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house. “That’s when Ms. Darcy went inside to make some calls.”
    Jess fished for her pad and pencil to make a few notes. “How long have you known Darcy?”
    “Her grandmother was my ballet teacher until I was ten. By then Ms. Darcy and her husband, Alex, had taken over the school. I was on the competition team until I left for college. Ms. Darcy offered me a position as assistant teacher when I came home in May for the summer.”
    “Is Darcy’s grandmother still involved with the studio?” The Chandlers were one of Birmingham’s most prominent families, but between college and working for the Federal Bureau of Investigation at Quantico, Jess had lived away for the past two decades. She’d never been very good at keeping up with the city’s elite anyway. But you couldn’t grow up in Birmingham and not know who the Chandlers were.
    “She lives at Southern Plantation. Even at eighty she attends all the local competitions.”
    Jess knew the place. High-end, exclusive senior living for those with the proper bank balance and no desire to be troubled with overseeing a grand home. “Was the vic—Darcy—with you and the students most of the morning?”
    Andrea nodded. “Except for going in the house to make phone calls, but she came back out a few minutes after that.”
    “The six girls waiting on the terrace have been here since ten as well?”
    She nodded again. “There were eight others but they left at lunch.” Andrea shifted her gaze back to Jess then. “There are fourteen girls on the Alabama Belles competition team. The ones still here compete as the international team. They stay for lunch and then we rehearse until three when their mothers pick them up.”
    “There was no one else here?”
    “I didn’t see anyone. But I didn’t go back in the house until… Katrina found her… like that.”
    “So Darcy served lunch to you and the girls after the others were gone?” At some point the vic was separated from her students for the last time. For how long? With whom, if anyone? Those were the answers Jess needed. Seemed simple enough, but getting straight answers from the witnesses after a tragedy like this was more often than not painstaking and complicated.
    “We had a picnic,” Andrea explained. “We do that a couple of times a week. Usually on Mondays and Fridays. The mothers take turns bringing the food. Today it was Ms. Dresher’s turn. She dropped off the food just before noon. The girls and I brought everything outside for the picnic while Ms. Darcy saw her out.”
    Jess jotted down the Dresher name and the fact that she’d delivered lunch. “Did Darcy join your picnic after seeing Ms. Dresher to the door?”
    “She stayed in the house.” Andrea looked around the room as if maintaining eye contact was too uncomfortable. “She was still busy with phone calls. We had lunch and then came back in here to begin rehearsal.”
    “What time did you become aware that there had been an accident?” The call had come into 911 about one fifteen. Judging by the ME’s estimation of time of death, Chandler may not have been dead very long when her body was discovered.
    “We were about to start rehearsal but we needed the boas for our routine and I sent Katrina inside to get them,” Andrea explained, sadness clouding her face. “The girls had been playing upstairs earlier, before rehearsals began this morning, and two of them had left their boas up there. Some of the moms have appointments or whatever and drop their girls off a little early. Ms. Darcy lets them play in the upstairs den.” She chewed her lower lip a moment or two before continuing. “A few minutes after going for the boas Katrina came rushing back. She was in tears and shouting that something was wrong with Ms. Darcy.”
    “When you say a few minutes, do you mean ten or fifteen? Five?”
    Andrea shrugged. “I don’t know. The other girls and I were doing warm-ups and talking. I really didn’t pay attention.”
    That was as