“Well, don’t stop singing on my account,” I said, but they had already stopped. Too bad. Something was going on; I’d figured out that much. A musical mystery to be solved in my own house.

“We still on for boxing after dinner?” I asked cautiously. I was feeling a little vulnerable because I didn’t want them to turn me down for the boxing lesson that has become a ritual.

“Of course,” Damon said, and frowned like I must be out of my mind to even ask such a question.

“Of course. Pshaw. Why wouldn’t we be?” Jannie said, and brushed off my silly question with a wave of her hand. “How’s Ms. Johnson?” she asked then. “You two talk today?”

“I still want to know what the singing was all about?” I answered Jannie with a question of my own.

“You have valuable information. Well, so do I. Tit for tat,” she said. “How do you like that?”

A little later, I decided to call Christine at home. Lately it had seemed more like the way it had been between us before I got involved with the Mr. Smith case. We talked for a while, and then I asked her to go out on Friday.

“Of course. I’d like that, Alex. What should I wear?” she asked.

I hesitated. “Well, I always like what you choose — but wear something special.”

She didn’t ask why.

Chapter 12

AFTER ONE of Nana’s roast-chicken dinners with baked sweet potatoes and homemade bread, I took the kids downstairs for their weekly boxing lesson. Following the Tuesday night fight with the kids, I glanced at my watch and saw that it was already a little past nine.

The doorbell rang a moment later. I set down a terrific book called The Color of Water and pushed myself up from my chair in the family room.

“I’ll get it. It’s probably for me,” I called out.

“Maybe it’s Christine. You never know,” Jannie teased, then darted away into the kitchen. Both of the kids adored Christine, in spite of the fact that she was the principal at their school.

I knew exactly who was out on the porch. I had been expecting four homicide detectives from the First District — Jerome Thurman, Rakeem Powell, Shawn Moore, and Sampson.

Three of the detectives were standing out on the porch. Rosie the cat and I let them inside. Sampson arrived about five minutes later, and we all gathered in the backyard. What we were doing at the house wasn’t illegal, but it wouldn’t make us a lot of friends in high places in the police department.

We sat on lawn chairs, and I set out beer and low-fat pretzels that two-hundred-seventy-pound Jerome scoffed at. “Beer and low-fat pretzels. Give me a break, Alex. You lost your mind? Hey, you having an affair with my wife? You must have got this bad idea from Claudette.”