Kissing the Beehive

I crumpled the note and dropped it on the porch. I didn't want to touch it again. He had shot her twice in the back and left me flowers. I knelt to pick up the note but stayed hunched down, the full effect of what had happened washing over and making me sick to my stomach.

The street was empty and silent. Darkness had come and the streetlights lit small patches through the blowing snow. Lights were on in all the neighboring houses: People were watching television, talking, drinking scotch and enjoying the coziness of being at home on a snowy night.

I walked to my car and opened the door, then switched on the telephone and called Fra

The Holiday I

When I found the room, fear squeezed my chest. I put my head against the door and knocked.

"Yes? Who is it?"

"Your dad."

A very different kind of horror followed that day. Cassandra was traumatized by Veronica's death. She could not get over it, and despite being told the facts i

My daughter refused even to speak to me for three weeks and when she did was cold and rude. When she finally agreed to meet, she insisted that Ivan be in the room. The girl I had for so long thought was strong and perfect was no more and no less than a very smart and fragile teenager from a broken family who for years had been holding too many things inside. No longer. Veronica's death brought them all out.

Most of what Cass said to me was the absolute truth, which is always the hardest to bear. I had thought our love for each other was the only good, true thing in my life. The only relationship that I had worked desperately hard to nourish and protect. That was only partly true. I had made big mistakes, many of them, and now my daughter did not hesitate describing them to me.

Today things are much better between us, but often when we are sitting together and I risk a peek at her when she isn't looking, I wonder about so much.

It turned out Veronica Lake had no family and her affairs were chaotic. When I discovered how few people knew her well I was deeply saddened. I willingly took on the job of setting everything straight – paying her debts, arranging the funeral, closing up the very peculiar shop that had been her life.

For a time I considered burying her in Crane's View but realized how much misery the town had caused her. It seemed she had never had peace in her life. Couldn't I do that for her now? Veronica often mentioned how much she loved the ocean and the towns far out on Long Island. After some inquiries and negotiating, I was able to find a small rural cemetery for her not far from Bridgehampton.

Only Fra

Riding back up the Long Island Expressway in McCabe's car, I asked if he remembered catching fireflies when we were kids.

"Of course I remember – every kid does it."

"But remember how easy it was to catch them? How tame they were?"

I was sitting in the backseat. Magda was in front but turned around, smiling. "That's right. They really were tame. You just had to reach up and you could catch as many as you wanted."

"But you never knew what to do with them once you caught them. You'd hold them in your hands awhile, or else put them in a bottle with wax paper over the top. But you knew they'd be dead by the next morning if you kept them in there." I looked out the window. "But we still went out every summer and caught them, didn't we?

"That's what it was like with Veronica. In the begi

"Sam, don't get all nostalgic, huh? The woman kidnapped your daughter!"

"I know. But no matter what happened, it was my fault too. I knew the minute we met she was going to be a handful. So why didn't I just leave her alone? How long does it take us to learn to keep our hands in our pockets and just watch most things fly around, out there where they belong?"

Snow had begun to fall again outside. I watched it awhile. "I blew it, Fra

Edward Durant collapsed the afternoon of Veronica's death. On coming to, he was barely able to call an ambulance. In the hospital they discovered there were new things wrong with his body, all of them working in concert to kill him as quickly as possible.

I stayed with him in his hospital room and we talked for hours and hours about Cass and what I could do to reconcile us. I realized his intense interest in our situation was due to his own failure with his son. With so little energy in his body, he would still grab my hand, look at me with feverish eyes and say, "Fix it! Use whatever you have. It's the only thing that matters."

The investigation into Veronica's death was long and useless. All they found were two spent shells from a deer rifle. Nothing else. But I was questioned until I thought I would go mad and, good cop that he was, McCabe didn't cut any corners for me. He wanted to know everything that happened that afternoon, but whatever I remembered didn't seem to help at all. God knows I wanted to help, but certain memories stuck while others fled. How had Veronica gotten into the house? I didn't know. I remembered the way she fell, but not the sound of the two shots. Or if I saw anyone at the window behind her. I was not a good witness. More than once I saw both derision and disgust in my friend's face. I could understand why and that made me feel worse.

I had di

The end of this story is full of ironies, but the greatest for me was that my estranged daughter saved me. Naturally, after Veronica's death I thought almost nothing of the book. I knew he was out there waiting, but I heard nothing from him after the night of the murder. Which was good because despite the unspoken ultimatum he had given, I could not work.

But one day during a particularly difficult meeting with Cass, she turned to me and asked how the book was going. It was the first time she had mentioned it and it took me off-guard. I stared at her as if I didn't know what she was talking about, then admitted I hadn't done any writing since that day.

"So it was all for nothing? Veronica did all that work for you and found out whatever her big secret was and you're not going to finish it? You have to. You can't stop now!"

I would like to say I went back to work with renewed purpose. But the truth is I went back to work because of the threatening look in my daughter's eye and nothing more.

I reread the manuscript and all the notes I had taken. I listened to the tapes and stared out the window and watched as spring arrived in Co