The old oaken table was covered by a beautiful white linen cloth that made the cobalt Fiestaware stand out nicely. Helen Louise’s set was vintage, lovingly cared for by her grandmother Brady and then her own mother.

“Why don’t you pour the wine?” Helen Louise said as she took my plate to fill it.

She’d chosen a Nuits-St.-Georges Chardonnay, a favorite of both of ours. Helen Louise would never settle for cheap wine, and, having benefited from her expertise on numerous occasions now, I had to agree.

Over the delicious dinner we chatted about ordinary things, neither of us wishing to let the events of the previous night intrude. We ate dessert in her living room in front of the fireplace, all nice and cozy. The dark chocolate cake, paired with a delicious tawny port, had me groaning with a combination of pleasure and guilt.

Diesel desperately wanted to taste the chocolate, but Helen Louise fended him off with a couple of bites of chicken instead. Chocolate was dangerous for cats and dogs, no matter how much they might beg for a taste.

When we set our plates aside, the cat took it as his signal to jump onto the sofa with us. He spread himself across our laps, with Helen Louise getting his head. His tail thumped against my chest, and I only narrowly avoided receiving a mouthful of hair. He settled down after a moment, and then we were able to talk about the subject we had avoided thus far.

“Was it only last night?” Helen Louise shook her head. “Hard to believe.”

“I know. I feel like I’ve aged a couple of months already.”

“Tell me what you’ve been up to. I have a feeling you haven’t been able to keep out of this.” Helen Louise grinned.

“True,” I said, “but not exactly by choice.” I shared with her the visits from the Ducote sisters and Kanesha Berry, then went on to relate the rest of my day.

“You have been busy,” she said when I finished. She filled my glass with more of the delicious tawny port, and I had a few sips. “Any conclusions?”

“Not really, though I still figure Morty Cassity had the best motive for pushing Vera down the stairs.”

“He’s the most likely one,” Helen Louise agreed. “I can’t believe he and Sissy are brazen enough to be carrying on in Vera’s house less than twenty-four hours after the woman died. That’s cold.”

“Isn’t it?” I recalled Morty’s attitude when I talked to him that afternoon. “He certainly didn’t hold back his feelings. No grief there, for sure. How long have he and Sissy been having an affair?”

“A couple of years, maybe three,” Helen Louise said. “It’s hard to know. First I heard of it was two years ago, I think.” She frowned. “Before that there was always talk that Morty was seeing other women, but no one could ever come up with a name that I recall.”

“He’s at least twenty or twenty-five years older than she is, right? What do you think she sees in him?”