Some of you put a bee in my bonnet about Sarah, so I headed by her place when I went downtown.  I wanted to check out Jack's alibi and maybe get some contact info so that my… little helpers… could jaw with her and see if I missed anything.  The store is closed Mondays, but I sure didn't miss the view on the way over there.  For a small town, Bay Horse has quite a few choice bits of calico roaming around downtown on a weekday. I jawed with the stuffed shirt in the city hall for a while, and convinced them to put some obituaries up on the Bay Horse website. Maybe there'll be something interesting there. After that, I decided to kill time, and a few soldiers, in the local bar.

My night started with a poker game and ended at a grave. I don't know which was more disturbing. Sometimes I think I need to find another line of work, but how else can a guy like me make a living? 

Somehow I had gotten it into my thick skull that the dead would have perfect poker faces and I, the only warm body in the room, would be the one losing my shirt. Let me tell you, I was wrong. Emerson always looks like he is ready for the kill, but that sour puss would roll his eyes and gnash his teeth the moment he got a bad card, then he'd glare at Nick even when he wasn't dealing. Emerson did that when I asked him about "the system" too. Nick just laughed. There's gotta be history there.

I asked Emerson why he was suddenly being so pally and he laughed and told me that bodies (his word; I guess the dead have their lingo too) are terrible at cards. He was in the mood to win. I did my best to prove him right and threw the game as much as possible. I was more interested in learning about my new friends than winning their battered old chips. Besides, I didn't have anywhere to cash them in.

When we started throwing down the cards, I kept hearing a faint "thunk pause shhhh" sound outside somewhere.  I put it down to a bum heating pump.  These old houses are harder to maintain than my drinking habit.

 So here's what I managed to worm out of them:

I mentioned that someone heard Mr. Emerson talk about "Roger." Nick went even whiter than usual.  I guess an upstage guy like him doesn't often get caught sticking his nose in another man's potatoes. Emerson just asked me if I liked my pa. I told him that was none of his beeswax, and he laughed, and said that Roger didn't become respectable until it was too late for him. No, he said "Roger didn't get his head on straight and become respectable until it was too late for me." He dried up after that, only talked about the game, so I decided to ask the priest a few questions.

Specifically I asked him why he was gambling with the likes of us. Wouldn't God look down on him? Sam just laughed and told me to look at him. 

"See the chair behind me?" he asked. Of course I could, and said so.

"Does it look like God cares what I do? I already gambled once, and lost. A few poker hands can't make things worse." I know the feeling.

A hand later, I looked at my new buddy Sam while I mentioned that the heat was dreadful. I guess a few slugs of hard liquor don't do wonder for a man's subtlety. He just rolled his eyes and told me that it wasn't as hot as his gamble. He played a killer bluff that round, but he wasn't talking about cards. 

Towards the end of my time with them, I asked the three about the "DZ" and "DM" initials that I found outside Z's window. Nick looked really uncomfortable and I think he was about to spill the beans when I heard a dame scream outside!

I'm no hero, but my legs seem to have missed the memo. Before I knew it, I was down the stairs and outside. Man or ghost, I was ready to fight. Fate wasn't smiling on me though, and the moment I burst through the door a figure in the cemetery took off running toward the church. I rabbited after him, but cut myself short when I almost fell into a half-emptied grave. An off-kilter flashlight made it clear that the other half was full of Madame Z.

My blood ran cold and I wasted no time digging the poor woman out. That's when I noticed Nick had come out with me, and was hovering over me like a nancy, looking anxiously at her and then back at the house. I think I saw Jasmine looking down at us from a window, but I could be mistaken. At the time, all I was concerned about was getting Z out of the hole. That didn't take long at all, and it turns out Z was fine apart from a bump on the noggin. As soon as I pulled her out of the hole she grabbed me and looked at me like a doe in front of headlights.

"I was attacked by a mortal man! He hit me! He, oh-"

Z fainted dead away. I carried her back to her house and called a sawbones to look in at her. Z has a mild concussion but she'll be right as rain soon enough.

She was right though.  It looks like there's an unsavory man or woman hanging around the Wylie house. I can't help but wonder… is he or she working alone?

Looks like this investigation isn't close to being over.  I figure I can use as much outside help as I can get, so I got the bird down at the internet café to set me up with one of those 'aim' accounts as 'pi jeffries'.  I'll try to get on as much as possible, but I'll make sure to be on Friday at 4 central.  Let's crack this case.