Page 86

Ellery said, “The sleeping pills that are three years out of date? How many did you use?”

“How many were in the box?”

Ellery gaped at her.

“I couldn’t use the trazodone. He saw you set those containers to the side.” Tosh shook her head. “I could see that he knew exactly what you were planning. And if that was true, I knew that you...you must be right.” She wiped hastily at the glitter forming in the corners of her eyes.

“I can’t believe it,” Oscar said. “Freddie. He’s always been such a great guy.Why? Why would he do it?”

“There had to be something in your photos, Tosh,” Flip said. “Chelsea saw it. And Freddie knew she’d seen it.”

Tosh looked up. “No. That’s what you don’t understand. Freddie and I pored over those photos dozens of times when we were together. There’s nothing there. Nothing incriminating. Itcan’thave been the photos.”

“But why else?” Flip and Lenny looked at each other.

Oscar said, “Then Chelsea really did take your photos because she was obsessed with Freddie?”

Ellery said slowly, “In a way, yes. She was bluffing. She pretended there was something in those photos. Something no one else had noticed. And because Freddiewasguilty, he was afraid she was right.”

“But why would she do that?” Tosh protested. “If she knew—are we talking about Noah? If she knew Freddie was responsible, why would she have hidden it?”

“Oh, comeon,” Oscar said. “Now he’s a mass murderer? You guys. Get a grip!”

“Not a mass murderer,” Ellery said. “He might not even have planned to kill Noah. It might have just been a crime of opportunity. And Chelsea happened strictly because she was somehow threatening him.”

“But that doesn’t fit,” Lenny argued. “Chelsea was crazy about Freddie. I wouldn’t be surprised if she knew about Noah the whole time. She wouldn’t have threatened him. They were together the night before.”

Flip regarded Ellery. “I guess it depends on what you mean bythreaten?”

“Exactly,” Ellery said. “Chelseawasobsessed with Freddie. But she was also really unhappy with her career and her life, and Freddiehadoffered to help her. What if she convinced herself that she could get everything she wanted through Freddie,includingFreddie—that he might even be all for that?”

“Freddie wasn’t in love with her,” Tosh said with absolute certainty.

“Okay, but if he wasn’t, she could remind him that maybe he owed her something? She wouldn’t think of it as threatening him.”

“She’d see it as sweetening the pot,” Flip agreed.

“And really, whether Freddie believed her or not about the photos, from the point Chelsea started hinting about whatever it was she thought she knew, he’d start to see her as a problem that needed to be solved ASAP.”

“Do you hear yourselves?” Oscar said. “Freddie killed Chelsea because she knew he killed Noah.Why? Whywould hekill Noah? On impulse or otherwise? The police ruled it a hit-and-run.”

“Because Noah knew that Freddie was the dorm sneak thief.”

Ellery’s friends stared at him with a mix of expressions. ‘I mean, that’s my guess,” he said a little wearily.

Oscar said, “And that’s all it is. A wild guess, Ell.”

Tosh groaned and put her face in his hands. “God. He’s right.”

“He’sright?” Oscar echoed.

Tosh lowered her hands. “I found it. Your lucky gold piece, when I was going through Freddie’s jeans for the laundry. When we all still lived at Third Avenue North. I asked him about it, and he said he’d picked it up in the grass and was going to give it back to you. Which he did. But I had a funny feeling about it because that was like a week after you’d lost it. Except, I couldn’t believe the thief was Freddie. And then we moved from the dorm and we never had another problem with anyone stealing anything.”

Lenny said, “But Freddie had plenty of money. His parents were rich.”

“No, they weren’t.” Tosh sighed. “Freddie liked that image, but back then he was strapped for cash like everyone else.”

Ellery said to Oscar, “Is he breathing okay?”