“Curious fellow.”

“That’s an understatement. So what we need to know from you are the answers to three small questions. As soon as you help us with our questions, we can arrange for you to be taken home. How does that sound?”

“I sure could use a shower.”

“You don’t have to tell us,” said Hanratty.

“And if you cooperate now, we’ll keep you out of it for as long as we can. We won’t call you before the grand jury, we won’t disclose your name to the papers.”

“And that helps me how?”

“Do you really want all the papers harping on your relationship to the dead man’s wife?”

“As long as they spell my name right,” I said.

“Victor, Victor, Victor. Can we begin?”

I thought about it for a long moment. Sims smiled easily and waited. Hanratty looked like he was struggling to keep from banging on the table with my head.

The whole factual recitation by Detective Sims was solely designed to convince me they had the goods on Julia Denniston, and I must say it had worked quite well. If everything he was telling me were true, who else could have committed the murder? And if she had committed the murder, then all my lowest paranoid suspicions were also true. I had made her a promise, and I owed her something, I figured, our past required it, but what did I owe her, really, other than the truth? And it’s not like she didn’t already have a lawyer on her side.

“She called me about ten from outside my apartment,” I said finally. “I invited her in. She was there when you guys showed up.”

“Showering,” said Hanratty.

“She asked if she could. I said it was okay.”

“I bet you did,” said Sims. “Do you mind if we run forensics tests on your apartment?”

“Knock yourselves out. Just be sure your guys screw the drain cover back into the shower floor.”

“How long had you been seeing her?”