I noted Helen Teig hustling around George Farkas and mulled over what I'd just learned. Helen's niece had tried to commit suicide because of Andy, which meant Helen could be out for revenge. She seemed the type who could hold a grudge, but was she the kind of person who could allow a grudge to lead to murder?

Hmm. Revenge was a definite a motivation for committing murder. Helen had a motive, and Andy's door being unlocked had provided her the opportunity.

I scuffled toward the waiting bus with a sinking feeling in my stomach. I wondered what I'd done with the card Inspector Miceli had given me this morning. I didn't want to make the call, but he probably needed to know that someone other than Mr. Nunzio had a reason to want Andy dead.

Chapter 6

"You're in room 4624, Miss Andrew," said the front desk clerk as she handed me the key. "I apologize for any inconvenience we might have caused you."

I grabbed Nana by the arm and sashayed her to the elevator. Three-quarters of our group had decided to be dropped off in town to shop, so only a handful of us had returned to the hotel.

"You seem awful excited, Emily. They must've given us a real spiffy room this time."

We stepped inside the elevator. I punched the button for level four. "It's not excitement. It's anxiety. I don't want to point fingers, but if Mr. Nunzio didn't murder Andy, I think I know who did."

"My money's on Helen Teig," Nana said. "She was probably holdin' a grudge against Andy for what he done to her niece, and it kept festerin' and festerin' until she couldn't stand it no longer. I can't say I like her doin' him in, but if Andy had hurt you like that, Emily, I'd probably wanna do him in, too. I can't figure out how she done it though. There was no blood on the scene, so you know she didn't riddle him with bullets. I didn't see no ligature marks around his neck, so you know she didn't strangle him. She might a suffocated him, but they'll have to wait for the results of the autopsy protocol to decide that."

I stared down at Nana. "Autopsy protocol?"

"That's the file tellin' you everythin' there is to know about how someone died."

"How do you know about autopsy protocols?"

"Investigative Report, dear. You can catch it on A & E almost every night at eight o'clock Central Time, nine Eastern."

That did it. I was going to have to start watching more TV...and thinking like Columbo. I'd even cooked up a possible theory. "Do you suppose someone might have tampered with Andy's inhaler? I saw a movie once where a killer discharged the spray from a woman's inhaler so when the woman had an asthma attack, the apparatus was empty. She nearly died."

"That woulda been the most obvious way to do him in. And tidy, too. No screamin'. No fistfights. No splattered blood. Just release the spray or muck up the chemical balance in his Pirbuterol Acetate. But it don't do much good for all this second-guessin', does it? The police won't know a thing until the serology and toxicology reports come back."