Framed by Nikki Andrews Page B

better schools and her charitable organizing. Berger had gained regional and some national attention for his artwork, particularly the series of paintings called “One Year.”
    Funeral arrangements will be announced.
    “Well, that was pretty gruesome,” Sue told herself. Even sanitized for the weekly paper, there was no avoiding the image of dismembered, half-eaten bodies in the snow. There was even the discreet hint of illicit goings-on between the two victims, and the righteous anger of the wronged husband. Or was she reading too much into it?
    Sue got to her feet and went upstairs for a drink of water. Jim was nowhere to be seen, but she didn’t expect to find him. She wondered if any of the current reporters had been with the paper ten years ago, and if they would talk to her about the story. Caution overtook her; if she asked about Berger, they would want to know why, and she certainly couldn’t tell them about the painting. Not yet. Besides, Ginny would want to control the announcement of a rediscovered painting by Jerry Berger.
    On she scrolled, making weeks pass in seconds. If only she could do that when she was sick or the weather was bad! She found the obituaries and the funeral announcements, and the brief related story about Mike Bingham stepping down from his position as alderman while he served his probation. Well into the next fiche, buried on page nine of a mid-April issue, she came across the story that reported the police determination.
    Deaths Were Murder/Suicide
    State police have completed their investigation into the deaths of Abby Bingham and Jerry Berger, whose bodies were discovered in January in the snow in Harpersville. Both were shot in an apparent murder/suicide. “The condition of the bodies made it difficult to determine the circumstances of the deaths,” reported Anna Fitzgerald, of the NH State Police. “However, we believe Mrs. Bingham was killed by Mr. Berger, who then killed himself.”
    Asked if a suicide note had been found, Fitzgerald said only that the investigation was continuing. She had no explanation for why the bodies were discovered in indoor clothing during the winter.
    Berger’s brother Howard said he did not believe his brother committed suicide. “Jerry was a happy guy. His career as an artist was blossoming, and no one who knew him saw any hints of unhappiness. As for his killing Abby (Bingham), that’s completely ridiculous. He wouldn’t harm a fly.”
    Mike Bingham, husband of Abby Bingham, did not respond to requests for an interview. A spokesman for his office read a statement, “Mr. Bingham still mourns the loss of his wife. He is satisfied with the result of the police investigation and wishes to commend them for their hard work. Nonetheless, the fact remains his wife is dead. She is and will be greatly missed.”
    A retrospective of Berger’s work is planned for next month at Brush & Bevel in Westford.
    And that seemed to be the end of it. Sue put the fiches into their envelopes and started to put them back in the drawer before she remembered Jim’s warning about the intern. She set them on the table, and then peeked into the drawer again, wondering if the next fiche would have any more information. She’d already spent most of the morning here, and her stomach reminded her it was time to eat lunch. She should go home and enjoy the rest of the spring day.
    But her finger was still in the drawer where the fiche belonged. She glanced at the next envelope. It was clearly out of order, almost a year later. Curious, she put it into the viewer and scrolled through, keeping a casual eye open for any of the names in the stories she’d been reading.
    All she found, however, was an ongoing investigation into certain tax irregularities in Mill Falls, which, according to what she read, were threatening to cause problems for the town of Douglass. She didn’t bother to read the whole story—it was long in the past and it didn’t concern her hometown—but it had