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It wasn’t, no. But it was liable to be more than his friends were capable of at the moment. Ellery didn’t say that, though. He could feel Jack’s frustration and worry. And that frustration and worry was understandable.

Jack’s tone changed. “Ellery, you need to be very careful. If there was any other way to get what I need done, I wouldn’t be putting you front and center on someone’s radar. But there isn’t. So please do everything you can to make it seem like you’re just following orders. Collect the information and let them know that it’s going straight to me. Do not, under any circumstances, pursue any angle or line of inquiry on your own. Please promise me that.”

For once that was an easy promise to make.

“I give you my word. The last thing I want to do is find out one of my friends is capable of-of murder.”

Jack returned tersely, “Yeah, well one of your friends ismorethan capable. So don’t forget it.”

Chapter Seventeen

The request to hand over electronics went about as well as Ellery had imagined it would.

And, as he’d anticipated, explaining Jack’s reasoning made zero difference.

“How are we going to influence or contaminate each other’s recollections when we don’tknowanything?” Tosh questioned. “We were all in bed.”

There was no way to argue with that without revealing that Edwin Dolph was dead and someone—a member of their close-knit circle—had murdered Chelsea.

Conscious of Jack’s warning to stay off the killer’s radar, Ellery had no choice but to pretend to be in agreement.

“I think Jack’s just following standard procedure,” he explained. It sounded lame to his own ears.

“I’m sure that’s true,” Freddie agreed. “This is exactly what we did in an episode ofLAPD Blues. Detective Bolton and his team are in Alaska and they get caught up in a local murder investigation. The small-town cops insist they all stay in their own motel rooms, and of course the killer tries to pick them off one by one.”

“Great,” Flip muttered. “Can’t wait for that part.”

Tosh said, “But it’s not standard procedure forus. We’re not murder suspects.”

“Why would we make it easier for someone to pick us off one by one?” Lenny asked, which was a reasonable question.

Seeing that he was not going to win this battle, Ellery had to let it go.

However, when it came to blocking off the secret passage entrances in the cellar and the hidden room off the dining room, that was a different matter. He got full and enthusiasticcooperation in stacking boxes and barrels in the cellar, and tables, chairs and chests in the dining room.

“If he’s still in there, he’s not getting out,” Oscar said with bleak satisfaction as the last dining room chair was stacked onto the precarious tower of furniture cutting off access to the hidden closet.

Flip said, “The problem is, even Ellery doesn’t know how many passages there are in this house. Or where they all lead.”

“Thanks for sharing that thought out loud,” Lenny said.

Flip shrugged. “It’s the truth. If we’re going to survive, we have to be realistic.”

Ellery said hastily, “I’msurewe’re going to survive. What sense would it make for Dolph to come after us? He’s probably long gone by now.”

“What sense did it make for him to go after Chelsea? The guy is crazy, Ell. I don’t think he’s worried about making good choices.”

“I don’t understand what Chelsea was doing down here,” Lenny said thoughtfully. “And she had to be down here because if he’d dragged her out of her room, that would have created ahugeruckus.”

“Right. True,” Ellery said weakly. He hated lying even when he had good material. This material? Spun of cobwebs and Jack’s hopeful delusions.

“So why did she come down to the library?”

“Maybe she couldn’t sleep?” Flip suggested. “Maybe she was looking for something to read.”

Of course, this was exactly what Jack didn’t want: his cast of suspects putting their heads together to work out plausible explanations for everything that had happened.

By then it was almost five a.m., though you’d never know it by looking out the window. The only light, as far as the eye could see, came from moonlight glimmering on snow.