I let myself into a smal foyer. White plastic letters on a gray board indicated the locations of reception, the arrangement room, the pal -bearers’ room, and parlors one and two.

Someone named Eldridge Maples was booked into parlor two.

I hesitated. Was “arrangement room” a euphemism for office? Was “reception” for the living? White plastic arrows indicated that both venues lay straight ahead.

I stepped through the foyer door into an ornately decorated hal with deep lavender carpet and pale rose wal s. The doors and wood-work were glossy white, and white faux Corinthian columns, complete with rosettes and volutes at ceiling height, hugged the wal s at intervals.

Or were they Doric? Didn’t Corinthian columns have capitals at the top? No, Corinthian columns had rosettes.

Stop!

Queen Anne sofas and love seats fil ed every inter-columnar space. Beside each, mahogany tables held silk flowers and Kleenex boxes.

Potted palms flanked closed double doors to my right and left. A grandfather clock stood sentry at the far end of the corridor, its slow, steady ticking the only sound in the crushing stil ness.

“Hel o?” I cal ed out softly.

No one answered. No one appeared.

I tried again, slightly louder.

Gramps tocked on.

“Anyone here?”

It was my morning for ticking clocks.

I was considering “arrangements” versus “reception” when my cel phone shril ed. I jumped and then looked around, hoping my skittishness hadn’t been noticed. Seeing no one, I scurried out to the foyer, and clicked on.

“Yes,” I hissed.

“Yo.”

My eyes did a ful orbital rol . Had the man never learned to say “hel o”?

“Yes?” I hissed again.

“You in church or something?” Slidel sounded like he was working on one of his ubiquitous Snickers.

“Something.”

“Where the hel are you?”

“At a funeral. Why are you cal ing?”

There was a pause while Slidel mul ed that over.

“Doc Larabee asked me to give you a shout. Said he had feedback from the Questioned Documents section, figured you’d want to know.” For a moment my mind didn’t link over.

“The note you and Doc found in Aiker’s shorts?”

I didn’t bother to point out the note’s correct provenance.

“Doc said to tel you that you were right about Columbia,” Slidel said.

Irrational y, I turned my back to the hal way entrance, as though dead Mr. Maples might pose an eavesdropping threat.

“The writer of the note was going to Columbia?”

“Looks that way. QD guys used some sort of voodoo light, managed to bring out a few of the missing letters.”

“Anything else?”

A door slammed in the vicinity of the chapel or garage. I cracked the entrance door and peeked out. No one was in sight.

“The only other word they could make out was ‘cousins.’”

My brain sparked like an electrical short.

No question. Cousins dirty. Heading to Columbia.

It was like being slapped awake.