“You’d better not be,” Sandra Rockwell said. “And now, I’ve arranged for you to meet with Twyla Cotton. It only seemed right. After that, we’ll pick the place you start to search.”

“Okay,” I said, and that was that.

TWYLA Cotton was a very heavy woman. You read about fat people who walk very lightly; she wasn’t one of them. She walked ponderously. She answered her door so quickly I figured she’d been standing right inside, since we’d called her to tell her we were on our way from the sheriff’s department.

She was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt that read “Number One Grandma.” Her face was bare of makeup, and her short dark hair had only a few threads of gray. I put her in her midfifties.

After shaking our hands, she led the way through the house. She didn’t match the décor. Some designer had worked here, and the result was very pretty—lots of peaches and creams and beiges in the formal living room, dark blues and chocolate browns in the family room—but not very personal. The kitchen was Twyla’s natural domain, and that was where she led us. It was full of exposed brick, stainless steel, and gleaming surfaces. It was warm and cozy after the chill gray of the morning. It was the homiest room in the house.

“I was Archie Cotton’s cook,” she said. She smiled at me as if she’d been reading my mind.

I’d had a white-collar upbringing for my first decade, but after that my parents had descended pretty quickly through blue collar and down below, so you could say I was a medley. It had been a case of riches to rags. Twyla Cotton had gone the better way, the rags-to-riches way.

“And then he married you,” I said.

“Yep, we got married. Have a seat, hon,” she said to Tolliver, and she pointed at a chair for me. There was also a formal dining room, but this gleaming round table was positioned in a bay window at one end of the kitchen, and the chairs were wide, comfortable, rolling chairs. There was a newspaper and a few magazines, a little pile of bills, handy to the most convenient chair. Tolliver and I both knew not to pick that one. “Can I get you-all a cup of coffee? Some coffee cake?” our hostess asked.

“I’d like some coffee, if it’s already made,” Tolliver said.

“Me, too, please,” I said. I sank into a chair and rolled up under the table.

In short order, we had mugs of coffee, spoons, napkins, and cream and sugar close to hand. It was very good coffee. The morning improved, just a bit.