Emily, I swear to god, something awful’s happened. I don’t know what to do, where to turn. I’m gonna do something illegal. I got to. And I need you as a witness. Just to say why I did it, if it comes to that …

I was into the next book about me and Dolly. I figured I had every right, like Cecil Hawke, to use what I knew. We’d lived these things, after all. If she didn’t like it she could sue me. I could just see that judge asking her if this really happened, if that really happened. All of it was true enough. I took a few liberties with any fact that made me look bad, but that was all.

I sat in my studio and dreamed the long dream that begins a book. Place: with colors and smells. Character: real people with faults and beauty. A plot that arcs and falls and curves in on itself, then out again until it ends and the threads make a whole. What I tried not to think about was the blood and pain it took to write a book; the pulling word by word from my head as if I were a spider, and the web had to be perfect or else I didn’t catch flies and didn’t get to eat. Then the greater pain … when would I hear from Madeleine Clark? Was having her working for me in New York just another part of the delusion—that I would ever get published?

I got up because I’d depressed myself enough to shut down the writing for the day, and went to the window to check out a new spider web. Because it was daytime, she was hiding, I couldn’t see my long-bodied spider, only her web. If I had to critique her work I’d say it looked a little ragged at the top, and some of her openings didn’t match the openings below. Overall, it achieved what she’d set out to achieve but the symmetry was missing. A utilitarian web. Maybe only an impression of a real web. Overall I gave her a B. This just isn’t what I’m looking for, spider. Thanks for thinking of me …

Then, Dolly called to tell me they had some news on the case and they needed me to come into the police station immediately. I didn’t argue. It wasn’t as though I’d gotten deeply into anything productive.

_____

At the station, Lo had gone out for a pizza and drinks by the time I got there. Dolly sat at the front desk since her little room, which used to be a closet, wouldn’t hold all three of us.

“How are you feeling?” was the first thing I said since it seemed to be part of that big elephant hanging in the air between us.

“Fine.”

“So, you’re due in January.”

“Who you been talking to now?”

“Your grandmother. She told me you’d been to a doctor, which I thought was smart.”

“Thanks.” She looked up at me. I couldn’t see her stomach. Three months. She’d be showing soon.

“Are there maternity cop suits?”I asked.

Dolly frowned at me. “You mean uniforms?”

I nodded.

She shrugged. “I’ll get bigger shirts, work out something with the pants.”

“What about winter?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know, a coat. You’ll be huge.”

“I’ll get a bigger coat is all. Got solid boots.” She threw back her head, let out an exasperated breath of air, then slapped her hands on the desk. “You know how many years women been having babies, Emily? Every one of them got through it somehow. I’ll bet they all didn’t have new coats either. I’ll bet they got on just fine with whatever they had …”

“Yeah, and laid down behind the plow and delivered the baby right there in the field.” I leaned toward her. “I’m here, Dolly. When the time comes … anything.”

Lo was back with the food. We ate, cleared the mess away, and got down to business.

“Dolly tell you the migrants have all left Crispin’s farm?” Lo asked.

I shook my head.

Dolly muttered, “Didn’t get around to it.”

“Crispin called Dolly so we don’t think they’ve just gone off to another farm. He said they’d cleared out completely. The farmers are getting worried that the rest will leave, once word gets around. He thought there might have been another threat. Something happened. Not a sign of any of them and even the worker he thought was a friend didn’t come to say anything.”

“So,” Dolly said. “All we’ve got is this name, ‘Toomey,’ and that might not even be right.”

“I remembered something.” I got a couple of encouraging nods. “It’s probably nothing but I’m working for a Cecil Hawke, editing a book he’s writing.” I explained what I was doing so Lo was up to speed. “Well, I thought I heard the name ‘Toomey’ when Jackson and I were leaving there, about a week ago.”

They looked at each other and then back to me.

“What I mean is, I saw this guy at their front door. Hawke’s wife said something to him about not coming in that way. Looked like a workman. I thought that was the reason she was so unfriendly. You know, mud on his boots. She said what I took to be ‘Listen to me’ or something like that. Can’t quite remember. But I was thinking about it and I wondered later if she was saying the man’s name instead: Toomey.”

Dolly looked skeptical. Lo nodded.

“It was just that …” I didn’t know how to describe an uneasy feeling.

“Not much to go on,” Lo said.

“Yeah. Just a feeling. But the guy that owns the place is odd anyway. Nothing ordinary about him and then he’s got this big Australian-type sheep ranch he doesn’t really run and claims to know little about. Not even the names of the men who work for him. It just seemed …”

Agent Lo looked from Dolly to me. “We’ve got some information on that boot print at the crime scene. You might not be far off.” He hesitated, deferring to Dolly.

“Don’t put this in the paper, Emily. Could blow the whole thing,” she warned.

I waited. Dolly was going for effect.

“Boot sole had imbedded matter.”

“And?”

“Sheep dung.”

That took my breath away. Cecil’s wasn’t the only sheep farm in the north country. Lots of mixed herds—cattle, sheep, goats, even a llama and a couple alpaca farms, but so far Hawke’s was the only one with a guy named Toomey connected to it.

Dolly looked hard at Lo and then at me. “Maybe I should pay a call over there to talk to your friend. Couldn’t hurt. We been seein’ a lot of farmers anyway. Think he’d let me take a look at his place?”

All I could do was shrug. Who knew what Cecil, or even Lila, would allow?

“And I’ll start looking into this Hawke,” Lo said. ‘Where he came from. Who he is.”

“A writer,” I said. “Rich. That’s all I know.”

“I’ll check him out. Ask about his operation. Got to have men working for him, as you say.”

“You know what?” I turned to look straight at Dolly. “If you want to go over there, take a look around without Cecil knowing, I’ve got a way to get you in.”

“Sure.”

“They’re having a big costume party Saturday. Lila told me to bring anybody I wanted to bring.” I had to smile. “You want to go to a party?”

She shrugged. “If it’ll get me inside. I mean, without giving away why I’m there.”

“Be a lot of people. Maybe that dark guy will show up. Or maybe you can get a look around outside. See what you think.”

She frowned, making her nose twitch to one side as her lazy eye drifted off. “Costume? You mean like Halloween? I gotta wear one of those?”

“The party’s based around one of Noel Coward’s plays. Hawke’s a Noel Coward expert. You’ve heard of Noel Coward?”

She shook her head, unhappy.

“Doesn’t matter. Just remember the guy’s got a big ego and he’s a snob. When you meet him go along with everything he says. You don’t have to know about Noel Coward, just pretend you do.”

“Sounds like a prick, to me.” She wasn’t getting any happier, or any nicer.

‘It’s a Blithe Spirit party. The play’s from the late thirties or early forties. I’m not sure, exactly. But I know there’s a séance in it. A dead wife returns. Should be a fun party and you’ll meet both the Hawkes without putting them on the defensive. If you get a chance, look around outside. If I see that guy I thought Lila called Toomey, I’ll let you know.”

She was still worried. “Costume, eh. You mean like going to K-Mart and …”

“I don’t think so.”

“Then what kind of costume?”

“You come as your favorite character from literature. Or your favorite writer.”

Lo gave a whistle and then choked. His eyes got big but he didn’t laugh. He knew Dolly already and waited to see what happened next.

“Sounds nuts, if you ask me,” she said. “But I guess … if I gotta go undercover.”

First she considered the idea. Then came a shake of her head. Then an ‘Ah-ha’ moment.

I nodded. “Some literary character. You know any?”

She ignored me. “Got one. All I need is an old raincoat. Maybe Eugenia’s got one. Or my grandmother. Cate loves dressing up …”

“Who are you going to be?”

“Columbo. You know, the guy from that TV show. I watch reruns with my grandmother. I’ll be him. Can wear the raincoat right over my uniform and …”

I threw up my hands and looked to Agent Lo for help but he wasn’t talking. I gave Dolly a hard look. “What part of ‘undercover’ don’t you get?”

She thought a while. “Guess not,” she said. “I won’t go as a cop. So, okay, you help me. But no damned Snow White or Rapunzel. Nothing like that.”

I thought awhile, looked hard at her, and came up with the perfect costume.