“Coz…” Judith’s voice was pleading. “Will you shut
SNOW PLACE TO DIE / 99
up, put your cigarette out, and turn off the damned light?”
“Okay, okay,” Renie sighed. “It’s not like you to avoid a
guessing game involving murder.”
“It is at one o’clock in the morning when I’m exhausted.
Good night.”
Renie not only put her cigarette out, she threw it into the
grate, checked the lingerie hanging from the fireplace tools,
took one last look at the falling snow, and clicked off the
bedside lamp.
“Good night,” she said to Judith.
Judith was already asleep.
Seven A.M. came far too early. Neither Judith nor Renie
felt fully rested. Indeed, the vigor Renie had shown the previous night had degenerated into grouchiness.
“Don’t talk to me, and you’ll be okay,” she snarled when
Judith came out of the bathroom.
Judith opened her mouth to express agreement, saw the
black look on Renie’s face, and clamped her lips shut. The
cousins dressed in silence, though Judith had to fight down
an urge to complain when Renie lighted her first cigarette of
the day.
The sun was almost up, but it was hidden behind heavy
gray clouds. The snow was still falling, though not as heavily,
and the wind had died down. That was not necessarily good
news as far as Judith was concerned. If the wind changed,
perhaps coming in from the west, the snow clouds might
blow away.
It was Renie who finally spoke, just as they were about to
go downstairs. “Don’t forget to give Frank or Nadia those
items that belong to Barry,” she said.
“Right.” Judith opened her big shoulder bag while Renie
unlocked the door and stepped into the corridor.
“Well?” said Renie, fists on hips. “Let’s hit it.”
Judith turned a hapless face to her cousin. “They’re gone.”
“What’s gone?” Renie had virtually shouted. She gave
100 / Mary Daheim
a quick look down the hall, then lowered her voice. “What
are you talking about? Barry’s ID?”
“All of it,” Judith whispered. “Credit cards, notebook, the
whole bit.”
“Jeez.” Renie reeled around the corridor, then shoved Judith
back up against the door. “Did you lock up when we left last
night to go downstairs?” she asked under her breath.
“No. Did you?”
“No.” Renie grimaced. “I didn’t think about it.”
“Who knew I had the stuff in my purse?”
Renie appeared to concentrate. “Everybody. You mentioned it in the lobby while Gene Jarman was questioning
you.”
“So I did.” Judith slumped against the door. “What’s the
point?”
Renie grabbed her by the arm. “Who knows? But we can’t
stand out in the hall and talk about it. Let’s go.”
The kitchen looked exactly as they had left it the previous
night. Judith had planned a simple self-serve breakfast of
cereal, toast, fruit, juice, and coffee. But there were eggs in
the refrigerator and bacon in the freezer. She decided she
might as well improvise.
“It had to be the notebook,” Judith said, filling the big
coffee urn. “The rest was all the usual plastic.”
“But there was nothing in the notebook,” Renie noted,
apparently jolted out of her early morning mood by the theft.
“The pages had been ruined.”
“Whoever took it didn’t know that,” Judith said, measuring
coffee into the urn’s big metal basket. “I don’t think I mentioned how the damp had ruined the notebook.”
“You didn’t.” Renie put two pounds of bacon into the
microwave and hit the defroster button.
Judith carried the urn into the dining room. “Tell me
everything you know about these people,” she said when she
got back to the kitchen.
SNOW PLACE TO DIE / 101
“You didn’t want to hear it last night,” Renie said in a
contrary tone.
“That’s because my brain had died of exhaustion. Give,
coz.”
Renie removed the bacon from the microwave and began
laying strips in a big skillet. “I don’t know that much. You’ve
already heard about Frank Killegrew—he was a former Bell
System vice president who decided to start up his own
company. While he claims to be from Billings, Montana, he
was actually born and raised in some itty-bitty town about
thirty miles away. His background was hard-scrabble, a fact
he likes to hide. To his credit, Frank went to college, in Butte,
I think, then straight to the phone company after he graduated with an engineering degree. His rise wasn’t exactly
meteoric, but it was steady. He and his wife—I think her
name is Patrice—have two grown children. Patrice is a typical
corporate wife—pampered and spoiled. More so than most,
because I think her family had money. Frank golfs, skis, and
has a big cruiser. They live in one of those plush neighborhoods on the lake and have a summer home on another lake
in Montana.”
“Good work,” Judith said approvingly. “You seem to know
Mr. Killegrew quite well.”
“Not really.” Renie was opening cereal boxes. “I’ve designed some brochures that featured his bio. Some of the
other, more personal stuff I’ve picked up from the downtown
grapevine.”
“How about Ward Haugland?” Judith asked as she began
to cut up a big Crenshaw melon.
“A native Texan, another engineering degree, another guy
who rose through the Bell System ranks,” Renie said. “He
served as an assistant vice president under Frank, then left
with him to form the new company. He also golfs, skis, and
has a boat.”
“Is that required at the executive level?” Judith asked with
a little smile.
102 / Mary Daheim
“In a way,” Renie replied, quite serious. “It’s part of the
old boy network. If, for example, you play golf with the boss,
you’re more inclined to get the next promotion. If you golf,
ski, and have a boat, you’re a shoo-in. Or so the passed-over,
non-sports enthusiasts would have you believe.”
“Is Ward married?” Judith inquired, tackling a cantaloupe.
“Definitely, to a world-class hypochondriac. Helen Haugland has suffered more diseases than the AMA allows.”
“Is she also spoiled and pampered?”
“Not to mention coddled and overprotected. I’ve never
met her—she never goes anywhere except to the doctor—though come to think of it, I did meet Patrice Killegrew
once,” Renie said as she turned the heat on under the bacon.
“It was a couple of years ago, at some graphic design awards
banquet. She was a stuck-up pill.”
“Somebody said Leon had lived with his mother,” Judith
remarked. “What else?”
Renie shook her head. “Nothing. I think she died not long
ago. Leon kept himself to himself, as they say.”
“Except when he was keeping company with Andrea Piccoloni-Roth,” Judith pointed out.
“So it seems. The odd couple.” Renie paused, apparently
conjecturing about the unlikely pair. “Andrea and—what’s
his name? Alan Roth—have a couple of teenaged boys. Roth
stays home on the pretext of being a house-husband, as well
as the aforementioned computer genius. I saw his picture on
her desk once. He’s rather good looking, in a lean, pedantic
kind of way.”
“More of a hunk than Leon Mooney?” Judith started to
smile, glanced at the counter where she’d last seen Leon,