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dressing rooms, greenroom, costume loft, carpentry shop…everything backstage. Then do the front of the Assembly Hall and the outside grounds. We’ll get the whole place taped off. I’ve got Ben Reilly, Brett Carty, and our summer intern Barbara Sinclair scheduled to come in and help you today and tomorrow. We will add days as necessary.”
    “And what did you learn last night?” asked Sue.
    “I talked to the whole group. They were all in shock, or at least appeared to be. No one had seen anything unusual, and no one remembers seeing anyone in the theater who shouldn’t have been. The crew and cast members were mostly in the green room before the beginning of the second scene.”
    “Why the long scene break?” asked Sue. “They were really taking their time. It was like the end of an act.”
    “My question also. As Grubbs explained that, people had been eating and drinking for quite some time, and then went off to the performance. And that most of the audience is of an age where….”
    “You don’t have to explain, Ray.”
    “But there’s more. The restrooms are in two buildings adjacent to the Assembly Hall, women’s on one side and the men’s on the other. It takes some time to negotiate back and forth.”
    “But it was pouring rain. That would make people go faster.”
    “Yes,” said Ray, “but the weather wasn’t a factor in the original thinking. The director said the opening scene was overly long and did what the first act usually does, so he decided to treat it like an act and put a break there.” 
    “Okay, so while I’m finishing up the scene and searching for the weapon, you’ll start the interview process?”
    “Yes,” said Ray. “And as soon as you’re done I need major help. Richard Grubbs has given us the use of the colony library.” Ray pointed off at a building nestled in the woods about 50 yards south of the Assembly Hall.
    “This is going to take a lot of time. There are 12 cast members and 10 or more members of the crew. And then there are the young women who worked as ushers, a custodian, and several maintenance men. And that’s probably only part of the iceberg. We’ve never had anything like this before.”
    “So give me the rest of the iceberg.”
    “Based on what Grubbs said in a previous conversation, a lot of people in the colony hated Wudbine.”
    “What was the basis for their enmity?”
    “He didn’t go into the specifics. There’s a long history here that we are going to have to probe. And in addition to the colony people, Wudbine has a personal staff and assorted family members living with him in his compound and in several cottages in the colony. We have to find out about those people, too.”
    “So where do you start?”
    “Cast and crew. I scheduled them last night, and I’ll start talking to people one at a time. I’m starting with Grubbs at ten o’clock, there are things I need to go over again, background info. Then it’s every half hour. Will you help me set up the audio equipment right now? It’s in the trunk.”
    “Sure. Let’s get it done. I’m eager to get started in there,” Sue pointed toward the Assembly Hall.
     

13
     
     
     
    R ay pushed the oak table against the timeworn umber wainscoting that covered the lower half of the wall in the colony library building. He placed a recorder near the paneling, turning it on, repeating, “testing,” several times, and then playing his voice back. His distrust of recording equipment went back to an incident early in his career, and the new digital devices—without any overt sign that anything is going on within, no turning of the cassette reels, just the bouncing of small bars on a miniscule screen and one small glowing red diode—did little to reassure him.
    He looked up from his seat facing the door as Richard Grubbs entered and collapsed in the chair across from him. He studied Grubbs’ face. The margins of his pale blues eyes were bloodshot. The gray-black stubble of a day-old