Carolyn G. Hart_Henrie O_02 by Scandal in Fair Haven

color.
    Beige cotton.
    It didn’t take long for me to satisfy myself. There wasn’t a single piece of beige cotton of any sort in the playhouse.
    Okay. Craig was standing there in a desperate panic, listening to the sirens come closer and closer. I’d think he’d run to his car, gun in hand, frantic to escape.
    Why would he even start to think about wrapping the gun in anything at that moment?
    I didn’t think he would.
    So how to account for the snag of material on the weapon? And it definitely was wrapped in something when the two boys spotted Craig getting out of his car on the country road.
    Maybe the answer was super simple. Maybe there was something in Craig’s car that he wrapped the gun in.
    No. If it were that easy, he’d have had no reason to get rid of the material. And the police hadn’t found it in the car or in the area with the gun though there were matching fibers beneath the driver’s seat.
    So Craig had hidden it somewhere between that country road and his arrival at the cabin.
    There had to be a reason.
    I recalled our talk at the jail.
    Craig refused to answer when I asked why he’d gotten rid of the gun and what he’d wrapped it in.
    And when I asked who might have reason to kill Patty Kay, I’d swear there’d been a flash of uncertainty—and fear —in his eyes before he cried out that it was “… crazy. Nobody’d want to kill her.”
    But what if there were someone he feared might have done it—because of something he found in the playhouseby his wife’s body? Something made of beige cotton, something he recognized.
    That made sense. Craig would scoop up that article along with the gun and there would be a reason to run, the frantic, terrible necessity to get the damning cloth out of there, away from the police.
    I left the playhouse. Back in the main hallway, I found the telephone directory. Again I dialed the police station.
    I had to wait only a moment.
    “Walsh here.”
    “Captain Walsh, this is Mrs. Collins.”
    “Yes, ma’am.” If they gave awards for lack of inflection, he’d be a cinch to win. “Glad you called. I talked to Mr. Matthews. According to him, the house was locked tighter than a drum when he left it Sunday.” Uninflected, yes, but puffed with smugness.
    I love to deflate smugness. “A teenage neighbor, Dan Forrest, found that back door unlocked earlier this afternoon. I’m sure you’ll want to talk to him. The boy may have heard the intruder.”
    Walsh agreed. Grudgingly.
    “Captain, you said there were fibers in Craig’s Porsche of the beige material snagged on the murder weapon.”
    “That’s correct.”
    “If I were you, Captain, I’d request the help of the highway patrol and the county officers in a search of roadside trash cans between Snell and Monteagle. Obviously, they should look for something made of beige cotton. It will be bloodstained.”

8

    The phone rang as I rinsed out the mop one last time.
    The kitchen sparkled. My back ached. And I was ravenous. I’d already checked out the refrigerator and freezer. There was plenty of food. Patty Kay not only enjoyed cooking, she was an orderly and saving homemaker. I’d picked out my supper, a frozen package of homemade beef Stroganoff, neatly labeled in her looping crimson script and ready for the microwave.
    I didn’t reach for the receiver with any great expectations, but I’ve learned that you can’t predict who may call or where the call may lead. In my years of reporting, I’d circled the world twice, visiting every continent, and many of those journeys grew out of a telephone summons. Right now I was standing in the kitchen of a murdered woman.
    So I got it on the second peal.
    I didn’t even have time to say hello.
    “Craig, Craig?” The now-familiar young voice trembled with eagerness. It was astonishing how much emotion she’dpacked into saying his name. I was glad Captain Walsh wasn’t on the line to hear it.
    “No. This is Henrietta Collins.”
    “Who are
you?”
It