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a lad working for the caterer,” Ursi said, clearly bursting to convey the gossip that was traveling up and down the Boulevard at the speed of sound. Thanks to the invention of the cellular telephone, this crowd could now swap stories while waiting in line at the supermarket, lounging on the beach and, horror of horrors, while driving. “It must have been one of his friends who did it,” she pronounced. “Most likely over a girl.”
    No story in Palm Beach, above and below stairs, is ever complete without a hint of romance thrown in to thicken the plot. “It was my thought, too,” I told her; merely confirming what she had heard from Maria. “If it is murder, the police have the names and addresses of all the suspects.”
    Jamie, who had been looking at his newspaper since I came down to breakfast but had yet to turn a page, offered, “Mr. Van Fleet’s man, Abe Calhoun, told me the cigarette they fished out of the pool was pure cannabis. Look for a drug connection.”
    Jamie doesn’t say much but when he does it’s a mouthful. If the boy was high he could very well have fallen into the pool and been too disoriented to pull himself out. “If that’s true,” I said to Jamie, “this is a whole new ball game. I don’t see a drug hit over a little grass, but it could have incapacitated the boy. Where did Calhoun hear this?”
    “He didn’t say,” Jamie confessed and went back to pretending to read his newspaper.
    The rumors were already flying fast, high and wide and, par for the course, mostly unfounded. I didn’t bother to tell Jamie that the cigarette I saw floating in the pool had a filter tip.
    “What did you think of Holga von Brecht, Archy?” Like the media, Ursi segued from Jeffrey Rodgers’s death to social commentary with nary a backward glance. “They say she’s ninety years old if she’s a day.”
    “That would be pushing it by forty years, at least,” I said. “She’s a beautiful woman with good skin. If she’s had a little work it was done by an expert.”
    “It’s the injections,” Ursi gushed. “The doctor in Switzerland invented some concoction that works better than plastic surgery. The years fade away after each shot. It’s derived from—well, I don’t want to spoil your appetite.”
    The more I heard about this doctor’s anti-aging vaccine the less I wanted to know about it. “There is no magic formula, Ursi. There are just those who age better than others but there will always be a hustler to cash in on the less fortunate. Now tell me your secret?”
    That got a laugh from Ursi and a grunt from her husband. “Whatever her age, they say she’s bewitched the Talbot boy.”
    So bewitched was Ursi with murder, rejuvenation and May/December coupling, she neglected to offer me a second cup of coffee. Very unusual for our Ursi, but this was just the first anomaly in a day rife with surprises.
    In fact and fiction, the police and private investigators go together like a lit match and a short fuse. Al Rogoff and I are the exception to the rule for a variety of reasons, mainly because we don’t compete. When working on the same case, which happens surprisingly often, we keep each other informed and gladly take a back seat when the other is in hot pursuit.
    Also, we don’t mix socially. It’s no secret that I’m one of Palm Beach’s most eligible bachelors, though my society connections come just as much from my last name as from my own charm. Al is also a bachelor, a big, beefy guy whose charm is, well, a bit more elusive. He may mangle the English language and prefer a Big Mac to a rack of lamb, but his appreciation and love of classical music, opera and ballet are awesome.
    I have knowledge of and entrée into the Palm Beach social scene and he has all the amazing paraphernalia of a modern crime-fighting force at his disposal. In short, we are an odd couple dynamic duo sans the black tights and capes, but don’t tell Al I said that.
    Sergeant Rogoff and I have several