Free Cutwork by Monica Ferris Page A

on the table into two stacks.
    Mickey sneered, “Go ahead, quit. You’re no good anyhow.”
    Wannamaker picked up a stack of papers and bumped them lightly on the table to align them. Without looking at her, he asked Betsy, “Do you want to ask this loser anything?” He didn’t think so, his behavior suggested, he opened his briefcase and put the stack into it.
    So Betsy, tired of being treated as a nuisance at best, said, “If you don’t mind.” She turned to Mickey. “Despite all the evidence against you, despite the bloody shoes, despite the money they found, despite the eyewitnesses, what if I told you I believe you did not murder Robert McFey?”
    He stared at her, unable to speak, then his face suddenly rumpled in all directions, his eyebrows going up and drawing in, his eyelids turning down at the corners, his mouth twisting oddly, as he struggled not to burst into tears.
    “Yeah, right,” growled Wannamaker, and as suddenly as it rumpled, Mickey’s face pulled smooth, then twisted with anger. He proceeded to show that while the young are fluent in all manner of scatology and pornography, they often lack imagination.
    Well before he was finished, Wannamaker went to the door and rapped sharply on it. The man with the key appeared so promptly that Betsy suspected a hidden microphone or camera.
    “That’s enough, Mr. Sinclair,” the guard said, and Mickey subsided at once, not even offering a parting shot at Wannamaker as he passed him on his way out.
    “Sorry about that,” sighed Wannamaker.
    “Are you going to withdraw as his attorney?” asked Betsy.
    “No, that was an empty threat. He’s not the one who hired me,” said the lawyer, amused. He consulted his watch and used what he saw as an excuse to hustle out ahead of her.
    On her drive home, Betsy growled to herself about the rude attorney, and then about the dreadful young man whom she was supposed to help. But as she cooled a bit, she recalled the brief but utter transformation of Mickey’s attitude when she offered to believe his denials. She’d blindsided him with that offer, so his reaction was very likely honest. Could it possibly be that he was, in fact, innocent?
    She decided to talk to his parents.

5
    The Sinclairs lived in a modest brick house on a small lot fronted by a hedge that needed trimming. A corner of the lot was cut off by one of Excelsior’s ubiquitous diagonal alleys that once had served as fire lanes. This one was unpaved, and had a slight curve punctuated by mature trees. Early pink peonies and the many colors of bearded iris thrust between the slats of backyard fences. The yards without fences marked their borders with lilac bushes or bridal wreath, the latter so heavy with white blooms the branches dipped to the ground as if caught in a fragrant blizzard. The lilacs were in their brief purple glory, the scent of them and bridal wreath and—What was it? Yes, mock orange—heavy in the air.
    Betsy’s shop carried a counted cross-stitch pattern of a romanticized country lane that was not as pretty as this, nor could it capture the heady fragrance. No wonder people paid ridiculous prices for houses in Excelsior!
    She suddenly remembered why she was there, and her pleasant reverie faded. She collected her wits and went up the sidewalk to ring the doorbell.
    The door was opened promptly by a short, thin woman with dark brown hair tucked behind her ears. There were brown shadows under her brown eyes, but her sleeveless white blouse and pale plaid shorts were crisp. “Yes?” she said.
    “Faith Sinclair? I’m Betsy Devonshire.”
    “Oh, of course. Won’t you come in?”
    “Thank you.” Betsy smiled to herself. Faith had never met Betsy, and was probably expecting a tall, thin sleuth with piercing gray eyes and a lot of presence. But Betsy was not tall, or slender, and the only thing gray about her would have been her hair if she didn’t make regular trips to a hairdresser.
    The woman led Betsy into a small, warm