Warren gave Nick a sickly smile. "Yes. I am guilty of discouraging her from attending these functions. But as I said, all Lorraine and I intended to do was have a drink. We just didn't want to be seen and start the gossip mill again. I was on my way to the bar to meet her when I remembered my ten o'clock call to Tamara, so I called from the car. Our answering machine here at the house recorded the call at 9:57. I returned to the hotel around eleven."
Nick wrote in his notebook mostly to make Warren nervous. "I understand why you didn't want to volunteer that information, but I'll have to ask for more. I need Dr. Glover's address and phone number."
"I can't give you that. It would be a violation of privacy."
Nick looked up. "Dr. Hunt, you still don't seem to comprehend the importance of establishing your whereabouts at the time of your wife's death. Now I understand you wanting to protect this woman's privacy, but given the circumstances, if you refuse to tell me how to contact her so I can verify your story, I'm going to assume you're lying."
"I am not lying."
"Then prove it."
Warren glared at him. A muscle in his jaw flexed. Finally he said, "Okay. But you cannot call her at home. Call her office. I don't know the number, but it's on High Street in Columbus."
Nick jotted down the information then snapped shut his notebook. "Sorry that had to be so difficult."
"So am I," Warren said stiffly. "Is that all?"
"For now." Nick stood. "I know you'll be around if I have any more questions. Hysell, let's be on our way. Dr. Hunt looks tired."
"Sure, Sheriff."
They paused at the door. "Once again, Dr. Hunt," Meredith said, "I'm sorry I had to put you through this. Such an awful thing, particularly with Tamara being pregnant."
Warren Hunt's face went slack. "Pregnant?" he repeated vacantly.
"Why, yes. Eight weeks. Didn't you know?"
Warren opened and shut his mouth twice. On the third try something emerged. "We hoped." Flat. "After all these years."
Hysell took Warren 's hand and shook it vigorously. "A tragedy, Warren. No Tamara, no pitter-patter of little feet."
Color drained from Warren Hunt's face and his eyes seemed to lose their focus for a moment. Nick thought he was going to pass out. Then he stiffened, muttered a curt good-bye, and slammed the door behind them.
"Well, at least we know he didn't know anything about a baby," Hysell said as they walked away from the house. "He didn't strike me as a guy who wanted a baby, either."
After they got in the patrol car and crept away from the curb, Nick opened his mouth to blast Hysell for interrupting his interrogation with that nonsense about the ship model, but Hysell began before Nick could get out a word. "That phone call he made to the house doesn't prove anything-"
"Except that he called his home from his car at 9:57. But, Hysell-"
"Oh, and did you hear him? 'It's the only time I've ever been unfaithful to my wife.' " Hysell imitated Warren 's perfect enunciation. "Bullshit!"
Nick glanced at him. "You know something I don't?"
"I've been hearing rumors about our Dr. Hunt's sex life for years. They're part of the reason Oliver Peyton can't stand him."
"Are they just rumors?"
"No. I've had my own suspicions and they just got verified."
"Now we know he'd had an affair with Lorraine Glover. I'll have to check her out. But, Hysell, I want to talk to you about-"
"Not just that Glover woman! Someone right here in Port Ariel." Nick raised an eyebrow. "You ever heard of Charlotte Bishop? Max Bishop's daughter? Max owns Bishop Corporation. They make parts for boats. He's had a couple of bad strokes, but he still controls the business."
"I know who Max Bishop is, Hysell. Everyone in town knows who Max Bishop is. And Charlotte was married to that actor-"
"Paul Fiori. He plays Eddie Salvatore on Street Life."
Eddie Salvatore. Wasn't that Jimmy Jenkins's hero? He'd have to ask Paige. "What about Charlotte?"
"Fiori dumped Charlotte when he made it big, so she came slinking home a few months ago," Hysell went on confidentially. "Well, one day I saw her coming out of Hunt's office!"
Hysell fell silent after dropping that bombshell. Nick glanced at him. "That's it?"
Hysell looked insulted. "No. About a week later I was at The Hearth with Dee having dinner. Dee Fisher, that's who I've been going out with the last few months. She's a nurse. Got fired from the hospital, but it was all a mistake. She's a lot of fun. We like The Hearth-"
"Hysell!'
"Okay. I went to the rest room. You know the restrooms at The Hearth are back through this long hall. So I'm going back and I see Charlotte and Hunt talking. I wouldn't have thought too much about it, but Hunt lowered his head and took off fast and Charlotte nearly pounced on me. Acted like she was thrilled to see me."
"You know her?"
"Sure. Didn't I say so? Well, actually I was a friend of her brother Bill. Maxwell William Bishop II. Not junior, the second. He was okay, though. I met him in Boy Scouts. He was nothing like Charlotte. She was gorgeous and she knew it. She never forgot she was Max Bishop's daughter, either.
Uppity as all get out. Anyway, her brother Bill got killed in a car wreck a few years ago. A damned shame."
Nick waited. Finally he asked, "What does any of this have to do with Charlotte and Hunt?"
"Yeah, well, when I was a kid, I spent some time at the Bishop house. Charlotte wouldn't wipe her feet on me then. Acted like I was invisible or something. But that night at The Hearth we were just long-lost pals. And she kept going on about how she'd just run into Dr. Hunt. On and on. What do they call that? Protesting too much? That's when I got suspicious. Today the ship model clenched it."
"The ship model?" Nick asked, bewildered.
"The one on Hunt's mantel. That's why I called attention to it. I know you got pissed, me interrupting that way and all, but when I realized what it was, I got all excited and I wanted to hear what Hunt had to say about it when he got taken by surprise. You told me to spring something on him and I did."
"He said the model was something Tamara picked up a long time ago."
"Yeah, sure it was. Listen, that was a model of the Mercy. That's the ship that wrecked off the coast here. Ariel Saunders was this.beautiful young gal who saw the shipwreck and saved the captain, Zebediah Winthrop-"
"I've heard the story about a hundred times since I'we been here."
"Okay. Well, Bill Bishop built a model of the Mercy. That model."
"The one on the mantel?"
"Yeah."
"Hysell, there must be dozens of models of the Mercy around here."
"Sheriff, I helped Bill build that model. We spent weeks on it. Besides, our initials were on it-M. W. B. and `I. Z. H. Charlotte must have given the model to Hunt."
"Are you sure she didn't give it to Mrs. Hunt?"
" Charlotte wouldn't give anything to any woman, much less her dead brother's model ship. I bet if old Max knew it was gone, he'd have one final stroke. He worshipped Bill, and Charlotte was jealous as hell. That's probably why she gave the model away. She could strike back at Daddy and at the same time give Hunt something she thought would mean something to him, something he thought meant something to her."
Nick's opinion of Hysell's powers of observation, deduction, and psychoanalysis were escalating by the minute. Maybe he had a more valuable deputy here than he'd thought. "Wouldn't Mrs. Hunt notice the initials?"
"They were tiny and sort- of hidden. A little faded after all this time. You'd have to really be looking for them. Besides, I can't believe she'd put it all together. Bill has been dead for years, and I'm sure Tamara didn't know my middle name. She wouldn't know who `I. Z. H. was."
"Hysell?"
"Yes, Sheriff?"
"What does the Z stand for?"
Hysell hesitated. He hated answering this one. "Zebediah." He grinned and added sheepishly, "I think everyone in this town is crazy for that Ariel and Zebediah story."