Bride & Groom

shrugged. We dropped the topic.
    We returned home from the hike to find that the Boston papers had compensated for the dullness of other people’s Labor Day weekends by playing up the similarities between the murders of Laura Skipcliff and Victoria Trotter. The papers couldn’t be expected to present as fresh and exciting the information that authorities were still investigating two homicides that might well turn out to be entirely unconnected. In contrast, warnings about a serial killer were newsworthy.
    It was true that both Laura Skipcliff and Victoria Trotter had been bludgeoned to death in Cambridge. Both murders had occurred in the evening, the first in the garage of the victim’s hotel, the second on the porch of the victim’s house. Both victims were, of course, women in their mid-fifties. The only truly new information in the Sunday papers was a weird feature of Victoria Trotter’s killing. In addition to showing a high blood-alcohol level, postmortem examination had revealed that immediately after death, she had been injected with a large dose of insulin.
    Steve and I ate pizza and watched the evening news in the living room. According to the television report, a search of Victoria’s house had uncovered neither insulin nor syringes nor glucose-monitoring supplies. Victoria had not been diabetic. Furthermore, neither of her dogs was diabetic. The segment closed with a few seconds of footage showing Victoria’s whippets with their breeder, who had reclaimed them. The dogs looked clean and happy. I’d have bet that the breeder was anything but happy about the condition they’d been in when the police had taken charge of them.
    After swallowing a bite of pizza, Steve the Rational said, “Insulin. That’s irrational. She was already dead.”
    “The murderer didn’t necessarily know that. Maybe he was making sure. Or maybe he intended to knock her out so he could inject her.”
    Steve shrugged. Although the television story had ended, Steve stayed with it. “Those warnings in the papers didn’t seem to get to you.”
    “I didn’t do more than skim them. They say the same things that Kevin is always preaching. But it did occur to me that we could use a few extra outside lights. Not that I believe that there’s necessarily a ‘Cambridge Killer.’ And Rita’s no more likely than I am to loll around on the front porch drinking gin. But she does sometimes drive home alone after dark, and she runs Willie out for a minute before she goes to bed. A few more outside lights might make her feel secure.”
    “She should call you from her car when she gets near home. And come through here with Willie and let him use the yard.”
    “Steve, this idea of a serial killer is almost certainly a media invention. Like the Boston Strangler. According to just about everything I’ve read, there was no Boston Strangler. Those were not serial murders. And that’s what Kevin says, too. But I’ll get more lights just as a general precaution. I’ll call an electrician.”
    “I’ll do it. We’ve got light fixtures at work,” Steve said. "They’ve been sitting on a shelf for years.”
    The next afternoon, Labor Day, he made a trip to the clinic and returned with six outdoor lights that he spent hours installing. Although I do a lot of home repair and maintenance, I won’t risk electrocution. I kept reminding Steve that the forecast was for rain and that I had no intention of watching him handle electrical wires in a downpour. Furthermore, I said, the Wayside Wildlife Refuge was open to visitors only until five o’clock. We absolutely had to find a place for our wedding, and if we didn’t hurry up, we’d have to rush through our visit to the refuge and would see the place only in dismal weather.
    Steve wouldn’t be hurried. Although the Wayside Wildlife Refuge was fairly nearby, in Lexington, it was four o’clock when we pulled into its deserted parking lot. By then, the promised rain was pelting down. The maples and oaks that lined the narrow, rutted access road and surrounded the parking lot had suffered in the August heat. In the rain, their leaves were simultaneously desiccated and drenched. Not a single light shone in the big, shabby brown-shingled building next to the flooded parking lot.
    “On a nice day—” Steve began. He didn’t bother to finish.
    “No wonder it’s available at this late date,” I said. “And no wonder it’s not an Audubon sanctuary. I’m surprised that Judith and