curse than a blessing. "Perhaps, if you think of the performance as a fictional role to play, it wouldn't bother you to recite the lines."
"I don't like being forced to do anything!"
"Jasmine!" Clint exclaimed, stunned by her outburst. "No one is forcing you to – "
"Oh no! You don't watch television, Clint. They're already running commercials advertising this special. There are shots in the advertisements of me at the bank and clips of the little girl's appearance on that program we watched together. The night before our tour is scheduled to air, the stations are going to rerun the entire episode of that talk show about Precious. I haven't even agreed to do the program, and our bank executives have made it practically impossible for me to refuse."
Clint's iron-gray brows lowered. "I didn't know about the commercials."
"What's your advice?"
The old man shrugged, looking somewhat baffled. Clint blathered in a pretense of solemnity, "As a general rule, I would say don't look a gift horse in the mou–"
"Oh for God's sake!" Jasmine exploded, slapping the table hard enough to make the plates jump. Her slightly slanted eyes rounded as she expostulated with the ceiling, "I invite the wisest man in the valley here, make him a lovely lunch, and the only insight he can offer is to recite one of the oldest, most worn-out clichés in existence." Jasmine lowered her glare to silently stare at Clint's stunned, bulging eyes and slackened jaw. They held each other's gaze for a quiet moment. Then both Clint and Jasmine erupted like volcanos, spewing molten streams of laughter across the table.
When the twin eruptions subsided, Jasmine wiped a tear. Clint shook his head and confessed, "I panicked. My brain went blank and burned. An over-roasted chestnut popped out of the fire. I'm terribly embarrassed." Clint paused. "I never claimed omniscience, Jasmine. This circumstance was beyond my experience. I'm sorry." Indigence's eyes suddenly widened as he was struck by a new thought. He immediately pleaded, "Please don't tell Mick!"
"I won't tell him," Jasmine pledged, looking less upset than she had since his arrival. Then she gave the old man a discerning look. "I've never seen you panic. You never speak in thoughtless platitudes. You only wanted to make me laugh."
"Well," Clint began judiciously, "according to my old copies of The Reader's Digest, laughter is the best medi–"
"Stop it, Clint!" Miss Jade hissed, but then she smiled. Clint and Jasmine began to tackle the, by then, slightly tepid cuisine.
Mick wolfed down a small portion of Sadie's corned beef and veritably sprinted across the meadows and up the hill to the cabin. The detective worked with smooth, precise movements. He gently blew the dust off the mantel's glass casket and used the kit's pilfered elements to lift
