Four Blind Mice

talk about yourself easily, do you?” he asked.
    She laughed. “Oh, I do. When I get going, I do. Too much sometimes, believe me. But I was interested in what you had to say, how you would say it. Do you want me to tell you about my husband now? What happened to him? Why I’m sure he was innocent too?”
    “I want to hear everything about your husband,” Sampson said. “Please.”
    “I believe Laurence was murdered,” she began. “He was killed by the State of New Jersey. But somebody else wanted him dead. I want to know who murdered my husband, as much as you want to know who killed your friend Ellis Cooper.”

Chapter 51
    SAMPSON AND MRS. Billie Houston stopped and sat in the sand in front of a sprawling ocean house that must have had at least a dozen bedrooms. It was empty now, boarded up and shuttered, which seemed a monumental waste to Sampson. He knew people in D.C. who lived in abandoned tenements with no windows and no heat and no running water.
    He couldn’t peel his eyes away. The house was three stories high with wraparound decks on the upper two. A large sign posted on the dune near the house read THESE DUNES ARE PROTECTED. STAY ON WALKWAY. $300 FINE. These people were serious about their property or its beauty, or both, he thought to himself.
    Billie Houston stared out at the ocean as she began to speak.
    “Let me tell you about the night the murder happened,” she said. “I was a nurse at the Community Medical Center in Toms River. I got off my shift at eleven and arrived home at about half past. Laurence almost always waited up for me. Usually we’d catch up on each other’s day. Sit on the couch. Maybe watch a little TV together, mostly comedies. He was a big man like you, and always said he could carry me around in his pocket.”
    Sampson didn’t interrupt, just listened to her story take shape.
    “What I remember the most about that night was that it was so
ordinary,
Detective. Laurence was watching
The Steve Harvey Show
and I leaned in and gave him a kiss. He sat me on his lap and we talked for a while. Then I went in to change out of my work clothes.
    “When I came out from the bedroom, I poured myself a glass of Shiraz and asked him if he wanted me to make popcorn. He didn’t. He’d been watching his weight, which sometimes ballooned in the winter. He was in a playful mood, jokey, very relaxed. He wasn’t tense, wasn’t stressed in any way. I’ll never forget that.
    “The doorbell rang while I was pouring my glass of wine. I was up anyway, so I went to get it. The military police were there. They pushed past me into the house and arrested Laurence for committing a horrible murder that night, just a few hours earlier.
    “I remember looking at my husband, and him looking at me. He shook his head in absolute amazement. No way he could have faked that look. Then he said to the police, ‘You officers are making a mistake. I’m a sergeant in the United States Army.’ That’s when one of the cops knocked him down with his baton.”

Chapter 52
    I WAS TRYING to forget that I was on a case. Carrying around a nasty straw doll and lidless evil eye. In pursuit of killers. Relentless as I had ever been.
    I walked into the lobby of the Wyndham Buttes Resort in Tempe, and there was Jamilla. She had flown east from San Francisco to meet me. That had been our plan.
    She was wearing an orange silk blouse with a deeper orange sweater around her shoulders, slender gold bracelets and tiny earrings. She looked just right for the Valley of the Sun, which is what I’d heard the metropolitan area of Phoenix, Scottsdale, Mesa, Chandler, and Tempe was called.
    “I suspect you already know this,” I said as I walked over and gave her a big hug, “but you look absolutely beautiful. Took my breath away.”
    “I did?” she asked, seeming surprised. “That’s a nice way to start our weekend.”
    “And I’m not the only one who thinks so. Everybody in the lobby is checking you out.”
    She laughed. “Now I know you’re putting me on.”
    Jamilla took my hand and we walked across the lobby. Suddenly I stopped and spun her around into my arms. I looked at her face for a moment, then gave her a kiss. It was long and sweet because I’d been saving it up.
    “You look pretty good yourself,” she said after the kiss. “You always look good. Tell you a secret. The first time I saw you in the San Francisco airport, you took
my
breath away.”
    I laughed and rolled my eyes. “Well, we better