Afterward Beth wondered why he hadn't just taken the picture of his great grandmother if that was the reason for this whole crazy quest. In the excitement no one would have questioned it, no one really would have known it was gone.

She was glad she hadn't seen the dead guy, not even in the body bag when they took him out. It was sad enough seeing that poor woman with her face streaked with blood.

The bag she knew was made of vinyl and zipped from end to end like a sleeping bag but closing over his head. In their car they had a soft-sided cooler, an insulated bag where they kept drinks cool while they drove, the teeth of its zipper large and shiny.

The ride home was like a funeral procession in a dream where they had somehow gotten lost, detached from all the others cars.

The things you thought she thought. It was peaceful in the mountains, the light at dusk along the ridges as blue as their name.

Eleanore of Castile was so mourned by her husband, Edward I, that he erected crosses at each place where her cortege stopped between Lincoln and Westminster.

She remembered the face of her great great grandmother in the picture. She had studied it while they waited for the state troopers. How brave her father was, how gentle with the lady murderer.

In English class they had read Macbeth. Lisle, her father's lover, told her that actors never called it that, never said it by name, because it was unlucky.

A murder most foul. The Scottish play.