"What do you mean?"
"The husband kept everything. The house, the agency, the bank accounts. That's why she was so hard up. The family money is gone, if there ever was much. I don't think there ever was a whole lot of money, just illustrious ancestors."
"You'll have to tell Mel that."
"I already did. He was at the cocktail party. Put a bit of a damper on things, in fact."
"I take it that you wouldn't be here if the party had been fun."
"Oh, it wasn't so bad. I was just sick of smiling and nodding. And I haven't had a real chance to talk to you for days."
"Has Constanza broken into your safe yet?"
Shelley giggled wickedly. "She made a big deal
of telling me how she'd spilled something and was looking for a tablecloth and just happened to notice that we'd gotten a safe. I tried to make her explain why she was looking for a tablecloth in an upstairs closet when there's a whole stack of them in the laundry room. That made her squirm. That safe has already paid for itself in satisfaction."
"Did she try to get the combination?"
"Repeatedly. She called Paul in Singapore with a cock-and-bull story about having brought along a valuable bracelet and she'd feel so much better if she could put it away safely."
"And?"
"Paul told her he doesn't know the combination. Which is true. I told her I'd lost the combination, which isn't true, but said I'd take her straight down to the bank and she could put her terribly valuable bracelet in our safe deposit box. Then she decided the bracelet wasn't so valuable after all and she'd just keep on wearing it. Anyway — the party wasn't so bad. Trey Moffat looks like the Pillsbury Doughboy. Has a cute little wife and roly-poly baby along."
Jane had no interest in the class president. "Did you pick up any other gossip?"
"Not much. The guy Pooky was bringing the pen set to is a nerdy, single plastic surgeon. They seemed to be hitting it off awfully well. Maybe there's a romance in the air."
"I hope so. I've gotten to really like Pooky. I know she's got the IQ of a kitchen appliance, but she's a good-hearted person."
"Is she? I didn't really get a chance to talk to her much. And when she did talk at the fund-raising meeting, I wanted to smack her. Her suggestions were so dumb. Good-hearted, as you say, but criminally
stupid. A telethon fashion show, for God's sake!"
"I never asked--does she have children?"
Shelley thought a moment. "I think there was a child in one marriage. But it didn't belong to either of them. Avalon was talking about it in the car. The husband had married before, this was his stepchild and the wife died, then he married Pooky. They later divorced and the child went with him. Apparently it's a source of great grief to Pooky."
"Poor Pooky. Was everybody impressed with Crispy
at the party?"
"Stunned senseless."
There was the sound of a key in the kitchen door,
then Katie calling good-night before stomping into the
living room. "Mom! — Oh, hi, Mrs. Nowack."
"Katie, did you have fun?" Shelley asked.
"Fun? Fun! What a couple of dweebs!"
Neither Jane nor Shelley, to their credit, cracked
a smile.
"It was a horrible, dumb movie. All these stupid car crashes. And Johnny didn't even offer to share his popcorn with me. What mega-losers! And we went out for ice cream after and all they talked about was cars, cars, cars. Even Jenny's dad! Bo-o-o-ring! I've got to go call Jenny."
"You've just been with Jenny for three hours."
"But we couldn't really talk. 'Night, Mom."
Of unspoken accord, Jane and Shelley hadn't got-
ten into really serious discussion, knowing they were
going to be interrupted shortly. When Katie had gone
upstairs, Shelley leaned forward and said quietly, "So
what has Mel told you?"
"Practically nothing. He's furious with me. About
the notebook."
"What notebook?"
"What notebook! We have fallen behind if you don't know about the dreaded notebook." Jane explained to Shelley about Crispy's getting her hands on Lila's notebook, then subsequently having it stolen. "But you know how hectic things have been. I kept meaning to tell him, but other things happened. It wouldn't have mattered if I'd told him earlier anyway, because it disappeared within an hour of Crispy's finding it anyway."
"Do you think she's telling the truth? About it not having anything interesting in it? And about it being stolen?"
— "About what was in it, yes, I think so. But about it being stolen, no. But I haven't any reason whatsoever for doubting her. It's just my instinct. I think she'd have held onto it and tried to read something into the notations."
"That would be my guess, too. That, or—"
"Or what?"
Shelley stood up and paced for a minute, curling her toes into the carpet as she walked. Willard heaved himself to his feet and walked ^alongside her, looking up expectantly. Shelley.petted his head absently. "Look, Lila was trying to put the squeeze on people. Blackmail them out of money. Right?"
"It looks like it from what Kathy said."
"So whatever she knew about them might have been written in the notebook."