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But less so lately Subtly, gradually, Nicholas was displacing Keller in the ro him out in the bedroom…

"Hence Pablo," Dot said "If you hate it I can probably co else I just always liked the name"

"Pablo"

"You hate it, don’t you?"

"It’s fine Is that why you called? To see if I liked being called Pablo?"

"No, I just wanted to check in I guess you’ve been keeping busy with stamps"

"Pretty h you ot a pulse, and nobody knoho burned his house doith him in it"

"The wife hasn’t talked?"

"She hasn’t," Dot said, "and I have to say I don’t bla about her"

"Oh?"

"I think she’s our client"

"Isn’t that e said the other day?"

"Not exactly, because at the tiht she’d set it all up Took the kids, left the house, and made sure she stayed away until the deed was done"

"Makes sense"

"It does," she said, "except it doesn’t Pablo, she hasn’t got a thing to wear"

"Huh?"

"What woets someone to burn down her house with all her clothes in it? That ood idea to Charles Lamb, but I bet Mrs Laood news is that your husband is dead The bad news is your fifty pairs of shoes are history"

"She had fifty pairs of shoes?"

"If she did, Pablo, she doesn’t anyht about it "All right," he said "She hired us, but while I was taking my time, somebody else went ahead and did the job Who?"

"Suppose we just call hiuy?"

"I don’t know," she said "I know the wife didn’t, and she’s pissed"

"Pissed"

"Royally I got a call froot a call fro The way she sees it, whoever burned her house down has to be the stupidest, craziest, most amateurish moron in the business"

"Well," Keller said, "I have to say I agree with her on that one"

"It’s a pretty good description of our friend the other guy, isn’t it? I passed the word that it wasn’t us, so either one of the sub-brokers made more than one phone call--"

"Or someone else had the saements with soured he wouldn’t go through with it?"

Dot was silent

"And he went through with it after all? Except burning down the house that way called for soe, wouldn’t you say? I certainly wouldn’t have kno to do it"

"You wouldn’t have done it in the first place"

"Well, there’s that Still, does it sound like the work of some tattooed joker that you’d find on the Internet and meet in a bar?"

"Or find in a bar," she said, "and ot soht make a fewus to give back the first payment, and there’s no way to earn the balance, so for us the war is over Even so…"

"It’d be good to know"

"It would," she agreed "I’ll be in touch You’re with the Stamp Widow tomorrow? Keep your phone handy"

Forty

The first stamp buyer was due at ten thirty, so Keller had a quick breakfast at Denny’s, read the Denver paper’s coverage of the Hudepohl case, and got to the Soderling house a little before ten He wanted to et there first

The previous evening, when Mrs Soderling proposed he stay the night and check out of his , he’d invented a reason why that wasn’t a good idea, soht on his co, after his shower and shave, he packed up everything and stowed his bag in the Toyota’s trunk

But he kept the roon on the knob so thehis options open, he told hi "I’m afraid I’ve already had e another cup of coffee," she said And he agreed that he could

They sat together at an outdoor table, and quite out of the blue she began talking about the Hudepohl case Had he been following it? He said he hadn’t, which eli that hadn’t made the papers, but led her to furnish a full account of everything that had

"That poor woman," she said "She’s lucky to be alive"