After admiring everything, Jane said, "I'll meet you outside. I have to find a bathroom.”

“Just down that hallway," Grace Axton said, entering the kitchen and catching Jane's words.

Jane followed Grace's directions. While she was washing her hands, she heard a crash. By the time she'd dried her hands and disposed of the paper towel, she could hear someone screaming. She stepped out of the bathroom.

A crowd of people was descending on an open doorway along the hallway between the bathroom and the kitchen. As she neared the door, someone shoved a sobbing Sarah Baker out of the doorway and into her arms.

“Sarah! What's wrong!”

Sarah was blubbering, "He's dead! Oh, my God—"

“Dead? Who's dead?" Jane asked, fearing the answer was Conrad.

Grace Axton pushed through the crowd and grabbed at Sarah. "Honey, come away from here. Come on.”

Somebody behind her gave a push and Jane found herself, against her will, in the room where somebody was dead. It was a storage room, as bright and clean as the rest of the deli. Cardboard cartons were neatly stacked on shelving that ran clear around the room except for the doorway where she stood and another doorway on the outside wall. A large chrome rack was lying on the floor. It had held hams, which had rolled all over the floor. Lying in the midst of the hams was a facedown figure. But nobody needed to see the face to know who it was. The showy, snowy white hair could only belong to Robert Stonecipher.

3

Everybody in the hallway seemed to want in the room.

Jane wanted out.

Pushing her way gently but firmly, she struggled into the hall and through the kitchen and sales area. She found Shelley waiting outside.