"Maybe a break is best all around," I said.
Betsy looked up. "We're all here now. Why not try it again?"
Quinn shook his head. "I don't think we should."
"Why not? I have one situation you could try," Betsy offered. "It's a lot different than saving Timothy but you might help catch a serial killer."
"I don't think I want to . . ." Howie said.
"Just listen." My tenacious wife read from an Internet news site. The nude body of a young girl was found in a wooded area in southern Kentucky. Police called it the work of one person, attributed to at least six earlier deaths. An elderly woman in a nearby farm house heard a car stop, an unusual occurrence in so remote an area. She noted the time at two fifteen AM but didn't see the vehicle. She discovered the body in the morning when she walked her dog. The authorities planned extensive questioning in the vicinity but held out little hope anyone else saw the vehicle.
Betsy turned to Quinn. "You could find the farm house, couldn't you? It lists the woman's name and township."
"Look," I said to my wife, "We should give more thought to this. We're putting all of us at risk. We could be accused of giving false information, subject to ridicule, god knows what else!"
"Not if we're careful and not if it isn't false!"
I strained not to be at odds with my bride. "The least we should do is come up with a fool proof way of giving a tip that can't be traced back to us!"
"We could call on our way back home, half way to New York," she answered.
"How can we be sure Howie is always right?" Martha said. "We'd be accusing people of serious crimes!"
"Not really," Betsy said. "We're just pointing the police in a direction. They follow the tip and do their job. Think of the good we might be doing! Don't forget the Burton boy is alive because of us."
Perhaps enough of the euphoria of the prior day's success remained that, surprisingly, a reluctant agreement was reached. Between Betsy's internet searching and Quinn's calculations the location we sought was found. Once again we trekked downstairs. Under Martha's soothing, near hypnotizing voice, Howie fell asleep quickly. Thirty minutes later, the two emerged from the room, all smiles.
Gathered together upstairs, we heard their report. The farm house area was unlighted and as still as a tomb according to Howie. He waited in the dark nearly twenty minutes before hearing an automobile approach. It was some distance from the farm house and he thought he might not get to it before it left. He watched an overweight man open the trunk of his car and drag out a child-size bundle.