f.u.c.kin' nickel, I'm not lettin' my brother know about it," Russo said. "And I like like the guy." the guy."

"It wasn't just the money," Mary said.

"What else?" Rodriguez asked.

"The brother, Albert, has some sort of muscular disease," Mary said. "And his insurance doesn't pick up all the costs. So he's always behind the financial eight ball."

"He know this Jamie's pullin' in a few thou a week?" Johnson asked.

"No," Mary said. "Thinks the guy's on the b.a.l.l.s of his a.s.s. In fact, Albeit lends him money. Feels sorry for him."

"What a p.r.i.c.k," Jo Jo Haynes said.

"Albert's over at the apartment," Mary said, finishing her scotch. "Sees a bottle of wine and looks for a corkscrew."

"He finds it," Russo said. "In a cabinet drawer next to a folded-up paper bag. Albie, curious as well as thirsty, pops open the bag."

"And finds the money," Johnson said.

"He sat on the bed for three hours," Mary said. "Holding the corkscrew and staring at all that cash."

"Jamie walks in," Russo said. "Sees poor little Albie sittin' next to his stash and starts yellin' at the guy."

"Albert snaps," Mary said. "All those years being suckered by Jamie melt down into a couple of b.l.o.o.d.y minutes."

"He sliced and diced the f.u.c.ker," Russo said. "Left him hangin', took the money, and walked out."

"And he never got to drink the wine," Johnson said.

"That's the sad part," Rodriguez said. "Guy comes in thirsty. Goes out the same way."

"Except this time with a murder rap," Russo said. "And Mrs. Columbo here smellin' his a.s.s out in no time flat."

"What happens to the old lady?" Haynes asked. "What's her name? Walker?"

"Who gives a f.u.c.k, Cap," Russo said. "She still got her feet and can swallow anything she chews."

"She'll die alone," Mary said in a low voice. "Jamie was her only real friend. After this, she'll never let herself get close to anyone. She'll be warm in the winter and cool in the summer. And she'll die alone."

"Think Albert cops an insanity?" Johnson said.

"Wouldn't you?" Russo said. "He comes up Mr. Clean on the sheets. Not even a parking ticket. One of those jaboes goes through life n.o.body notices."

"Two lives ruined and one ended," Mary said. "All for a gla.s.s of wine."

"Let this be a lesson," Russo said, holding up a bottle of Bud. "Drink beer. You don't need a f.u.c.kin' weapon to open a bottle, and anybody who drinks it sure as s.h.i.t don't have a paper bag filled with cash."

"I guess this means you're not buying," Mary said.