Mayleen Richards glanced perfunctorily at the photographs, did a double take, then looked more closely at the young woman in the cockpit of a plane, surrounded by other women in flying gear, getting a medal pinned to her jacket by a general, sitting on the wing of an airplane. “You were a pilot? Which war is this?”

“WW Two,” she said proudly. “I was one of the women that ferried planes from the assembly lines over to Europe. They wouldn’t let us join the Air Force or fly combat missions, but at least we got to do that much.”

From the next room came another cracked and trembly voice. “May I get you some tea?”

“No, thank you,” Richards said. She turned, expecting to see another elderly person in the doorway, but no one was there.

“That’s only Billy, my cockatiel.” The woman laughed and seated herself in a high rocking chair, the seat of which was made even higher by a thick cushion so that she didn’t have far to lower herself. “Please make yourself comfortable, Deputy Richards, and are you sure I can’t get you some tea?”

“Some tea?” the bird asked again.

Richards smiled. “No, ma’am, thank you.”

She explained the reason for her visit and Mrs. Collins nodded immediately.

“Carrie Sholten. Lovely woman. We were neighbors more than thirty years. Her husband died about eighteen months ago and her daughter wanted her to come live near her in Atlanta. Carrie wasn’t exactly sure about making it permanent, so she rented the house to his cousin and put her best pieces of furniture in storage while she looked for an apartment. But then, before she could find one, she fell and broke her hip and bless her heart, she never came home from the hospital.”

“What about her daughter?”

“Janice? Yes, she came up last month to put the house on the market and get Carrie’s things, but that shiftless cousin that was supposed to forward her mail never passed on the letter from the storage place that she was behind on her rent, so they sold everything at auction. Janice was mad as fire over that, but it was all legal. Nothing she could do about it. She did go find the high bidder and bought back some of the pieces.”

“Do you have an address or phone number for her?” Richards asked.

“Oh yes.” A telephone and a large businesslike Rolodex stood on the table beside her chair. Mrs. Collins spun the round knob until she found the card she wanted. “Janice Radakovich. She’s a civil engineer with the highway department down there in Georgia. Builds roads and bridges. Isn’t that wonderful? You young women today!”

About the time Deputy Richards was checking out the E-Z-Quik Mail and McLamb and Jamison were winding up their interview with Lamarr Wrenn, Dwight Bryant was ready to walk through the outbuildings at the old Hatcher place with Tally Ames. Not that he’d known the name given to the farm by local residents in this part of the county. All he knew was that Mrs. Ames had said it belonged to her grandparents and now to her.