Okay, so much for unencumbered. And the thought of Grandfather lying unconscious in the hospital washed away the last shreds of pleasure.

"Ice cream and get-well cards coming up," I said.

At least I had plenty to distract me. When we got near town, we ran into something rarely seen in Caerphilly, especially on a Sunday: a traffic jam. So many cars, trucks, and even buses were heading into town that I thought we'd never get a chance to pull out of our country road onto the main highway.

But after a few moments, a farmer in a truck slowed to a stop and cheerfully waved me onto the highway. In fact, the entire crowd was strangely cheerful about the traffic. Perhaps because we all had something concrete and manageable to do. We couldn't solve the county's budget or legal problems, but packing and moving were things we all knew how to do.

"Wow," Timmy said. "Where did they all come from?"

"All the churches sent out calls for help last night and this morning at their services," Mother said. "Not just to their own congregations, but to nearby counties."

And apparently the volunteers had come by the busload. As I made my way through town I saw buses from as far away as Henrico County and Manassas. When we finally reached the town square, I saw various groups gathering under impromptu banners and signs to form work teams. Along with the church groups I spotted uniformed Scout troops and delegations from the nearby Lions, Elks, and Rotary clubs. And to top it off, Mother had sent her all-points bulletin to the Hollingsworth family, who could be expected to answer her call in the dozens if not hundreds. I saw several knots of faces I usually saw only at funerals and family reunions.

I dropped Mother off near one flock of cousins and drove on toward the library.

From the difficulty we had parking anywhere nearby, I deduced that helping at the library was a popular choice.

Ms. Ellie, looking determined, if slightly harried, met us at the door.

"Welcome," she said. "Timmy, would you like to help pack the children's section?"

He nodded vigorously and trotted toward the familiar sunny alcove.

"They're a bit slow back there, but they're having fun," Ms. Ellie said. "And I think it's doing a lot to ease their anxiety about where all their beloved books are going. How's your grandfather?"

"Stable," I said. "Don't ask me what that means. Dad's worried, but not frantic."

A Shiffley cousin wheeling in a four-foot-high stack of moving boxes appeared in the doorway. We both stepped aside into the corridor that led to Ms. Ellie's office.

"And they have no clue who did it?" she asked.

"No," I said. "And no idea whether or not it has anything to do with Parker's murder or the county meeting."

"I'm sure it has something to do with both," she said. "They must be connected. But what happened at the meeting to suddenly make someone want to attack your grandfather?"

I'd been chewing on the same question for hours.

"I don't think it's something that happened at the meeting," I said. "I think it's something that was going to happen after the meeting. The committees, for example. Several of them were organized to dig out information that someone might not want found."

"Good point."

"So which of the committees did Grandfather volunteer for last night?" I asked. "Maybe that would tell us what's got his attacker running scared."

"I don't remember that he volunteered for any of them," Ms. Ellie said. "Your grandfather's better at giving orders than volunteering."

"Are you sure? Can you ask whoever's keeping the list?"

"I have the list," she said. "Let me check."

I followed her into her office and fretted as she pulled a file folder out of her desk and flipped through the four- or five-page document it contained.

"As I thought," she said. "Not on any of the committees. But he did promise to bring down some auditors to help with some of the financial investigations."

"That's right," I said. "I remember him shouting that out during the meeting."

"I thought he ran a charitable foundation, not an accounting firm," she said, as she tucked the list back in its folder.

"He does run a foundation," I said. "And he'd be the first to tell you that any foundation worth its salt needs top-notch auditors. He gets a lot of funding requests, and he has to have someone to help him sort out which ones are worthwhile and which are not."

And which ones were actually scams. I wasn't sure whether many of the requests they got were crooked or whether Grandfather just talked a lot about the ones that were, but I knew his audit staff was large, skilled, and enthusiastic about unearthing potential fraud. He'd bragged about that at the meeting, too.

"What if someone heard his offer and got scared?" I asked. "Of course it would have to be someone who was at the meeting, which lets out my favorite suspect, Mayor Pruitt."

"Not necessarily," she said. "Could also be someone who got a full report from his spies."

"You think the mayor sent spies?"

"We know he sent spies," she said. "We expected him to-after all, it's a public meeting. We even knew who they were. Poor things-he made them come down to the town hall to brief him once the meeting was over. Kept them there well past midnight, I heard."

"We have spies down at the town hall?"

"One of his spies is actually our spy. Would have joined Corsica if she wasn't on the town payroll. She told us all about it."

"And the mayor wasn't happy?"

"She says he went berserk. I think she'd have mentioned it if he told any of his spies to sneak back and bludgeon your grandfather, but that doesn't mean he didn't order someone to do it as soon as no inconvenient witnesses were around."

We stood in silence for a few moments.

"Are we seriously considering the possibility that one of our elected officials is a cold-blooded murderer?" I asked.

"Yes," she said. "I think he's capable. And if he thought Parker Blair and your grandfather were trying to expose him for the crook he is, he'd sure as hell have motivation. Watch your back. We don't want him going after you next."

The mayor's round red face popped into my mind. When I'd first come to Caerphilly, I'd considered him a comic figure. The prototypical sleazy small town politician. Then I'd realized there was nothing comic about him at all. His was the latest in a long line of Pruitts who'd lived well at the expense of the citizens of Caerphilly, and the idea that he might be about to lose control of the goose that had been providing them with so many golden eggs for a century and a half-that might well turn him homicidal.

"I'll be careful," I said. "But it's not as if he has it in for me particularly."

"He knows you," she said. "He knows you've helped the chief out a time or two. And he knows you won't take the attack on your grandfather lightly."

I nodded.

"So maybe I'll stay here for a while where there are plenty of witnesses," I said. "What can I do?"

"Fiction's pretty well taken care of," she said. "A bit too well. But we could really use someone to work on the nonfiction. Everything except the cookbook section, which is also pretty well covered."

As I made my way to the stairs, I could see what she meant. The fiction shelves, particularly the genre sections, were filled with happy people, and some aisles sounded less like work crews than book club meetings.

"You've never read The Man in the High Castle? Don't pack it; check it out before Ms. Ellie shuts down the computers."

"You know, that's an idea. Maybe we should just all check out as many books as we're allowed to. Just for the time being."

"Is this a new Terry Pratchett, or just a British edition of an old title?"

"What do you mean, she's overrated? When was the last time you actually read anything by Christie?"

"Oh, man! They have half a dozen P. G. Wodehouses that I haven't read yet!"

Upstairs it was a lot quieter. With the exception of a group of avid foodies drooling over the cookbooks they were packing over in the 640s, the aisles were largely empty.

I grabbed a stack of boxes-provided, I noticed, by Shiffley Movers-and begin with the 000s, computer science. I was itching to be out doing something else. Something to help foil the mayor's scheme. Something to help Chief Burke solve the murder. Or something to help Grandfather recover. Trouble was, I had no idea what to do on any of those fronts. But packing didn't exactly occupy my whole brain, so I planned to pack until I thought of something better to do.

After half an hour, a couple of employees from Rob's computer gaming company showed up eager to help with the computer books, so I moved over to the 100s (philosophy), where I labored alone for about an hour.

I was just starting on metaphysics (110) when a familiar face peered down my aisle.

"Can I help?"

Francine Mann.

Chapter 18.

I had to give Francine credit for nerve. Though I couldn't help wondering what I should deduce from the fact that she was spending part of her Sunday helping to pack the library. Was it a sign that Terence Mann was in sympathy with feelings in the county? Or evidence of a rift in the Mann household?

"Ms. Ellie can use all the help she can get," I said. "Though I think they're having more fun down in the cooking section."

"I think all the chatter is coming from the paranormal shelves," she said, as she began assembling a box from the stack at the end of the aisle. "By the way, I was sorry to hear about your grandfather. Is there any more news?"

"Still unconscious, but his signs are stable," I said. "Thanks for asking."

"If there's anything we can do for him or you, please let me know," she said. "All of us down at the hospital, I mean."

It was a curious clarification. Did she think I'd spurn good wishes and a rather conventional offer of help if it came from her and her husband? I hoped that wasn't indicative of how people had been treating her.

"Terence won't be staying on as county manager," she said, as if reading my thoughts.

"He's resigning?"

"He probably should," she said. "Before they fire him. They called him on the carpet before an emergency meeting of the county board this morning. He's been there for hours."

Rather useless, if you asked me, but no doubt the board members who had been so nervous at last night's meeting were thrilled to take it out on someone.

"How are you doing?" I asked. I suppose I should have said "I'm so sorry" or "How terrible" or something of the sort, but it wouldn't have been sincere, and she probably would have realized that.

"I just want the whole thing over with," she said. "If they're going to fire him, I wish they'd just do it. I'm going down to the town hall to pick him up in a couple of hours, and if he hasn't resigned by then..."

She shook her head and applied herself to the shelves.

I nodded, and searched for something else I could honestly say.

"This has been tough on you," I said finally.

She nodded.

"I have no idea what's ahead," she said. "I'll probably be staying on at the hospital for the time being. Assuming they're okay with it. We need the income. It takes a while to get a job at Terence's level. Of course, when he does get a new job, it will require moving. And right now it's up in the air whether I'll be moving with him."

"I'm sorry," I said. This time I could say that, no matter what I felt about her husband.

"Or maybe I should just leave now," she said. "It's not as if the medical staff ever really accepted or supported me. In fact, they undercut me every chance they get, all because I tried to make a few minor changes in how things have always been done."

I could understand. I'd had a few run-ins myself with "that's how we've always done it."

"I could just go home," she said. Her voice cracked slightly, and I looked up with alarm at the intensity of emotion she'd packed into those five words. She was holding the shelf in front of her as if afraid she'd fall, and biting her lip to keep it from trembling. My first impulse was to give her a comforting hug, and with anyone else I'd have done it, but I was afraid it would shatter the fragile composure she was visibly struggling to regain, and I sensed she wouldn't appreciate that.

"Home would be Boston?" I asked instead.

"Near there," she said with a fleeting smile. "Worcester."

At least I assumed that was what she meant. Sounded more like "Woosteh" in her accent.

We packed in silence for a few moments. Suddenly Francine dropped the rather large book she was packing.

"It wouldn't be so bad if he'd just admit that maybe he was partly to blame," she said, in an undertone. "Not wholly to blame-the county board were fooled, too. And not even mostly to blame-that would be the mayor. But it did happen on his watch."

"Oh, dear," I said.

"And it's ridiculous to go blaming a dead man," she said.

Now that was interesting.

"He blames Parker Blair?"

"He keeps saying everything would have been all right if Mr. Blair had stayed out of it," she said. "And that's ridiculous."

Not only ridiculous, but highly suspicious. When had Terence Mann started blaming Parker for the problems that had eventually lost him his job? Before or after the murder?

I didn't dare ask Francine, though. No matter how innocently I tried to ask it, she'd guess that I was asking if her husband had a motive for murder. I couldn't think of anything to say that didn't sound as if I suspected her husband, though I kept trying for another ten or fifteen minutes as we packed in silence.

I heard a soft dinging sound coming from somewhere nearby.

"Oh, that's my phone," Francine said. She got up and scrambled to the end of the aisle, where she had left her purse.