At least, that's what I was thinking as I knocked on their door. When it swung open, however, to reveal not just Jack, but both Slater brothers dressed in swimwear, I began to have my doubts.

Jack pounced on me like a kitten on a ball of yarn.

"Guess what?" he cried. "Paul's not playing golf or tennis or anything today. He wants to spend the whole day with us. Isn't that great?"

"Um," I said.

"Yeah, Suze," Paul said. He had on long baggy swimtrunks (proving that it could have been worse: he could have been wearing one of those micro Speedos) and a towel wrapped around his neck and nothing else, except a smirk. "Isn't that great?"

"Um," I said. "Yeah. Great."

Dr. and Mrs. Slater scooted past us in their golf clothes. "You kids have fun now," Nancy called. "Suze, we've got lessons all day. You'll stay until five, won't you?" Then, without waiting for an answer, she said, "Okay, buh-bye," took her husband by the arm, and left.

Okay, I said to myself. I can handle this. Already that morning I'd handled a swarm of bugs. I mean, despite the fact that every once in a while I thought I felt one crawling on me and jumped, only to find it was just my own hair or whatever, I had recovered pretty well. Far better, probably, than Dopey ever would.

So I could certainly handle having Paul Slater around all day bugging me. Um, I mean bothering me.

Right? No problem.

Except that it was a problem. Because Jack kept wanting to talk about the whole mediator thing, and I kept muttering for him to shut up, and then he'd go, "Oh, it's okay, Suze, Paul knows."

Which was the point. Paul wasn't supposed to know. It was supposed to be our secret, mine and Jack's. I didn't want stupid, non-believing,, since-you-won't-go-out-with-me-I'm-telling-on-you Paul to have any part of it. Especially since every time Jack mentioned anything about it, Paul lowered his Armanis and looked at me over the top of the frames, all expectantly, waiting to hear what I'd say.

What could I do? I pretended I didn't know what Jack was talking about. Which was frustrating to him, of course, but what else was I supposed to do? I didn't want Paul knowing my business. I mean, my own mother doesn't know. Why on earth would I tell Paul?

Fortunately, after the first six or seven times Jack tried to mention anything mediator related and I ignored him, he seemed to get the message and shut up. It helped that the pool had gotten very crowded with other little kids and their parents and sitters, so he had plenty to distract him.

But it was still a little unnerving, leaning there against the side of the pool with Kim, who'd shown up with her charges, to glance at Paul every so often and see him stretched out on a deck chair, his face turned in my direction. Especially since I had the feeling that Paul, unlike Sleepy, up in his chair, was wide awake behind the dark lenses of his sunglasses.

Then again, as Kim put it, "Hey, if a hottie like that wants to look at me, he can look all he wants."

But of course, it's different for Kim. She doesn't have the ghost of a hundred-and-fifty-year-old hottie living in her bedroom.

All in all, I would say the morning turned out pretty wretchedly, considering. I figured that, after lunch, the day could only get better.

Was I ever wrong. After lunch was when the cops showed up.

I was stretched out on a lounge chair of my own, keeping one eye on Jack, who was playing a pretty rambunctious game of Marco Polo with Kim's kids, and another on Paul, who was pretending to read a copy of The Nation, but who was, as Kim pointed out, spying on us over the top of the pages, when Caitlin appeared, looking visibly upset, followed by two burly members of the Carmel police.

I assumed that they were merely passing through, on the way to the men's locker room, where there'd been an occasional break-in. Imagine my great surprise when Caitlin led the cops right up to me and said in a shaking voice, "This is Susannah Simon, Officers."

I hurried to climb into my hideous khaki shorts, while Kim, in the lounge chair beside mine, gaped up at the cops like they were mermen risen from the sea or something.

"Miss Simon," the taller of the cops said. "We'd just like a word with you for a moment, if you don't mind."

I've talked to more than my fair share of cops in my time. Not because I hang out with gang-bangers, as Sleepy likes to think, but because in mediating, one often is forced to, well, bend the law a little.

For instance, let's say Marisol had not turned that rosary over to Jorge's daughter. Well, in order to carry out Jorge's last wishes, I would have been forced to break into Marisol's home, take the rosary myself, and mail it to Teresa anonymously. Anyone can see how something like that, which is really for the greater good in the vast scheme of things, might be misinterpreted by local law enforcement as a crime.

So, yes, the fact of the matter is, I have been hauled before the cops any number of times, much to my poor mother's chagrin. However, with the exception of that unfortunate incident that had landed me in the hospital some months previously, I had not done anything lately, that I could think of, that could even remotely be construed as unlawful.

So it was with some curiosity, but little trepidation, that I followed the officers - Knightley and Jones - out of the pool area and behind the Pool House Grill, near the Dumpsters, the closest area where, I suppose, the officers felt we could be assured total privacy for our little chat.

"Miss Simon," Officer Knightley, the taller policeman, began, as I watched a lizard dart out of the shade of a nearby rhododendron, look at us in alarm, and then dart back into the shadows. "Are you acquainted with a Dr. Clive Clemmings?"

I was shocked into admitting that I was. The last thing I had expected Officer Knightley to mention was Dr. Clive Clemmings, Ph.D. I was thinking something more along the lines of, oh, I don't know. Taking an eight-year-old off hotel property without his parents' permission.

Stupid, I know, but Paul had really rattled me with that one.

"Why?" I asked. "Is he - Mr. Clemmings - all right?"

"Unfortunately, no," Officer Jones said. "He's dead."

"Dead?" I wanted to reach out for something to hold onto. Unfortunately there wasn't anything to grab except the Dumpster, and since it was filled with the remains of that afternoon's lunch, I didn't want to touch it.

I settled for sinking down onto the curb.

Clive Clemmings? My mind was racing. Clive Clemmings dead? How? Why? I hadn't liked Clive Clemmings, of course. I'd been hoping that when Jesse's body turned up, I could go back to his office and rub it in his face. You know, the whole part about Jesse having been murdered after all.

Only now it looked as if I wouldn't get the chance.

"What happened?" I asked, gazing up at the cops bewilderedly.

"We're not sure, precisely," Officer Knightley said. "He was found this morning at his desk at the historical society, dead from an apparent heart attack. According to the receptionist's sign-in log, you were one of the few people who saw him yesterday."

Only then did I remember that the lady behind the reception desk had made me sign in. Damn!

"Well," I said, heartily - but not too heartily, I hoped. "He was fine when I talked to him."

"Yes," Officer Knightley said. "We're aware of that. It's not Dr. Clemmings's death we're here about."

"It isn't?" Wait a minute. What was going on?

"Miss Simon," Officer Jones said. "When Dr. Clemmings was found this morning, it was also discovered than an item of particular value to the historical society was missing. Something you apparently looked at, with Dr. Clemmings, just yesterday."

The letters. Maria's letters. They were gone. They had to be. She had come and taken them, and Clive Clemmings had caught a glimpse of her somehow and had had a heart attack from the shock of seeing the woman in the portrait behind his desk walking around his office.

"A small painting." Officer Knightley had to refer to his notepad. "A miniature of someone named Hector de Silva. The receptionist, Mrs. Lampbert, says Dr. Clemmings told her you were particularly interested in it."

This information, so unexpected, shook me. Jesse's portrait? Jesse's portrait was gone from the collection? But who would have taken that? And why?

I did not have to feign my innocence for once as I stammered, "I - I looked at the painting, yes. But I didn't take it or anything. I mean, when I left, Mr. - Dr. Clemmings was putting it away."

Officers Knightley and Jones exchanged glances. Before they could say anything more, however, someone came around the corner of the Pool House.

It was Paul Slater.

"Is there a problem with my brother's baby-sitter. Officers?" he demanded in a bored voice that suggested - to me, anyway - that the Slater family's employees were often being dragged off for questioning by members of law enforcement.

"Excuse me," Officer Knightley said, sounding really very offended. "But as soon as we are done questioning this witness, we - "

Paul whipped off his sunglasses and barked, "Are you aware that Miss Simon is a minor? Shouldn't you be questioning her in the presence of her parents?"

Officer Jones blinked a few times. "Pardon me, uh, sir," he began, though it was clear he didn't really consider Paul a sir, seeing as how he was under eighteen and all. "The young lady isn't under arrest. We're just asking her a few - "

"If she isn't under arrest," Paul said swiftly, "then she doesn't have to speak to you at all, does she?"