“Then can you read the anonymous caller’s mind? Did he say how he knew where the gun was?”
“No.”
“Or why he called now?”
“No.”
“But he knew which piece of furniture it was hidden in?”
“He said the leg on the large table.”
“Does it bother you at all that you found the gun this way?”
To Manning’s credit, he doesn’t duck the question. “It would not be my first choice.”
I nod. “Thank you for that. Would you say that the anonymous caller, whoever he might be, wants Steven Timmerman to be found guilty in this trial?”
“It would seem so,” Manning says.
“That’s quite a coincidence, don’t you think?”
“What do you mean?”
“The person who wants Steven to spend the rest of his life in jail just happens to be the person whom Steven told exactly where he hid the gun.”
I check my cell phone messages when court adjourns, and there is one from Sam telling me that he has found the DNA expert to end all DNA experts. He’s a college professor, specializing in genetics. He teaches classes all day and does research at night, so he’s going to bring him to the house early Monday morning before court, and I should call him if that doesn’t work. It works fine, so I don’t bother calling.
When I get home, Laurie is on the phone talking and laughing with a friend from back in Findlay. That is happening with increasing frequency, and I can’t say I’m thrilled with it. Pretty soon she’s going to want to talk and laugh with those creeps face-to-face, which means she will leave here. That is a day I’m not looking forward to.
We decide to have pizza tonight, and because the smell of pizza always brings Marcus out into the light, I order five large pies. More accurately, I let Laurie do the ordering, since on her pie she always wants a long list of toppings, all of which are healthy. On the other side of the scale, Kevin can have no toppings at all, because every one ever invented sets off his allergies.
I overhear Laurie doing the ordering, and to my horror I actually hear her get artichoke on her pizza. I believe in live and let live, but there should absolutely be a law against artichoke pizza.
Kevin arrives at the same time as the pizza delivery man, and Marcus shows up thirty seconds later. We decide to postpone our trial-day rehash until after dinner, and we dig right in on the pizza.
Marcus eating pizza is a sight to behold. He takes three slices at a time and lays one on top of the other, face-to-face, with the third one in the middle. Then he eats it as a pizza sandwich, in maybe three bites.
Laurie, Kevin, and I don’t eat the crusts; instead we feed them to Tara and Waggy. But of course we wouldn’t dare suggest that to Marcus. At least I wouldn’t.
After Marcus has had four such sandwiches, he stands up, a strange look on his face, and walks toward the back of the house. He doesn’t say a word, which is not exactly a news event where Marcus is concerned.
“Where’s he going?” asks Kevin.
“Maybe he’s going hunting for more pizzas,” I say. “They’re in season.”
The three of us continue eating the cheese portion of the pizza and feeding the crusts to Tara and Waggy. Waggy tries to butt in and get every piece, which clearly annoys Tara, but she’s too lady-like to do anything about it. She leaves it to us to make sure she gets her fair share.
Marcus comes back holding what appears to be a hamburger in his hand. “Where’d you get that?” Laurie asks.
“I don’t think hamburger hunting season starts until September,” I say to Marcus. “I hope the game warden didn’t see you.”
Marcus puts the hamburger at the edge of the table. “Yard,” he says, which I assume means he found it in the yard. It takes a moment for the significance of this to hit me, and during that same moment Waggy moves toward the burger.
“NNNNNNOOOOO!” I scream, as loud as I can, and I make a dive toward Waggy and the table. Waggy, forced to decide whether to keep moving toward the hamburger, or to get out of the way of this screaming, middle-aged lunatic, makes the wise choice. He backs away, huddled down toward the floor, fearful.
I grab the hamburger and, without thinking, run into the kitchen and throw it into the sink. By this time, everyone