"She's still the same. In a coma."

"I'm so sorry. I went to see her yesterday afternoon. The nurse told me to talk to Jilly, just talk about anything- the weather, the latest Denzel Washington movie-whatever. Anyway, the party. Will all of you come?"

"Of course we'll come," Paul said, a hint of impatience in his voice. "Your father commands and we struggle to be first in line."

"It's not like that, Paul," Cal said, without looking at any of us.

Cal looked over Paul's right shoulder, toward a painting with two long diagonal slashes of stark black paint slapped on dead-white canvas. "We're all very worried about Jilly, Paul. Dad hopes you'll be able to make time and come to our house for at least a little while tomorrow night. He really wants to meet Jilly's brother. Maggie, do you know if Rob is working tomorrow night?"

"That's a loaded question. What makes you think I know his schedule?"

Cal Tarcher shrugged. "You're both law officers." "Yeah, right."

Cal Tarcher was very uncomfortable with this, probably embarrassed. What was going on here? I felt as though I'd been dumped in the middle of a play and I didn't have a clue what the plot was. "I'll call him," Cal said in a low voice. Then she raised her head and looked directly at Maggie. "It's just that he's more likely to come if you ask him. He'll do whatever you ask. You know he doesn't like me. He thinks I'm stupid."

"Don't be ridiculous, Cal," Paul said. "Rob doesn't dislike anyone. It would take too much mental energy and he's got to conserve all he's got. I'll call him for you, all right?"

"Thank you, Paul. I'm off to invite Miss Geraldine. She's had a bad cold, but she's better now. I'm taking some homemade coffee cake to her. My father admires her so very much, you know."

"Beats me why," Paul said. He added to me, "Miss Geraldine Tucker is our mayor and a retired high school math teacher. She also heads up the Edgerton Citizen Coalition, better known as the BITEASS League. Its members range in age from in vitro to ninety-three- that's Mother Marco, who still owns the Union 76 gas station downtown.

"And no, there's no correlation between the letters and the name of the group. Didn't your dad come up with that, Cal?"

"It was my mom, actually."

"Your mother? Elaine?" There was surprise and disbelief in Maggie's voice.

"Why, yes," Cal said. "My mom's got a great sense of humor. She's also very smart. Actually you, Mr. MacDougal, are the only one coming who isn't a member of the League."

I said, "You need to come up with words to fit the letters."

"People have tried," Paul said. "Is that all, Cal? We're really busy here. Maggie is acting like I'm responsible, like I drove Jilly off that cliff. She's asking all sorts of questions."

Maggie waved her ballpoint pen at him, before turning back to Cal Tarcher. "Before you go, Cal, did you happen to see Jilly last Tuesday evening?"

"There was lots of fog that night," Cal said, looking, I thought, at her Bally shoes. "I remember Cotter's date canceling because she didn't want to drive in it."

"Jilly went over about midnight," I said. "Was there fog then?"

"No," Maggie said. "It.was nearly gone then." She added, "It's very changeable around here-the fog flits through like a bride's veil or it settles thick as a blanket, then all of a sudden it vanishes. It was like that last Tuesday night. Cotter's date was driving to your house?"

Cal nodded. She was, I saw, finally making eye contact with me. "Cotter likes his dates to pick him up," she said, seeing my raised eyebrow. "He says it makes women feel powerful if they're the ones driving. If they get annoyed with him they can just drop him off and leave him on the side of the road, no harm done."

"So did you see Jilly or not?" Maggie asked. She didn't like Cal Tarcher, I thought, looking from one woman to the other. I wondered why. Cal Tarcher seemed perfectly harmless to me, just painfully shy, just the opposite of Maggie, and that was perhaps why she didn't like her. Cal Tarcher made her impatient.

"Yes, I saw her," Cal said. She took two steps toward the door. It seemed that now she wanted to get out of there. "It was around nine-thirty. She was driving her Porsche down Fifth Avenue, playing her car stereo real loud. I was eating a late dinner at The Edwardian. There were maybe ten, twelve people there. We all got up and went outside to wave to Jilly. She was singing at the top of her lungs."