"You really gotta get a sense of humor, Dan. It'll help you with the girls."

The rental car flashed around a turn a couple of hundred yards ahead. Cora stomped on the accelerator, shot down the road like a NASCAR driver heading for the flag. She screeched through the turn and straightened up just in time to see Bambi's car zoom out of sight up ahead. She tromped down harder on the accelerator.

"Are you crazy!" Dan said. "Slow down."

"Sorry. This is a Toyota. They don't stop."

Half a mile ahead, the brake lights flashed and the car turned right. Cora made up the distance, fishtailed through the turn.

The rental car pulled up alongside the riverbank. Bambi jumped out. She had something in her hand.

"Okay, kid, you're up. Got your handcuffs ready?"

Cora screeched to a stop in the gravel. She wrenched the door open and jumped out. "Don't do it, Bambi!"

Bambi stood frozen. A deer in the headlights.

In her hand was a laptop computer.

CHAPTER.

56.

Chief Harper was somewhat perplexed. "You take a recess to collect evidence against one person, and arrest another?"

"Yeah," Cora said. "Isn't that nice?"

"The prosecutor doesn't think so. Now he's got two people arrested for the crime."

"Yeah, but he's going to let Melvin go."

"I'm not so sure."

"I am. For one thing, he's innocent. For another, if he holds him, he can't hold the person who actually committed the crime. Both seem like excellent reasons for letting him go."

"a.s.suming they're true."

"You know they're true. Just look at the little hussy. Did you ever see a more guilty-looking woman?"

"Yeah, but she won't talk. She asked for a lawyer and clammed."

"What more proof do you need?"

Harper looked at her in exasperation. "How can you say that? You're always haranguing me about defendants' rights, and how stupid cops are for taking silence as an indication of guilt."

"Yeah, when they're innocent. Then it's really stupid. But when you've got some bimbo who's guilty as sin ... h.e.l.l, the way she moves her hips is an indication of guilt."

"I'm not sure you're entirely rational on the point."

"You're the one not being rational, Chief. You got her laptop. She was apprehended trying to destroy it. You're probably going to find the puzzles on it. Or at least the programs to create them."

"Can you tell me what happened? In simple, plain English I can pa.s.s on to the district attorney?"

"I'll use words of one syllable."

Chief Harper gave her a dirty look.

"I'll be good," Cora said. "Here's the dope. My ex-husband, Melvin, is a low-life, philandering creep."

"You seemed quite close to him."

"You wanna hear this or not?"

"Go on."

"His wife, the redhead spitfire, doesn't take it lying down. She fixates on him with the type of obsessive hatred only guys of his caliber can inspire."

Harper raised his eyebrows.

Cora put up her finger. "I warned you."

"I'm listening. I'm listening."

"She pesters his girlfriend with the usual tactics. Did-you-know-he's-married notes, stuff of that ilk. She spies on him, keeps a record of his indiscretions. They play the game. Melvin tries to hide stuff from her. She tries to find out.

"What he doesn't try to hide is his alimony scheme. He's always short of money. His excuse is the alimony he's paying. The reality is the bimbo he's banging. Anyway, my monthly bill is something he and the current Mrs. Melvin can agree on. Both would love to see it stopped.

"And so it comes to pa.s.s that Melvin has to go to Bakerhaven. It's a business trip, he's going with his lawyer, his wife can't come. Of course, he's going with his lawyer, but he's not staying with his lawyer, because he's going to be joined by the young and nubile Bambi.

"Here's where the whole thing bites him in the a.s.s, and you'll pardon me a bit if I gloat. He's cheating on his wife with his current girlfriend, but it doesn't mean he's dead. He tells Bambi it's a business trip and she's gotta stay behind, at least until he gets everything set for the hearing. It's partly true; he is lining the witnesses up. But he also wants to get away from his current squeeze and check out the other fish in the sea.

"Lilly Clemson is female, and she has a pulse. Just Melvin's type. He makes a play for her. Big mistake. The wide-eyed, innocent Bambi is actually a cold, calculating schemer.

"Bambi rents a car and follows. To see if Melvin is cheating on her. And what does she find? It's a parade! Melvin's being followed by his wife. Bambi spots Mrs. Melvin, but Mrs. Melvin doesn't spot her. She probably plotzed when the woman turned into the same motel. What the h.e.l.l! Was Melvin cheating on her with his own wife?

"But, no, Mrs. Melvin rents a unit, watches her husband from a distance. Bambi watches both of them. When Melvin goes out, he's got a double tail. The redhead and the bimbo. Hmm. Sounds like a TV show. Bet I could pitch that.

"Melvin makes a play for the teller. Takes her to dinner, tries to talk his way upstairs. He's spied on by his wife and his girlfriend."

His wife is merely amused. This is the type of behavior she's grown accustomed to from the philandering son of a b.i.t.c.h. But the bimbo is royally p.i.s.sed, decides to fire a warning shot across the bow. Without revealing her presence, of course.

"Bambi's a whiz at puzzles. What can I tell you, some airheads are. She composes a simple KenKen. Breaks into the banker's house and leaves it there."

"In his safe?" Harper said. "How the h.e.l.l did she get into his safe? Don't tell me she's a safecracker, too."

"It was probably unlocked. She was trying to make the room look like it had been searched. She took the picture down off the wall, found the safe. It was unlocked because there was nothing in it. Perfect. She pulls the door open, puts the KenKen in.

"And what was the point of the KenKen? To attract yours truly. The former Mrs. Melvin. The last link in the chain. Past, present, and future. He must have talked about me. She must have hated me as much as the current Mrs. M.

"Anyway, she left the KenKen. When you solve it, the top line gives you the amount of my alimony payment."

"What?!"

"Didn't I mention that?"

"You certainly didn't."

"Well, it didn't mean anything to anyone but me."

"It would have meant something to me if you'd told me."

"Let's not get off on a tangent. The point is, it's a clue. Whoever composed the KenKen knew the amount of my alimony payment. Bambi wanted Melvin to get out of paying me alimony so he could spend the money on her. So Bambi would know. She put the amount in just to goad me."

"When did you know this?"

Cora smiled. "Lets not start worrying about who knew what when. This isn't the Watergate hearings."

Harper scowled.

Cora pushed on quickly. "Which brings us to the first day in court. The banker testifies. I'm a little put off by the fact the guy who's testifying against me is the same guy whose robbery I was just investigating. It's a coincidence, and I don't like coincidences, and I'm right, because it actually isn't.

"Anyway, the banker testifies, and we break for lunch. Bambi's back at the motel-at least, that's what Melvin thinks-so he tries to take the teller out to lunch. A bad move, but then in Melvin's case there've been so many. He makes another play for the teller, displeasing both wife and mistress. Some more than others.

"Bambi, born with a homicidal streak, might have offed the teller. But she hasn't testified yet. And it is in her interests as Melvin's girl that he stop sh.e.l.ling out money to me. No such problem with whackin' the banker. He's already testified. Or so Bambi thinks. She can't have antic.i.p.ated Becky will be smart enough to get the testimony thrown out. She goes off and composes the KenKen and the crossword puzzle."

"Crossword puzzle? What crossword puzzle?"

"Oh. Didn't I mention the crossword puzzle? This is a confusing case, Chief. So many things to keep straight."

"There was no crossword puzzle found with Roger Randolph. Just a KenKen."

"Right. The crossword puzzle came to my house. So it had nothing to do with the KenKen. It's just a coincidence they were connected."

"Really?" Harper said, suspiciously. "What did the crossword puzzle say?"

"Oh."

"What was it?"

" 'Being a bad boy in court cut his life very short.' "

"You didn't think that was connected to the crime?" Chief Harper said sarcastically.

"Not unless you think I did it. I don't think I did it. So how could it possibly apply?"

"I don't know. But don't you think that should be up to the police to determine?"

"Absolutely. What do you think it means, Chief?"

"Don't get smart with me. You're getting in deeper every minute."

"Don't be silly, Chief. We're solving the crime. All of this is just incidental. You wanna hear the rest of it, or you wanna beat me up?"

Chief Harper took a deep breath, exhaled very slowly. "Go on."

"So, Bambi offs the banker. With the gun she had hidden in her car."

"Car? What car?"

"Now that's something you can check, Chief. She came up here last Wednesday. Most likely in a rental car. Drove around in it until Sunday when it was time for Melvin to pick her up at the bus stop. Then she beat it down to Danbury so she could pretend she'd just arrived. Her rental car's gotta be parked somewhere near the motel so she could follow Melvin when he took off in his."

"She committed the other murder, too?"

"Of course she did. Once Lilly Clemson testified, she was dead meat. Bambi had to use a razor because she'd already ditched the gun. She slit her throat, left the puzzles implicating Melvin."

"The KenKen gave us his license plate."

"I know."

"She tried to get him convicted?"

Cora shook her head. "Of course not. She loves him. No, like I said in court, implicating Melvin doesn't implicate Melvin. Not unless you think Melvin's stupid enough to implicate himself, and trust me, he isn't dumb. Bambi knows the current Mrs. Melvin is on the scene following hubby around. Bambi's trying to make it look like his wife is framing him."

"I don't know."

"I do. That was her plan from the start. If there's anyone Bambi hates worse than me, it's the current Mrs. M. For Bambi it's a situation made in heaven. All she has to do is leave a few clues around. If she can make it look like Melvin's being framed, Evelyn Crabtree sticks out like a sore thumb. The only problem is no one knows she's there. Her husband hasn't spotted her, and no one knows she's Melvin's wife. That's why she tried to give us a hint."

"Who tried to give us a hint?"

"Bambi. When Dan brought her to the police station. She tells us she's got this funny feeling she's being watched. What she's really saying is, 'Hey, dumb-dumbs, there's a woman with hair as red as a Raggedy Ann doll snooping around, how come n.o.body's noticed?' She also tried to implicate her in planting the gun."

"How'd she do that?"

Oops.

Cora's mind flip-flopped, realizing she didn't actually have an answer, at least not one she could give the chief. "By pretending the puzzle and the KenKen had been slipped under their motel room door," she improvised, tap dancing nimbly. "She knew when we found out Melvin's wife was staying at the motel, she'd be the most likely suspect."

"Yeah, yeah," Harper said, "but what about the gun?"

"She made up the puzzle and the KenKen to tell us where it was. Pretty clever on her part. The puzzle tells us to add up all the numbers. Of course, the numbers in the answer to a KenKen always add up to the same thing. If it wasn't the numbers in the answer, there was only one other thing it could be.

"Only we didn't think of it. Bambi can't believe it. What a bunch of dummies! She finally had to suggest it herself. 'Hey, maybe it's the numbers in the problem.' "