"No," he said. "No time this morning."

"Usually you make time," I observed. "Is there something you don't want me to read today?"

He shoved Spike onto the seat beside me and closed the car door without answering. We drove into the city with Spike panting at the window.

After reluctantly agreeing to keep Spike in the car, Reed dropped me at the Pendergast Building, home to offices of the Intelligencer.

Instead of taking the elevator to the ninth floor, I went to the security desk and used the house phone to call Stan Rosenstatz, my editor. The company's automated telephone system routed me through three different menus before I was finally encouraged to press 5 for a real person, who picked up and immediately connected me to Stan.

Ten minutes later he came down to meet me, a lanky drink of water tying a worn, hand-knitted scarf around his neck. "What's wrong with your cheek?" he asked.

"I fell."

His own face-usually careworn and pale from a lifetime spent molelike in the newsroom-was unusually animated this morning.

"Let's go up the street to talk," he said. "I know a place."

We walked a couple of blocks to the Turf Club, a wood-paneled betting parlor just a short walk from City Hall. A welcome blast of heat hit us as we stepped inside, along with the noise of televised horse racing.

In the middle of the morning, the place wasn't crowded, but a gang of regulars hung around the televisions, mostly men and mostly smoking like dragons. With stubby pencils and well-thumbed copies of the Daily Racing Form in their hands, they were intent on the races televised from tracks in Europe. I could see a rainy gray racetrack on all the screens, with graceful horses flickering like lightning.

Stan took me upstairs to the Clubhouse, where each booth boasted its own television set. As the horses rounded the turn and headed for home, a handful of racing enthusiasts intently watched the screens.

No shouts rose as the horses flashed across the finish line. In silence, tickets were torn, and the only noise became a few groans and mutters.

"Back here," Stan said. "Nobody will bother us."

He found us a table in a quiet corner and shut off the television there. The bartender brought Stan a cup of coffee before we had time to sit down. Stan asked for a Reuben sandwich, and I said I'd have a BLT. I peeled off my gloves and asked for a tomato juice, no vodka. The bartender nodded without a word and went away.

Stan hung up my coat, then sat on the opposite side of the table and pushed a stack of photocopies across to me. "It's Kitty's schedule. We made a copy before the cops came yesterday. They took the original book for their investigation, and she may have kept a pocket version with her. If so, the cops have that. This one is all we have to go on. Trouble is, it's in some kind of code."

I flipped open the pages and clumsily found my way to December. Not only would the book provide us with a way of piecing together Kitty's coming plans, we could also check where she'd been recently.

I glanced down at a few of the entries and nodded. "I can read this, Stan. The organizations are in initials, and the locations of the events are here, too. I can decipher her coming schedule. Fortunately, this week isn't very busy. It's the social season's post-Christmas lull."

I ran my finger down Kitty's notations. The Brinker Bra launch had a line drawn through it, and my initials were printed in the margin. Below, alongside the hyphenated names Brinker Lamb, she had written the number seven with the word Oaks.

"We checked," Stan said, "but there's no Number Seven Oak Street in the city or any of the suburbs. I thought you might recognize it."

I shook my head. "I'm sorry."

He took a small sip of his coffee, like a man who knew how to nurse a drink in a betting parlor. I knew Stan ducked out every afternoon for his AA meeting and suddenly wanted to ask him how he worked to overcome his problem. Did he have siblings who pestered him to stay sober?

He said, "There's another thing."

"Yes?"

"When we went through Kitty's desk, there was a letter. It outlined what she wanted after her death."

I looked up from the photocopied pages. "You mean a will?"

"There was a will, but another document, too. It's newer. The company lawyers are reading it now. It specifies about her funeral. For people with no family, I guess it's common to find such letters in desks at work."

"What's it to be? A pyre in Rittenhouse Square?"

"Actually, that's up to you."

I laughed shortly. "To me?"

Stan didn't blink. "That's right. Kitty wanted you to take charge of her funeral. Or memorial service-whatever. She said to leave the details up to you."

"Why me?" Flummoxed, I asked, "Doesn't she have any family?"

"Apparently not. She may not have acted like it, Nora, but Kitty respected you. She knew you'd do the right thing."

I muttered a word that seldom crossed my lips.

Stan let me think about things for a minute while he sipped another quarter teaspoon of his coffee. Then he said, "We're running her obit today. But the space for her column on Sunday should probably include some kind of tribute to her. I was hoping you'd write it."

Still stunned, I said, "What would I write?"

"You'll come up with something appropriate. You're a good writer, and you have good instincts. Consider it an audition piece." He set his coffee cup in the saucer. "I wish I could offer you Kitty's job right now, Nora. I can make a recommendation about Kitty's replacement, but nobody's going to take me seriously if I suggest you right away. Especially after somebody delivered her body to your house."

"I know it looks bad."

He nodded. "The guys at the news desk have heard that your sister was making public remarks about Kitty-how you'd be better off if she weren't around anymore."

I groaned as I remembered Libby's stupid exclamation. "My sister is no diplomat. She wasn't serious, Stan."

"I assumed so." He leaned forward on his elbows to tell me more. "The police didn't just go through Kitty's desk, Nora. They wanted to search yours, too. The company lawyers stopped them, but . . . Look, I've spent a lot of time around cops, and I can guess what they're thinking. They want to believe somebody might have killed Kitty as a favor to you."

"A favor?"

"So you'd get her job."

"That's ridiculous."

"Yeah, they haven't taken a good look at our working conditions yet." He allowed a grim smile. "Nora, I'd love to interview you for the Intelligencer and get the whole story-everything about your boyfriend, the whole nine yards. But that's not my job anymore. My job is to edit a Features section that will sell papers. I believe you can help me do that. Fact is, I want you to have Kitty's column. But until your connection to her death is cleared, my hands are tied."

Out of nowhere, I heard myself say, "I can't believe Kitty's gone."

I hadn't liked Kitty. She had certainly made a public display of hating me. But her death unnerved me just the same.

"Me neither," said Stan. "I hated her tantrums and bullying and all the diva stuff. But she was the most reader-savvy writer in my department, and the paper is going to take a hit now that she's gone. You can write, and you know the people who count. Her beat is really your turf. But can you take your assets to the next level?"

"What do you mean?"

"Kitty had ideas. She had opinions. She made people mad, but her work always got attention. In the newspaper business, that means something."

"I can't write like Kitty. I can't smear people. She ruined lives, Stan."

"Bull. People ruin their own lives. She might have made their falls more public, but she didn't stick out her foot and trip anybody up."

"Then what . . . ?"

"She had a vision. And she used her skills to back it up. You need to figure out a way to use your own talents to support a viewpoint that's distinctly yours. I don't want another Kitty. I want somebody new and fresh."

The bartender brought our sandwiches and my juice, then warmed up Stan's coffee. Stan picked up half his Reuben.

I sat staring at my BLT, wondering why I'd ordered it. "I'm not a journalist, Stan. I never claimed to be."

"Do you want to sit at Kitty's desk?"

I didn't need to look farther than my bank account to know that I needed a better job than the one I had at the moment. But as Stan waited for me to respond, I suddenly had a new answer. I hadn't enjoyed being Kitty's handmaiden. She had made me feel devalued and foolish even while I contributed to her column. But I knew her world better than she had, and I was sure I could do her work better, too.

"Yes," I said before I could stop myself. "I really do."

"So make it happen. Quit worrying about being so damn polite. Come up with your own concept of the social column."

"What if my concept isn't what the newspaper wants?"

"Convince us," Stan said, around a mouthful of sandwich. "What have you got to lose?"

Stan was right. I didn't have much to lose anymore. And I had a lot to gain. It was about time I had more going for myself than a broken-down farm and a lover who spent a lot of time in and out of police custody, not to mention two sisters who weren't exactly Mary-Kate and Ashley.

"Thanks, Stan," I said. "It's nice to know I have a mentor."

He snorted. "A mentor? I just want the least likely pain in my ass to get Kitty's job. That means you."

"You're a dear." I picked up my sandwich and forced myself to eat a few bites.

He drank more coffee and studied the tabletop for a moment. "Funny thing. I have a hunch Kitty was on the trail of a story when she died."

"A news story?"

"Something beyond her usual beat. I don't know what it was."

"Maybe it got her killed."

Stan smiled wryly. "That only happens in the movies."

I had a brainstorm. Suddenly I knew exactly what Number Seven Oaks meant.

Across the table, Stan blinked at me. "You okay?"

"Yes," I said.

I ate quickly and thanked Stan for meeting me away from the office and the news reporters. Then I telephoned Reed from the public phone. Twenty minutes later, he pulled up to the curb in the black town car. I slipped into the backseat, and Spike leaped at me in a frenzy of joyous puppy kisses.

"Reed, I need to get to Bryn Mawr."

The tony suburb of Philadelphia included a few well-manicured colleges, dozens of estates that could pass for Hollywood sets, and a patchwork of upscale shops, restaurants and luxury car dealerships. Litter didn't linger in the streets for long, and a corner patisserie did a brisk afternoon business in low-fat lemon tea cookies. Some of my dearest friends entertained each other at Chez Nous, just around the corner from a pricey day spa.

"This some kind of park?" Reed asked when he drove the car through a towering gate and into a beautifully designed landscape of graceful hillocks and mammoth trees.

"No, it's a private home," I replied.

Cast in the bronze gate was the name of the estate. Tall Trees. Those of us who grew up visiting the house and grounds knew the place by its original name, Seven Oaks. During a storm fifteen years ago, half the trees had been knocked down, so the new name made sense. Unless you'd been invited to parties on the old estate, you'd not know its former name.

Reed glanced over the trimmed bushes to the Henry Moore statue that sat stolidly in the east lawn. "Scarlett O'Hara live here?"

"No, just an old family."

Reed mumbled something under his breath. I directed him to drive me around the back of the gracious brick home.

When we arrived at the back door I checked my face in my compact and touched a little powder to my cheek before I hopped out. I asked Reed to wait for me.

"What about the dog?" he asked, eyeing Spike as if he'd like to see him roasting over a campfire.

"Maybe he'd like a walk," I suggested. "There's an old croquet lawn beyond the big garage." I pointed.

"That's a garage?"

"It used to be a barn. I bet there is something interesting to keep him busy there."

"That's what scares me." Reed sighed.

A cold wind whipped my coat as I dashed up the stone steps to the servants' entrance. A simple wreath of magnolia leaves with a unfussy tan ribbon decorated the door. I rang the bellpull and waited only ten seconds before a white-clad figure appeared on the other side of the window. She unlocked and opened the door.

"Is Miss O'Toole at home?" I asked. "I'm Nora Blackbird."

The sturdy middle-aged woman invited me inside. She wore an immaculate white apron over a white cotton shirt and-once the door was opened wide-blue jeans and running shoes. She shook my proffered hand. "Nora, I'm Agnes Harley. Forgive my cold hands. I've been cleaning."

"I didn't recognize you at first, Agnes. You've lost weight."

"South Beach diet," she said with a grin. "Eighty-two pounds. Come into the kitchen. I'll call Mary Margaret."

I waited in the large, modern kitchen, where a king's ransom in silver had been laid out on the long center island along with cleaning supplies. Two candelabra, shined to perfection, stood in a splash of sunlight on the round table in a breakfast alcove. The scent of fresh-brewed coffee wafted in the air. I could see my reflection in the gleaming marble countertop. It could have been a kitchen in Architectural Digest.

"Nora?"

Mary Margaret O'Toole crossed the kitchen in three athletic strides and hugged me with her long arms. "Isn't it wonderful to see you? I loved your Christmas card this year. You make your sisters sound so funny, don't you? How are you, dear? Aggie, let's have some of your delicious coffee, shall we?"

Irish to the bone, Mary Margaret was fair-skinned, prematurely white-haired, and shaped like one of those warrior-women statutes that stand at park gates with their swords raised and bosoms flaunted. Except Mary Margaret didn't wear armor. Her no-nonsense blue jeans were better suited to the housework that kept her busy. She managed to stylishly elevate the casual jeans with a faded green cashmere sweater and ballet-slipper flats that showed off her slim ankles. I often thought of her with a feather duster carried aloft like a sword, though. She managed the household with more fervor than a crusader marching into Jerusalem.

"I'm fine, Meg. And you? I should have called ahead, but-"

"Am I ever too busy for a chat with a friend?" She pulled me to the breakfast alcove. "This house isn't going anywhere, is it?"