“I’ll fetch Linney after all. It’s so rare the three of us have the evening together. We can get in a game of Uncle Wiggily before she goes to bed.”

“That’ll be great.”

Nancy went out the door. I stared at the egg timer and thought about a chart I’d been wanting to write of “My Blue Heaven.” I hummed a bit to myself. I’d voice it for two trumpets, trombone, and tenor sax.

“Lin-ney! You can come out now!” called a voice outside. It was a kid, not Nancy. I heard the cry again. The sand or salt or whatever it was in the egg timer was halfway gone.

“Lin-neyyyyy!” Nancy’s voice took up the call. Well, if there was one thing that always summoned Linney, it was the sound of her mother’s voice. They had an understanding with each other. Sometimes they communicated in ways I couldn’t comprehend. It was an almost mystical—

“Linney!” snapped her mother. I guess she’d done something wrong. That was not a request. That was Nancy’s voice of authority.

I decided I’d go outside and give Linney a hug and hoist her onto my shoulders. So what if the eggs were hard-boiled.

I went out the door and angled down to where the kids were. They were calling, “Linney, you can come out now, you win!”

I saw my wife searching hastily about our neighbors’ yards, wearing an expression of mounting anxiety that frightened me, for she was always the calm one in a crisis. She kept calling out our daughter’s name. I joined in, and with each plea for which there was no response, I felt an ominous panic rising within me.

Nancy came down the far side of the O’Lunneys’ and I moved quickly toward her. We both saw the icebox at the same moment.

Our eyes met and we knew. We raced to the icebox. I was closer and I screamed, “Look away!” as I pulled open its door . . .

Chapter 23

23

The Wake

. . . and air rushed into my lungs.

I heard a loud scuffling sound and saw Lieutenant Bob Culpepper standing over me, while his friend Russ Hewett was doing an effective job of holding on to the barker, stopping him from trying to smother me again.

The lieutenant shook his head and took out a handkerchief from his breast pocket.

“You’re a mess, Sherwood,” he said, and held the handkerchief against a cut on my forehead. “I don’t think anyone’s going to be proposing to you today.”

Chapter 24

24

The Cover-up