“Right. But the description this time is quite different. Hang on, I printed it out . . . ‘Her hair was hennaed a dark, glossy auburn, cut like Mia Farrow’s in her waif period. It contrasted with dark eyebrows and eyes the color of Hershey Kisses, and served to emphasize chubby cheeks that reminded Carradine of a squirrel storing a lucky find of nuts for later. Somehow, he wouldn’t have been surprised to discover her body pierced in places that would make most women wince.’”

“King hell,” Lindsay said.

“I take it that means something to you?” Sophie asked.

“With a description like that, you could pick Baz Burton out of any line-up,” Lindsay said. “You think there’s any doubt that Penny knew about Baz and Meredith’s night of passion?”

Sophie chuckled at Lindsay’s ironic tone. “Is the Pope a Catholic? Remind me never to cross a writer. If what you’re saying is right, the character would have been instantly recognizable to everybody at Monarch as Baz.”

“Not to mention the rest of the publishing world. And not just in London. What do you think they’d be gossiping about at the Frankfurt Book Fair, if not the way that Penny Varnavides had extracted her revenge against her former editor? Make no mistake, sending a message like that to Baz is the longest sacking note in history,” Lindsay pointed out as Helen barged into the kitchen.

“What is this, Pinkerton’s Detectives, we never sleep?” she demanded loudly enough for Sophie to hear her in California.

“Tell Helen to shut up, we’re talking serious murder motives,” Sophie said.

Lindsay relayed the message and Helen poked her tongue out at the phone. Kirsten shook her head in amusement and gestured at the oven with her thumb. “Get on with your call then, Sherlock,” Helen mock-grumbled, taking warm pastries out of the oven.

“It is a motive,” Lindsay said. “No two ways about it.”

“It’s horrible to think of Penny dying for something so petty,” Sophie said soberly.

There was a long silence as they both recalled what lay behind the excitement of the hunt. Then Lindsay said, “I need to see this stuff soon as.”

“I know,” Sophie acknowledged. “But I’m up to my eyes. I’ve had to come back into the clinic.”

“The joys of high-risk deliveries?”

“Yeah. I had to come back into the city after I’d picked up the disk from Carolyn. I don’t know how soon I’ll have the chance to reformat these text files and e-mail them to you.”

Lindsay groaned. “Oh, God.” Both Helen and Kirsten looked up momentarily from their morning paper and Danish, decided it was nothing serious and carried on, ignoring Lindsay’s histrionics.

“I’m doing my best, Lindsay,” Sophie said, sounding hurt.

“I know, I know, I wasn’t having a go,” Lindsay said apologetically. “It’s just so frustrating.”