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Mrs. Simm’s repeated staunchly, “Dr. Perry would never do anything he could be blackmailed for.”

Never was a long time. But Archie agreed with her. He just couldn’t picture John committing insurance fraud or medical malpractice or writing fake scrips or running a pill mill or falsifying patient records or doing any of the many things that might conceivably get doctors into trouble.

He said, “Anyway, how would anyone know he was pulling out large sums? How would a rumor like that get started?”

“I’ve no idea. It seems to me it would be an ethical violation to share that kind of information.”

“At the least.” Archie sipped his coffee, and Mrs. Simms moved away to wash up the breakfast pans.

As he was finishing up his meal, Archie said, “Simmy, did John say anything about leaving a letter for me?”

She glanced up from the mixing bowl—he was afraid to ask what she was preparing next. Cookies? A cake? There had always been plenty of that in the old days, though Archie didn’t eat many sweets. John did. And Beau did.

“No,” she said slowly. “But it would be in the safe, wouldn’t it?”

“I’d have thought so, but the police went through the safe and there was no letter.”

“Are you sure there is such a letter?”

“I hope so. Ms. Madison seemed pretty sure of it.”

“Then it must be somewhere else in the house.”

They stared at each other, but no bolt of enlightenment struck.

“Perhaps his bedroom? Perhaps your bedroom?” she suggested.

Not his bedroom or he’d have surely found it by now.

“Maybe? Thanks.” Archie finished his last bite of breakfast.

“More coffee?”

Archie agreed to more coffee, and Mrs. Simms topped up his mug.

“It’s going to be hard going back to real life after this,” Archie admitted. A homemade meal that didn’t include MREs or franks and beans? Heaven.

Her little smile was just a touch complacent, but she said seriously, “I think Dr. Perry hoped this would be your real life.”

Archie didn’t have a ready answer for that. He settled for an apologetic, noncommittal smile.

Mrs. Simms said, “You liked working at the Portland FBI office, as I recall.”

“Yep. I did. But I’m based in Washington D.C. now.”

She considered and sighed. “I suppose you love D.C. You always longed for big cities and bright lights.”

Archie smiled faintly at the bright lights comment. It was true that he couldn’t wait to get out of Twinkleton, to get back to “civilization.” But it turned out, he wasn’t that crazy about D.C.’s bright lights. He had never been much for the nightlife or social scene. He was not and never would be a party animal. The job in D.C. had been all about career advancement and doing something that really mattered.

Mrs. Simms returned to her mixing bowl, remarking, “Well, maybe we’ll win you over. Dr. Perry said it would be a while before you were well enough to go back to work.”

Archie couldn’t help an amused, “You don’t have to sound so happy about it.”

Simmy looked abashed, but then chuckled.

After breakfast, Archie returned to John’s study and opened the safe hidden behind the gold-framed full-length, door-sized portrait of Jacqueline McCabe.

He had half expected that John might have changed the combination over the years and forgot to tell him, but nope. It was the same exact sequence of numbers John had shared when Archie turned twenty-one.