“Notice anything different?” The tall deputy was standing by the door and keeping quiet, a point in his favor.

I shook my head and resumed my examination.

“Emanuel,” he said suddenly.

Was this some kind of religious statement? My eyebrows drew in and I regarded him with some doubt.

“Clifton Emanuel.”

After a distinct pause, I understood. “You’re Clifton Emanuel,” I said tentatively. He nodded.

I didn’t need to know his name, but he wanted me to know it. Maybe he was a celebrity freak, True Crime Division, Famous Victims Subsection. Like Sharon Tate, but alive.

Maybe he was just being polite.

I was relieved when the sheriff stuck her head out of Deedra’s bedroom and jerked it back in a motion that told me I’d better join her.

“Everything in the living room okay?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“What about this room?”

I stood at the foot of Deedra’s bed and turned around slowly. Deedra had loved jewelry, and it was everywhere; necklaces, earrings, bracelets, an anklet or two. The impression was that the jewelry was strewn around, but if you looked closer, you would notice that the backs were on the earrings and the earrings were in pairs. The necklaces were lain straight and fastened so they wouldn’t tangle. That was normal. Some of the drawers were not completely shut-there again, that was typical Deedra. The bed was made quite tidily; it was queen-size, with a high, carved headboard that dominated the room. I lifted the corner of the flowered bedspread and peered beneath it.

“Different sheets than I put on last Friday,” I said.

“Does that mean something?”

“Means someone slept in it with her since then.”

“Did she ever wash the sheets and put them right back on the bed?”

“She never washed anything, especially sheets. She had seven sets. I did her laundry.”

Marta Schuster looked startled. Then she looked disgusted. “So if I count the sheet sets in the laundry hamper, I’ll come up with the number of times she entertained since last Friday morning?”