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Authors: Monica Ferris
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not a gallant one, at that.
Which was not what he wanted to think about. He wanted to think about sleuthing. He’d thought he’d be a natural. Wasn’t he nosy? Even nosier than Betsy, if it came to that. Wasn’t he able to charm almost anyone into talking to him? Hadn’t he gone to places where he knew he could get people to talk to him, where he knew many of the people he would talk to? And hadn’t he found that Bob Germaine was living a secret second life? And yet the way she’d looked at him and his deductions…
He’d watched Betsy’s techniques as she investigated crimes over the past few years. He’d hung on her every word at the end of her cases and absorbed her explanations. It wasn’t hard, she always said. She’d just talk to people and gather their meanings, hidden and obvious, until a pattern emerged. And that’s what he’d done, talked and listened. And he brought home lots and lots of good information.
So why did it seem to him that she wasn’t fully satisfied with his results?
The deep thinking this was calling for was getting a bit hard, so he reached for the remote and turned off the television. He continued working on the sock, which was one begun at the toe and ending at the cuff. He was at the cuff, knit one, purl one, very easy, and he liked a nice, long cuff. Betsy often said that knitting something simple freed her mind to think, to ponder, which she defined as a deeper kind of thinking. He sat back in his big, comfy chair, allowing his mind to ponder.
He hadn’t done everything wrong. For example, Betsy had been very impressed with his idea that Bob Germaine had decided to come out of the closet with a big, bad, dishonest act, make a statement, so that was probably true—Betsy had a nose for the truth that was at least as good as his own.
But she had seemed particularly nose-wrinkly at his vision of Bob sailing down a highway with his silver-haired lover, which Godwin thought was a particularly fine piece of deduction. Why didn’t she like that one?
He pondered that for a while before deciding it was too many for him—he’d read that expression in a Mark Twain story once upon a time and really liked it—“too many for him,” meaning he just couldn’t figure it out—that was sharp. But knowing it was too many didn’t solve the problem. He knew his next assignment was going to be to talk to the women who had been at the EGA convention banquet, which was going to be a lot harder than talking to friends around the city. Maybe he’d better ask Betsy about her expectations, or at least get some solid instructions about his methods. That decision settled his mind enough that he could tuck his knitting away and go off to his lonely little bed for the night.
B ETSY, struggling gingerly into a fresh nightgown, reflected on Godwin’s efforts. Godwin had many talents, and his admiration for Betsy’s sleuthing ability was as charming as it was sincere. But his ambition to emulate her, to be a sleuth himself, was, she feared, not something he could do reliably.
Godwin had gone investigating to prove his already-drawn conclusion that Bob Germaine was a closeted gay man. Which was almost all right. He had told Betsy that Germaine was gay before they talked about his sleuthing. The problem was, he found a number of people who helped support his theory, and felt his mission was accomplished. Perhaps if he’d talked to more people, he might have found some who disagreed with his theory, perhaps with facts to back them up.
But what put the cap on the thing, she thought, was his imaginative description of Bob Germaine driving his Lexus down a long highway with a handsome, wealthy, mature lover in the passenger seat—there was not a shred of evidence to indicate this scenario was more than a happy dream—and one close to Godwin’s own heart. Who knew what Bob Germaine’s dreams were?
She sank carefully into bed, laying sheet and blanket tenderly over her mending leg. She had a
Which was not what he wanted to think about. He wanted to think about sleuthing. He’d thought he’d be a natural. Wasn’t he nosy? Even nosier than Betsy, if it came to that. Wasn’t he able to charm almost anyone into talking to him? Hadn’t he gone to places where he knew he could get people to talk to him, where he knew many of the people he would talk to? And hadn’t he found that Bob Germaine was living a secret second life? And yet the way she’d looked at him and his deductions…
He’d watched Betsy’s techniques as she investigated crimes over the past few years. He’d hung on her every word at the end of her cases and absorbed her explanations. It wasn’t hard, she always said. She’d just talk to people and gather their meanings, hidden and obvious, until a pattern emerged. And that’s what he’d done, talked and listened. And he brought home lots and lots of good information.
So why did it seem to him that she wasn’t fully satisfied with his results?
The deep thinking this was calling for was getting a bit hard, so he reached for the remote and turned off the television. He continued working on the sock, which was one begun at the toe and ending at the cuff. He was at the cuff, knit one, purl one, very easy, and he liked a nice, long cuff. Betsy often said that knitting something simple freed her mind to think, to ponder, which she defined as a deeper kind of thinking. He sat back in his big, comfy chair, allowing his mind to ponder.
He hadn’t done everything wrong. For example, Betsy had been very impressed with his idea that Bob Germaine had decided to come out of the closet with a big, bad, dishonest act, make a statement, so that was probably true—Betsy had a nose for the truth that was at least as good as his own.
But she had seemed particularly nose-wrinkly at his vision of Bob sailing down a highway with his silver-haired lover, which Godwin thought was a particularly fine piece of deduction. Why didn’t she like that one?
He pondered that for a while before deciding it was too many for him—he’d read that expression in a Mark Twain story once upon a time and really liked it—“too many for him,” meaning he just couldn’t figure it out—that was sharp. But knowing it was too many didn’t solve the problem. He knew his next assignment was going to be to talk to the women who had been at the EGA convention banquet, which was going to be a lot harder than talking to friends around the city. Maybe he’d better ask Betsy about her expectations, or at least get some solid instructions about his methods. That decision settled his mind enough that he could tuck his knitting away and go off to his lonely little bed for the night.
B ETSY, struggling gingerly into a fresh nightgown, reflected on Godwin’s efforts. Godwin had many talents, and his admiration for Betsy’s sleuthing ability was as charming as it was sincere. But his ambition to emulate her, to be a sleuth himself, was, she feared, not something he could do reliably.
Godwin had gone investigating to prove his already-drawn conclusion that Bob Germaine was a closeted gay man. Which was almost all right. He had told Betsy that Germaine was gay before they talked about his sleuthing. The problem was, he found a number of people who helped support his theory, and felt his mission was accomplished. Perhaps if he’d talked to more people, he might have found some who disagreed with his theory, perhaps with facts to back them up.
But what put the cap on the thing, she thought, was his imaginative description of Bob Germaine driving his Lexus down a long highway with a handsome, wealthy, mature lover in the passenger seat—there was not a shred of evidence to indicate this scenario was more than a happy dream—and one close to Godwin’s own heart. Who knew what Bob Germaine’s dreams were?
She sank carefully into bed, laying sheet and blanket tenderly over her mending leg. She had a
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