“You can’t prove anything.” He sounded mean, but he didn’t try moving away.

“Screw that,” I said impatiently. “Ed and Martha told me the whole story the other night. And your daughter looks so much like you, it’d be an easy make. Murray Ryerson at the Herald-Star would be on it in a minute if I asked him, or Edie Gibson at the Trib.”

I moved to one of the metal benches at the edge of the paving around the fountain. “We’ve got a lot to say. So you might as well make yourself comfortable.”

I saw him looking over at the limo. “Don’t even think it. I’ve got a gun, I know how to use it, and even if your boys finished me off, Murray Ryerson knows I’m meeting with you. Come sit down and get it over with.”

He came over, his head down, his hands jammed into his pockets. “I’m not admitting anything. I think you’re full of hot air, but once the press got their teeth into a story like that, they’d ruin me just with the innuendoes.”

I gave what was meant to be an engaging smile. “All you’d have to do is say I’m blackmailing you. Of course I’d run Caroline’s photo, and they’d interview her mother and all that stuff, but you could give it a shot. Now let’s see—we’ve got so much old family business to talk about, I don’t even know where to begin. With Louisa Djiak’s mortgage, or me in the mud at Dead Stick Pond, or Nancy Cleghorn.”

I spoke musingly, watching him out of the corner of my eye. He seemed a little jumpier at Nancy’s name than Louisa’s.

“I know! That report you sent to Mariners Rest for Xerxes. You’re running a fiddle on the insurance, aren’t you? What are they doing—paying a higher rate than they’re charged so you can pocket the difference? And what difference does it make if someone finds out? It ain’t exactly going to ruin you in the neighborhood. You’ve been charged with worse and been reelected.”

Suddenly the memory that had been eluding me since I talked to Caroline on Saturday popped to the surface. Mrs. Pankowski standing in her doorway, telling me her financial woes, saying Joey didn’t leave her any insurance. Maybe he hadn’t signed up for the group plan. But that was a Xerxes benefit, I thought, noncontributory life insurance. Only maybe it was term; since he hadn’t been with the company when he died, he wouldn’t be covered. Still, it was worth asking.

“When Joey Pankowski died, why didn’t he get any life insurance?”

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Joey Pankowski. He used to work at Xerxes. You’re the fiduciary on their LHP business, so you must know why an employee doesn’t collect life insurance when he dies.”

He looked suddenly as though he’d collapsed through the middle, I thought frantically, trying to follow up my advantage with piercing questions. But he was an old hand at taking the heat and he could tell I didn’t really have anything. He recovered enough poise to keep up a front of stubborn denial.