"He wasn't?"

"No. He was brought to the station for questioning last night. It's almost certain that Bissel's machine was used to run down Michael Lippincott. There's paint on Lippincott's body and a dent in Bissel's auto with what looks like a piece of Lippincott's coat stuck in it."

My comprehension skills weren't at their peak yet that morning. I stared at the cradle where the receiver had lately been and said, "Huh?"

"That's why Dennis Bissel was taken in to be questioned." Sam sounded annoyed. "Because his car was used to kill a man. And for all anyone knows at this point, Bissel was driving it at the time."

"But... But..."

"Don't ask me. I don't know any more than that."

"But did Dennis even know Michael Lippincott?"

"How the hell should I know? Bissel's car killed the man. That's all I know."

"Are they sure about this?"

"Of course, they're sure! We don't go around picking up people to question for the hell of it."

"Good Lord."

"Yeah, I guess so. An arrest may follow, depending on circumstances and if Bissel can prove where he was the night of the murder." And he hung up.

I stood there, staring at the receiver in my hand, for what seemed like infinity. I jumped when Pa said, "Daisy? Are you all right?" and gently put the receiver back into the cradle.

But I was far from all right. "That was Sam," I said. "He said it's been proved that Dennis Bissel's car was the one that ran down Michael Lippincott." I stared at my family, who all stared back at me, aghast. Except for Spike, of course, who was never aghast.

"Mrs. Bissel's son?" asked Ma, who liked to make sure everything was clear and precise before taking it as the truth.

"That's the one, all right," I said. "But I don't believe he did it. Someone must have borrowed his car, or stolen it. Or something like that. Dennis Bissel wouldn't hurt a fly. At least, I don't think he would."

Maybe I was wrong. What the heck did I know? At that point, nothing. Nuts.

"I've got to get dressed and go to Mrs. Bissel's house." I started for my bedroom, but Pa stopped me.

"You'd better telephone her first, to see if she's home. She might be down at the police station, trying to bail out her son or something."

I turned to stare at my father. "Oh, Lord. You're right." What a dismal thought.

Although, after I thought about the matter for a moment or two, it was better to have Mrs. Bissel mixed up in a mess than Mrs. Pinkerton. Mrs. Bissel was sure to be upset by these goings-on, but she didn't get irrational and wail at me.

Small comfort.

I decided to dress before using the telephone. After all, Sam had called me at an indecently early hour, but that didn't mean I had to be rude, too. So, after seeing my mother and aunt out the door with good wishes for them both, I went into our bathroom and took a bubble bath. What the heck. I needed soothing.

Then I approached my closet. I'd removed Billy's clothes from it, although they still sat in our basement, folded up in boxes, because I couldn't quite bear to get rid of them yet. Selfish, I guess. I should take his duds down to Johnny Buckingham, Captain in the Salvation Army, to use. He always had a bunch of down-and-out poor folks who could use them.

But I wasn't ready to lose of the last of my Billy yet.

The closet revealed a host of costumes, made by my own clever hands. I sneered at them all, then walked to the door of the outside deck Pa had built for Billy and me to use when we wanted to be private outdoors, to check the weather.

Nippy. Good. That gave me something to start with. I toddled back to the closet.

After some fumbling around-I really didn't want to go to Mrs. Bissel's house that day-I decided a sober brown suit would be appropriate. It wasn't a doleful dark brown, but a rusty-brown color that kind of matched my hair. The suit had a three-quarter length unfitted jacket with a wide collar, around which I'd cleverly sewn a dark brown edging. The straight skirt came to my mid-calf. With it I wore a white blouse and a man's tie with a brown-and-rust stripe. I wore my black low-heeled shoes, black gloves and plopped my brown cloche hat on my head. There. Serious but not despondent. Spike wagged at me, so I guess he approved.

I walked from my room to the kitchen, where Pa still sat at the table, cracking walnuts, probably for Aunt Vi to use when she baked something scrumptious. He liked to help around the house when he could, bless his heart. He looked up as I entered the room, and his eyebrows lifted in approval.

"You look swell," said he.

"Thanks," said I. "I'm trying to be serious but not dismal."

"I think you've pulled it off quite well."

"Thanks, Pa." Then I sighed and walked to the telephone, lifted the receiver, found none of our party-line neighbors on the wire, and dialed Mrs. Bissel's number.

She was home, darn it.

Chapter 13.

At least I knew I looked all right as I drove up Lake Avenue to Foothill Boulevard and turned right. Mrs. Bissel owned all the property from the corner of Maiden Lane on the east to Lake Avenue on the west. It was a huge estate, but I'd heard rumblings from her about how she might just sell some of her land now that her children had married and left the nest, and she only had her daughters' two horses to roam the vast acreage.

Must be nice to have property to sell off.

On the other hand, none of my kin owned automobiles that had been used to murder anyone. At least I hoped like mad they didn't.

I parked on the circular driveway in the back of the house and walked across the lovely paved courtyard to the back door. During the summer, the Daphne hedge lining the courtyard smelled heavenly. However, summer was gone and now everything was merely bleak and cold. I rang the bell, and Keiji Saito, who seemed to have been waiting for me, opened the door and let me in.

"Good morning, Keiji," I said, which was probably a stupid thing to say under the circumstances.

"You wouldn't know it from the mood around this place," said Keiji, confirming me in the notion that my comment had been inapt.

"Is Mrs. Bissel all right? I mean, I know she's worried and everything, but-"

"All things considered, she's doing okay. Dennis and Patsy are with her in the living room right now." Keiji's voice was soft, probably because we were in the sun room, and the living room was straight ahead of us.

I heaved a sigh, took a breath for courage, said, "Thanks, Keiji," and walked onto the field of battle-which was an almost-appropriate word when I saw that the room held only wounded people.

Very well; they weren't physically wounded, but I'd never seen a gloomier family gathering in my life... with the possible exception of the one at my house after Billy's funeral.

Dennis and Patsy sat together on a sofa, holding hands. Mrs. Bissel sat in a chair near the sofa, petting a couple of dachshunds. Everyone glanced at me as I entered the room. The dogs-I do believe they were Lucille and Lancelot, Spike's parents-bounded from Mrs. Bissel's lap in order to race over and say hello to me. They brightened my mood a bit as I stooped to pet them.

"Lucille!" cried Mrs. Bissel, confirming my suspicions about which of her billions of dachshunds had just vacated her lap. "Lancelot! Come here!"

Lucille and Lancelot, unlike their son, Spike, had never been to obedience school, I reckon, because they continued to frolic at my feet for several seconds until Mrs. Bissel clapped her hands. I could swear both dogs sighed as they trotted back to their mistress, jumped back onto the chair and snuggled their way onto her lap.

"Thank you so much for coming today, Daisy," said Mrs. Bissel.

"Yes," Patsy said in a voice thick with leftover tears. "Thank you, Mrs. Majesty."

Dennis stared at me with eyes that appeared to have sunk into his face. He wore an expression of befuddled misery. "I don't know how anyone used my machine to kill that man. I didn't even know him."

I walked over and took a chair near the family group. "Detective Rotondo is working on the case," I said, trying to sound as if Sam's interest in Dennis and his automobile were benign. For all I knew, Sam truly believed Dennis had deliberately set out to murder Mr. Lippincott.

"But who would have taken my machine to kill a man?" Dennis wailed softly.

I shook my head. "What kind of automobile do you own?"

"It's a Silver Ghost. 1922. Got it last year when Patsy and I were married."

Mercy sakes. He owned a Rolls Royce Silver Ghost. His mother had a Daimler and a chauffeur to drive it for her. I asked, "Do you have a chauffeur, or do you drive it yourself?" I considered my family fortunate to own a 1921 self-starting Chevrolet instead of the old 1909 Ford Model-T we'd had since... well, 1909. And we couldn't even have been able to afford that old Ford if not for one of Pa's old clients-he used to be a chauffeur for rich folks-who'd given it to us.

"No, I don't have a chauffeur. I drive it myself, although I didn't drive it that night. I was at the club, and took a cab there from work."

I perked up slightly. "Your club? Where's your club?"

"North El Molino, near Colorado," said Dennis.

Aha. The same club-perhaps-where Michael Lippincott held a membership. "I understand Mr. Lippincott was run down in front of his own club, which is on El Molino," I said.

Dennis's mouth fell open. "I-I-I... I don't know what to say. I didn't know the man."

"Do you know how many members belong to your club?"

Shaking his head, Dennis said, "A lot, I guess, although I don't know. There are many men I don't know who go there to play cards or pool or whatever. I just went there for a meal, because Patsy was attending a charity thing at church."

"A charity thing?" I asked, hoping for clarification.

"We sew and knit clothing for orphans of the Great War," Patsy said with another sniffle. "At St. Mark's."

"That's right across the street, isn't it?"

"Yes. Mother Bissel and I go every Wednesday evening. There were so many orphans left to fend for themselves after that awful conflict. We send at least one box of knitted or hand-sewn children's clothing every month to Belgium or France or Russia."

"I see. That's very good of you." Of course, there were orphans in the good old U.S. of A. thanks to that blasted war, too, but I didn't think it would be appropriate to say so. Both Mrs. Bissels meant their work kindly.

"Did you drive your automobile to St. Mark's?" I asked Patsy.

She looked at me as if she thought I was nuts. "Drive? Me? I don't drive. Henry picked me up with Mother Bissel, and drove us both to St. Mark's." Henry was Mrs. Bissel's chauffeur.

"So your machine was home alone," I said, musing, and sounding as if they'd abandoned a child to its fate that Wednesday night. I didn't mean to sound that way.

"Yes. It was parked in the drive. Well, you know where we live, don't you? Just down the street from Mother," said Dennis.

"A little east of here, right?"

"Yes. Next door to the Dearings."

"Ah. I see." Dr. Dearing and his family lived directly across Maiden Lane from Mrs. Bissel. They had a grand home, too, although it didn't have acres and acres of land around it. I was familiar with Foothill Boulevard, which ran east-west through Altadena until it took a dive south into Pasadena a little way past Allen Avenue. I couldn't quite visualize the home where Dennis and Patsy lived, but I knew for a rock-solid certainty that it was as huge an abode as Mrs. Bissel's. Probably without so much land circling it. "That's a large property for a young couple," I mentioned just for the heck of it.

Patsy's face bloomed red. "Well, we want to start a family soon."

"Of course." I thought for a second. "Is your property fenced off? I mean, do you have to open a gate or anything to get to the drive?"

"No," said Dennis.

"Out of curiosity, why didn't you take your automobile to work that day?" I asked him, feeling quite detectival as I did so.

With a shrug, he said, "I knew Patsy wouldn't be home after I left work and that I'd dine at the club. There's not a lot of parking space available at the club, so I took a cab to work."

Sounded reasonable to me. But something else didn't. "Do you have any idea at all who would play such a trick on you? I mean, to steal your automobile in order to murder a man is terrible thing to do."

Dennis and Patsy looked at each other, and it appeared to me as if their handhold tightened. I couldn't see Gloria Lippincott prying a wedge between those two, although stranger things have happened, I suppose. After staring at each other for an appreciable time, they both turned to look at me.

Dennis said, "No."

So did Patsy.

I hadn't been paying attention to Mrs. Bissel during my inquisition of poor Dennis, but when she burst out with, "I do!" I jumped. I think Patsy and Dennis did, too. We turned as one to stare at her.

Dennis said, "You do?"

"Yes, I do! It's that awful woman who's been trying to get you away from Patsy! That's who did it!"

Both her son and his wife assumed blank expressions. Dennis said, "Um..."

Patsy said, "Er..."

I guess Mrs. Bissel was frustrated beyond bearing because she lifted a magazine-the latest Saturday Evening Post, from the looks of it, and slammed it on the table beside the sofa. Lancelot and Lucille both yipped and skedaddled out of the room as if someone had set fire to their tails.

"Oh, for heaven's sake! Don't tell me neither one of you have noticed that Lippincott creature has had her eye on you for months now, Dennis Bissel!"

An exchange of glances took place between Dennis and Patsy. Whatever Mrs. Bissel thought, it looked to me as if they not only hadn't noticed Mrs. Lippincott's intentions, but were at a loss to explain Mrs. Bissel's declaration.

"Mrs. Lippincott?" said Dennis, his eyebrows dipping above his nose. "Who's-? Oh. You mean that murdered man's wife. Widow, I guess I mean."

"Dennis Bissel, if you aren't the most innocent... Well, I just don't know what to say." Mrs. Bissel turned to Patsy. "And you! Don't tell me you never noticed that woman sidling up to your husband and insinuating herself into his company every time she has a chance."

Patsy opened her mouth, but it didn't seem to contain any words, because she shut it again.

"Mother," said Dennis, his dignity high. "I believe you must be mistaken."

"I'm not mistaken!" declared Mrs. Bissel. "I've seen her. Every time you enter a room, her claws come out, her whiskers twitch, and she tracks you like a cat stalking a mouse."