So the subject passed away, but I didn't forget it, and I thought about it while he watched a basketball game on ESPN. He would know I wasn't dismissing his concern, that I'd keep it under my skin until I had an idea about it. In the meantime, I felt like reading. I'd gotten heavily involved in an old mystery, Marjorie Allingham's A Tiger in the Smoke, and after a page or two I was in the England of decades ago.

When the room phone rang, I was simply irritated at having to put down my book. I was closest, so I answered it.

A male voice said, "Hey, can we come up?"

"Who is this?"

"Um. Sorry. This is Victor, you know? Morgenstern?"

I could feel my face wrinkle in a frown. "Who is 'we'?"

"My friend Barney and me."

I covered the receiver and relayed the request to Tolliver. "This is weird. I want to talk to him, and here he arrives on our doorstep," I said. Tolliver was not so pleased. In fact, he looked mildly exasperated. "Oh, okay," he said. "I was thinking about going out for lunch, trying to get some barbecue as long as we're here in Memphis. But we'll see what he wants. You think he's just showing off to his friend or something?"

I shrugged, uncovered the receiver, and gave the boy our room number. After a few minutes, there was a tentative knock on the door.

Tolliver answered it, looking quite grim and intimidating. Actually, he was probably just aggravated at the interruption to his game watching, but Tolliver is a tough-looking guy, and when he's unhappy, he tends to look a little dangerous. If the two teenagers had been dogs, the ruffs on their necks would have been standing up. Like many teenagers, Victor and his friend Barney were strange combinations of tentative and aggressive.

Victor was wearing a tight knit shirt, which allowed us to see just how much he'd been hitting the gym. He didn't have his father's magnetism, but he did have a pair of big blue eyes that worked almost as well. His blond friend Barney was taller, narrower, but still a substantial hunk of immature male. Both were wearing school jackets, jeans, and Pumas. Victor's "Tommy" polo shirt was green-and-white striped, and Barney's Ralph Lauren was golden brown.

"So, uh, you doing okay?" Victor asked me. "This is my friend Barney."

"I'm fine, thank you," I said. "Barney, I'm Harper Connelly. This is my brother, Tolliver Lang."

"Hey," said Barney. He looked at us furtively, and then back down at his shoes. He and Victor were sitting close together on the love seat, while Tolliver and I were in the chairs.

"Can I get you anything to drink?" I asked politely.

"Oh, no, no thanks. We just had a Coke down in the car," Victor said.

There was a small, awkward silence.