CHAPTER   1


     Private investigator Andi Wicksham stood at the edge of a double row of
small holes aligned in a field with similar rows holding miniature winter-bare
roses.  With the rain plastering her hair to her head and dripping down her neck,
Andi cursed not bringing a hat and that she'd been so eager for a case without 
veterinarians or infidelity that she'd been seduced into this one.  Her eyes flitted
from client to client pondering their real agenda--twenty-four roses couldn't
possibly be important enough to justify her daily fee.
     It was an early spring downpour--with rain falling faster than it could be
absorbed, the ground glistening under a sheen, running to rivulets along each
row to gather into streamlets filling flooding ditches at the far edge of the
garden.  Big drops splashed madly in half-full holes.  Her four clients stood
quietly half a step back on the other side, heads bowed, each alone with their
thoughts as if sharing a grave-side prayer.
     Yesterday Darrel Feight, the missing rose's owner was found dead in his
living room and twenty-four of his miniature roses were discovered missing.  It
had rained all day yesterday like it was raining now, the rain had washed all
detail from the paths once over-run with crisscrossing cart-tracks and muddy
footprints.
     Andi watched her client's faces.  Perhaps it was the water soaking her
pants and socks that made her wish she had another way to make a living. 
Maybe the rain and overcast prejudiced her, but already she didn't like them.  
     She just discovered that her new yellow, thigh-length rain-coat of an
impenetrable rubbery fabric leaked at its seams.  Water ran down her neck--she
squirmed only to feel it trace a cold, damp track down her back.  
     Andi stooped to look closer at the holes; two thrusts with a curve-backed
shovel, one on each side, then the shovel was levered against the path side of
the hole.  Bits of root trailed from the sides and bottom where they'd yanked
from the soil.  She glanced around the soggy crime scene.  It felt vaguely of
standing in Liliput; all the roses in the section were stubby miniatures; bare
branches with only the barest hint of budding leaves.
     She rose to turn and look across to the parking lot--it was separated from
the house by a thick hedge.  A tree-shaking gust of wind dashed a torrent off the
pavement and into a misty-aerosol that caught and streaked sideways like fog
before the rain settled back to a steady downpour.
     "They could still be here somewhere, couldn't they?" Andi asked, peering
through the rain to fix the general lay-out of the property in her mind.  "...behind
a shed or something?"
     "No...we searched thoroughly."  Warren Laroux dismissed the idea out of
hand, blinked water from his eyes and turned from the driving rain.
     Andi accepted the claim without challenge; things could always be
hidden; how hard would this group of overly-comfortable dilettantes look?  Andi
glanced over her shoulder to the shelter of the potting shed, shook her head
and stepped purposefully in that direction.  Despite her slicker she was soaked
to the bone.  She silently cursed the way the mud grabbed with clay-like
restraining tugs each time she raised a foot.
     "Nothing else missing?"  Andi addressed Laroux as he caught up with her. 
He was the executor of the estate and the dead man's attorney; it was he who
had called her in.
     He shook his head "No" and wiped his thinning hair to the side of his
forehead.
     Andi reviewed her mental file.  Yesterday morning Darrel Feight's body
was found by his niece--no signs of violence, no suicide note.  A preliminary
coroner's report noted that the death appeared consistent with myocardial
infarction--he was sixty-three.  
     The roses' disappearance was discovered late yesterday--six hours after
Feight was found, maybe ten hours after his death.  This morning, a call from
Laroux waited on her office machine.  She'd called back and flatly stated her
day was crowded--Laroux insisted and finally she cleared a hour.
     Darrel Feight's horticultural beneficiaries followed behind them up the
path.  Andi watched Laroux as he walked beside her.  "If this is a commercial
nursery, there must be plants dug all the time.  How can you be sure these were
his hybrids?"  She stepped under the overhang and scraped her shoes on one of
the two steel mud-irons set in cement at the edge of the covered potting shed.
     Laroux stood at the other scrapper.  "Not this time of year.  Bare-rootstock season's mid-fall to winter, then pruning, cleanup and Christmas. 
There's little done mid-winter to mid-spring."  He took his water-spattered
glasses off and held them in his hand.  "Anyway...the holes are fresh."
     Andi ignored his pointing out the obvious.  "You said he hadn't sold any
roses in months?"
     "...we checked his bookkeeping--there's no paper-trail...besides, all four
of us were here sunday..."  He gestured toward the others just stepping in from
the rain.  "...we can attest to them being there." Laroux took off his hat and ran
his fingers across his damp scalp.  "I think Jennifer has a photo showing Darrel
and William kneeling beside them."
     Andi felt her attention wandering; she pulled herself back to the problem. 
"Would anyone but a collector would want them?" she queried politely.  There'd
be no difficulty maintaining professional distance from her clients in this case. 
The way they could pour conspicuous amounts of money down muddy holes and
rationalize it as business made her skin crawl even when the money was flowing
to her pocket.  Maybe she was in the wrong line of work--who but the rich hired
detectives?  Why investigate roses instead of their friend and colleague's
death?
     "Any real rose fancier might.  These are the cream of Darrel's
work...culmination of two decades of grafting and hybridizing...they're
distinctive and unique..."  Warren's voice resonated heavy with loss and he
concluded with a heart-felt sigh.
     Andi looked back as the others approached.  "There can't be many rose
experts around.  If the roses turn up in a couple of years wouldn't you know they
were the stolen ones?"
     Jennifer Gould started scraping her shoes, but paused to look over her
shoulder, "Individual bushes are seldom distinctive and we all develop similar
hybrids..."
     "Is it significant that the miniatures were almost bare of buds while other
roses already had shoots and leaves?" Andi looked back toward the holes
again.
     "Its probably easier on the plants to be disturbed now than a month from
now...but its just a species variation." Gould discounted the observation out of
hand.
     "So what made those valuable?"  Andi watched Gould's face.
     Jennifer Gould leaned back to give Andi a superior look.  "Darrel locked
unique attributes together in a stable genetic stock...a lacy-leafed, heavy-barked, tea-noisette with deep apricot color and spicy-apple scent topping off
deep-rose base notes."  She looked over her shoulder and gave a sad-eyed
smile.  "Whoever took them could adapt a new line and claim it as their own. 
They could do that in Santa Rosa, or Victoria, BC or anywhere..."
     Andi made a performance out of trying to understand, self-consciously
scuffing the edge of her shoe on the hard-packed, graveled floor like a kid
asking for her frisbie back.  "You know...it seems a casual collector might want
a plant or two...that might be reasonable for a garden...do you think that all of
them being taken points to a professional?"  She trailed the word `professional'
upward and looked beyond Jennifer in the direction of the rose-less rows of
water-filled holes.
     "You have to control all of a strain to claim it." Jennifer Gould confirmed
with gruff authority.  "Only a commercial hybridizer would need that..."  She
gave a last kick at the mud-iron, pulled at the collar of her coat and pushed past
Andi to give William Tyson a turn at scraping the mud from his shoes.
     Andi nodded and stepped to the rear of the open walled potting shed,
watching her clients mill, shaking water from their clothes and exchanging
generalities.
     "You think Darrel Feight died of a heart attack?" Andi asked Laroux.
     He shrugged disconsolately, "The police evidently thought so...they're
awaiting lab results."  Warren turned away from the others, caught Andi's eye
and replied half-under his breath.  "It's too much of a coincidence for me...you
are keeping your eye on that, aren't you?"  He shot Andi a cold stare, holding
her eyes until breaking away with a little underscoring nod.
     Andi chewed her lip and tried to keep on track.  Stray thoughts of her
partner Lena kept stirring, rising up to steal attention.  Last week they argued
about pets; decided no to a dog, maybe to a cat.  Then they argued about time
spent with friends; how much responsibility to take on when one had a hard
time.  Lena was back warm and dry in their office.
     Andi blinked and shook her head to clear it, yanking herself back her
business at hand.  Laroux said the stolen roses could be worth a couple or three
hundred thousand depending on how they were sold.  It was hard to believe--exaggeration was a basic human trait, but what did she know of the price of
roses?  Still...she made a mental note to cash her checks the same day she got
them.
     Along with the recently departed Darrel Feight--William Tyson, Jennifer
Gould, Elizabeth Dao, and Warren Laroux shared a devotion to rose breeding. 
They were among the Northwest's most successful hybridizers and they lived
within a half-mile of each other.  They were the beneficiaries of Feight's roses. 
Andi did a quick mental division; a few hundred grand--each share would be fifty
or seventy-five--not sharing would probably make the money enough to kill for if
their professional reputations and the breeding potential wasn't enough.
     With no other descendants, the non-rose bulk of the estate was going to
his niece Alison Simpson, a poor relative he'd taken in after her release from
several years in a mental hospital.  She'd answered the door when Andi came,
an insecure, plain woman--but obviously with more sense than her clients--she'd
declined the invitation to join them in the downpour.
     Alison Simpson was rumored to have no interest in her uncle's passion,
hence his will's instructions that the roses go to his rivals--they at least, would
honor the fruit of his work.  Simpson had kept house for Feight the last fourteen
years.  Now, Warren Laroux had quietly explained, Simpson was receiving the
property and house with a portfolio of holdings in the comfortably upper six-figure range.
     Simpson had answered the door when Andi knocked.  She'd let her in
without meeting eyes, simply showing her to the drawing room where her
uncle's friends waited.  Then, without a word to her guests, she closed the
drawing room door and retired to the kitchen.
     The rose breeders greeted Andi with hand-shakes and introductions
while overlooking Simpson the way they'd overlook a waitress or busboy.  Her
uncle's will carried his obsession beyond the grave, giving these snobs a
sizeable portion of what would have been hers.  Andi made a mental note--if her
uncle treated her like his friends did now, she had an understandable reason to
hate him.
     Andi had brought up the expense of investigation during the first minute
together with her clients and had given her standard disclaimer--results not
guaranteed.  None of them seemed concerned with her fee or that it might go
for naught and none excluded Darrel Feight's death from her inquiry's focus.
     They insisted that she view the site the downpour.  The way they'd trailed
passively behind had bolstered the sense of grave-side mourning and fed the
illusion of her presiding over a solemn proceeding. 
     Andi told them bluntly that since each had motive and opportunity, they
themselves were the most likely suspects.  It didn't seem to alarm or dissuade
them.  Andi looked from face to face to read who might be nervous, but learned
nothing--each stared back interested, but unmoved.
     Soaked and bad-humored, Andi finally broke away, declined an offer of
coffee, curtly announcing she'd inspect each of their gardens and need forty
minutes of their time for questions. 
     She retreated to her car, grateful to escape; started the engine and rolled
down the long driveway, cursing that she hadn't gotten the new windshield
wipers Lena'd suggested and trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together. 
     Hoping for an insight this morning, after talking to Laroux, she'd called
her mother.  Doris Wicksham, now a retired political science professor had
dabbled in rose breeding and knew Elizabeth Dao.  Her mother first chatted
about some medical tests, then offered impressions and backgrounds of her
clients.
     Elizabeth Dao had been a fellow academic from Lewis and Clark, with an
office up the hall from Andi's mother.  Dow and her mother had a collegial
closeness build through parallel careers liberally scattered with committee
meetings, white wine-and-brie receptions and the tedium of teaching.  Dabbling
in roses ranked low among her mother's retirement interests, but she'd heard
significant gossip.
     There had been five in Portland's inner court of rose hybridizers--a set of
affluent, comfortably-intellectual retirees; Darrel Feight had been active the
longest.  By her mother's account, he'd retired as an engineer to perfect his
reputation as cantankerous old goat.
     Warren Laroux joined the group about the same time as Betty Dao, six or
eight years ago, pouring himself into roses with a passion after the death of his
wife.  The third man, William Tyson, moved from Virginia five years before with a
seemingly effortless entre to their circle.  He was a tall, angular Air Force
retiree vigorously dabbling in real estate, roses and right-wing politics.
     Jennifer Gould joined just after Tyson, moving to the immediate
neighborhood and being accepted among the inner coterie something just over
four years ago.  Gould was a retired bank manager, with a permanently soured
expression and straight-backed, anal fussiness that rankled Andi before they
were even introduced.
     All had been widowed, all were economically comfortable if not affluent,
carried themselves with a condescending air of disapproval and shared a
passion for miniature roses.  All had come out and withstood the downpour to
accompany her.  In all probability though, one of them had twenty-four roses
hidden away among their own.  She had a gut-feeling about Darrel Feight's
death--eat least one of those people behind her knew more than they were
saying.
     Andi turned from Feight's drive onto the small lane.  It was as good to get
away from them as it was to get out of the rain.  They reminded her of the worst
parts of her mother.


     Andi phoned Lena from the telephone booth in front of a convenience
store/gas station on the county road just up from Feight's.  "Lena...call Spinelli
for me, would you?  Make up something, I'm soaked and going to be twenty
minutes late..." 
     "Yo Sherlock...I just talked to him, seems his baritone sax turned up at a
neighbor's.  I told him we'd still bill a minimum...he said `Fine..'"
     "So what time's my next appointment?" Andi shivered as a gust of wind
tore at her wet clothes.  She could see her reflection in the storefront's window,
her short, dark hair lay plastered to her forehead made her ears obvious, the
angular lines of her face in the humorless dead-pan lines.
     "You got a four-thirty in Sellwood about documenting an
infidelity...remember...Mrs. Knowles?" Lena seemed to be reaching across her
table for a file.  "She wants you to come up with high-tech surveillance
stuff...you talked twice on the phone."
     "Oh yeah, the techno-freak..." Andi grumbled disconsolately at being
reminded.
     "She's buying and we're keeping...so don't discourage her..." Lena
cautioned dryly.  "Maybe push her toward an audio dish or infra-red video
camera...you looked through the catalogues?"
     Andi avoided looking through the magazines of Mission Impossible spy-gear the way she avoided TV evangelists.  While legal to sell and own the stuff,
using it treaded questionable ground.  "Why doesn't Knowles just divorce him?"
she complained insincerely.  "Either he's screwing around or not...either she's
unhappy or not...why spend six or eight grand digging up evidence?"
     "Your mid-century roots are showing, Sherlock." teased Lena.  "Maybe
Knowles thinks black-mail will squeeze a settlement...maybe it spices their love
life.  For all we know she's a voyeur and they plan the exploits together...maybe
they'll play your humble recordings over and over in the privacy of their
bedroom.  Think of yourself as a sexual aide...after all, you're charging like a
therapist."
     "Good-bye Watson..." replied Andi, putting as much of a droll edge on her
response as she could.  She returned to her car and turned the heater to max. 
The rain was slacking off.  She'd speed home for a shower and change of
clothes. 
     What a life--lucky her, with Spinelli crossed off her calendar she could
whittle an inch or two of paperwork from her pending box before heading out to
discuss high-tech surveillance with a rich matron into spy novels and intrigue.


     In warm, dry clothes Andi returned to her office.  There in Portland it was
only a steady drizzle.  On her desk was a note that her mother called.
     "She sounded upset..." Lena offered with a quiet voice so unlike her usual
tone that Andi got suspicious.  Lena was dressed in layers of mismatched,
bright-colored clothes, her hair bleached strikingly white and growing out about
four inches long in an carefully un-coiffed mop.
     Without even going around to her chair Andi reached for the phone and
impatiently punched in the number.  It was already well after lunch-time and her
stomach growled objections.  
     "Hello...Doris Wicksham..." her mother answered. 
     "Hi Mom...I got a note that you called..." Andi idly looked out the window
at the people walking the sidewalk across the street in the rain.
     "Hi, honey..." her mother's voice sounded tired, with an edge that could
be the residue of tears.
     "What's up?  You don't sound too good..." 
     "Are you sitting down, Andi?" her mother asked.
     Andi wasn't, but she said "Yeah, why?"
     "I just got the results of a biopsy...my breast cancer's back and...it's
spreading..."  There was a long, long silence in which the world seemed to
contract to a pinpoint.  "Andi?  Are you there?" her mother asked with alarm.
     Andi felt the blood drain from her face.  "Yeah..." she croaked, suddenly
feeling cold and clammy.  "I'm here...are you sure?  Are you OK?  Where are
you?"
     "I'm in shock at the moment...I'd thought I was all done with that..."  Her
mother's voice broke as she subdued a sob with a gasping breath. 
     "Have you told Cinny?" Cinny was her sister, in Dallas now.  "What do
they want to do?  Is there anything I can do?"  Andi fought back the question--what it meant. 
     She was afraid that she already knew.  She didn't want to ask, didn't want
to hear, didn't want to know.
     "...I couldn't face Cinny just now.  Maybe you could call her in a few
days...after the results of the next batch of tests..."  Her mother had lapsed into
the quiet, resigned voice she'd used when Andi's father died.
     "What sort of treatment will this mean?" Andi pushed impatiently.  She
held the phone to her ear as she circled around and sank resignedly in her
chair.
     "Radiation for sure...they think it's into my bones...maybe a marrow
transplant...I don't really know."  Her voice had ebbed to a whisper.
     "Radiation again?"  Andi asked, "Another surgery?"
     "I don't know, honey...I don't know.  I just wanted to tell you.  I'm going in
tomorrow for another appointment.  They'll take another set of biopsies and
blood.  When I talk to Dr. George she'll fill in details."
     "Do you want me to come down?  I could be there..." Andi looked at her
watch, "...in an hour...it's really no problem.  What do you need?"
     Mrs. Wicksham's voice recovered the tone of competency Andi always
remembered it having.  "I just needed to tell you, Andi.  No, don't come
down...stay up there with Lena.  There'll be time enough to visit and discuss
everything..."  The assurance and strength that reentered her voice was more
reassuring than anything she could have said.
     "OK, Mom..." Andi replied quietly.  "...shall I call tomorrow?"
     "In the evening, but if I'm out just try the next day..."  There was a moment
of quiet as if her mother was reviewing a list.  "Now I've a lot more to do so I've
got to hang up.  Thanks for calling back..."  Her mother sounded exactly like she
used to when telling about upcoming plans for a symposium on a weekend Andi
had softball games.
     "Is there anything I can do?" asked Andi in a helpless voice.
     "Well, I suggest you put off calling Cinny for a couple of days.  You'd put
the wrong spin on it entirely if you called her in the state you're in now.  Do what
you think best, but that's my suggestion..."
     "Sure..." Andi responded subdued.
     "Other than that, I can't think of anything dear...I know this is going to be
hard, but I want to put the best face on it that I can.  OK?  Until later then...I love
you..."
     Andi blinked.  The phone line clicked off as she was saying "Goodbye,"
and she slowly lowered the phone to her desk.
     Lena had come over.  "Andi?" she asked gently.  "It's bad isn't it?"  She
looked down into Andi's face and reached a finger to dab away a tear that
formed at the outer edge of Andi's eye. 
     "Her cancer's back..." Andi said simply.  Her voice came close to sobbing
and she had a haunted look in her eyes.  "...it's spread..."
     Lena watched Andi's face until she realized that Andi's eyes weren't
focusing on the room around them.  Without another word, she returned to
chair, took up her phone and rescheduled Andi's appointments.


     That afternoon their office was empty.  
     Lena took Andi out for a walk in the rain.  They walked up and down the
branching paths of Mount Tabor until they were soaked and their muscles
ached.  Still on foot, they drifted back to their apartment, stopped for a drink of
water and dry clothes and stayed to make long, needy love on the rumpled
sheets of their un-made bed.
     Later, as evening over-took late afternoon, Andi sat by herself under the
eves of the balcony while Lena poached some sole from the freezer in lemon
juice and capers and steamed broccoli and rice to go with it.
     Andi could smell the fish, but her stomach felt leaden.  That her mother
had called her instead of Cinny was almost shocking--Cinny had always been
the close one, the one her mother would confide in.  
     Now her mother didn't even want Andi to phone Cinny for a couple of
days--Cinny who was a CPA and always a good girl in the most nauseating
sense of the word.  Andi could hardly believe her mother'd called her first to
share the tragedy.  In a depressing way it was more validation than she'd ever
had before.  The thought brought a cryptic smile--then she hated herself for
finding anything good in the situation. 
     Her mother discovered a breast lump six years ago, had a lumpectomy
and radiation.  No mastectomy and no chemo to take her hair and drain her
strength.  That was it, the whole of it, she thought it a scary chapter long closed.
     For it to return was bad, that it had spread, dangerous, and to her bones,
worst of all.  Andi fought against really knowing, but death rose unbidden
behind other thoughts.  Stomach-gnawing hopelessness opened its maw like a
canyon.  She'd have come home to drink if it were five years ago during her
binge period.  Now, she sat feeling the air on her skin, feeling the slow pacing
pulse of time tick against the ultimate futility of life.
     Lena stuck her head out the door, seeking Andi's eyes before saying
anything.  "Dinner's ready...want to eat out here?"
     "No..." Andi didn't want any favors marking this time as special.  "No, I'll
come in..."






                           CHAPTER   2


     In the turmoil accompanying learning of her mother's diagnosis, Andi had
left her car down by Hawthorne so, after a quiet breakfast of fruit and toast she
and Lena walked to work, umbrellas in hand like a couple of schoolgirls.  There,
they worked quietly; Lena careful and protective, intercepting each call that
came in--Andi with a hard lump in her chest that she almost willed to be her own
inoperable cancer so she could be bonded more securely to her mother.
     She cranked out routine skip-searches as she ruminated over Feight. 
Feight's death was still unexplained.  If the toxicological report came up blank
and it was still a heart attack, what could induce it; electric shock?  Surely the
pathologist would look for that sort of burn marks.  With an elderly man and no
suspicious evidence on the scene the medical examiner might not give him the
attention they should.  They'd probably checked the brain for hemorrhage and
the spine for dislocation and trauma when they checked his heart. 
     That regular examination covered ninety-nine point nine percent of the
otherwise unexplained deaths they investigated.  What was less obvious?  How
would someone kill without leaving a trace?  She jotted a note to ask about his
medical condition in the last month and if withholding medications could have
killed him.  Simpson might have switched real meds for something else. 
Laboratory tests more sophisticated than simple screens were expensive and
only wielded with strong evidence pointing to foul play--it was all to easy to
guess that the Medical Examiner might not go the big-ticket route.
     Mid-morning, Andi drove through an off-and-on drizzle to keep
appointments with Alison Simpson and William Tyson.  Lena'd efficiently
scheduled them without consulting her--she'd meet them both at Feight's. 
Simpson because she lived there, Tyson because he told Lena that meeting at
his place wasn't acceptable that morning.
     Turning off the county road at the convenience store, she drove the small
lane at a crawl, peering up driveways and studying the houses to get a feel for
the neighborhood.  There weren't many turn-offs from the lane, she paused a
moment at Feight's drive, then drove past two more houses before the road
ended in a rutted turn-around. 
     The lane wandered through a small valley of ten to twenty acre plots--tracing both lines of overlooking hills she could see no access roads cutting
over.  Unless a neighbor carted the roses home, the lane was figuratively as
well as literally a dead-end.  She turned her car and drove back to the house
that would soon be Alison Simpson's.
     Simpson must have been waiting.  She opened the door before Andi had
time to knock and led her quietly down the hall to a sunny table in the kitchen. 
She was dressed as she'd been before, in an ill-fitting, much-washed dress with
her greying, dishwater blond hair held back with plain red plastic barrettes like
Dorothy of Kansas.  "I hope you don't mind meeting here..." she apologized
shyly.  "Uncle Darrel always used the living and sitting rooms...I've always
waited in the kitchen...I guess I'm more comfortable here..."  Simpson gave an
awkward shrug, then stood as if waiting insecurely for instructions before
finally gesturing for Andi to sit, "...do you want coffee?"
     Andi smiled, nodded and chose a position where she could look out the
window at the south-east garden.  "You've been here fourteen years?" Andi
asked congenially, she left her notebook unopened on the table, deemphasizing
the business aspect of her presence.  A small double picture frame with photo's
of Feight and William Tyson stood on the counter with scraps of paper from a
small pad.  The room was high-ceilinged and airy, large stove, a dry pantry
stood beside the open door to steep, winding back-stairs leading up to the
second story.
     Alison moved to the stove and turned a flame on under the tea pot.  There
was momentary pause, she glanced up and then quickly away. 
"Yes...fourteen..."
     "Were you close to your uncle?"  There were two more note-pads and half
a dozen pieces of paper.  Andi craned her neck to read.
     Alison twitched as if surprised at the question, still turned away.  "He was
good to me..."  Her voice was clipped and a bit defensive.  "I've never had
anything of my own.  If he hadn't taken me in I suppose I'd be living out of a
shopping cart."  She carefully measured coffee into a filter and waited by the
stove for the water to boil.
     "But were you close?" Andi repeated.  "Did you talk, did he tell you
anything of his friends?"  The notes were all lists; lists of chores, of books of
thoughts, of actions in making coffee.  There was one on mopping the kitchen
floor that included getting out the bucket, taking it to the sink, and turning on
the water.
     Alison shook her head, still looking away from Andi.  "He didn't really
think much of me...we didn't talk.  He was doing me a favor.  I was here to keep
house.  That's all."  She paused quirkily between each phrase and looked
embarrassed at the admission.
     "But you know his friends?  The four he gave his roses to?"  She needed
to get the interview on track.  Feight seemed to have been a jerk, but Andi didn't
care about their family dynamics--Simpson's resentfulness was enough to keep
her on the suspect's list.
     A flash of bitterness washed Alison's face and then disappeared.  "Of
course I knew them, they came over all the time to talk roses with Uncle
Darrel."  She said it simply, without rancor, but with the flat affect of the
severely depressed.
     "You didn't join them?" Andi asked gently.
     Alison swung her head from side to side like a little girl.  "I brought them
coffee and served lunch."  She poured hot water through the coffee, set a plate
with four cookies on the table and settled, ill at ease, to Andi's left.
     Andi watched silently; each of Simpson's actions was simple and
conscious.  Pouring coffee, carrying cups, pulling out the chair and sitting
down--a hand sweeping her dress straight under her as she descended--perfectly polite and proper, though barely risking eye contact since meeting
Andi at the door.
     Andi allowed a silent few moments to tick away.  Alison sat primly upright,
staring at the table between them with nervous anticipation.
     Andi offered a smile and murmured "Thank you..." before raising her cup
to her lips.  She held the coffee as a prop, a symbolic screen between them,
asking "...tell me about them..." from behind the steam rising from her mug.
     "They talked about roses...hardly anything else."  Alison's eyes darted to
Andi's, then flitted away.  "I don't like roses..."
     "What do you think about them as people?  Your uncle knew Warren
Laroux a long time..." Andi let the sentence end as a statement instead of a
question.
     "...longer than I've been here..." Alison smiled suddenly, her eyes
sparked, but didn't quite focus.  "He and Uncle Darrel were
related...distantly...Aunt Tamara and Mr. Laroux's wife were step-cousins..." 
She leaned forward as if to share a womanly confidence.  "They were a couple
of grumpy codgers...playing chess, drinking brandy and smoking their pipes in
the living room...especially before Mr. Tyson and the others came along."  She
squinched up her nose as if remembering a disagreeable smell.
     "That would be after their wives died?" Andi asked more to buy another
moment to think than for the answer.
     "Their wives died before I came..." Alison responded, suddenly sad and
remote.  "That was a long time ago...I went to Aunt Clare's funeral..."
     Andi let another moment or two pass to let the mood clear.  A bulletin
board hung on the wall covered two and three levels deep with more of
Simpson's lists.  Andi sipped her coffee wondering how to bring the
conversation around to her uncle's death.  "How about William Tyson?"
     Simpson shifted uncomfortably in her chair.  "He's an interesting man..."
she admitted with a shy smile.  "He's decisive...I like that."  She seemed to drift
off in thought after making each statement.  She looked up suddenly.  "He has
strong hands, have you noticed?  And he's patriot...Air Force officer and
everything.  Has he talked to you about the constitution?"  Simpson asked as
eagerly. her cheeks had grown rosy and a warm smile graced her face.
     "So you've talked to him more than the others...?" Andi enquired politely,
the tone of the interview had drifted into that of a tea-party.  She set her cup
down and deliberately opened her notebook as if ready to get back to business.
     "Not really...only a couple of times..." blushed Simpson again.  "I've heard
him talking...when I see him by himself in the garden I go out, but usually can't
think of anything..."  She gave a flustered smile before staring selfconsciously
into her coffee.
     "But you like him..." encouraged Andi gently.
     "I respect him..." Alison admitted carefully, then took a breath and held it
as if waiting an explosion.
     "Do you think he's attracted to you?" Andi questioned bluntly.
     Alison Simpson hung her head shyly.  "I don't know...maybe a
little...maybe if he knew I watched him..." she blushed again.  "...he's always so
serious...it makes it hard to get close..."
     "How do you mean?" prompted Andi, kicking herself for wasting time
exploring Simpson's romantic fantasies.
     "Well...he talks politics when he's not talking roses.  He doesn't like the
government or the courts or schools or TV or music.  Sometimes all he does is
complain...but he's very organized and logical."  Her voice dwindled in volume
until it was almost a whisper.  "He doesn't like people who don't think like that."
     It was obvious that Simpson didn't think like that, no use asking if she
thought she did.
     Alison blinked and caught Andi's eye directly for the briefest of moments
before looking away again.  "I don't think he even likes roses...that they're just
something else to be best at."  She held Andi's gaze, her eyes opened wide in
apprehension, her mouth closed to a narrow pucker and a muscle twitching in
her cheek at the audacity she'd shown.
     Andi nodded and looked at the window, the clouds were beginning to
clear.  Simpson's answer might have been appropriate for an adolescent with a
crush, but not for a woman nearer middle age.  "You think he's embarrassed by
what the others might think?"  Andi wondered just how far from rational
Simpson was.
     "Maybe..." Simpson acceded defensively.  "...sometimes he ignores me. 
When the others are around he never looks or says `thank you.'  I think he's
shy...you think so?"
     Andi gave Alison a self-depreciating smile and shook her head.  "Believe
me...I'm not really good for advice."  
     Simpson just sat silently watching her. 
     Andi hazarded.  "I think he'd be difficult to get to know..."  She kept to
safe comments.  There weren't prudent responses to romance-and-attraction
questions.
     Simpson's lips tightened and she stared fixedly out the window.
     Andi paused to share the view, then gave a big sigh to break the mood. 
"Tell me about Jennifer Gould and Elizabeth Dao."  They were looking out to
where the twenty-four holes lay empty.
     Simpson seemed ill at ease at the mention of Gould and Dao.  "More
coffee?"  She asked it without looking into Andi's face, then without waiting for
an answer, stood, strode across to the stove and touched the tea-kettle to see if
it was hot.  "Neither of them like me..." she said in a quiet voice.  "Mrs. Gould
tried to be friendly...sought me out, but there was something about her I didn't
trust..."
     Andi noticed that her hand shook as she poured hot water into the filter. 
Simpson ended up with both hands on the teapot's handle.
     She continued awkwardly.  "...I'm not good at social things..." her voice
grew more insecure and reduced to a bare-whisper, "I'm not like other
people..."
     "Jennifer Dao sought you out?" Andi asked gently, purposefully ignoring
Simpson's comments.
     "One day when Uncle Darrel was outside she insisted I show her the
kitchen, then she turned chatty and nosey...asked about Uncle's business.  She
thinks I'm a meek little mouse and tried to use me..."  Simpson's voice abruptly
turned judgmental and a sneer twisted her upper lip. 
     Andi chewed at her lip and studied Alison's face.  Simpson's swings of
emotion were marked and that made evaluating her more difficult, but the
neuroses that ruled them were beyond her expertise.  The class-conflict wasn't
hard to read though.  It wasn't hard to imagine an unscaleable social barrier
between affluent, upwardly-mobile professional women and a penurious
housekeeper whose last tenure had been at a mental ward. 
     Andi let Simpson pour coffee before continuing.  "Which of them do you
think could have taken the roses?"
     Simpson shrugged as if she didn't care.
     Andi paused then probed again.  "Warren Laroux came out first on that
day you found your uncle, didn't he?"
     "They were all here...sunday and monday...all four of them.  They've
always treated the house as if it were their's...even since Uncle Darrel died..." 
Simpson sat properly, almost stiffly, her eyes blazing with indignation.
     "Did you expect them monday?" asked Andi.
     "I assumed they'd come...I called Uncle's lawyer Mr. Laroux after the
police."  She looked up apprehensively.
     Andi nodded.
     "...there wasn't any doubt that he was dead..." Simpson continued
defensively.  Wetting her lips with her tongue, she lifted her hands from her lap,
shifted the position of her coffee cup a bit to the right, then glanced up at Andi
with what could have been defiance.
     "You found him in the living room?" Andi had read the police report, but it
was always good to re-plow such ground.
     "I tried to help him sit-up, but he was already stiff and the lower side of his
face was purple with settling blood."  Simpson touched a finger to her cheek. 
"His eyes stared straight ahead without blinking...like dead people's on TV." 
Simpson's account was as detached as a morgue attendant's.  She lifted her
face toward Andi but focused on the wall behind her.  "I came back to use the
kitchen phone, then stayed so I wouldn't touch anything."
     "It sounds like you were extremely responsible..." complemented Andi
evenly, "...you called the police, then Mr. Laroux?"
     Smiling at the praise, Simpson continued.  "...he arrived right after the
police...Jennifer Gould came a few minutes later.  The police were only around
a few hours, until they took Uncle Darrel's body...by then all four were here...I
stayed in the kitchen as they came and went through the rest of the day."
     "They came and went?" asked Andi cautiously.
     Simpson sipped her coffee, then blew across its surface as if to cool it. 
"They stayed until the police left just before noon, then left but kept coming
back..."  There was a resentful look on her face and a flash of barely-submerged
hostility.  "They came and went a couple of times, looking at things, talking in
the drawing room among themselves...going into the living room."
     Andi nodded again.  "...and the police?" she prompted.
     A skeptical smile momentarily turned the corners of Simpson's mouth. 
"The police were being official...they asked if things were stolen.  We didn't
know, so Uncle Darrel's friends looked through the drawing room while I looked
through the rest of the house.  We didn't expect to find anything stolen..."
     "Nobody knew about the roses then?"  Andi had the police version.
     Simpson shrugged nonchalantly.  "I guess no one went outside...Mrs. Dao
discovered them missing that afternoon."  Both Simpson and Andi looked out
the window.  "It was three o'clock...I looked at the clock when she came in
yelling..."  A smug smile graced her lips.
     "Before that...it seems strange they'd stay..." Andi tried unsuccessfully to
catch Simpson's eyes.  "What were they doing...why the coming and going?" 
After asking the question Andi sat a quietly as she could, trying to ease into the
background.
     "I don't know...they argued...loudly, looking through his papers, shouting
at each other, driving off and coming back.  I didn't care...I guess I was
shocked...it was all I could do to answer the door when they rang."  Alison
brought her hands up to cover her cheeks.  Her eyes had a far-away look, as if
remembering her uncle--she held that held that pose until Andi spoke.
     "Loudly?  Arguing?" Andi's interest perked.
     "Arguing?  Sure...they were loud..." Simpson again favored Andi with an
unfocused gaze and self-satisfied smile.  "...they take roses very seriously."
     "Was one of the hand carts up at the parking lot when the roses were
discovered missing?"
     "No...not that I know of..."
     Andi chewed her lip.  "As they came and went, did they take anything
away?" 
     Alison, shook her head.  "Unless the front door's slammed, I don't hear it
and the parking lot's on the far side of the house.  I only knew when they'd ring
to get let in..." she pointed to the door bell over the kitchen door.  "The others
wouldn't answer the door."  She smiled contemptuously.
     "You stayed here all day?"  Andi pointed to the kitchen table.
     "Sipping tea and staring out the window." Alison murmured.
     "And you didn't see anyone outside?" 
     "No...I suppose I should have, shouldn't I have?" Alison worried, a wave of
doubt creased her brow.  "I guess I didn't watch every second."
     "I guess not..." smiled Andi.  "Did they leave one at a time or in a group?"
     "I don't know.  I walked around a bit...passed the drawing and living
rooms--the doors were open...a couple of times no one was here..." Simpson's
eyes anxiously shifted from window to floor to wall and back and her voice had a
slight, betraying tremor.
     "Nobody here?  Why would they drive off and keep returning?" pushed
Andi.  Alison must have been listening, at least unconsciously.
     "...checking mail?" guessed Alison vaguely.  "...and getting lunch...maybe
they had chores..."  Her eyes darted about the kitchen as if seeking answers to
the question.  "They used the telephone...I know because I tried to make a call
and they were on it."
     "They all live nearby?" Andi consciously made her voice easy and
undemanding, she lifted her coffee cup to her cheek and smiled as if sharing a
chummy moment.  
     Simpson blinked.  "Mrs. Gould lives on the other side of county road, Mr.
Laroux just north beyond the little store, Elizabeth Dao on the next road north
and William Tyson one road south...just over that ridge."  Alison pointed out the
window, then self-consciously pulled her sweater a little tighter.  "They're all
within minutes of here...do you want more coffee?"
     "No...no thank you..." Andi murmured.  There was a brief, awkward
moment of quiet.  "Actually I'd like to look around.  Can you show me the living
room and sitting room?  Then maybe I'll poke around outside..."  Andi looked up
to read her expression, but she was already rising, looking away, twisting a cup-towel between her hands and shaking her head as if responding to an internal
dialogue. 
     "Are you OK?  Is there something you want to tell me?" Andi asked gently. 
     "No!" Simpson answered a bit too loudly before turning abruptly away,
"You wanted to see the drawing room?" she asked the question demandingly as
she strode purposefully across the floor, leaving Andi to close her notebook,
rise and follow.
     The drawing room could have been more accurately termed a library. 
Bookcases lined two walls from floor to ceiling and two oak tables were strewn
with papers, manuals and reference books.
     Andi quickly scanned the shelves--books on horticulture, plant pathology
and grafting filled one bookcase.  The other was dedicated to books and
pamphlets and typewritten papers on roses.  There were photo albums and
scientific tomes, popular press pruning guides and catalogues from every rose
nursery in this half of the world.
     On a side-wall a locked gun case stood--two hunting rifles and a short-barreled, pump-action shot gun in a rack above three handguns--the case was
all oak and beveled-glass with brass fittings and maroon velvet padding.  These
were not generic hunting rifles.  The guns had hand carved rose-wood stocks
and engraved scrollwork on their barrels.  Even for a non-gun fancier like Andi
they were impressive.
     Simpson came up beside her and lay a hand on the side of the case. 
"Uncle Darrel won competition shooting matches." she volunteered proudly. 
"He loaded his own bullets and everything...want to see?"  Her eyes had opened
wide and her mouth was split with a eager smile.
     Andi looked up with an encouraging smile.
     Simpson turned and led upstairs to what must have been her uncle's suite
of rooms--two with a private bath, the first a bedroom, the bed neatly made, two
chest of drawers, a wood-framed antique-looking mirror on a wall with old
photographs.  There were no dirty clothes in the basket behind the door,
nothing was out of place, even the tops of the bureaus looked dusted.
     Andi followed through that room to the second.  It was obviously a work-room, two long tables waited with an efficient craftsman-like display of tools
and the warm, utilitarian smell of steel and gun-oil.  Parts of at least two
disassembled pistols and a rifle were neatly laid-out.  Two lever-action shell
reloaders were mounted on one side.  Simpson pointed to a shelf of trophies
and plaques--gold and wood--statues of men in various shooting positions with
pistols or rifles, each inscribed with Feight's name, the event and inevitably, a
first or second place.
     "He tried to teach me to shoot..." Alison said, "...but I don't like loud
sounds."  Her face took on a mask of pained concern.
     "I understand..." allowed Andi.  "...he did quite a lot of work here?"  There
were neat stacks of her notes on the table, all firearm related it seemed from
what she could see.
     "Oh yes..." beamed Simpson, "...I helped him clean guns and load shells
and all that...`like Annie Oakly' he'd say..."  She gave an embarrassed grin and
proudly met Andi's eyes a brief moment.
     "Neat..." offered Andi distractedly.  "He must have done lot of that sort of
thing..."
     "Him and Mr. Tyson.  They talked guns and went across to Mr. Tyson's
house to shoot..."  Beaming radiantly, she turned on her heel in slow motion. 
"...now I guess it's all mine..." she looked down at the workbench with obvious
pleasure.
     "I guess so..." responded Andi a bit uncomfortably, "...can you show me
the living room now?"  She stepped back out to the bedroom.
     Simpson paused as if reluctant to leave the room's pleasant aura, but
turned off the light and glided after her.
     "You must have cleaned up since yesterday morning..." observed Andi,
looking at the neatly made bed.
     Simpson followed her gaze and answered awkwardly.  "Well I had
to...with the police coming...didn't I?"  Her eyes swept around the room as if
seeking something she'd missed that was out of place.
     "Did your uncle sleep in this bed sunday night?" Andi asked pointedly.
     "Of course..." snapped Simpson defensively.  "Where else would he
sleep?"
     Andi stepped out to the upstairs' hall way to avoid the question, moving
quickly to poke into at least one more room before she could be headed off. 
There were three other doors off the hall--one was a large, well-lit, tiled
bathroom with pedestal sink and huge old tub.
     There were two other bedrooms; only one with an open door.  Its room
faced south-east garden like the kitchen directly below and must be Simpson's. 
A low, neatly made twin-bed waited with a chenille spread beside a narrow door
probably leading to the back-kitchen stairs, on the other side of the room an oak
chest of drawers had four prescription-labeled bottles lined in a row on its top. 
More notes lay on the bureau and bedside table.  There was an open closet with
neatly hung clothes.  In the open expanse between lay a large braided rag-rug in
browns and grays.  No pictures graced the walls, there were no books, no radio
or TV.
     Andi turned to look back at Alison, she'd stopped a pace behind her,
glowering at her guest's unauthorized intrusion.  The room had the vacant,
austere feel of a guest room.  Simpson set her jaw in disapproval as Andi
retreated downstairs.


     The living room was centered around a grey-brick fireplace. A low table
with a waiting chess board stood between over-stuffed chairs; two massive, oak
buffets lined the inner walls; the front wall held a bay window and cheerful
window seat set with square pillows and lace curtains.  A masculine smell of
pipe tobacco, brandy and dust hung in the air almost possessively.  It lent an air
of serious deliberation, of long evenings in talk and contemplation--contrasting
with the well-lit, studious feel of the drawing room or the yellow, efficient
breeziness of the kitchen. 
     "He was there..."  Alison stood in the doorway and pointed to the area
before the hearth.  A set of fireplace pokers stood to one side, the screen was
pulled open revealing a wrought iron grate with a few charred remains of logs. 
Ornate Persian rugs lay on either side--Feight's body must have lain on the
hardwood floor or the stone skirting before the fire.
     Andi paused beside Simpson just inside the door to take in the mood and
setting before stepping inside to examine things.  
     "Aren't there drugs that can cause heart attacks?" Simpson asked
indelicately.  She held Andi's gaze with her own.
     "The coroner'll check his blood and stomach for drugs..." assured Andi
with a dismissive shrug.  "Do you think he was murdered?"  She glanced down
to the place of death, then back to Simpson to read her response.
     Simpson's eyes narrowed and shifted from side to side as if seeking
escape, two or three waves of expressions washed across her face in a series
of twitchy grimaces.  "He was OK the night before..." she said circumspectly. 
"...but his friends always wanted his roses..."  She walked away to stand by the
bay window chewing nervously at her thumb nail.
     "Were you up with him that morning?" Andi asked, trying to visualize how
he must have been lying, looking about for possible blunt weapons.
     Simpson glanced down at Andi's feet then turned toward the window. 
"No...I made coffee and went back upstairs...I heard him puttering upstairs
while I was in the kitchen, but I didn't actually see him." 
     "You heard him talking?" Andi asked hopefully.
     "No...just footsteps and his cough...then down the stairs, and into the
kitchen." Simpson's voice had a rough-edged intensity, suddenly definitive, sure
of herself.  "I snuck up my back stairs when I heard him coming down..." 
     "What time do think that was?" Andi pursued, glancing in the ashtrays--all
were clean.
     "I don't know...just after dawn...maybe five, five-thirty..." Simpson
abruptly changed to being vague and insecure.
     "Do you think he could have been given something with a drug in it?"  Andi
studied Simpson's face as she asked.
     Simpson shook her head and gave a half-embarrassed, half-confused,
sort of smile.  "No...we had spaghetti on sunday evening...we both ate it.  I don't
know what he had for breakfast.  The police took his medications..."
     Andi swept the room with her gaze.  "Why did his friends keep coming in
here?  Didn't you said they kept coming into the living room?"  Morbid
fascination with death-scenes was normal, but returning several times was
worth an explanation.  Andi poked at the charred remnants in the fireplace
looking for half-burnt scraps of paper.
     "They came for these..." with two quick strides, Alison strode to the
nearest buffet and tugged open a heavy drawer.  Andi quickly rose and joined
her.  The drawers were filled with notebooks, folders and monographs on roses. 
     Andi didn't even bother glancing through them.  It would take months to
wade through the material and probably years of expertise to guess what was
important or missing.  Her prime suspects, separately or together, had already
been through it the day before.
     Andi shook her head--she felt drained.  "Thanks..." she tried to look
sorrowful, "...and my condolences about your uncle."
     "Thank you." replied Alison.  "I'll show you to the door."
     They stepped to the entry and Simpson graciously opened the door. 
"Didn't you say on the phone you were meeting Mr. Tyson?"
     "Yes, but I've got a few minutes...I was hoping to look about a bit before
he comes..." Andi explained with an easy smile.  "Would you tell me him I'm out
here wandering?" 
     Andi suddenly noticed that Simpson stood so ready, so patiently by the
doorway that, despite the fact that she now was owner and mistress of the small
estate, it was hard not to treat her as a servant.


     There was the barest misty drizzle falling now--almost a clear day by
Portland standards.  Andi had a brief thought about her mother, wondering what
she was doing at that moment.  It wasn't a desperate or depressing thought and
she lauded herself for being mature. 
     She returned to the muddy holes and twice traced the paths to the
parking lot, but after three days of rain, there was nothing to interpret. 
Undismayed, she returned to the potting shed to examine the shovels.
     There were seven round-point round-backed standard shovels, six square
potting shovels among an impressive array of other equipment.
     She systematically surveyed the scene--when looking before, she was
inhibited by the watchful presence of her clients.  Even then though, there'd
been a nagging-something that seemed wrong about the scene.  There was a
subconscious-something, something she couldn't put her finger on crossing
some vague subconscious line to seem out of place.  She stood a moment with
her eyes shut, willing the scene to reconstruct itself around her, but she
couldn't retrieve the detail and gave up.
     Before her, plywood tables stood mid-floor, the shelves beneath them
piled high with a couple hundred pots in various sizes and rolls of burlap and
twine.  A mulcher-grinder stood quietly, unplugged, but waiting.  Four large bins
stood at the back, one filled with sand, one of soil, one of manure and the fourth
with mulch.  Everything looked as it should, surfaces of the bins had been
disturbed slightly, a small quantity of pale-clean chips lay scattered over the
greyer, older mulch material.  There was even a trowel left on a ledge with a
residue of manure as if someone came in to re-pot a houseplant, but the amount
of missing material wouldn't fill twenty-four pots and why would the thief risk
doing such work here.
     Andi mentally paced through the steps of someone working at the tables--a person would mix potting soil from-scratch as needed--probably to a specific
recipe for each plant.  The scene was neat, professional, everything in order,
nothing seemingly missing, nothing here that shouldn't be.  She looked among
the pots stored under the tables--there would be no way to tell if twenty-four
pots were missing.  There wasn't the remainder of a pile with noticeably less
dust.
     In the tool shed, a peg-boarded wall held rakes and shovels and hoes,
hoses lay coiled on the floor in a corner.  Measuring cups and pails hung
nearby, hand tools, gloves, insecticide sprayers--it was a legitimate workroom.  
There was a red cabinet locked with a small pad-lock emitting the distinctive
smell of pesticides.  Trowels, clippers, tar and accumulated gardening odds and
ends cluttered the back half of the work-bench.  A well-smudged, tan telephone
hung on the wall.  Everything seemed very much as she'd expect a small
specialty nursery to be.
     Shutting the door carefully behind her, Andi inspect the four waiting pull-carts.  Their green industrial frames had pneumatic tires and the efficient
balance of well chosen tools--the tread on the tires appeared identical and none
had noticeably more, or recent mud.
     It was there that William Tyson found her; `Colonel Tyson,' Andi
remembered cynically.  He held himself with a stiff erectness that seemed more
fitting for a person in a body cast than a trim, fit man in casual clothes.  He wore
canvas sports shoes, tan slacks and a plaid stay-pressed shirt under a light
jacket.  His hair was cut to a uniform quarter-inch length and his gaze seemed
to cut right through, as if assessing how much of his time she'd waste.
     "Thanks for meeting me..." smiled Andi professionally, extending her
hand.  They stood under the potting shed's eves as a light drizzle fell around
them.
     Tyson shook hands without comment or expression.  Andi gave him
opportunity to respond--he didn't, so she continued.
     "I was hoping you could help me understand some things..." She pulled
out her slightly-confused, Colombo-style persona.  "For instance, you and the
others are competitors...adversaries when it comes to breeding roses, but
you're also friends and spend quite a lot of time together..."  She scratched
behind her ear and shook her head in mock confusion.
     "...and?" questioned Tyson impatiently.  "Is that a question?"
     "No...no I guess it's not..." fumbled Andi awkwardly.  "But maybe you
could tell me about your relationship."  She even tilted her head to a side and
gave the sort of helpless smile Colombo used to encourage answers.
     "It's not so strange if you figure that bowlers, car racers and golfers
socialize and train together, yet compete...we're not much different." Tyson
said in a quiet, self-controlled voice.
     "No, I guess not..." admitted Andi.  "I understand you and your friends are
inheriting these?"  She waved an arm to encompass the gardens around them. 
"...they worth much?"
     "Not as much as if they included Darrel's miniatures..."  Tyson admitted
with a bitter smile.  "We'll probably split up the lot to sell through our own
catalogues...without the new miniatures to headline a promotion, it probably
isn't worth the trouble of a joint venture."  He didn't try to hide his frustration
and disappointment.
     Andi paused and looked up to catch his eye as if embarrassed to ask her
next rookie question, "...uhhh...just what would somebody do with stolen
roses?"
     "What would somebody do with them?"  Tyson gave a superior smile that
would have made a politician jealous.  "If I'd stolen them I'd keep them hidden,
maybe salting them in among my others to use in hybridizing.  To be safe, each
pruned branch would have to be clipped to remove Darrel's snipping...that
might be a season or two, but it would only take a few minor changes to obscure
ownership...maybe a different soil chemistry would change flower
expression..."  He waved his hand in dismissal.  The explanation was clinical,
without personal judgement or feeling. 
     Andi watched his face and body language.  He was experienced enough
to know that the best hiding places were often right out in the open.  For all she
knew Feight's roses were still here, waiting among the others.   "...so it would
take a while...months or years...before it would be safe to bring them out?"  She
kept her voice as neutral and uninterested as she could.
     Tyson nodded, his thin lips drawn tightly across his teeth.  "That long to
be really sure...less for any practical purpose...a whole lot less if they were
taken out of the Northwest..."  He spoke in a clipped efficient manner, no
beating around the bush, no obvious evasions, but despite his being straight-forward, Andi didn't trust him.
     Andi shifted the direction of her attack.  "What did you think of Darrel
Feight...personally?"
     "He's a neighbor...knowledgeable...helpful...we shared a passionate
avocation, but weren't friends.  I didn't like his politics..."
     "His politics?" Andi asked.
     "Darrel was a fuzzy headed moderate, thinking he was conservative...I
don't like that type--don't trust 'em.  Once I learned to not talk social issues we
got along fine."  Tyson confided that understanding matter of factly, as if used to
living among lesser creatures and long-ago having given up expectations of
consistency.
     "How about Alison Simpson?"
     "His niece?" Tyson smiled and shook his head as if bemused.  "She's an
little empty head, isn't she?  She's harmless...she didn't kill Darrel or steal the
roses."  Tyson gave a sort of humorless chuckle, then looked up into Andi's
eyes.  "Frankly, I don't think she has the capacity."
     "Who do you think does?  Who would you suspect?" Andi asked
immediately.
     The question seemed to take Tyson off balance, he actually took a step
backward and blinked.  "Suspect?  I don't suspect anybody...like you pointed
out, one of us seem the likeliest thief, but I didn't do it and don't suspect the
others.  That kind of thinking doesn't lead where I want to go...if there's proof of
guilt I'd have no problem pressing charges...otherwise I'm still be working with
them...suspicion would get in my way."
     "You live right over the hill I hear..." Andi shifted subjects effortlessly,
pointing as Alison had, but keeping her attention on Tyson. 
     "Yeah...top of the hills is a green-belt, you know..."  Tyson smiled like a
satisfied burgher.
     "Walking distance?" Andi offered casually.
     "There are paths winding through...but you couldn't walk in this mud..."
responded Tyson with a mocking snort. 
     "You didn't want to meet at your place this morning?" Andi questioned.
     "That's right."  A simple affirmation without explanation, he smiled easily.
     "Why was that?" Andi asked, matching his insincere smile.
     "Some mornings visitors are a pain..." he met her eyes without flinching. 
"Is there anything else you want to know?"  It was a dismissive question, as if
daring her to continue.
     Andi looked across the rows of roses and stretched languidly.  "No, not
that I can think of.  If I think of anything, would you mind if I call?" 
     "No, not at all...but I don't know if I've been much help..."  Tyson shrugged
and looked back toward the parking lot.
     The earlier drizzle had ended and the sky was starting to clear.  They
turned together, stepped from the shed and walked to the parking lot without
sharing another word.  Andi didn't like the man at her elbow and felt certain his
impression of her was equally negative.  All in all, it hadn't been a fulfilling
morning of interviews.  
     Andi sat in the driver's seat without starting her engine, watching Tyson
disappear down the drive before jotting notes on the interviews and all the
details she could remember of the house and shed.  Then she drove slowly out
the private drive and turned toward the county road lost in thought. 
     When she got to the intersection, instead of heading right back to the
office she pulled into the convenience store for a snack.  She pulled a bag of
corn chips from the display and asked the bored clerk if he knew many of the
neighbors. 
     He shrugged and shook his head with the passive, bad-attitude insolence
of the minimum-waged.  She searched her pockets but found nothing but
twenty-nine cents in change.  Cursing, she almost pulled out the fifty she kept in
her wallet for emergencies, but stopped at the last moment with her wallet in
her hands.  Despite her urge for salt, corn chips were not an emergency.
      Behind the clerk was a video monitor showing the back of his head and a
full-faced view of herself.  She waved selfconsciously to see her image wave
back.  The camera was directed so that it caught the display and buttons of the
register as well as customers--the owners were obviously as suspicious of their
under-paid help as they were of potential robbers.
     The on-screen image showed her bag of corn chips on the counter--beyond it and her own image Andi could see down the candy isle to the window
and the intersection beyond.  As she watched, a car pulled in from the county
road.  Surprised, Andi turned around to watch it continue on down the lane.
     Suddenly the corn chips seemed more important.  "Can you cash a fifty?"
she asked, turning back and forth to compare the video image to the view
behind her.
     "Sure...we got lots of twenty's..." the clerk smiled and rang up the chips
and handed her two twenties, a five, a couple of ones and change. 
     "...that thing connected to a VCR?" she pointed to the video screen.
     "Be kind of stupid if it wasn't...wouldn't it?" the clerk responded
rhetorically.  He reached for his paperback book, obviously waiting for her to
leave him in peace.
     "Do you keep the tapes more than a day or two?" Andi asked in her
professional voice, opening her wallet to show her private investigator's license
and handing the clerk a business card.  She looked toward the back-room,
wondering if the VCR were someplace obvious.
     "I don't know...you'd have to talk to the owner."  The clerk was suddenly a
lot less friendly, he had to be cajoled into giving out the owner's name and
number.  The name Andi left the store with was Freedom, Inc.  Thankfully, the
number had a local-sounding prefix.
     She munched corn chips as she drove back into Portland.  Maybe it hadn't
been as worthless a morning as she'd feared.





                           CHAPTER   3


     Back in her office, Andi typed the essential points of the morning's
interviews into her computer; a listing of times, names and places.  Her
notebook held material for the investigation, the computer files were essential
for justifying their work in an bill.
     Lena had been constantly on the phone since Andi returned.  Andi
reached for the receiver, giving silent thanks for extra lines.  She dialed
Ramirez's office number. 
     He didn't answer--no surprise; she left a voice mail message asking if he'd
like to meet for coffee, then looked up Betty Dao and Jennifer Gould's numbers
and left requests for meeting times.
     Andi looked over to Lena as she took information on the missing-person
from Tacoma.  Lena lifted her chin and blew a little kiss before returning to
taking notes.  Andi tuned out Lena's conversation and punched in the number of
Freedom, Inc.
     The fussy, female voice on the other end of the line was far from helpful. 
Yes, the convenience store was one of those they managed, "but.." she drawled
nasally, there was no information available to the public.  She kept asking if
Andi was an attorney and the exact nature of her problem.
     Andi repeated for the third time that she was a private investigator and
that she was interested in the security system tapes for the last few days.
     The voice asked again if there had been an accident? Had somebody
fallen?  Was it related to shoplifting prosecution?  She asked again if Andi was
an attorney.
     Finally succumbing to frustration, Andi repeated that she was not making
a complaint and asked for the owner to return her call.
     The voice, in a doubtful, worried tone, said that she didn't know if they
would be able to or not...
     Andi replied as icily as possible, "Please ask them to...this may be
important to solving a crime...thank you." and hung up, fuming.
     She tried Ramirez again, but didn't leave a second message when the
ringing phone gave way to his out-going message.  She made a half-dozen futile
calls to the Farm Bureau and agricultural extensions of local universities hoping
for background material on the worth and markets for twenty-four specialized,
hybrid dwarf-roses.  She drew a blank.  No one even pretended to be interested--roses weren't considered an agricultural commodity.
     Ten minutes later Lena was still on the phone, so Andi returned to the
thankless task of bailing her pending box below flood-stage; slogging through
billings and proof-reading correspondence before signing at the bottom. 
Twenty minutes later the phone rang.  Andi looked up--Lena, still on her phone,
glanced over again, this time with a smile and shrug.  Andi grudgingly picked up
the receiver and  said "Investigatory Services, Wicksham here..."
     It was a neutral male voice.  "Returning your call, Ms. Wicksham...you do
work quickly.  I didn't expect to hear from you for a day or two."
     Andi closed her eyes and massaged her temples against a sense that her
brain was expanding beyond the discomfort stage.  "And who is this I'm
speaking to?"
     "William Tyson, Ms. Wicksham...I'm returning your call."
     Andi had a moment of confusion.  She hadn't called Tyson--that she was
sure of.  She was about to tell him so when he continued.
     "...you called the office of Freedom, Incorporated about monday's
surveillance tapes?"
     Andi let out her breath.  "Oh, yes...Mr. Tyson of course...I was taken
aback for a minute...couldn't get you in context.  You're the owner of the
convenience store?"
     "It's one of my holdings..." he admitted a bit defensively.  "Thinking of the
store's tapes is brilliant.  Frankly, I'd harbored some doubt, but this impresses
me.  I've pulled an old tape and see what I think you're after...the view of the
corner outside?"
     "I was hoping to see who'd come by...are the tapes available?"  Andi had
little faith.  The tape she wanted would be, maybe they weren't kept more than
twenty-four hours, maybe the camera was on the fritz.  To her surprise, Tyson
responded cheerfully.
     "I've called to have that day's tapes brought over...we rotate in a ten day
cycle.  You'll have to forgive the grainy quality, they're not intended to be
broadcast quality...and to keep to a manageable length we only grab stills every
fifteen seconds, but you can see the intersection and identify cars..." there was
a pause as if he was viewing a tape right then, "...maybe drivers..."
     "Can I get monday's tape?" Andi asked in her very nicest voice.  No sense
beating around the bush.
     "I'll run a copy soon as I get it...you can pick it up at your convenience."
     Andi was startled at the cooperation.  "I could come this afternoon...or
tomorrow morning..."
     "This afternoon's better..." Tyson said curtly.  "Morning's aren't generally. 
Say four...four-thirty?"
     Andi almost tipped her coffee pulling over her notebook and scrambling
for a pen.
     He gave her his address, efficiently repeating it twice.  "I hope it will
help..." he offered in closing.
     She said "Yes...I hope so too..." and mumbled "Thanks." before he rang
off.
     Lena looked up.  "Bad news?" she asked, a touch of concern in her voice.
     "No, I think we just got lucky..."  She shook her head, jotted a final note
and filled Lena in on the morning's events.


     Before heading out to West Linn, Andi visited with Mrs. Knowles,
spending forty minutes discussing options for gathering embarrassing
evidence.  She steered her away from wire-taps and stressed the advantage of
keeping the surveillance with the bounds of her property.  Mrs. Knowles
seemed in no hurry, chatting chummily about skip-traces and DNA evidence
while expressing a gifted amateur's interest in investigation.
     Andi mused that Knowles might really be researching a book and toyed
with the idea of asking right-out.  It was flattering to think of a character
patterned after her style.  The idea bubbled titillatingly on the way to Tyson's. 
Maybe K.D. Lang for the movie version, Andi could almost see herself in dark
glasses, lounging on the busy set.
     Tyson's house was new--a ranch style with clean, Mexican-style tan
stucco, blue tile roof and a formal, monastic-looking front door opening onto the
north side's paved courtyard.  On the south, three wings of the house wrapped a
patio with an acre of windows looking down a serpentine private drive.  His
avocation was testified to by row upon row of roses in terraced courses cut into
the hillsides and looking for all the world like a vineyard.
     The door was answered by a thin, clean-shaven, humorless young man in
khaki slacks and a short-sleeved golf shirt who looked as if he'd be more
comfortable in a uniform.
     She was obviously expected.  Without asking her name, the young man
nodded her in and led wordlessly through a hardwood-floored entry, down a
wide hall lined with display cabinets and a collection of American flags, past a
formal living room over-looking the patio-courtyard, to a closed door that he
politely knocked upon.  Andi glanced at a case at her elbow with a civil war
sword and scabbard decorated with tassels and an eagle.  Her grim escort
stared straight-ahead facing the door.  Mounted on the wall beside the frame
was a punch-in key-pad of the type used for electronic combination-locks.  
     There was an audible metallic click near the knob.  The young man
courteously opened the door and stood aside, letting Andi enter alone.
     Andi entered and heard the door close and lock behind her.  To her left,
William Tyson sat behind a desk in a room resplendent with collectable, and
undoubtedly expensive, military memorabilia.  The walls were crowded with
professionally-framed displays of battle ribbons and yellowing hand-written
documents.  A flag with stripes and a circle of stars in its blue field was
mounted under glass, its frayed edges were charred, its heavy fabric looked
hand-stitched. 
     Another flag stood on an eagle-mounted pole just behind and to a side of
Tyson's chair; to the desk's left was a wide window opened for fresh air, but
barred with close-set security bars.  A few feet in front of the window a couch
and end-table stood at right angles to the desk, bordering the area before it like
a reviewing stand. 
     Tyson rose graciously, asking if she wanted anything, coffee, water, a
beer?  He could have Rex make iced tea...
     "No, I don't really have time..." answered Andi, it was hard not to peer
about her.  "Your hobby?" asked Andi, waving hand vaguely.  The display case
beside her held rank upon rank of little metal toy-soldiers, the exquisitely
painted uniforms with black belts and buttons were chipped and weathered,
next to them stood an identical case with a historic review of the history of
pistols, muzzle-loaders with ball-shot, percussion-caps, old revolvers, trophy
show-pieces and modern automatics.
     "My most valuable are in here...it's my favorite place to work."  Tyson was
obviously enjoying his role as host.
     "I thought roses were..." began Andi, a bit in awe at the collection around
her.
     Tyson smiled.  "...roses are fascinating...but I hire a worker to do the
labor.  My primary passion is military memorabilia and firearms.  I take care of
these things myself..." he said a bit pridefully.  He moved from behind his desk
and paused at her side.  "But, I know...you want that tape..." he shook his head
as if musing at her lack of appreciation.
     "I heard you were a gun expert...you and Mr. Feight I think?" Andi tossed
the thought out like a baited hook.
     "You appreciate fire-arms?  That would make sense in your
profession...I've got a Gluck full auto you'd like..."  He mentioned it lightly, in the
manner another host might ask regarding her choice of wines.
     Andi watched him tap a code into the waiting key-pad and check to see
that the door was locked.  
     "I've a private, indoor range in the basement and a functional collection
like few collectors in the country..."  His eyes gleamed with pride and ardor.
     "Perhaps another time..." Andi demurred, "Unfortunately, I've booked
myself solid...I didn't expect this trip today..."  
     Tyson nodded understandingly.  
     Andi continued, "I hear you and Mr. Feight rebuilt guns...loaded
bullets...fixed antiques..."
     "Oh yes...we did..." he paused for a moment of appropriate sorrow. 
"...I'm going to miss having him to talk to..."  He turned a corner, stepping slowly
to match her pace so they remained congenially side by side.
     "Were you surprised when you learned of the rose's disappearance?"
Andi asked conversationally.
     "No not really, Rex had mumbled something or other about it..." Tyson
acknowledged distractedly as he opened a door and led her into a small
screening room with five tastefully upholstered chairs set before the largest TV
screen as Andi'd ever seen.  He passed across to enter another room with a
video library and editing suite with two grey monitors and a rack of professional
decks and recorders.  He took a tape laying on the corner of the counter and
checked the label.  "Yes...here it is.  I really didn't view much...but it's the one
you wanted..."
     Andi took the tape and turned back toward the door.  "Thank you very
much..."
     "You mentioned wanting to tour my roses?" Tyson lifted his eyebrows in
an obvious invitation.
     "Next time'll be better.  When I come and take your statement..."  She
didn't like Tyson and wasn't ready to spend an hour talking to him.  "...I simply
haven't time."  She shook her head and gave a tight-lipped smile.
     Tyson nodded again, commiserating knowingly of busy schedules, led her
back to the entry and graciously showed her out.  
     She didn't catch a second glimpse of Rex.


     It was past their usual closing hour by the time she got back to the office. 
Lena filled her in on what she'd missed--Betty Dao, Warren Laroux and Jennifer
Gould had each called to claim filled calendars and request alternate times--the
only time available for all of them was two days away.  For good measure, 
waiting until Andi would be on her way home, phoned Tyson to set up a formal
one with him as well. 
     Ramirez called back, requesting a ten in the morning coffee-date.  Lena
had confirmed and asked him to check with his woman-friend Tanya about
whether friday or saturday night were best for a dinner together.
     Andi took the information without responding, straightening the files on
her desk as she listened.  It rankled her to be scheduled without being asked,
but if she voiced dissent Lena would threaten her with a cellular phone.  Now,
Andi just nodded at each point--the subject was perennial, better silence than
losing another round.
     They performed their ritual end-of-day office-cleaning and left for home
discussing whether a larger Persian-style rug or two or three smaller ones
would better grace their office floor.


     She and Lena had been working together two years, living together for
one and had exchanged more barbed words in the last couple months than in
that whole time before.  Perhaps it was post-honeymoon reassessment.  What
started with a appreciative glance had swept into a business relationship,
through friendship to a giddy romance and settled into comfortable
cohabitation. 
     Andi cooked dinner and ruminated on their lives while Lena watered
houseplants.  She put water on to boil, got out an onion and murmured a choice
expletive that they hadn't bought fresh herbs.  The relationship was fine; as a
liaison it was extraordinary, as a business partnership successful, as a
friendship secure--so what was the matter?  She chopped onion,  sauted the
dried basil and thyme in butter--the problem was that there wasn't an obvious
problem only evidence that pointed to one.  She tossed the diced onion into the
skillet to saute, then added a half-empty bottle of white wine rescued from the
refrigerator.  Somehow, despite getting any freedom she asked for, she felt a
loss of freedom.
     That evening over linguine in clam sauce and salad they discussed
clients.  "Our clients and Simpson....all live close...had casual and regular
access...each had motive and opportunity."
     "...an embarrassment of suspects..." Lena quipped as she piled salad
greens on her plate.
     Andi smirked indulgently.  "Everybody but Feight benefitted from him
kicking off."
     Lena spooned grated romano on her pasta.  "They hired you...that's
something..."
     "But if one of 'em was guilty, they couldn't very well object.  It's denial...I
tell them flat out they're the likely suspects and they just give placid smiles." 
Andi took a sip of water and stabbed a slice of tomato.
     "Which one hired you?"  Lena mumbled mushily through a mouth-full of
linguine.  She gave a silly, embarrassed grin and dabbed her napkin to her
mouth.
     "Warren Laroux, but he's sharp enough to figure it might deflect
suspicion.   I don't like any of them..." Andi gave an exaggerated shudder as if
shaking off their memory.
     "They're only clients..." Lena shook her head disparagingly.  "...it's not
like you live with them or anything."  She paused and gave Andi a thoughtful
appraisal.  " I think you should consider getting a matronly dress and a pair of
sensible walking shoes for this case...maybe little white gloves...stolen roses
are a very `Miss Marple' sort of mystery."
     Andi looked across the table in shocked dismay.  "You're
terrible...matronly dress...Lena..."  she threw her wadded-up napkin--it glanced
off Lena's shoulder and fell to the floor.  "Perhaps you're forgetting, my able
friend and colleague...you're following a precarious tradition...Miss Marple
never had a Watson, and Poirot's Captain Hastings didn't stick around long, did
he?"  Andi gave a superior wink and shook a reproachful finger.
     "You can't threaten me, Sherlock..." Lena said smugly, daintily touching
her lips with her napkin and bobbing her head saucily back and forth.  "Hastings
didn't do books or answer the phone and Sherlock's Watson wasn't computer
literate...I'm not scared.  Some of us are indispensable."
     After helping clean dishes and kitchen, Lena retired to the couch with a
paperback and Andi closeted herself in  the bedroom to phone her mom.  She
dialed twice, but the phone rang endlessly, without even a machine to take a
message.  
     Her mother said she might not be available.  It was like her to be out of
touch, Andi grumbled, but she was secretly relieved.
     She reviewed the convenience-store tape with Lena curled beside her
reading a Walter Moseley mystery.  Logging in the corner's traffic wasn't very
difficult, there wasn't much to keep track of.  Andi pushed fast-forward,
watching intently until something flashed beyond the window.  She went through
the entire tape twice, copying every shot with cars or people onto a second
tape.
     Between dawn and five o'clock, nine figures walked past the window. 
Four different people--one making a single return trip, first east, then west and
one making the circuit twice.  Of the remaining three, two walked east, towards
Feight's house while one strolled toward the county road.  She could see all nine
clearly enough, none looked familiar and none carried anything that could have
been roses.
     Thirty-four vehicles left the dead-end lane, turning onto the county road,
twenty-eight entered.  It was such a short, little road, she was surprised there'd
be that much traffic.
     She reviewed cars going in and out and decided she'd reasonable
confidence that none slipped by un-recorded.  A really fast-moving car at
exactly the right instant might just barely swing in from the county road without
being caught, but heading outward, the stop sign demanded at least slowing
before turning and most cars appeared in two or three frames.  She looked
carefully, but couldn't read a single license plate.
     Andi scribbled two pages of notes--the time and date of each frame
glowed handily in the video's lower right-hand corner.  Some of the vehicles
could be sorted by function--two were police cars and one the county van
retrieving Feight's body.  As Tyson mentioned, when the driver's window was
open and the car headed east she could recognize drivers.  Nineteen different
vehicles made sixty-two trips.  She picked the best examples of each car each
trip and took an instamatic photograph of her screen.


     The next morning at the office Andi beat against the latest barrage of
incoming paperwork, only breaking at nine twenty-five because Lena swung
around with a level gaze and insisted she call her mother.  Andi was going to
argue, but saw Lena's eyes and gracefully reached for the phone.
     "Hi, Mom?  It's Andi.  How you doing?"  Andi couldn't think of anything to
say.  She hoped the conversation wouldn't be weepy.
     "...OK."  Tension rasped like static in her mother's voice.  "...I thought
there'd be results by now, but evidently they're asking more specialists for
comment...Dr. George says it's not a good sign."
     Andi murmured "Sorry..." in a whisper.
     "...They're giving me pain pills that make me feel pretty good...you haven't
called Cinny yet have you?"  Her mother sounded tired and a great cloud
seemed to hang over the conversation.
     "Didn't you ask for me to hold off?" Andi asked, reliving three decades of
concern that she'd done something wrong.
     "Yes, of course..." Mrs. Wicksham responded quickly, "...there are a few
things I wanted to think out before we tell her."
     "Like what?"  Andi played with the pencils on her desk, placing a third
and fourth atop two laying before her.  She carefully laid a fifth crossways on
the third and fourth.
     "Like how long I'm likely to be around..." replied her mother quietly.
     "What?" demanded Andi, suddenly refocused on the conversation. 
"...how long you're going to live?"  The pencils were swept away with a sweep of
her hand--two clattered noisily to the floor.
     "Well..." her mother began cautiously, "...there are different treatments
with various trade offs..."  There was along awkward pause that Andi didn't
have courage to break.  She waited, feeling the seconds tick, until her mother
continued.  "One oncologist is pushing massive chemo...but it could kill me and
would make me weaker and frailer than I'd otherwise be..."
     "...would it save you?" Andi burst in, anxious for the answer.
     "Save me...?"  Her mother's question seemed to question if Andi'd been
listening. 
     Andi chewed her lip and remained quiet.  
     "...no, it won't honey...no, I'm sorry...it won't..."
     There was a moment of silence.  "...Mom..." Andi wailed plaintively.
     "Andi..." her mother responded sternly, "...you have to be strong with
this...anyway we don't know the results of the latest tests."
     Andi took a breath.  "OK, Mom...I'm OK."
     "Different treatments may prolong my life for weeks or maybe months, but
that's all..." 
     "I see." encouraged Andi quietly, shutting her eyes, surrendering to that
feeling of falling--adrift at the speed of sound.
     "I've given it a lot of thought..."  She took a deep breath.  "...and I've
decided that quality...enjoying the act of being alive...that's most important."
     Andi could feel the lump in her stomach harden to stone then turn to an
icy leaden mass.  "Ok..." she murmured.  She'd never confront her mother on
something this serious, but inside she shrieked for another answer.
     "...and there are other factors to consider..." her mother continued in her
fussy, businesslike manner.  "I know it's only vanity...but I don't want to lose my
hair..."
     "But to save your life?" questioned Andi outwardly timid, but inwardly
raging with frustration.
     "If it did that I'd be doing it now...but it won't..."  Mrs. Wicksham
responded with definition.  "...and...there's the problem of cost...my insurance
won't cover everything.  Things like marrow transplants would leave nothing in
my estate if I went the full-service route."
     "Mom..." Andi said forthrightly, "...Cinny and I don't care about your
money.  If you'd ask us we'd throw that money into treatments at the blink of an
eye..."
     "Yes, I know dear..." Andi could envision her mother smiling tolerantly. 
"...but it's not your decision.  For me, the idea that I could help you and Lena buy
a house or something is more important than an extra month of life, especially a
month of mortal illness.  Think of it as a motherly gift...a legacy and tradition I
want to hand down.  Hopefully you'll do the same when it's your turn." 
     "Turn?...Mom...you're talking about dying!" Andi's concern erupted as
outrage.
     Her mother chuckled.  "All of us, including you are going to die, dear...I'm
talking about knowing when death's ahead.  It's an incredible blessing to be
able to plan it.  So many people have accidents or can't face the truth...surely
you know me enough to understand..."  She laughed, she actually laughed, a
healthy, robust laugh.
     Andi made a growling sound in her throat.  "...we're talking about your oft-discussed control issues..." she grumbled, not at all pleased at the lightness of
her mother's tone. 
     "Yes dear...I suppose we are.  But I've forged them over decades and
they're liable to continue.  Anyway, I'm weighing all possibilities."
     "OK, Mom..." Andi sighed in concession.  Her mother had called the shots
all through her childhood; this wasn't the time to begin to fighting it.
     "I've always felt Cinny to be the frailer of the two of you.  Here I'm asking
you to shield her...maybe it's been a mistake, but I've always done it.   You've
always been a solid stoic..." Mrs. Wicksham paused, fearing misunderstanding. 
"...it's really a complement..."
     "You still don't want me to call?" asked Andi, eager to interrupt.  She
didn't want to point out that stoic meant shut-down.
     "No, don't...until we can tell her something surer..."
     "Surely the doctors can't predict..." Andi argued.
     "True...that's true dear," her mother responded.  "but I can..."  There was
a long moment of silence, then she continued.  "Anyway, that's enough for now. 
I've made reservations for a night in that motel at the coast...I want to walk
along the beach...it always helped me make decisions.  We'll talk when I get
back.  OK?"
     "OK, Mom...." Andi murmured automatically, she hadn't digested much of
what her mother'd been saying.  "Talk to you then..."  She almost said goodbye,
but bit it off at the last moment.  She didn't ever want to say that to her again.
     "So long Andi...I love you...I love you a lot.  I'll call..."
     "I love you too..." Again `goodbye' almost slipped through her teeth.
     Without another word, her mother ended the call.


     Andi stood and turned to look out the window at the traffic on Hawthorne.  
     Three or four minutes ticked past unnoticed, and Lena appeared at her
elbow.  "Serious stuff?" she asked, slipping her hand in to Andi's and squeezing
tightly.
     "She's..." Andi started, but stopped.  She shook her head, there was
nothing she could say.
     "You've got a date with Ramirez in twenty minutes...I can cancel for
you..."
     "Naw...it wouldn't be right." Andi shook off the clammy feeling that had
taken her.  "What I need is a good strong dose of life and friendship."  She
smiled up at Lena with a hopeless little smile and gave her hand a squeeze
before turning back to her desk. 
     Lena blinked and pursed her lips together.  "...I can do that..."  She swept
gracefully back to her chair and sat a moment to collect herself.  "Now about
your date with Ramirez...not that I'm jealous of you flitting around with your low-life pals in sleazy dens of inequity..."  Lena turned half-away and touched her
fingers to her brow in a classic pose of feminine anguish.
     "Right...Ramirez is a low-life friend..." snorted Andi, happy to exchange
repartee for gloom.  "...and we're meeting at the Underground...you could have
dealt yourself in to this get-together you know..."  She stared fixedly at Lena and
tapped her foot impatiently.  "...you still could come along."
     "Never mind...somebody has to shoulder the burden and be
responsible...go, go off and be happy...never mind me..." Lena used a squeaky
falsetto when she played Jewish mother.  She dropped the voice as Andi neared
the door, instructing unromanticly.  "Get him to commit to a time for our dinner--he was supposed to have asked Tanya."
     "Will do..." Andi smile over her shoulder.  "Want me to bring back a
treat?"
     Lena held up crossed fingers as if warding off a vampire.  "Get thee
behind me Satan...and don't forget...your afternoon's booked with Dao, Laroux,
Tyson and Gould..."
     Andi ground her teeth as she crossed into the hall, beating a timely
retreat.
     

     To the side of the deli counter installed two years ago to increase off-sale
comestibles, Ramirez, coat off, his shirt-sleeves rolled to the elbow and pen in
hand, leaned over a paper strewn table--the perfect image of a harried, public-sector professional getting out of the office to get things done.
     Andi ordered an Earl Grey tea and a small Caesar salad and pointed to
Ramirez's table before sauntering over to slouch tensely in the chair to his right. 
She pointedly averted her eyes to show disinterest in whatever he was trying to
make sense of.  "What do you know about the rose business?" she finally
offered as a greeting.
     "...they like well drained soil and lots of sun...get varieties that are suited
to your micro-climate and blast aphids with the hose..."  Ramirez didn't look up
from his work.
     "That's a lot...more than me actually..." Andi admitted graciously.  "I got
twenty-four missing roses worth a humble retirement, but can't tell one from
another."
     "Luckily you're after the thief and not the plants..." observed Ramirez,
looking over the tops of his glasses.
     "Yeah, but my list of possible perps overlaps my client list."  Andi looked
over to the counter to see if her salad and tea were coming.
     "I'm hardly moved...you cash your checks and take a holiday when you're
done..."  Ramirez didn't break a smile as he re-piled his work and put it aside. 
"Seems you're hanging with a better class of people..."
     "I hardly think so...we don't share values."
     "Family values?" Ramirez offered, deadpan.
     "I got family values...they got free enterprise values."  Andi didn't crack a
smile either--until admitting, "Maybe I'd be selfish if I had more money."
     "Gotta honor political and fiscal diversity, Wicksham..." Ramirez turned a
cynical eye her way as if passing on the wisdom of the ages, "...gotta make
room for all sorts.  The rich want more--it's a bore--get used to it."
     "You are a bright spot on a dreary day..." Andi gave him an up-and-down
sweep of her eyes.  "You know..." she leaned back in her chair, "...Darrel Feight
might have discovered the theft and died of grief...or he might have dug them up
himself and died of remorse."
     Ramirez lifted his latte to his lips, then but it back down without sipping. 
"Yeah...?" he asked neutrally.
     "Well, my contract says roses, but it seems I've also been hired to check-out Feight's death."  Andi rocked her chair back forward and favored Ramirez
with a sour grin.
     "Quit whining...there's something real...Feight's dead, the roses are
gone...there's something to investigate either way you fold it.  If one of your
clients didn't off him, maybe all went in together."  offered Ramirez dryly.
     "Naw..." Andi rejected, "...they wouldn't trust each other...there's not one
among 'em I'd trust enough to kill somebody with."  A waitress brought her
salad and tea, setting them before her, smiling and holding her eye for a
moment longer than she needed to.
     "Does that imply there are people you would kill somebody with?" asked
Ramirez levelly.  The waitress turned half-away, but paused mid-step, lingering
to hear her reply.  Ramirez lifted his cup, sipped, made a face and set the mug
down.
     "I guess it's a friends-and-family thing...slay together to stay together."
Andi responded sourly.  The waitress glided back to the counter.
     "Lena said you got some neat evidence--so don't poor-mouth to me about
what to do."  Ramirez blinked and forced a smile for her benefit.
     Andi grinned and tapped the table with a finger tip.  "...a video of cars
entering and leaving Feight's dead-end lane."  She smirked, picked up her fork
and paused with it poised over her salad.
     "Neat...does it show newly-dug roses and a close-up of the driver?" 
Ramirez rubbed his eyes and tilted his chair back on two legs.
     Andi gave a humoring smile and shook her head.  "...too bad  huh?  I
haven't had time to match cars and people."  She tossed a rubber-band bound
pile of photos across the table.  "Sorry, no license plates..."  She sampled her
Caesar salad, and allowed herself a slight swoon at the salty, anchovy taste.
     "A car jock might ID make and year..."  Ramirez glanced through the
photos and tossed them back. 
     Andi nodded, chewed and swallowed.  "Good idea.  By the way I was
supposed to ask..."
     "Tanya says saturday...she'll bake French bread and a dessert mousse if
you do European or dim sum if you do the Far East."
     "Far east from here's Europe, Ramirez..." Andi pointed out over a fork
impaled crouton.
     "Are you being difficult, Wicksham?" he countered.  "She takes her angst
out on friends..." he extended open palms before him and lifted his eyes in an
appeal to heaven.
     Andi concentrated on her salad while Ramirez rambled about inter-department gossip she only half-followed.  When she finished, he efficiently
gathered his papers and said, "Ready to go?  I'll walk you out."
     "Sure..." Andi said with a smile as she pulled out a twenty and dropped it
to the table.  "I'll pay for your coffee if you take it up...leave a tip...I'm going to
the loo."
     Ramirez smiled, waved her on and reached for the bill.  


     When she came back out Ramirez was still sitting at the table.  "Ready?" 
Andi turned to go.
     "Sit down Wicksham..." Ramirez instructed grim-faced, nodding to her
chair.
     "What's up officer?" Andi mugged, "...change your mind about saturday?"
     "Where did you get that twenty?" he asked bluntly.
     "I don't know..." complained Andi incredulously.  "Jesus, get a grip....did
it have drug residue on it or something?"
     "Can it..." prompted Ramirez in his cop voice.  "Got any others?"
     Andi reached in her pocket and threw her folded few bills on the table. 
There was one other twenty.  "I got them cashing a fifty for corn chips."
     "You broke a fifty for corn chips?"  It was Ramirez's turn to be
incredulous.  He held the twenties up to the light and examined them.
     "It's a long story...at the store with the surveillance camera--the chips
were a business expense.  I gave the clerk the fifty...he said he had lots of
twenties."
     "Both these are bogus, Wicksham..." Ramirez said flatly.  "You're out forty
dollars, because these go with me to the station."
     "They what?" exclaimed Andi in anger.
     "It's the way it is, amiga...funny money gets confiscated when found." 
Ramirez shrugged his shoulders and tucked the bills in his shirt pocket.
     "So who pays me back?" demanded Andi.  "You better at least pick up my
tea and salad..." she pouted--it was clear there'd be no justice.
     "OK, I'll catch your salad...don't get your panties in a twist.  You think I
want this aggravation?"
     "Great...I get stiffed forty bucks because you got a work ethic on steroids
and eyeballs without enough work to keep 'em out of mischief..."
     "OK, OK...I'll get a lunch next week too...but that's as much payoff as
guilt's going to get you."  Ramirez had risen again, picked up his pile of
paperwork and walked over to the register.
     Outside, they parted ways.  "You better give a call and tell me about this
money thing, Ramirez...taking my twenties...you better not be pulling a fast
one."
     "I'll call, Wicksham...auf Wiedersehen.  Keep your powder dry..."


     Andi stopped in at the foreign-car mechanic two blocks up SE 50th before
returning to her car.  As Ramirez guessed, a kid doing a brake-job was able to
ID makes and models and make guesses as to years.  Andi stopped to get a
couple packets of instamatic film and made a quick run to West Linn to see what
cars she'd find.
     The clouds were clearing, hurrying off to the south-east and leaving wide
expanses of pale-blue sky.  Andi first drove Jennifer Gould's house and parked
just off to a side--she could see both house and garage easily from the road over
a rustic split-rail fence.  Gould's roses filled a third of an acre plot behind the
house--neat straight rows with tended paths and a fairly large-sized green
house.  A classic Ford Mustang with a red and white interior was parked in the
carport with a Ford pickup and a tan Volvo station wagon waited before the
front door.
     Flipping through her photos Andi found no Volvos or Ford trucks, but she
did have shots of the Mustang coming and going--six grainy photos with the
vague shape of driver or driver and passenger.  Without getting out of her car,
she took a quick photo of both the all three vehicles, noted the location, time
and date on the photo's fronts and drove on.
     Warren Laroux's home lay up a drive behind a double row of trees that
extended beyond the house.  So much for her desire to not attract attention--she
took a deep breath and signed on for the direct approach, pulling up the drive
and brazenly looking at the cars under the four-car covered carport.  Three
cars were parked in its shade and another, a grey, late-model Nova was tucked
just beyond, next to a tree. 
     She glanced nervously toward the house, waiting the inevitable
confrontation.  The sound of a blaring TV burbled through some window, but
minute after minute passed and nobody came out to challenge and she finished
her quick survey. 
     A Chevy Blazer, a grey Lincoln Continental and a Mercedes coupe were
sheltered by the carport.  She took four quick snapshots, jotted the license
numbers and ground back down the gravel driveway without pausing to look
through the photos. 
     Elizabeth Dao's house was one of two tucked among a stand of cedars
and firs up a small private drive.  A gnarled Monterey pine and decorative
screen half-shielded the entry from the parking area.  The grounds had a
natural esthetic, but were fastidiously tended.  Andi ignored the tastefully
meandering stepping-stones leading to the front door and stepped around to the
side to inspect the double garage set twenty feet back from the front plane of
the dwelling.  
     The lights in the house appeared out, she listened carefully but couldn't
hear music or TV.  No cars were parked in front--perhaps Dao wasn't home. 
With a guilty glance over her shoulder, Andi raised on tiptoe to peek through a
side window into the garage's interior.  A red Porche waited on the far side of
the wide garage.  The dimly lit space was sparsely filled; an empty work bench,
wide shelves with token clutter--no car parts, tools or gardening equipment. 
     The lack of gardening equipment made Andi pause.  She walked around
back looking for a tool shed, but found only a two-level deck extending from the
shadow-draped home into sunlight.  There wasn't a rose bush in sight as she
made a complete circuit around  the house.  The grounds were set up for
minimal maintenance; no beds of annuals or bulbs, few shrubs.  Native
vegetation was prominently utilized, low-woody ground covers and the strong
lines of trees trunks seemed a far different image than she would expect from
somebody with a passion for something as Euro-centric as miniature roses. 
Puzzling on that, Andi returned to the garage, held the camera up to the glass to
snap a quick shot though the window of the Porche and returned to her car to
re-check the video's snapshots.
     There was red Porche among them and Warren Laroux's Chevy Blazer
passed the convenience store three times each way last monday--she
recognized him in the shadowed interior of the Blazer, frozen in time, hands on
the wheel.  He faced forward in the photos, unaware that anyone would be
watching.
     Of the nineteen cars she'd logged entering or leaving Feight's lane she'd
accounted for six--all in all not a promising start.  
     She drove slowly to William Tyson's, pulling up the twisting drive and
parking at the top.  There were three garages--with the house, they enclosed a
pebbled-concrete quadrilateral.  There were no cars parked in the open, but
there was a atmosphere of tension that made Andi opt for ringing the door bell
rather than peeking into the garage's windows.
     The door was opened immediately by the clean-cut young man that
greeted her yesterday.  "Yes?"  He asked expectantly.  "Is Mr. Tyson expecting
you?"  His face was unreadable, his voice wary, but polite, but his steely eyes
seemed to stare right through her. 
     "No, Rex...I'm Andi Wicksham...I was here yesterday..." she held out a
business card that the young man took, but pointedly didn't bother to read.  "I've
been hired by a group that includes Mr. Tyson to look into the disappearance of
some roses from a neighboring property.  I'd like to see what vehicles are here
so I can eliminate them from my search..."
     Rex silently weighed her words, blinked and said, "Please wait...I'll ask
Mr. Tyson..."  The door swung silently closed and Andi stepped away from the
door to enjoy the moment of sunshine.
     A few minutes later the doors of all three garages began automatically
opening.  The formal entry's door reopened, Rex stepped out and carefully
closed it behind him.
     One garage held farm equipment; a narrow-gauge tractor and trailers
with various attachments, an all-terrain vehicle, and two walls of carefully
maintained tools and equipment.
     The other two garages were more conventional, between them easily
housing six vehicles; an open topped jeep, a suburban station-wagon, a light-yellow Corvette convertible, a new-looking, brown Ford pickup with tinted
windows, mud-flaps and fog-lights, a silver Mercedes with tinted windows that
looked like a small limousine, and a dark green 850 BMW.  
     The BMW was the one Andi expected.  Andi thought she'd recognized
Tyson in her photos, identifying his closely-cropped head through the lightly-tinted side-windows.  For Rex's benefit she suppressed any sign of recognition,
neutrally getting shots of all six cars and the tractor and ATV for good measure. 
Her crew-cut attendant stood by mutely observing, hands clasp behind his
back, neither helping or inhibiting in any way.
     She jotted license plate numbers, made a final double-check of her
pictures, then offered Rex a quick "Goodby," returned to her car and sped down
the twisting drive.


     Returning to Feight's road by the convenience store, she made her way
up the narrow lane to its end, stopping at each driveway to peer and snap
photos of cars.  There were seven private drives, six with obvious dwellings and
one with a locked gate across a little-used rutted road winding its way out of
sight.  
     No one contested her presence, though she drew suspicious stares at
least twice.  She let the gated road go--it hadn't been used in a while, no tracks
appeared in the ruts and the padlock had a soft dusting of rust that came off on
her fingers attesting to little if any recent use.
     She saved visiting Feight's property for the end--turning her car to park
facing out as far from the house as she could.  Three vehicles stood in the
parking area, an old, blue rusting step-side pickup, a light-blue Honda Accord,
and a bronze Toyota Corolla.  With an uneasy glance toward the tree-hidden
house, she snapped her photographs and returned to the convenience store to
buy a bottle of juice and look through her photos.  The same bored employee set
aside his paperback to wait on her when she entered.
     She considered hassling him over the bills he'd slipped her.  Somebody
owed her forty dollars--but she pushed the thought from her mind--it made more
sense to pad her bill by a couple of hours.  She smiled for the camera and
escaped to her car.
     Surprisingly, two vehicles from Feight's matched her photos from the
video.  Andi flipped through her notebook to the listing of times she logged.  The
pickup exited and returned early that morning; out from 6:21 to 6:51 AM--the
Honda Accord made a similar run from 12:43 to 1:19.  One trip each, out and
back.  Was it Feight or his niece who'd driven?  Andi kicked herself for not
knocking.  She considered going back, but backed down, the issue would
resolve itself in time.
     She looked through the photos of neighbor's cars, identifying six more of
monday's vehicles.  She counted them up--six from the neighbors, the two
parked at Feight's, Gould's Mustang, Laroux's Chevy Blazer, and Tyson's BMW--she'd accounted for eleven of the nineteen--subtract two police cars, and a
morgue van and she'd almost aced the problem.
     Andi went through all her photos again without picking out anything else. 
She stretched rubber bands around the piles, tossed them into the passenger
seat and drove back to her office.  Maybe Lena could be talked into going out
for a late bite of lunch--Andi remembered her missing forty dollars.  Damn; it
wasn't one thing it was another.  She'd have to hit the bank machine or expect
Lena to pay.






                                                  CHAPTER   4


     The next morning, Lena set about deciphering the slew of phone
messages that had come in.  Andi called Ramirez, left a mumbled message, got
out her notebook and started sorting out that fatal monday's time-line.
     Feight's death had been preliminarily set between three and eight that
morning.  Alison Simpson claimed to have heard him at five or five-thirty, but not
find his body until nine, at which time she says he'd already begun stiffening
with rigor-mortis--her call to 911 was recorded at 9:04.
     Andi leaned back in her chair and bit the end of her pencil.  Figuring three
hours for the onset of rigor, the latest possible time of death was about 6:00 AM. 
If rigor was just beginning at 9:00 and conditions were optimal, that could be
stretched to 7:30 at the latest.  Andi dug yesterday's paper from the recycling
and looked at the back of the sports section--dawn had been at 5:37.  If alive
then as Simpson asserted, the time of death lay between 5:30 and 7:30.
     The pathologist's report hadn't been issued yet--the temperature of the
room and the cooling rate of his various body 
parts would give the experts more to go on, but it didn't seem likely to matter. 
Unless they found some chemical agent leading to a heart attack there would be
no finding that a crime occurred--once "natural causes" was typed into the
report, if it was a murder, it became a perfect one. 
     Andi pulled out the photos taken from the video.  The pickup in Feight's
parking lot had been out around six-thirty--it was back by seven.  Feight could
easily have driven off and returned to die, but that would put his death at best
only two hours before being found already beset by rigor.  She reviewed the
factors and made a note on her time-line--it was pushing the envelope, but
maybe if Feight was thin enough and the room warm enough rigor could begin in
two--maybe. 
     If Feight had taken it--what was he doing at that hour?  If he was already
dead, then who was driving the truck--and why?  His niece, Alison Simpson was
the obvious who.
     Andi inspected the truck's photos again, laying them before her on her
desk.  With the morning light shining on the convenience store window there
was so much glare she couldn't make out the driver.  Maybe the originals would
be clearer.
     "I'll be back..." she called to Lena as she dashed out.
     Andi replayed the two trips of the pickup on her living room VCR, but
between the window's glare and generally grainy image, she couldn't make out
more than a dark-smudged form.  She replayed the re-recorded sections over
and over, then viewed the full-length copy she got from Tyson.  There was
nothing any clearer...
     Andi returned to the office a bit abashed and set again to working the
time-line.  There was the 911 call at 9:04.  Andi pulled out her copy of the police
report, confirmed that the police left at noon, then cross checked the report
against her photos.  The video showed two police cars cruising by the
convenience store at 9:16.  Laroux's Chevy Blazer passed at 9:20, Gould's
Mustang at 9:22.  Tyson's dark green BMW was noted at 9:31.  The dark van with
a county insignia on the side showed up at 11:43 and left twelve minutes later. 
By easy deduction, assuming that she'd come and gone at least once as
Simpson said, Betty Dao's car must either be a silver Cadillac Eldorado that
made two round trips or a burgundy Buick le Saber that made three.
     Andi re-wrote her time-line to absorb the new information.  Between dawn
and seven-thirty Feight had died--his roses, present the afternoon before,
disappeared some time before three.  The times set the boundary.  Within that
span lay her clients predatory behavior and their repeated comings and going's. 
What led from one to another?  
     Ramirez returned her call at that moment.  Not bad timing, all things
considered.  After exchanging their usual banter Andi asked, "Can you ask your
West Linn colleagues what they're thinking about Feight's death?"
     "No..." Ramirez was unusually direct.  "...not unless I had a reason to
ask...which I don't."
     Andi let it slide.  She shifted gears and started describing the case. 
"...Feight...our deceased might have made an early run just before croaking,
but it crowds the timing...more probably Simpson took his truck.  I've got the
four main suspects coming and going, but no smoking gun...so any of the five
them could have removed the bushes and I don't know where any of them went."
     "So, what do you know?" Ramirez prompted.
     Andi took a breath and flipped back a page in her notebook.  "Most
probably he died between five-thirty and half-past seven, that leaves him a
possible driver of the truck returning at seven.  "Two of the suspects came and
left three times, two came and left twice.  Feight's niece Simpson left about
noon and returned, if she made the mysterious trip morning trip that's twice out
and back for her too."
     "Maybe the roses were never there to begin with." offered Ramirez.  "It
could be a total scam...or each suspect could have taken three or four."
     "...and then hire me to find them?  Naw..." Andi grumbled doubtfully. 
"...anyway, it would take a conspiracy.  They were inheriting the damn twigs. 
What's to be gained?"
     "Avoiding inheritance taxes or claiming a couple hundred grand tax
loss..." Ramirez pointed out stoically.
     "Yeah..." Andi admitted grumpily.  "But Laroux still could have just
claimed the roses were worth a dollar seventy-five each and they could have
taken 'em home without ado."
     "So all you know is that each of them made at least two trips from the
site..."  Ramirez pointed out the obvious, "...that ain't much."
     "Right," asserted Andi with resolution, "...other than knowing the number
of trips each made...the case hasn't moved an inch." 
     "Still...this investigation's got to be a better schick than tracking-down
poodles." Ramirez observed idly.  "By the way, the pathologist's report came in,
time of death six to eight...natural causes, heart attack, no violence, no drugs
except prescriptions, those in appropriate levels...nothing pointing to
murder...no crime no foul."
     "What was he wearing?" interrupted Andi.
     "Wearing?" queried Ramirez, with the sound of turning pages in the
background.  "Denim pants, underwear, flannel shirt, glasses, wrist watch, two
rings..."  
     "No shoes or socks?" asked Andi insistently.
     "Not listed..." noted Ramirez in a bored tone.
     "But his truck passed the store at six thirty that morning.  If he'd taken it
he'd be wearing shoes.  It implies Simpson was behind the wheel..."
     "Time-out, Wicksham...you're hyper-ventilating.  Suppose he didn't wear
shoes, or he slipped on thongs or rubber boots or got his socks wet so he took
'em off when he returned.  You're making something out of nothing.  Who cares
who drove the truck?  If you believe Simpson's account of finding rigor mortis,
he died around six.  The only point you can make is that he probably didn't drive
his truck..."
     "...yeah, but..." sputtered Andi.
     "It doesn't touch your problem with the damn shrubs.  Does it change your
list of suspects or the fate of the bushes?  No...it doesn't.  The status is quo, so
the result of that info is na-da."
     "God I hate it when you're both smug and right, Ramirez.  It's
insufferable...you should get out of the nasty habit."  Andi put as much disgust
into her voice as she could come up with on short notice.
     "Yeah, but I keep it hidden most of the time."  He yawned a tired yawn. 
"By the way, those bills you donated are definitely bogus...there's been a rash of
them through the Northwest and the treasury boys are kicking up an incredible
cloud of dust."  
     He paused, Andi didn't say anything so he continued, "...I passed your
bills by Max and he decided in his infinite wisdom that I'm the perfect person to
stick with the job of being liaison with the feds..."
     "There's some sort of poetic justice there, Ramirez." Andi observed
casually.
     "Thanks a hell of a lot...just what I needed....another four hours of
meetings a week on top of my usual pile."
     "It's the karma of being gung-ho..." Andi offered.  "...maybe you'll learn
not to chuck your friend's money down bureaucratic rat holes..."
     "Yeah sorry..." he conceded, grudgingly, then changed the subject. 
"...you and Lena decided on a culinary direction for saturday?"
     "No...things have been too hectic..." Andi suddenly remembered her
mother, but didn't' want to say anything.  "Say, I gotta' go...I'll give a call.  If
anything breaks ring me...otherwise Lena'll buzz Tanya to gab food."
     "Fine...give my love..."  He hung up without waiting for a response.
     Lena continued to talk, her feet up on her table, the receiver to her ear. 
Andi glanced at her watch, it was well past noon--she'd haul Lena out for lunch
when she got off the phone.  Impatient and frustrated, she abandoned the time-line and reviewed for the day's appointments.


     Andi met Jennifer Gould at her home.  The Mustang and truck waited
under the carport, the Volvo was still parked in front--Andi wondered idly if it
could be a lover or room mate's.  Gould was officially single, but that took in a
wide slough of options.
     Gould answered the door with a little high-pitched "Hello..." as if she were
hosting a baby shower.  A pot of coffee and a plate of tiny scones waited on a
table overlooking her backyard queues of roses.  
     There was neither sign or sound of another person about.  The house's
furnishings looked as if they'd been picked from expensive Ethan Allen
showrooms, but they were almost obsessively plain--1950's middle-class;
couches and chairs with gingham slip-covers; a lathe-turned pseudo-Americana
soft-wood dining room suite with flat, square matching pillows that tied to the
chair's back supports with little bows. 
     Unremarkable prints served to break up barren stretches of wall, the
nick-knacks and reading material visible seemed as far from noteworthy as one
could get.  There was a hint of herbal pot-pori in the air, but there wasn't a
personal item, or bright color or exotic note in view.
     Gould herself could have stepped out of a Good Housekeeping magazine
in her pastel leisure suit with matching pumps.  Her nails and hair were recently
done.  Andi got the impression that for some reason the interview was important
to her, that she wasn't simply making herself available.
     "Please, with cream..." Andi responded to Gould's gestured offer of
coffee.  She chose a seat looking out upon the lines of roses that were just now
putting out the season's first shoots and leaves.  "Wouldn't it a bit late to risk
transplanting?" she asked conversationally.
     "I suppose if someone were desperate..." hazarded Gould carefully.  "You
are talking about Darrel's, aren't you?  It will be an incredible loss if we can't
regain them..."
     "Perhaps you'd tell how the four of you decided to call me."  Andi left her
notebook on the table before her--unopened, as if the questions were
unimportant preliminaries. 
     Gould took a sip of coffee, straightened in her chair and looked across at
Andi as if at a job interview.  "Warren suggested the idea the afternoon we
discovered them missing--he didn't think the police would take us seriously."
     "Did you discuss the fact that investigations were expensive?  Unless the
roses are recovered and truly worth something, you could dish-out a reasonable
sum without satisfaction."
     Gould's blue-sparkled lids half-hooded her eyes as she offered Andi a wry
smile.  "Oh that was mentioned...but the roses were worth anything we'll throw
your direction." she said smugly.  "None of us have illusions about that..." 
     Andi looked across without blinking.  "Is Darrel's death relevant to the
rose's disappearance?"  Andi wasn't sure if Gould knew of the coroner's finding
or not.
     "It's relevant to him..." Gould sniggered coldly.
     "Could one of you have done it?" Asked Andi bluntly, not clarifying
whether it was Feight or the roses she asked about. 
     "Of course one of us could have done it." Gould snorted.  "One of us
probably did do it...that's what we've hired you to expose.  And the money's no
object...we can afford it..."  She too didn't clarify whether it was Feight or the
roses they addressed.
     "It doesn't seem there's any trust or warmth wasted between the four of
you...yet you've maintained a relationship for years..." Andi let the observation
float to see what it comment it attracted. 
     "We share a obsessive hobby...a ardor for the illusive perfect rose.  That's
more than most people have in common."  Her words were almost bitter, eyes
had grown hard, losing the gracious, house-beautiful look.
     "When do you think the roses were taken?"
     "I haven't a clue."
     "Mr. Feight or his niece drove off in his truck that morning.  Left about six-thirty and was gone about a half-hour...any idea what they might have been
doing?"
     "He was an early riser...notorious for it..." Gould chuckled.  "Myself, I
sleep until ten."  She gazed into her coffee as if it were a crystal ball.  "...let's
see...six-thirty's too early for most businesses, half an hour's not enough to
drive to Portland or go out for a croissant and coffee."  She looked back up as if
surprised at her conclusion.  "...I've no idea what they could have been doing..."
she waved a dismissive hand and looked bored.  "Do you know?"
     Andi opened her notebook, nibbled at her scone and feigned having to
chew and swallow to leave Gould's question unanswered.  "You drove out to his
place in your red and white Mustang, first arrived about 9:23.  The police were
there already.  You waited with Warren Laroux as the other's assembled.  After
Darrel's body and the police were gone each of the four of you left and returned
once or twice.  Can you tell me what you were doing as you looked through his
papers and why you returned later that afternoon?"
     There was a moment of almost absolute silence.  Andi could hear the
distant buzzing of a neighbor with a chain saw and the sound of her own
breathing. 
     "You know when each of us came and went?" Gould asked in a slightly
incredulous voice.
     "It's what you hired me to do, isn't it...investigate?  I found a low-quality,
out of focus security video...shows car colors and body-type..."  Andi down-played the tape with a depreciating shake of her head.  "Couldn't see much..."
     "But you saw me?" Gould's voice had a sharpened edge.  She leaned
forward, her penetrating gaze piercing.
     "I recognized the Mustang...red, you know...it was fuzzy..." Andi gave a
silly, sheepish grin as if Gould caught her making an unqualified claim.  She
didn't want to telegraph that she'd registered Gould's alarm.
     Gould appeared either relieved or accepting of the situation, she sat back
in her chair and explained authoritatively.  "We were examining Darrel's
breeding records...his chains of root and flower stocks.  He was, as the rest of
us still are...notoriously jealous of his secrets--and in hybridizing, that
information is the key secret each of us has." 
     She smiled smugly at Andi who nodded sagely for her to go on.  With an
arched eyebrow commenting on Andi's silence Gould continued, "None of us
would trust the others to look through the material alone...so we did it
together...none of us wanted to wait even a day before looking...so we did it
then.  That was typical of how we worked--our group dynamic..." Gould sat back
in her chair and showed Andi a self-depreciating smile that seemed patently
insincere. 
     "You did seem to have dropped everything to come to Mr. Feight's house
that afternoon too..." Andi observed casually.
     "I naturally rushed over when the roses were discovered missing."  Gould
shrugged, "But I rushed right over when I learned that Darrel had died.  It's a
normal response...we'd already talked about inheriting the roses..." 
     "You talked of inheriting from somebody who was still alive and healthy?"
asked Andi in surprise.  There was no hiding the implication.
     "Casually...yes..." Gould responded haughtily.
     Andi paused, wondering what lay behind that off-hand little discussion.
     Gould sipped her coffee, then asked quietly over the lip of the cup,
"They're testing for drugs that might have caused his heart attack aren't they?" 
She looked across into Andi's eyes.
     "They're usually quite thorough.  Very little escapes them..." assured Andi
with some certainty, doubly frustrated that the coroner evidently didn't find
anything.  Her clients seemed guilty of at least wishing him dead.  She didn't
want to be the one to tell them there was no official suspicion of murder.
     "But those tests aren't finished yet?" Gould held her cup in both hands,
her elbows on the table, looking across the table meaningfully at Andi.
     "Do you think he was murdered?" asked Andi, baldly avoiding Gould's
question.  
     "Probably..." answered Gould.  "What does the pathologist say?" she
asked directly.
     "The preliminary findings seemed to point to a natural death..."  Andi
admitted with disappointment.  It was as far as she would go.
     "It's such a tragedy...but conveniently timed..." Gould set her cup down to
the table a bit too abruptly.  There was a moment of silence as each considered
what had just been said. 
     After another sip of coffee, Andi said, "At any of the times you were in the
parking lot, did you notice a hand-cart?"  Andi held her pencil over her
notebook, hoping to refocus the discussion.
     "No, was there one?" Gould's mask was up and impenetrable.
     "Each of the four of you came and left at different times, so all of you had
opportunity to have slipped away with the roses.  Who do you think most likely
to have taken them?"
     Gould's frown was sour.  "It could have been any of us.  It would only take
a minute to pop them into bags, then up to the lot and you're off..."  
     "Would the thief keep them or sell them?" Andi asked in her neutral
professional voice.
     "Sell them?" Gould shook her head in dismay.  "For what?  Money?  You
must mistake us for people who struggle to make ends meet.  The question is,
would one of us keep them around here or ship them out until the furor dies
down."  She disdainfully shook her head at Andi's naivete.
     Andi looked out the window and regrouped.  Gould's brand of haughty
frankness was hard to deal with.  "You'd known Mr. Feight for a long time?" she
asked politely.
     "Yes...a very long time." Gould said quietly.
     "Were there people outside your group, who might have wanted the roses
and who could have learned of Mr. Feight's death that quickly?"
     Jennifer Gould sat pondering that question, her eyes on Andi's face as if
reading it.  "There was an editor of The Bloom that visited saturday and sunday. 
He could still have been around the next morning...I don't know who'd tell him
though."
     "The Bloom?" Andi asked politely. 
     "...a rose specialty magazine, grafting, new strains, hybrids...all that sort
of thing.  He was going to do a feature on Darrel, his nursery and his new
apricot tea-noisette.  He was going to write it up and return later in the season
for photos of the bushes in bloom."
     "Remember his name?" Andi asked, turning to a new page in her
notebook.
     "Jason something..."  Gould looked at her slim, gold wristwatch and gave
a surprised "Oh..."  It was a blatant cue for ending the interview, she smiled and
rose graciously to her feet.
     Andi thanked her for her time with as much sincerity as she could muster. 
"May I poke around your garden?  I really need to be able to say that I've at least
looked in all the obvious places."      She smiled an innocent smile, shrugged
away the inconvenience and waved toward the back of the property.
     Herding Andi toward the door, Gould first scowled, then smiled
graciously.  "Help yourself, I've an appointment...leave open gates open and
closed ones closed..."  She recited the instructions as if Andi was there to wash
her windows or turn her compost.  "I'll leave you to it then..."
     Andi slowed a step and glanced across at Gould.  "Oh...there's one last
thing..." she turned as she stepped over the threshold.  "Do you remember
Alison Simpson driving off that afternoon in the Honda sedan?  It was about mid-day for a little less than a half-hour...any idea what she might have been doing?"
     Gould raised her chin and stood straight-backed.  "I've spent years
avoiding that insignificant little nobody.  She has nothing, has done nothing and
is nothing...why would I suddenly pay attention to her?"  She shook her head in
patrician disapproval. 
     Andi nodded slightly in acknowledgment and turned away again.  Half-way down the walk, she turned once more.  Gould still stood in the doorway. 
"She doesn't like roses like the rest of you, does she?" Andi asked, raising her
voice a bit.
     "No, of course not..." replied Gould stiffly.  "They're an acquired taste..." 
She made a show of pulling the screen door closed and slamming the front door
behind her.
     Andi glanced at her watch