For all the people leaving for a midday meal, the line at the ground-floor snack bar was thin. I waited until no one was in line, went over and bought coffee, only yards from Bayless’s office. Overpaying by two bucks, I said, “Keep the change,” and showed Katherine Hennepin’s picture to the pimply kid working the counter.

A guy in a T-shirt and jeans flashing a photo deserved an explanation but the kid just looked and said, “Nope. She a shoplifter?”

“Get a lot of them?”

The kid smiled slyly. “Like you don’t know. Being a narc?”

“Me?” I said, grinning.

He grinned back. “Gonna bust someone?”

“Given the opportunity. So you don’t know her?”

“Nope.”

“Been having shoplifter problems?”

“You kidding? Turn your back and half the sugar packets are gone. Turn again and there’s no ketchup.” He huffed. “Rich people are cheap.” Third look at Hennepin. “Yeah, she’s definitely sketchy.”

I returned to the center of the lobby swarm, mingling aimlessly as people eddied around me.

Something Bayless had said stuck with me. The murder at the opera.

Met her in the elevator.

No cameras in these elevators. What better place to hunt unobtrusively?

I got closer to the bank of lifts, watched doors open and close, disgorging hungry-looking folk. Some had their cigarette packs out in anticipation. The sound level rose. Or maybe that was just the noise in my head.

Nothing more to do here and no sense annoying Bayless. I made my way toward the exit.

Got that itchy feeling on the back of my neck.

Someone watching me? More likely, too much coffee and failure.

I half turned anyway. Saw nothing. Then I did.

A sudden shift as a man moved into the crowd quickly.

Not quick enough to avoid identification: Grant Fellinger trying to wedge his stocky frame into the throng. Hustling toward the elevators.

Had he been watching me? Even if he had, the explanation could be simple: recognizing me but not in the mood to deal with police business.

I resumed my exit, allowed myself a brief half turn.

Fellinger had turned also. Tight-faced. Fear? Anger? Both?

For a second, we locked eyes. Then he swiveled fast and showed me his back.

Not a phantom? A man who worked here, had good reason to be here?

A professional man who’d had a professional relationship with Ursula Corey? Far beyond professional if Richard Corey could be believed.

Who better to put a woman at ease as she walked to her car than her own lawyer? The man she’d come to see in the first place.

What bigger surprise than to see that man aiming a gun at her face?