“If wishes were horses, beggars could ride,” she said aloud, repeating one of her Great-Grandmother Elsa’s favorite sayings. She was in a cell at the Winnetka County Sheriff’s Station and she had to try to make the best of it. Perhaps the time would pass more quickly if she had something to read, something to take her mind off this horrible situation.

“Rick?” she called out. “Is there anything around here to read?”

“I’ll go see. Sometimes the secretaries leave magazines in the break room.”

Hannah watched as he got up from behind the desk and left. She heard the sound of his footsteps echoing down the corridor and then stopping. She imagined him opening the door of the break room, switching on the lights, and checking to see if there were any magazines on the long wooden table in the center of the room. All too soon, she heard the door close and the sound of his footsteps increasing in volume as he walked back.

“Sorry, Hannah.” Rick came up to her cell. “No one left any magazines. I’ll check in Barbara’s office. Maybe there’s something to read in there.”

Again Hannah waited, hoping that there was something, anything to get her mind off the events of this horrible day. It didn’t really matter what it was. She’d settle for a book on police procedures, or a drivers manual, or a copy of the county statutes. Even a phone book would do although there weren’t that many pages in the Lake Eden phone book.

Rick was coming back. Hannah listened eagerly as his footfalls approached. He simply had to have found something!

“Not much to choose from here,” Rick said, arriving with several choices in his hand.

“That’s okay. I’ll take anything.”

Rick laughed. “That’s good.” He reached through the bars to hand her part of a calendar with daily tear-off pages. “It’s last year’s, but it’s got a knock-knock joke at the top of every page. Since it starts in November, it must have belonged to that temporary secretary we hired last year when Sandy was on maternity leave.”

“Thanks, Rick,” Hannah said, even though she wasn’t very fond of knock-knock jokes. “What else have you got?”

“A booklet on . . . never mind. I shouldn’t have brought that.”

“What is it?”

“Something you probably don’t want to read.”

Now Hannah’s curiosity was aroused. “Come on, Rick. Hand it over. I’ll decide if I want to read it, or not.”

“Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Rick passed a slim booklet through the bars and Hannah read the title aloud. Symptoms and Treatment of Venereal Disease?”

Rick’s face colored slightly. “I don’t know who brought that in. Actually, I don’t think I want to know who brought that in.”

“Me, either,” Hannah said, handing it back to him. “Better put it back where it was.”

“Good idea. Here’s the other thing I found, Hannah. It looks pretty dull.”

Hannah took the thick volume and began to smile. “A Chronology of Minnesota Weather,” she read the title aloud. “This is absolutely perfect, Rick!”