Crazy Lady (40 page)

In Vancouver, Trina is back to chasing her guinea pig, while Inspector Mike Phillips still sits on the report linking Dave Brougham with Craddock, Janet's abductor.

Jody Craddock, ex-cop turned private investigator, is still in Hawaii, but no one takes any particular notice of the broken hobo who scavenges the garbage bins alongside the gulls and iguanas on the outskirts of Hilo.

In Dewminster, England, Amelia Drinkwater has stood down from the bench, much to the relief of the local constabulary, and hits the bottle while she awaits a verdict.

The warm Provençal sun lights up the fortress on the island of Ste. Marguerite the following morning as Bliss sits on the promenade in St-Juan-sur-Mer with his pen poised over a plain sheet of paper.

“Daavid?” queries Daisy, appearing from nowhere. “I zhought you had gone.”

“No, Daisy,” he replies as he gazes towards the Château Roger on the promontory. “I was just chasing a dream.” And then he looks deeply into her dark Mediterranean eyes
and reaches out to touch her hand, asking, “Would you like to have dinner with me this evening?”

Daisy's broad smile gives him the answer, but then she asks, “What about your novel and
l'homme au masque de fer
— zhe Man in zhe Iron Mask?”

“I shall set him free,” says Bliss as he bends to write the last sentence in his book. “He was a passionate and good man who was just the unwitting victim of a very cruel trick.”