Murder at Eagle Summit. Virginia Smith

unfair. After all, who was the injured party here? Who got dumped three weeks after announcing their engagement to his friends and his whole family? Who was left looking like a chump? He gathered his eyebrows into a scowl as Liz gave a halting account of her midnight view from the balcony.

      Sheriff Daniels let her finish before uttering a word. “Interesting. Did you notice what he was wearing?”

      “A bulky jacket, probably a ski jacket. It might have been black or some other dark color. I…” She squeezed her eyes shut. “I don’t know about the rest. I want to say jeans, but I can’t be sure. They could just as easily have been ski pants.”

      “And snowboarding boots?”

      She nodded, then hesitated. “I—I think so. I mean, if he was carrying a snowboard, surely he had on the boots.”

      “About how big was the snowboard he carried? And how did he carry it?”

      She shot Tim another quick glance that stabbed at him. Did the sheriff’s question bring to mind for her the time she helped him shop for the right size of snowboard, as it did to him? Her lips tightened for a moment before she answered. “I can’t say for sure how long it was. Four and a half feet, maybe? He carried it lengthways, under his right arm as he walked.”