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By the time I had the dishes clean and piled in a perilousfrom the bathroom, her head wrapped in one towel and her body in another Without any ot dressed Her body was much older than her face She sat down at the kitchen table in jeans and a T-shirt, barefoot She looked exhausted, but her skin was scrubbed and her eyes had cleared to so seriously I didn’t think unfiltered cigarettes were available these days

I sat down across froet I started drinking this ht there" She paused and her eyes filled with tears again, her nose turning pink with e I just lost it Couldn’t cope I wasn’t crazy about hioofball whoall over What was he thinking about? He must have been nuts Bailey comes back to town and look what happens Somebody else dead This tiures somebody put Tap up to it"

"Bailey did," she snapped

"Just wait," I said "He got a telephone call last night at Pearl’s He talked briefly and then took off"

She blew her nose "Must have been after I left," she said, unconvinced "You want some coffee? It’s instant"

"Sure, I’ll have soot up She filled a saucepan ater and stuck it on the back burner, turning on the gas She extracted two coffeeup You didn’t have to do that"

"Idle hands…" I said, not ed a little of the devil’s work

She unearthed a jar of instant coffee and a couple of spoons, which she set on the table while aited for the water to boil She took another drag fro I could feel it settle around ain and change my clothes

She said, "I still say Bailey killed her"

"Why would he do that?"

"Why would anybody else?"

"Well, I don’t know, but from what I’ve heard, he was the only real friend she had"

She shook her head Her hair was still wet, separated into long strands that dampened the shoulders of her T-shirt "God, I hate this Soht about that a lot I never was much of a mom in terms of the ordinary stuff, but that kid and I were close More like sisters"

"I saw some pictures of her in the yearbook She was beautiful"