was me," she said simply. "After Felicia met you in Nashville, she talked about you at a party, and I was so interested. She really believed in your powers. So I read about you on-line, and I thought that finally someone would be able to give Clyde some of his own back. He's been teaching that course for two years now, and he just loved exposing all those people as frauds, or at least as less than reliable. It wasn't that Clyde disagreed with their beliefs, either; he just didn't want anyone to be able to do anything different. But you, I knew you were real. I read the articles and I saw some pictures. That day you found the child's body, he was just furious at you. The night he died, he went out once, and then he came back even angrier, and I gathered he'd seen you at your hotel?"
I nodded.
"So then he made a phone call or two on his cell phone, and off he went again," she said drearily. "I went to sleep in my room. And that time, he never came home."
"I'm sorry for your loss," I said after a moment, when I saw she'd said all she wanted to say. But I wasn't sure she wasn't better off without Clyde Nunley.
Anne remained seated while we showed ourselves out. She was looking down at her hands, and all her manic energy seemed to have faded away, leaving her melancholy. She shook her head when I offered to call a neighbor or friend for her. "I need to keep looking through Clyde's papers," she said. "And that Seth Koenig said he was coming over later. The federal agent."
We were both quiet for a few minutes after we got in our car.
"He was mean to her," Tolliver said. "Surely she'll be better off."
"Oh, yeah, Clyde was rat poop," I said. "But she's going to miss him, anyway."
I couldn't see any wonderful future for Anne Nunley, but I would have to put that in the file of issues I couldn't do anything about. As we drove, I mentally constructed a future for the widow in which, at Clyde's funeral, she met a wonderful and kind doctor who had a great weakness for thin, needy women who lived in big comfortable houses. He would help her struggle back to emotional health. They would never have parties.
I felt much better after that.
Chapter eighteen
WE'D learned a lot more about the professor during our strange talk with his widow, but I wasn't sure that what we'd learned would be of much help in narrowing the search for his murderer. Not that I cared a whole lot about who'd killed Nunley--but I did care who'd killed Tabitha.
There was a basketball game I wanted to watch in Texas. I wanted to be free to go to it. I wanted to look for a house in Texas, a house that wasn't too far from where my sisters lived. So I wanted to be free of this situation, both for the sake of the Morgensterns and for my own reasons.
Tolliver was outside tipping the valet as I walked through the Cleveland lobby. I was so lost in thought that I didn't even notice Fred Hart until he called my name.
"Miss Connelly! Miss Connelly!" His heavily southern voice pulled me back into the here and now, though I wasn't happy about it. Maybe the look I gave him wasn't very friendly, because he stopped in his tracks.
"Did you need to see me?" I asked, which was a stupid question, but I had to say something.
"Yes, I'm sorry to disturb you," he said. "Joel and Diane asked me to deliver something to you on behalf of the Find Tabitha Fund."
It took me a few seconds to understand what he was saying, and by that time Tolliver had caught up me and shaken Mr. Hart's hand. Standing in the middle of the lobby didn't seem to be a good place for such a conversation. I suggested Mr. Hart some up to our room with us. He wasn't very enthusiastic about accepting, but he trailed along after us into the elevator.
The close quarters made me aware that Mr. Hart had been lubricating himself with bourbon. I tried not to make a face as the all-too-familiar smell caught at my throat, and I saw Tolliver's face tighten. Tolliver's father had been very fond of bourbon. We both had a great distaste for bourbon.
"I understand that you two met my daughter