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right over my head.
    “What I think is—you’d better go buy a new suit for theEmmys, kiddo.” I jump out of my chair and sit down again, clamping both my hands on the top of my head. The pencil in my hair falls out and clatters onto the floor. “Listen, Franklin. A peculiar thing happened at Melanie’s. She insisted her husband had sent me an e-mail. The day before he went missing, she said. And she was wondering why I never answered him.”
    “Sent you an e-mail? Did she say what it was about?” Franklin rubs his chin, considering. “It’s freaky that he writes you, then dies in a car accident.”
    “No kidding. Creepy. And no, Melanie said she didn’t know what it was about. But I will bet you ten million dollars he was writing to tell me he was either the whistle-blower in that lawsuit you found, or wanted to spill the facts of the case. Or something like that.”
    Franklin and I always bet ten million dollars. Sometimes one or the other of us is up or down a hundred million or so, but eventually it always evens out.
    “And that means,” I continue, “somewhere in Bradley Foreman’s files, or in his computer or in his notes, there could be some amazing documents. Maybe—the proof his company is somehow ripping off the government.” I pause, nodding. “Here’s an idea. Since Melanie says Brad wrote to me, let’s see if she’ll let us take a look around.”
    Franklin shakes his head. “No way.”
    “Way,” I insist. “This could be a major-league story. I think he did send that e-mail, maybe I even read it. I didn’t find it again because I was looking under Aztrat-e-k, spelled wrong. And then I searched for his name, but maybe he didn’t put his name in the letter.”
    Big finish. “So I’ll be happy to wager his e-mail is right now waiting right here in my little computer, and I’m goingto be able to find it in about two seconds. Brad Foreman’s the whistle-blower, and we have our story.” I sit back in my chair in triumph. Yes. I love to be right.
    “You’ve got mail.”
    The techno-voice interrupts my find-Brad’s-message mission. I click it open. Meet me at the usual place, the message says. Big G!
    Big Gossip. My best friend Maysie has such a flair for the dramatic. She’s the only woman working upstairs at Channel 3’s all-sports radio station, so she’s pretty much turned the ladies’ restroom into her private sanctuary. It’s also our usual place to chat and trade info, sort of a secret clubhouse for grown-ups.
    “Back in a second,” I tell Franklin. I sprint up to the fourth floor, and open the door marked W. Maysie’s sprawled in the black canvas director’s chair she’s appropriated for her hideout, her shoeless feet perched on the counter under the mirror, the sports pages balanced on her outstretched legs. Her ponytailed hair, still naturally dark brown, is tucked under a Celtics cap, and as usual, she’s not wearing a stitch of makeup. Radio is so easy.
    “Hey, Brenda.” She welcomes me with a wave, then refolds her paper and gestures me to the guest seat on the counter. She knows I’m uncomfortable with the “Brenda Starr” nickname, since I’m hardly as glamorous and definitely not a comic book journalist. But she thinks it’s hilarious. And she means well. “Heard you on the newsbreak. How’d that happen?”
    I spin out the mystery of the vanishing anchorwoman and describe how secretive Angela was. “And Teddy said something like, ‘She’d better be dead,’” I report. “Maybe there’s more to this. Maybe heads are going to roll.”
    But Maysie only laughs. “That was a trick question,” she says, eyes twinkling. “I actually have the total scoop.”
    “Tell all,” I demand. Ellen’s apparently not dead. And there’s nothing like someone else’s life chaos to put things into perspective.
    “Let’s just say…” Maysie pauses. “The ‘new face of Channel 3’ will be facing a judge instead of a camera. She has now learned, in a most