Grave Sight Page 0,17

said, "I'll wait in the car."

I'd assumed the lawyer would have left the check in an envelope at the reception desk, but Edwards himself came out when I told his secretary my name. He shook my hand while the parched and dyed blonde watched his every move with fascination. I could see why. Paul Edwards was a man with charm.

He ushered me back into his office.

"What can I do for you?" I asked reluctantly. I was ready to go. I sat in the leather visitor's chair, while he leaned against the edge of his huge desk.

"You're a remarkable woman," he said, shaking his head at the phenomenon of my remarkableness. I didn't know whether to laugh sardonically or blush. In the end, I raised an eyebrow, remained silent, and waited for his next move.

"In one day, you've made a tremendous difference in the lives of two of my clients."

"How would that be?"

"Helen Hopkins is grateful that her Teenie's body has been found. Now she can have closure. And Sybil Teague is so relieved that poor Dell won't be the victim of these foolish and false accusations people have been making since Teenie's disappearance."

I digested this silently, wondering what he really wanted to say to me.

"If you're going to be in Sarne for a while, I was hoping for the chance to take you out to dinner and find out more about you," Paul Edwards said. I looked at his good suit and white shirt, his gleaming shoes. His hair was groomed and well-cut, his shave had been close, and his brown eyes were glowing with sincerity.

"As a matter of fact," I said slowly, "my brother and I are leaving Sarne in an hour or so. We're just dropping by Helen Hopkins' place first, at her request. Then we're outta here."

"Oh, that's too bad," he said. "I've missed my opportunity. Maybe someday if you have business close to here, you'll give me a call?" He tucked a business card into my hand.

"Thanks," I said noncommittally, and after some more hand clasping and eye-to-eye contact, I got out the front door with the check in my hand.

I tried to tell Tolliver about the odd interview I'd just had, but I guess he was miffed at the long wait he'd had outside the lawyer's office. In fact, Tolliver was mighty quiet while he searched for the Hopkins house, which turned out to be a humble box-like building on a humble street.

Hollis Boxleitner had said some pretty bad things about his wife's mother's past, and I had formed a negative picture of Helen Hopkins. When she answered the door I was surprised to see a tidy, thin woman with wispy brown hair and popping blue eyes. She had once been pretty, in a waif-like way. Now she seemed more like a dried shell. She was wearing a flowered T-shirt and khakis, and her face was about as wide as my thin hand.

"I'm Harper Connelly," I said. "This here's my brother, Tolliver Lang."

"Helen Hopkins. God bless you for coming to meet me," she said rapidly. "Please come in and sit down." She gestured around the tiny living room. It was jammed with furniture and so cluttered that it took me a moment to realize the room was nonetheless extremely clean. There was a shelf mounted on the wall, full of a display of Avon carnival glass. A huge Bible was centered on the cheap coffee table. Flanking it were two starched crocheted doilies, and in the exact center of each one was a glass candlestick holding a white candle.

I knew a shrine when I saw one.

And the pictures; two brunette girls were duplicated over and over around the room. There was an age progression beginning on the north wall. Sally and Teenie were born, went to grade school, trick-or-treated, danced, graduated from grade school and junior high, went to proms, and in Sally's case, got married. This room was a panorama of the lives of two girls, both of them murdered. The last picture in the progression was a bleak shot of a white casket covered with a pall of carnations resting on a bier at the front of a church. This final picture, surely taken at Sally's funeral, had a bare spot next to it; this would be where the picture of Teenie's casket would hang. I swallowed hard.

"I been sober now for thirty-two months," Helen Hopkins said, gesturing to us to take the two armchairs squeezed together opposite the sofa, where she perched