In the morning Imogen claimed that a candidate was on her way to interview for the receptionist position. In honor of the occasion I put on a fresh pair of jeans and my best V-neck black T-shirt. I didn't want to scare the poor lady off.
All last night and on my way to work I couldn't get the idea of Bill and Lee Endicott knowing each other out of my head. It didn't make sense. But he had the card. Right there in his shed, buried under a box of golf balls.
I was sitting at my desk, sipping a coffee when Imogen appeared in the doorway.
"I have been staring at Bill's schedule for the past hour."
"What time is our candidate set to arrive?"
"Soon, Max."
"And what have you found out?"
"About the receptionist candidate?"
"No, my love, the schedule."
She chuckled. She seemed distracted.
"Right. That's the thing. The more I stare at it, the harder it is to focus. Can you take a look? I have a hunch, but I'm just not sure what I'm looking at anymore."
"Sure. Scoot over here, my love."
She pulled over an Aeron chair and sat next to me behind my desk. I pulled up the image on my laptop. It was hard to focus sometimes when I was sitting next to Imogen. She had a habit of wearing short skirts. And she'd always be crossing her legs, revealing a healthy amount of tanned thigh.
"Pull it up, ol' boy," she said.
"I'm working on it. Hold your horses," I said, pulling up the image.
"I hate that expression," she said.
"That's because you're English," I said. "'Round these parts we hold our horses."
"Silly American."
"Here it is," I said.
We both stared at the image. I blew up the part where you could see some sort of lines that had been erased.
"So, let's hear it," I said. "What's your hunch?"
"I think Lee Endicott was out on that course the day Carl was murdered."
I was shocked, and I must have looked it. Her hunch threw me. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that she might be right. It made sense. I don't know why I hadn't come to the same conclusion sooner. Bill had his card. Hidden in a drawer. It did seem rather odd.
"Pick your jaw up off the desk," Imogen said.
"Do I really look that bad?" I asked.
"You didn't connect the dots?" she asked.
"Can't say I did. I'm glad someone in this office has a brain."
"So now that we're in agreement, let's take another look at that picture."
I sipped my coffee and looked. Hard. I stared at the screen trying to make out the faint, blurred lines that sat directly in front of both of us. But my eyes had gotten tired from staring, and I diverted them toward Ginny's legs. She was an extremely attractive woman. And she was my wife. I was indeed a lucky man.
"Dutch," she said.
I must have been staring blankly at Ginny's lower half.
"What on earth are you looking at?"
"I think it's funny when you call me Dutch," I said.
"I only do it to annoy you," she said.
"It's not working. I like it," I said.
"Max, what do you think?"
"I'm not sure," I said. "It all just looks like a blur at this point."
"See! That's the same problem I'm having. But look here," she said, pointing to one of the blurred lines. "That's a straight line. Do you agree?"
"I do," I said. "There are a lot of straight lines. That's the problem."
"Just hear me out, Max. Look at this one running perpendicular at the bottom of that line."
"Yes, I'm with you. I see that. It's just a little blurred where the lines would connect."
"Yeah, but zoom out," she said.
I zoomed the image out a bit so we could see all of the blurred erased markings.
"I think that's an L," she said.
I stared at the screen. She might have been right. Was that an L? It certainly looked like it. How had we not seen that before?
"I think you're right," I said. "How did we miss that?"
"Sometimes your mind needs direction," she said. "Helps to channel the focus in the right direction."
"You are a wonder."
She blushed.
"Why thank you, Max."
She playfully pushed me, and then we got back down to business.
"If that's an L are you thinking that the other lines—"
"Yup," she said, interrupting me.
We both looked at my laptop screen trying to piece together the other markings. We zoomed in, zoomed out, increased the resolution, decreased the resolution. We tried every computer trick in the book. Nothing. We just stared at the same thing, and it was leaving me with nothing but bloodshot eyes. And Imogen wasn't faring any better. She was rubbing hers trying to coax them into seeing something that wasn't there. We were about to call it quits when I had an idea.
"I've got an idea. Let me try this," I said.
"What?"
"Just watch," I said.
Then, with one click of my thumb, I flipped the image into its negative. And that's when I heard Imogen gasp. My eyes all but popped out of my head. My mouth must have been gaping open, and if Imogen hadn't made some sort of audible sound I might have stayed like that for the next fifteen minutes.
"I can't believe it," she said.
"Neither can I," I said.
"Are you seeing what I am?"
"Yes."
And there it was as clear as rainwater, the initials LE.