Second Chance by Jonathan Valin Page A

trouble with the police
before now?"
    "He hasn't the guts for that," Louise
Pearson said with crude satisfaction. "Ethan's not much of a
doer, but he's a ferocious, bullying talker. Witness how he twisted
Kirsty around his finger."
    "I don't think it was Ethan alone that led
Kirsten to this," I said. "She's had a rotten year. And
last week an important relationship went awry."
    "What kind of relationship?"
    "A romantic one."
    The woman looked surprised. "She was having an
affair?"
    " She was trying to. There's some question about
whether she succeeded. The man . . . he's an older man. A teacher at
the university."
    "You didn't tell Phil that, did you?"
Louise Pearson said with alarm.
    "No. I didn't tell him much of anything. He
didn't look as if he could take it."
    "He can't," Louise Pearson said flatly.
"Especially that."
    The woman took a step closer to me and I caught her
sweet, powerful scent again.
    "Mr. Stoner, if things should go wrong, please
call me. I mean, before you talk to Phil. He'll need careful handling
if Kirsten and Ethan land in real trouble."
    She handed me a piece of stationery with a phone
number on it.
    "That's my private number here at the house.
I've got a fairly busy social schedule. If I should be out, an
answering service will know where to find me."
    I told her I'd call when I had some news.
    Leaning forward hesitantly the woman kissed me
lightly on the cheek. It wasn't meant to be provocative, but it had
that effect on me. It must not have felt right to Louise Pearson
either, for she pulled away at once.
    "I'm sorry," she said, reddening. "I'm
feeling a little frail at the moment. And then I'm a physical sort of
person, anyway."
    "It's all right," I said. "I liked
it."
    She laughed feebly.
    "Go," she said, waving her hand down the
hall to the front door. "Before I make a fool out of myself."
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    From the Pearson house I drove downtown to the main
branch of the Public Library on Vine Street.
    The first-floor periodical room was relatively empty
that early on a Monday morning—a couple of earnest-looking college
students, a few old-age pensioners, and two or three bums, who'd come
in out of the cold and fallen asleep on scattered benches, their
shopping bags of belongings rolled up for pillows. I skirted the
snoozing bums and got a brief workout running down a fleet-footed
librarian, who kept turning corners in front of me as I tracked her
through the stacks. Once I ran the woman to ground I asked her for
advice on where to begin looking for Ethan Pearson's photograph.
    "If the article you're interested in was from a
paper purchased in the Ft. Thomas area, you should begin with the
Kentucky Post" she said. "It has the largest circulation in
that part of northern Kentucky. You should also try the Louisville
Courier-Journal and the Cincinnati Enquirer; ofcourse. Many northern
Kentuckians read the Enquirer."
    "Do you keep back issues in circulation?" I
asked.
    "For seven days, then they're recorded on
microfiche."
    She pointed me to the newspaper stacks and told me to
come back if I needed to use a microfiche machine. I found the
Wednesday, December 16, edition of the Kentucky Post and read through
it slowly. The court news was in the local section, but there were no
photos or paragraphs on released felons. I tried the Courier-journal
next, without any luck. Then the Enquirer. Ethan's mystery man wasn't
there—or if he was I wasn't seeing him.
    I was very tired, and concentrating on the newsprint
was maddeningly difficult. I was worried that the fatigue would cause
me to overlook something—and even more worried that Ethan's photo
didn't exist. If that was the case I'd have nothing to go on, save
the chance that the Volare would be spotted by the cops. That is, if
the Pearson kids had come back to Cincinnati, which was no ironclad
cinch.
    I sat, brooding, at the library table for a full
minute, before it dawned on me that the photo