Frenzy

“Okay,” Qui

“Preliminary tests show we got no record of the DNA left from that severed finger that was found in Alexis Hoffermuth’s vaginal tract. Got something else, though. A fingerprint. A match turned up right away in the FBI database.”

Qui

“The fingerprint—right forefinger, incidentally—belongs or belonged to John Wayson Clairmont. Goes by Jack. Three arrests in upstate New York for burglarizing jewelry stores. One conviction. Did a three-year stretch behind walls, was released four years ago.”

“Tell me he’s related to Craig Clairmont.”

“His brother,” Renz said.

Qui

“You wa

“No. Let’s not tell Craig, or Ida French, about the owner of the finger yet. See how this plays out.”

“Jack might not have had anything to do with Craig, and Craig might have nothing to do with Alexis Hoffermuth’s missing bracelet.”

“Or Jack’s missing finger.”

“But it isn’t missing—”

“Jack would disagree.”

“The rest of Jack might be as dead as his finger,” Renz said, “tucked away someplace where it won’t be found.”

“Jack was at one time in that alley where we found his finger,” Qui

“Always a possibility,” Renz said, “somebody ru

“No,” Qui

“Ida French. Real Name Ida Beene. From Cinci

“So many people go to Cleveland to start over,” Qui

“Craig’s real name is Lester,” Renz said. “Not much about that couple is real.”

Qui

“Not quite. Nift’s postmortem on the Hoffermuth woman is in. She died of a heart attack.”

“I thought the scarf—”

“Probably it was only used to choke off her screams when the knife was applied to her back. There were a lot of knife wounds along her spine, very precise, between the vertebrae. Nift said whoever wielded the knife was skilled. The insertions must have produced incredible pain. She had her heart attack simultaneous with being throttled to keep her quiet.”

“Hell of a way to die.”

“There are a few good ways, but hers wasn’t one of them.”

“Any other cheerful news?”

“That’s it for now,” Renz said. “You can sleep on it.”

“But not very well,” Qui

When Qui

Qui

“Sounds as if Craig was in on stealing the Hoffermuth bracelet with his brother,” Pearl said.

“And maybe the cat has the bracelet around its neck. Eloise thought it was a collar.”

“Which is why Craig and Ida Bee—French—are so hot to find Boomerang.”

“But what’s the deal with Jack’s finger?” Qui

“Maybe Jack told somebody something he shouldn’t have,” Jody said. She had come downstairs and listened at the living room doorway to Qui

“Sounds plausible, but I’ve never heard of the mob doing that,” Qui

“But it’s his forefinger,” Jody said. “His pointer.”

“Wouldn’t they cut out his tongue?”

“You ever try to cut out somebody’s tongue?”

“Well, I—”

“She might have something there,” Pearl said, mostly to defend Jody.

Jody glanced gratefully at her mother.

These two were about to gang up on Qui

“Let’s all sleep on it,” he said, echoing Renz’s suggestion. “What’s the score on that ball game?”

“Detroit’s wi

“Let’s go back to the DVD and see if that international pharmaceutical company gets convicted of testing that dangerous drug on kids in third world countries.”

“What pharmaceutical company?” Jody asked, her ire obviously up.

Qui

“Have you ever considered,” Jody said, after the pharmaceutical company’s entire board of directors were successfully tried in the Hague for murder, “that Alexis Hoffermuth might have set up this whole thing? She might still have the genuine bracelet.”

“And all this ru

“I’ve thought about it,” Qui

Jody, whose thirst for justice hadn’t been quenched by the downfall of Big Pharma, looked from one of them to the other.

“We shouldn’t rule it out,” Qui

Pearl’s cell phone chirped, and without thinking to check who might be calling, she answered it.

“Pearl!” her mother’s voice said, from Golden Sunset Assisted Living in New Jersey. “I have been trying to get in contact with you in regard to an outrageous change in dining room seating in this nursing home hell—”

“Assisted living,” Pearl corrected, as she often did.

“Anyway, to continue my diatribe—and I know that is how you regard it, unable to conceptualize as you are that nefarious things do go on in this purgatory of pain that reasonable people . . .”

“Is that Grandma?” Jody asked, her face lighting up. “Let me talk to her!”

Pearl tossed her the phone, and Jody snatched it from the air and walked off into the next room, yammering.

Pearl and Qui

May 11, 1:19 p.m.

“Jack is dead?”

Ida seemed astounded.

Craig Clairmont looked suddenly out of breath and sat down hard enough in a patched vinyl wing chair to move the heavy piece of furniture six inches across the hardwood floor.

“We don’t know that for certain,” Qui

Ida French went to stand at the back of the chair, over Craig’s right shoulder. She appeared ill. “And you know it’s Jack’s finger?”

“Yes,” Pearl said. “Fingerprints. Print.”

“Jack would never harm anyone,” Craig said. “Not physically, anyway.”

Qui

Jody was seated off to the side, observing. She’d wanted to come with them, actually meet these people. She viewed it as research for her own fledgling career in criminal law. You couldn’t know too much about the criminal mind.

“It could be theorized,” Qui

Craig appeared to have been struck a glancing blow. “Wow! That’s wild.”

“Jewel theft and homicide are wild.”

“First Jack, then that poor Mrs. Hoffermuth,” Craig said, pacing. “Or maybe it was the other way around.” He seemed unable to sit down.