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“Possible,” Odelia allowed, “but unlikely. Why would Rose kill her father and then cry wolf? The police have accepted his death as a suicide, so if she’s the killer she would have kept her mouth shut and wouldn’t have asked me to investigate.”

“Or it could be that because she’s guilty she hired you as a way of throwing the suspicion off herself,” I countered. “She didn’t know that night that the police were going to treat her father’s death as a suicide. She could have been hedging her bets.”

“Yeah, but then why did she visit me this morning? By that time it was clear my uncle wasn’t going to investigate further.”

“I still don’t think we should exclude Rose as a potential suspect,” I said. “She had motive, opportunity and means, so there’s that.”

“All right,” said Odelia with a smile and a glance at me through the rearview mirror. “I’ll put her on my list of suspects, Detective Max.”

“That’s all I’m asking,” I said, returning her smile.

“And what about Dick?” asked Dooley. “Is he on the list of suspects, too?”

“Who’s Dick?” asked Odelia, puzzled.

“Dick—the man who sent the picture of his sausage to Rose.”

“Oh, him,” she said with a grin. “Yes, Dooley. I’ll be sure to put him on my suspect list, too.”

We’d arrived at our destination, and I glanced up at the house whose owner had been instrumental in supplying Daphne Wimmer with a solid alibi. I liked Mrs. Wimmer. It’s hard enough for a woman to enter a new relationship where one of the partners has a kid from a previous marriage, but having toface a rebellious teenager who likes to dump a boyfriend like Cole Donalds on the mat and then duke it out with her dad isn’t much fun. And now she’d have to raise the recalcitrant teen all on her own.

The home where Daphne’s friend lived was a nice big house, with a cute little apron of green out in front, behind a picket fence. The mailbox had one of those flags that indicate mail has arrived, and I could see several garden gnomes standing at attention. Tex, an avid garden gnome aficionado, would have yipped at the sight.

Odelia rang the doorbell and soon the lady of the manor opened the door. She was a smallish woman with shoulder-length brown hair and a kindly face. She was wiping her hands on her apron, and I could smell the delicious scent of freshly baked cake wafting from inside the house.

“Come on in,” said the woman. “You must be Odelia Poole. And are these your darlings?”

“Yeah, these are Max and Dooley,” said Odelia. “I hope you don’t mind that I brought them along? They like to go where I go.”

“Oh, no problem at all,” said the woman, and already I was warming to her to a great degree. An Avon ladyand a cat lady. Definitely a woman after my own heart.

“Take a seat,” said the woman as she gestured to a cozy sofa in the bright and airy living room. “I have to take this cake out of the oven but I’ll be with you in a second. Can I offer you anything? Coffee? Tea?”

“Coffee will be fine,” said Odelia, who’s something of a coffee addict.

Unfortunately she didn’t offer us any refreshments, but I decided to overlook this minor faux-pas. I was sure that soon she would rectify this oversight by presenting us with a nice bowl filled with goodies.

This is one of the reasons I enjoy accompanying Odelia on these interviews: you get to see how the other half eats. And join in.

“So what can I do for you?” said our hostess as she placed a tray with two cups of coffee on the coffee table and took a seat.

“Well, as I told you over the phone I was asked by Rose Wimmer to look into the sudden death of her father two nights ago,” Odelia began, “and now I’m trying to establish a timeline of events, and trying to figure out where everyone was at the time of Mr. Wimmer’s death.”

“Daphne told me all about it. Terrible, isn’t it? Such a tragedy for the family. He wasn’t even fifty yet. And a young daughter. Terrible—just terrible.”

“So you and Daphne are friends? Or colleagues?”

“Friends and colleagues,” said Mrs. Ojala with a nod. “We’ve known each other since we both worked as secretaries for Jackson Securities, an investment company that went belly-up a couple of years ago. By the time the company failed Daphne had already moved on, having just gotten married toDino Wimmer. I stayed, but could see that things weren’t going well. So when Daphne suggested I join her in selling Avon products, I decided after long consideration to take the leap. And we’ve been proud Avon representatives ever since—and with great success, I might add.”

“And you and Daphne had one of your Avon events two nights ago?”

“Yes, we had back-to-back events all weekend. So Daphne decided to stay over. It’s something we’ve gotten into the habit of doing. We like to call it our bi-weekly slumber parties.” She smiled. “Mixing business with pleasure. We have dinner, catch up—it’s always fun when it’s just us girls, without our husbands. Mike, that’s my husband, was out of town this weekend so it was just me and Daphne.”