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couple of academic essays. He must write something else as well. Maybe articles for Playboy or something, under an assumed name. Was that why he was in such an almighty hurry to get me out of the cottage this morning? Not that there was anything wrong with writing for Playboy. More power to him. Some of the top writers did it.
    No, it must be something else. I remembered Rosalie’s diary, there on the desk by his typewriter. I remembered his startled face when he asked if I’d got to that part already. Alarm wasn’t too strong a word for his reaction. He was very interested in those diaries, in everything about Rosalie.
    An unpleasant, niggling suspicion was scratching at the back of my brain. If he hadn’t gone jogging today, who was to say he ever went? Maybe he just ran around the cedars and sneaked back home every day. Maybe he hadn’t spent last night fishing either—the lights were on in his cottage, and he hadn’t caught anything. Maybe he was in the cottage all the time, pounding away like a fiend at his typewriter. In a great hurry—to beat me! He was Hume Mason, holed up here in the country like me, to bang out his cheap, unauthorized book. He’d discovered somehow I was coming here with the research, and he came trotting after me. That’s why the fashion model was living in a hovel! He was putting on this whole infatuated act to get at my research material!
    The bastard! I glared at the cottage window. What an ass I was to have been taken in so easily. Bought with a couple of meals and a few kisses. I’d been seduced as surely as if he’d had his way with my body. I was beyond working. I couldn’t think of anything but his trickery, and every detail bolstered my theory. His strong reaction when we heard of Rosalie’s death—he looked like a zombie. He knew he had to get his book hammered out faster. And he even had the gall to ask me to bring another diary to him that night, to devour while I innocently slept, wasting time.
    I ran back to my typewriter, but nobody could work when her adrenaline was pushing through her skull. My fingers were shaking with anger. I got up to go and confront him, then stopped at the door. He’d deny it, of course. He’d pull out that blasted dull book on Eliot and claim that was the source of his wealth. I couldn’t prove otherwise, either, unless I used my wits. For that matter, I could be wrong. I was consumed with a desire to read what he was writing. I wouldn’t let on I knew, but the first time he left his cottage, I’d go in and see for myself.
    I forced myself back to work. His flashing eyes laughed at me between the lines. Every word he’d said came back to taunt me. He’d stood up for Hume Mason, intimated he was no worse than me when I put the man down. I knew there had to be a lead lining to my little cloud of pleasure. Well, here it was, raining pellets on me. For a few distraught hours, I’d write a line, then look to the cottage to see if Brad was leaving, reread what I’d written, and strike it out. It was hopeless. Nobody could write under these conditions. Barbara Cartland would run dry.
    I phoned Lorraine Taylor, and heard she was in bed with a sedative. I went through the letters, trying to find some evidence that Rosalie had actually had a child, but there was nothing except that question about her feeling better. The word nausea was used. Morning sickness certainly caused nausea. I turned to the diary in which she’d mentioned gaining weight, and couldn’t find even that passage. I knew I hadn’t imagined it. I remembered mentioning it to Brad . . . and he’d borrowed that particular diary. That was the specific one he wanted. He’d removed the pages! I pulled the sheets back as far as they’d go, and sure enough, two pages had been razored out, very neatly. So Hume Mason was even going to have that coup!
    It was suddenly noon hour, and I stopped for a can of soup. Brad was probably simmering himself a duck à l’orange. I was supposed