Philly Stakes by Gillian Roberts Page A

I made a deal with myself. If Alice Clausen mentioned fireplace pokers or baseball bats or poison or knives or any weapon, if she screamed until he had a heart attack—anything that would have made her husband die before the fire, then I’d contact Mackenzie immediately. If, instead, she said she put a match to him like kindling, I’d maintain my skepticism and silence. “What did you do?”
    “I don’t want to talk about it.”
    “But the police will want to know.”
    She shrugged.
    I changed course. “If what you’re saying is true—”
    “It is!”
    “Then why is Laura saying that she—”
    “I told you! To protect me!” The arms windmilled. “You don’t understand how it was! You don’t understand anything!”
    She was right on the mark. Not only that, but with unrepentant, wobbly confessions from both wife and daughter, I wasn’t overeager ever to understand how it had been.
    “Still and all,” I said, “there’s no need to talk to the police yet, is there?”
    “What if she does, though?”
    “Laura?”
    Alice Clausen nodded woefully.
    I slumped into a lethargic and heavy confusion. Alice perched like a nervous bird on the arm of the sofa, and we’d probably still be in those positions if the telephone hadn’t rung, breaking the spell.
    It was Mackenzie. “Mandy?” I knew from his tone this wasn’t going to be an invitation to party.
    “You’re still at work?” Maybe the thirty-six-hour shifts of medical residents are necessary, but why should homicide detectives work that way? After all, their clients are already dead.
    “Again, not still. Actually, I’m supposed to be home sleepin’. I’m on four to twelve. Didn’t I tell you? I juggled it around so we’ll have Christmas Eve and Day. Didn’t I give you my schedule?”
    “Schedule? You have one? I thought you were indentured.” He didn’t chuckle.
    “Maybe real late?” But he was yawning by midsentence, so there went Saturday night.
    “What you doin’?” he asked.
    I was doing finger exercises on the scales of justice, but I saw no need to tell him.
    “Remember that Clausen business?” he asked, idiotically. How could I forget it—even if its players hadn’t been rushing to confess to me? “Surprisin’ thing happened about it just now. A boy, Peter Shaw, called.”
    “About…that?” I didn’t want Alice to go on alert.
    “You sound weird. Is somebody there with you?”
    “Uh-huh,” I said, relieved.
    Mackenzie’s voice grew cold. “Didn’t realize you were entertaining. Sorry to interrupt. Get back to your guest.”
    “Oh, for the love of—” I gave him three more seconds to fantasize my romantic suitor, and then I opted for honesty. “Alice Clausen’s here.”
    With no sound of grinding gears, Mackenzie switched suspicions. “Why?” he demanded.
    “For a chat.”
    “Sure.” He grew silent, ruminating, meditating, speculating.
    “You called because…?”
    “Peter. Says he got my name from you. You talk to him?”
    “No. But the kids at school remember you from last spring. Besides, nothing about a teacher’s private life escapes them.”
    “He hasn’t spoken to you about this?”
    “I haven’t seen him since…that night. Why’d he call?”
    “You know him, though?” Mackenzie, unlike me, gets the answers he wants.
    “Taught him two years ago, if that counts.”
    “What was he like?”
    “Then? Going through a rough period. Punky, arrogant. Acting out.”
    “You think he’s violent?”
    I took a deep breath. He had been. Definitely. Also provoked. His father had been an alcoholic who beat up his wife. Peter had intervened, attacked him back, and the father had pressed charges, trying to have Peter institutionalized. Ugly, stupid case that was eventually dropped when the mother filed for divorce. I knew of no further incidents. I chose my words carefully. “He went through a bad time, but it’s long since over. He looks scary with the hair and the muscles and the black clothing,