Fire Engine Dead by Sheila Connolly Page A

and said, “Nell, I’ll take it from here. You don’t have to do anything more.”
    “My, that sounds familiar. You do know I’ll be talking to Peter, right?”
    “Just give him what he asked for about the collections, okay?”
    “No problem. But what do I do if Marty comes tearing in and starts demanding action?”
    “Send her to me. Period. All right?”
    “Yes, sir. Certainly, sir.” I refrained from saluting.
    “Nell, I’m serious. One man is dead, and now I’m not so sure that was an accident.”
    My flippant mood evaporated. “I know. You take care, too, James.”
    “I will. Good night, Nell.”

CHAPTER 6
    When Marty came stomping into my office the next morning, brushing past Eric without even looking at him, I had a pretty good idea what she was mad about. Of course, the crumpled copy of the
Inquirer
crushed in her fist was a solid clue. She threw herself into a chair, her face flushed. “Somebody pulled a fast one!” She glared at me.
    James had told me not to talk to her about this, but as I had anticipated, she’d figured it out all by herself. At this rate, it was going to be difficult to keep a lid on things, but luckily I didn’t think many people would look very hard at the picture and put two and two together. I thought briefly about playing dumb, but Marty deserved better, and I wasn’t very good at it anyway.
    “Shut the door, please, Marty.” I waited until she had complied. “I think you’re right. But think of it this way—that means the Terwilliger fire truck is probably alive and well somewhere.”
    “Yeah, but my grandfather gave that to the museum so people could enjoy it! And now some jerk has made off with it and destroyed the museum’s collection at the same time.”
    “And possibly killed somebody in the process,” I added quietly.
    Marty seemed to shrink just a bit. “Right. Sorry. I’m being selfish.” She stopped ranting long enough to realize what I’d said. “Wait—you knew? When did you figure this out?”
    “Yesterday.” I waited for her wrath to descend and was not disappointed.
    “
Yesterday?
When were you planning to tell me?”
    “I haven’t seen you since then. And it’s not as though you’re responsible for doing something about it. That’s up to the police.”
    She eyed me critically. “Does Jimmy know?”
    I nodded mutely.
    She jumped out of her chair. “What? You told him before you told me?”
    “Marty, he’s law enforcement. This is arson and maybe murder and fraud. What do you think you can do that he and the police can’t do a whole lot better?”
    She deflated again and dropped back into her chair. I was getting exhausted just watching her. “I know, you’re right. Official business and all that crap. What’s Jimmy’s take?”
    I shrugged. “He didn’t tell me. Since he only just found out himself”—I thought I wouldn’t mention that I was the one who had pointed it out to him—“I don’t know if he’s had any time to get balls rolling or wheels turning or whatever it takes. At least the police were smart enough to ask the FBI for help.”
    “Yeah, for once.” She thought for a few moments. “What do you think the point was? Money? Or maybe the fire was the main purpose, to cripple the museum, and whoever set the fire couldn’t bear to destroy the engine? Oh, but that would mean the person had to know it was there, which points to an inside job.”
    I sat back and stared at her. “Marty, why are you assuming that the museum and its collection was the primary target? It was a big warehouse, and there were others involved. James said they had to look at everybody.”
    “Unless this was one of those creepy arson-for-fun crimes, do you know of anything else there worth destroying? The fact that the prize fire engine has gone missing kind of points straight at the museum, don’t you think?”
    She had a point—trust Marty to connect the dots. Interesting that she’d gone straight to motive. “At the museum, or