By the time Kathy showed up at the restaurant, Butts and Lee were well into their second round, hunched over the table deep in conversation, their heads almost touching. When he saw her, Lee leapt up from his chair and rushed over to her, his handsome face flushed with happiness. How different he was from the thin, pale, and worried-looking man Kathy had met five months ago. Though he still suffered from occasional bouts of depression, he was much more relaxed than he had been when they met. Of course, he told her it was because of her presence in his life, and as much as Kathy wanted to believe this, she suspected there were other factors as well.
"Hi! We were beginning to worry about you," he said, kissing her on the lips and putting his arm around her shoulders. She was much shorter than he was, so he had to bend down a little. Kathy was self-conscious about her height, but Lee Campbell made her feel good about the way she looked-one of the many reasons she loved him. She was dark-haired and small, and he claimed to prefer compact brunettes over the American stereotype of beauty-tall, leggy blondes. She didn't even need to believe him to feel grateful-it was enough that he said it. She was a successful scientist, brilliant and respected in her field, and a member of an old aristocratic Philadelphian family, but she was still a woman, with all the insecurities about her appearance of most American women, bombarded daily by impossible images of airbrushed physical perfection.
"What took you so long?" asked Detective Butts.
"Oh, you know, the whole rush-hour train thing," she said, slipping into the booth across from the homely detective. Kathy liked the plainspoken Butts-his lack of pretension was refreshing. Her father moved in elite circles in Philadelphia, and sometimes Kathy found his friends irritating, with their expensive wines and trendy restaurants-or at least as trendy as Philadelphia could claim to have. She enjoyed mentioning her frequent trips to New York, knowing that inside most Philadelphians is an envious would-be New Yorker.
Impulsively, she gave Butts a kiss on his pockmarked cheek, and his already florid face turned a deep cherry red.
"Let's get you a beer," he said, looking around for the waiter, though she suspected it was so she wouldn't notice his embarrassment. "You got a lot of catchin' up to do."
"What's everyone drinking?" she asked.
"There's a special on this Belgian brew," he said, signaling to the waiter for another round. "It's really not bad."
"Sounds good," Kathy said, looking around the room, which was beginning to fill up. Friday night was prime time for the East Village, but it didn't begin to really heat up until around ten. She and Lee always tried to be indoors by then, away from the roaming mobs of drunken bridge-and-tunnel teens.
"So," she said, turning to Lee, "what did I miss?" There was an awkward pause as Lee looked to Butts, who said, "Nothin' much-we just been talkin' shop."
"I see," said Kathy. "I'm not allowed in on it." "Well," Butts said, beginning to sweat, "see, technically speaking-"
"Technically speaking," Lee interrupted, "I'm not even officially in on it."
"Yeah," Butts said apologetically. "See, it's my case, but I probably shouldn't be talkin' about it."
"But if you're talking to him about it, why can't you talk to me?" she said.
Butts picked at the bumpy skin on his chin. "Yeah, well, I probably shouldn't' a even said anything."
"Well, you already have, so are you going to let me in, or am I just going to sit here all evening in suspense?"
Butts frowned and chewed on his lower lip. "Okay, okay-seein' as how you're a professional, too, I guess it couldn't hurt. But you can't tell anyone I told you," he added quickly, "or my ass is grass, you know?'
"Understood," Kathy replied. "Maybe I can be of some help."
"I dunno," Butts said. "It's not the science that's wacky on this one, it's the psychology."
"Ah," said Kathy. "So that's why you confided in Doc Campbell here."
Lee rolled his eyes. He was a PhD, not an MD, but Butts had insisted on calling him "Doc" ever since they first met. He wasn't sure whether Kathy was making fun of him or Butts-or both of them.
"We're not even sure there's a connection yet," Butts said, lowering his voice as the sleek young, white-aproned waiter delivered their drinks. "But there's a coupla pretty weird deaths within a week, both staged to look like suicides-but badly staged, y'know, suggesting they weren't no suicides."
"That's why you think they're linked?"
"Yeah, maybe-or maybe not. The two vics are real different, and as far as we can make out, there's no other connection between them. Didn't know each other-weren't even the same age or profession."
"What about race?" Lee asked. "You said they were both white."
"Yeah, sure, but that's not much to go on. We're still lookin' into their backgrounds, but so far we got bubkes."
"So what are the details?" Kathy said, gulping down a swallow of beer. It was delicious-cold, a little sweet but with a nice bitter edge.
Butts told her the puzzling particulars. Two men, both dead, one electrocuted and the other drowned-both clumsily staged suicides, "phony as a tuxedo on a rooster," as he put it. Kathy had no idea where he got his sayings-he had a gift for odd metaphors.
"Chuck Morton hasn't called you yet?" she asked Lee.
"Nope," he replied.
"That's odd," she said. "It's right up your alley."
"That's what I'm sayin'," Butts agreed. "Hey, I'm starvin'-you wanna order?"
They did. Butts ordered a steak, and Kathy got the same thing she always did-the Moroccan chicken. It was terrific as ever-tangy, spicy, and a little sweet, but the real winner was the spinach fettuccine in lemon caper sauce that Lee ordered. After trying one bite Kathy kept looking at it so longingly that Lee finally threw his hands up and pushed the plate toward her.
"Go ahead-have the rest. I can tell you want it." He turned to Butts and laughed. "She always does this. No matter what she orders, she always wants what I have."
"I do not!" Kathy protested, but she gobbled up the rest of the fettuccine greedily.
"Hmm," Butts remarked, chewing on his steak. "I guess you suffer from pasta envy."
"Touche," Lee said, poking Kathy in the ribs.
Butts smiled broadly, obviously pleased with himself. Kathy pretended to be irritated with both of them, but in truth she was feeling good-a little tipsy, full of excellent food, sitting in this charming restaurant with a man she loved. Happiness filled her like helium; she was buoyant as rising dough. She wished she could always feel the way she felt right now. Later, she would think back to that evening and wish she could have stopped the hands of the clock right then and there.