Bones

Jan Burke

The seventh book in the Irene Kelly series

Copyright © 1999 by Jan Burke

To Judy Myers Suchey and Paul Sledzik

and the AFIP Forensic Anthropology Faculty for their compassionate work and for teaching me to see more than bones

and

in memory of Shadow and Siri

The gate was open and the drawbridge down.

He galloped across, but when he got to the end of the drawbridge, someone yanked the cable so abruptly that Parzival was nearly thrown, horse and all, into the moat.

Parzival turned back to see who had done this to him. There, standing in the open gateway, was the page who had pulled the cable, shaking his fist at Parzival. “May God damn the light that falls upon your path!” the boy cried. “You fool! You wretched fool! Why didn’t you ask the question?”

“What do you mean?” Parzival shouted back. “What question?”

—PARZIVAL: THE QUEST OF THE GRAIL KNIGHT

by Wolfram von Eschenbach,

as retold by Katherine Paterson

He paid cash for the book, as he had all the other books on this subject. He spoke to no one, did nothing that would make him memorable to a clerk or customer.

There were many customers in the store when he made the purchase; he always chose times when he knew the bookstore would be busy.

Even if the store had been empty, he would have had little to worry over. When he chose to hide his powers, he was a nondescript man in a world full of people who could seldom describe more than what they saw in the mirror each morning.

Oh, perhaps they could also describe close friends, their own children, their spouses, people they worked with every day. At a stretch, their neighbors. But not quiet strangers in bookstores. Not a stranger who had never been there before, who would never come in again.

He found mild excitement in buying these books, knew this was how some men felt when buying pornography. Seeing it sitting in the bag on the car seat on the way home, he knew the book’s subject matter would arouse him, Not as much as the real thing — nothing ever excited him as much as the real thing.

This one was about Dahmer.

We don’t share the same appetites, he thought to himself, and was hard put to control a little fit of hilarity at the joke he had made.

When he had finished reading and rereading the book, he would place it with all the other books about his brethren. Books about Bianchi and Speck and Bundy; about earlier ones — Mors and Lucas and Pomeroy — and others; books about killers and their minds, about killers and their victims, about killers and those who hunted them.

At first, he had read the books because he wanted to understand the drive, the need that he feared would consume him. But now it was merely entertainment of a sort. By now, years after he had begun his little library, he knew he understood all there was to understand: he knew that only a man of his genius could cope with the demands of his desire.

He did not lack daring or creativity. Every new aspect, every heightening of the experience, merely confirmed what he already knew: he was unique in history.

Thinking of this, he was a little sad that he wouldn’t be caught, because he knew he was going to miss that one additional thrill — the only one that eluded him. The acknowledgment.

Notoriety beckoned. He dreamed of it, fantasized about it almost as much as the killings.

Why did he kill?

Everyone would want to know.

Why did he kill?

Everyone would ask.

And he would speak — quietly, and with authority — and all would hear the answer.

1

FOUR YEARS LATER

Monday Afternoon, May 15

The sensation of being watched had been almost constant on this journey, and now I was feeling it again. I tried to ignore it, to concentrate on the paperback I was reading, but my efforts were useless. I lifted my eyes from the page and looked toward the prisoner, three rows up, expecting to see him staring at me again. He was asleep. How he could manage it over the loud drone of the plane’s propellers, I’ll never know. How Nicholas Parrish could sleep at all — but I suppose that’s one of the advantages of being utterly without a conscience.

So if Parrish wasn’t the one eyeing me, who was?

I glanced around the cabin. Most of the men — even those who were not sociopaths — were sleeping. Two of Parrish’s guards were awake, but not looking at me. The other two napped. I turned to look behind me. Ben Sheridan, one of the forensic anthropologists, was looking out the window. David Niles, the other, sat across the aisle, reading. There, sitting next to him, was the starer.

He wasn’t staring so much as studying, I decided. No hostility there. Actually, of the all-male group with me on the small plane, he was the only one who didn’t object to my presence. While most of the others snubbed me, he had taken an immediate liking to me. The feeling was mutual. He was handsome, intelligent, and athletic. But then again, nothing excited him more than discovering a piece of decaying flesh.

He was a cadaver dog.

Bingle — named for his habit of crooning along whenever he heard his handler sing — was a black-and-tan, three-year-old, mostly German shepherd dog, trained to find human remains.

And that was what this expedition into the mountains was all about: finding human remains. A very specific set of them.

I looked into Bingle’s dark brown eyes, but my thoughts had already turned to a blue-eyed girl named Gillian Sayre; Gillian, who had spent the last four years waiting for someone to find whatever remained of her mother.

Four years ago. One warm summer day, the day after her mother failed to come home, Gillian was waiting outside the building which houses the Express. I was with a group of coworkers on our way to lunch. I saw her right away; she was tall and thin and her hair was cropped short and dyed the color of eggplant. Her face was pale; she was wearing dark brown lipstick and lots of eye shadow, which only accentuated the nearly colorless blue of her eyes. Her lashes and brows were thick and dyed black and her left brow was pierced by a small silver hoop. Seven or eight pierced earrings climbed the curve of each ear. Her pale, slender fingers bore silver rings of varying widths and designs; her fingernails were short, but painted black. Her clothes were rumpled, her shoes clunky.

“Are any of you reporters?” she called to us.

Never slow to grasp this sort of opportunity, my friend Stuart Angert pointed at me and said, “Only this lady here. The rest of us just finished an interview with her, so she’s free to talk to you.”

The others laughed, and the words “call for an appointment” were on my lips, but something about her made me hesitate. Stuart’s joke had not gone over her head — I could see that she was already expecting me to disappoint her, and she looked as if she was accustomed to being disappointed.

“Go on,” I said to the others. “I’ll catch up to you.”

I put up with another round of chiding and some half-hearted protests, but before long I was left standing alone with her.

“I’m Irene Kelly,” I said. “What can I do for you?”

“They won’t look for my mother,” she said.

“Who won’t?”

“The police. They think she ran away. She didn’t.”

“How long has she been gone?”

“Since four o’clock yesterday — well, that’s the last time I saw her.” She looked away, then added, “She went to a store. They saw her there.”

I figured I was talking to a kid who was doomed to learn that her mom was throwing in the towel on family life. But as I let her talk, I began to feel less certain of that.

Julia Sayre was forty years old on the night she failed to come home. Gillian’s father, Giles Sayre, had called his wife at a little before four that afternoon to say that he had obtained a pair of coveted symphony tickets — the debut of the symphony’s new conductor was to take place that evening. Hurriedly leaving their younger child, nine-year-old Jason, in Gillian’s care, Julia left the house in her Mercedes-Benz to go to a shopping mall not five miles away from her affluent neighborhood, to buy a slip.

She had not been seen since.

When he came home that evening and discovered that his wife hadn’t returned, Giles was more anxious about the possibility of being late to the concert than his wife’s whereabouts. As time went on, however, he became worried and drove over to the shopping center. He drove through the aisles of the parking lot near her favorite store, Nordstrom, but didn’t see her blue sedan. He went into the store, and after questioning some of the employees in the lingerie department, learned that she had indeed been there — but at four o’clock or so — several hours earlier.

When Giles Sayre reported his wife missing, the police gave it all the attention they usually give an adult disappearance of five hours’ duration — virtually none. They, too, looked for Julia Sayre’s car in the shopping center parking lot; Giles could have told them it wouldn’t be there — he had already made another trip to look for it.

“Sometimes, Gillian—” I began, but she cut me off.

“Don’t try to give me some bullshit about how she might be some kind of runaway, doing the big nasty with somebody other than my dad,” she said. “My folks are super close, happily married and all that. I mean, it would make you want to gack to see them together.”

“Yes, but—”

“Ask anybody. Ask our neighbors. They’ll tell you — Julia Sayre only has trouble with one person in her life.”

“You!”

She looked surprised by my guess, but then shrugged. She folded her arms, leaned back against the building, and said, “Yes.”

“Why?”

She shrugged again. “You don’t look like you were some little sweetcakes that never stepped out of line. Didn’t you ever fight with your mom when you were a teenager?”

I shook my head. “No, my mother died when I was twelve. Before I was a teenager. I used to envy the ones—” I caught myself. “Well, that’s not important.”

She was silent.

“If she had lived,” I said, “we probably would have fought. I got into all kinds of mischief even before I was a teenager.”

She began studying one of her fingernails. I was wondering how my memories of my mother might have differed had she lived another five years, when Gillian asked, “Do you remember the last thing you said to her?”

“Yes.”

She waited for me to say more. When I didn’t, she looked away, her brows drawn together. She said, “The last thing I said to my mother was, ‘I wish you were dead!’ ”

“Gillian—”

“She wanted me to watch Jason. She wanted me to cancel all my plans and do what she wanted, so she could go to the stupid concert. I was upset. My boyfriend was upset when I told him I couldn’t see him — so I yelled at her. That’s what I said to her.”

“She may be fine,” I said. “Sometimes people just feel overwhelmed, need to take off.”

“Not my mom.”

“I’m just saying that she hasn’t been gone for twenty-four hours yet. Don’t assume that she’s—” I stopped myself just in time. “Don’t assume that she’s been harmed.”

“Then I need you to help me find her,” she said. “No one else will take me seriously. They’re like your friends.” She nodded in the direction Stuart and the others had walked. “Think I’m just a kid — no need to listen to a kid.”

I pulled out my notebook and said, “You understand that I don’t get to decide if this story runs in the paper, right?”

She smiled.

Once I argued my editor into letting me pursue the story, I drove over to the Sayres’ home, a large two-story on a quiet cul-de-sac. Giles answered the door after scooping up a yapping Pekingese. He handed the squirming dog off to Gillian, who took it upstairs. Jason, he told me, had been taken to stay with his grandmother.

When I first approached Giles Sayre, I thought he might resent Gillian’s recruitment of a reporter for help with what could turn out to be an embarrassing family matter. But Giles heaped praise on his daughter, saying he should have thought of trying to enlist the Express himself.

“What am I going to do if anything has happened to Julia?” he asked anxiously.

Like Gillian, he was tall and thin and had pale blue eyes, but his hair was a much more natural color, a dark auburn. He had not slept; his eyes were reddened from tears which, by this point, could come easily, and which he didn’t try to hide.

He hurried to hand me several recent photographs of his wife. Her hair was dark brown, her large eyes, a deep blue. An attractive, self-possessed woman, she appeared to be perfectly groomed in even the most casual photographs. Gillian did not resemble her so much as her father, but Jason, I saw from a group photo, took a few of his features from each — her dark hair and aristocratic facial structure, his pale blue eyes.

“Which of these is the most recent?” I asked.

Giles selected a photograph taken at a Junior League event.

“Can I keep it? I can try to get it back for you, but I can’t make any promises.”

“No, that’s all right, I have the negative.”

This level of cooperation continued throughout the day. He met my involvement with a sense of relief, anxious to do whatever he could to help me with the story. The benefit was mutual — I gave him a chance to take action, directed some of the energy that up until now had gone to pacing and feeling helpless; his help made much of my job easier. It occurred to me that his anxiousness to spread the word was not something you’d be likely to find in a man who fears he has been cuckolded.

So I talked to neighbors and friends of Julia Sayre. I talked to other members of her family. The more I heard about her, the more I was inclined to agree with her daughter — Julia Sayre wasn’t likely to disappear of her own volition. Julia seemed fairly content with her life, content with just about everything except her relationship with her daughter. The universal opinion on that matter was that Gillian’s hellion phase was bound to come to an end soon — according to friends, no one was more sure of that than Julia.

If she was conducting an extramarital affair, Mrs. Sayre had been extremely discreet about it. I still hadn’t ruled out the possibility that she had left Giles Sayre for someone else, but it was no longer my pet theory.

I asked Gillian to tell me again what her mother had been wearing. A black silk skirt and jacket, she said. A white silk blouse, a pair of black leather pumps and a small black leather purse. Her only jewelry had been a simple gold chain necklace, a pair of diamond earrings, and her wedding ring.

“Not her wedding ring, really,” Giles said. “On our fifteenth anniversary, we had new rings made.” He held his up. “Hers is gold, like this one, and it has three rubies on it.”

He drove me to the mall where she had last been seen. With his help, I got the Nordstrom manager to look up the time of the transaction. Julia had used a MasterCard to purchase a black slip at 4:18 P.M. the previous afternoon. We thanked the manager and left. Giles called the MasterCard customer service number on his cell phone as we walked from store to store in the mall, showing Julia’s photo to clerk after clerk, none of whom had seen this lady yesterday. Eventually, he got his answer from the MasterCard customer service rep, and asked her to repeat the information to me. She confirmed that Julia Sayre hadn’t used the credit card since making the Nordstrom purchase.

I called an overworked missing persons detective in the LPPD and told him I was writing a story about Julia Sayre’s disappearance. He wouldn’t comment for the story, but — off the record — told me he’d try to get some action on the case.

When Julia Sayre’s Mercedes-Benz was first spotted on an upper floor of the Las Piernas Airport parking garage, the two patrolmen who found it thought the woman might have decided to escape her marriage after all. But then the detectives called to the scene made a discovery, a discovery that had my editor — overjoyed that we had beaten the competition to the story — praising my instincts, while it tied my stomach into knots.

Julia Sayre’s left thumb was in the glove compartment.

2

Four weeks ago, when the Kara Lane story first broke, I had expected another of Gillian’s “try to find out” calls. Over the years following Julia’s disappearance, I had heard from Gillian whenever certain events were reported in the Express. If a Jane Doe was found, Gillian calmly asked me to try to find out if the unidentified body might be her mother’s, never failing to recite the details of her mother’s height and coloring and clothing and jewelry. Was the victim a blue-eyed brunette? Was the victim wearing a gold ring with three rubies?

If a man was arrested for killing a woman, she wanted me to interview him, to try to find out if he had killed her mother, too. If a suspected serial killer was arrested in another state, she wanted me to try to find out if he had ever been in Las Piernas.

I quit the paper once, and went to work for a public relations firm. She tracked me down and called me there — O’Connor, my old mentor at the Express, was a soft touch for a missing persons case, and told her where to find me. When I told her that she should ask O’Connor to follow up on these stories, she quoted him as saying it would be good for me to remember what it was like to have a real job.

I could have refused her, of course, but even at an observer’s distance, I had allowed myself to become too close to the Sayres’ misery over those years.

I seldom saw Giles, and never away from his office; he apparently worked long hours to distract himself from his grief. His mother moved in with the family to help care for the children. Two months after Julia disappeared, Giles told me that he didn’t know whether or not to hold a memorial service for her. “I don’t even know what’s involved in having her declared dead,” he said. “My mother says I should wait, that people will think I was happy to be rid of her. Do you think anyone will think that?”

I told him that he should do what he needed to do for his family, and to hell with everybody else. It was advice he seemed unlikely to take — the opinions of others seemed to matter a great deal to him.

Jason got into trouble at home and in school on a regular basis. His grandmother confided to me that his grades had dropped, he had quit playing sports, and had become a loner, having little to do with his old friends.

Only Gillian seemed to continue on with her life. She gave her grandmother as much grief as she had given Julia. She dropped out of high school, moved out and got a small apartment on her own, supported herself by working at a boutique on Allen Street — Artsy-Fartsy Street, my friend Stuart Angert calls it. And spent four years quietly and persistently reminding the police and the press that someone ought to be looking for her missing mother, her determined stoicism shaming us into doing what little we could.

On the day the Kara Lane case first made headlines, Gillian waited for me outside the Wrigley Building, home of the Express. She seemed to me then as she had seemed from the first day I met her: no matter how likely it was that she would meet with disappointment, Gillian simply refused to acknowledge defeat. This affected me more than tears or hysterics. Nothing in her manner changed; she was often brusque, but she was never weak. Her clothing, hair, and makeup styles might be a little extreme, but her feelings — whatever they were — were not on display.

So I made calls, I followed up. There was never any progress. Until Kara Lane disappeared.

By then, I wasn’t allowed to cover crime stories — a result of my marriage to Frank Harriman, a homicide detective. But my marriage is more than worth the hassles it causes me at the Express and Frank at the LPPD.

As it happened, Frank was part of the team that investigated the Lane case. I learned details about it that I couldn’t tell the paper’s crime reporter, let alone Gillian. But before long, almost all of those details became public knowledge.

Kara Lane was forty-three, dark-haired, blue-eyed, a divorced mother of two teenage daughters. She had gone to the grocery store at eight o’clock one evening, and when she had not returned by eleven, her daughters became concerned. Too young to drive, they called a neighbor. By midnight, after a search of local store parking lots, the neighbor called Kara’s ex-husband. After another search of the stores, the ex-husband called the police. The search for Kara Lane began in earnest early the next morning.

Several factors caused the police to search for her more quickly than they had Julia Sayre: Kara was a diabetic who needed daily insulin injections — and she had not taken her medication with her; she had never before left her daughters alone at night; and during the morning briefing, Detective Frank Harriman noticed that in height, age, build, and hair color Kara Lane resembled Julia Sayre — a woman whose daughter pestered his reporter wife every now and then. He suggested to his partner, Pete Baird, that they take a look at the Las Piernas Airport parking lot.

Kara Lane’s aging VW van was parked in exactly the same space where Julia Sayre’s Mercedes had been left four years earlier. Not long after they called in their discovery, the van was carefully searched. Kara’s left ring finger was found in the glove compartment.

At this point, the department called Dr. David Niles, a forensic anthropologist who owned two dogs trained for both search and rescue and cadaver work, and asked him to bring them to the airport. The results were remarkable — so remarkable that when Frank and Pete told me about it that evening, I was fairly sure they were exaggerating.

“One of his dogs — Bingle — is so smart,” Pete said. “He can find anything. I mean, he makes these mutts of yours look retarded, Irene.”

“Wait just a minute—” I said, looking over at Deke, mostly black Lab, and Dunk, mostly shepherd, who were sleeping nearby.

“Our dogs are smart,” Frank said, trying to head off an argument, “but Bingle is — well, you’d have to see him to believe it. And he’s highly trained—”

“And don’t forget Bool,” Pete said. “His bloodhound. He works with two dogs. If one acts like he’s found something, he gets the other to confirm it.”

“Bingle has even located bodies underwater,” Frank said.

“How is that possible?” I asked. “You put him in a little scuba outfit?”

“Very funny,” Pete said.

“The dog can do it,” Frank said. “It’s not as miraculous as it sounds. The bacteria in a decomposing body cause it to give off gases. The scent rises through the water, and the dogs smell it when it reaches the surface. They can take Bingle out in a boat and cross the surface of a lake, and he’ll indicate when he smells a body below.”

“All right,” I said, “that makes sense. But—”

“Let us tell you what happened,” Pete said.

The gist of the tale was that Bingle led a group of men at a fast clip over a weaving trail out of the parking structure and across the grounds of the airport. Then he headed toward an airplane hangar.

“He went bananas,” Pete said, moving his hands in rapid dog-paddle fashion.

“He was pawing furiously at one of the back walls,” Frank explained.

It took the police some time to get a warrant, and to locate the owner of the building, but they gained access. At first, nothing seemed amiss. The hangar was leased by Nicholas Parrish, a quiet man, the owner said; a man who paid his rent on time, never caused any problems. An airplane mechanic. The police ran Parrish’s name through their computers — he had no outstanding warrants. In fact, he had no criminal record at all.

David Niles brought out Bool and let the bloodhound sniff an article of Kara Lane’s clothing. Bool, who needed this “pre-scenting” in order to track, traced a path almost identical to the one Bingle had followed.

Frank suggested getting a crime scene unit to check the hangar with luminol, a chemical capable of detecting minute traces of blood, but the skeptics in the group were starting to grumble, especially Reed Collins and Vince Adams, the detectives in charge of the Lane case.

“Collins is starting to make remarks about wasting precious time and his partner is making noise about wild goose chases,” Pete said, “when all of a sudden, Bingle lifts his head and sings.” Pete crooned a single high note that brought both of our dogs to their feet, heads cocked. “David gives another command and the dog takes off again.”

This time the dog headed across the Tarmac, to a field beyond the nearest runway. When he stopped, he pranced and bounced around, pawing furiously at the earth, crooning again — actions which Pete, getting into his story, performed for us. Quite a workout.

David moved ahead, to the place where Bingle had alerted, and called back, “I think he’s found her.”

The others soon caught up. They saw the shallow grave, the freshly turned earth, and a woman’s shoe protruding from something shiny and green — plastic sheeting. Frank got on the radio, telling the officers in the hangar that they should secure the area, call out a crime scene unit, and put out an APB for Nicholas Parrish.

“The whole time he’s on the radio, I’m moving a little closer,” Pete said, “and I see what the dog was digging at, what he uncovered. It’s her hand — you know, the left one, the one that’s missing the finger.”

I looked at Frank. “Gillian Sayre will—”

“You can’t tell her yet,” he said firmly. “Nobody. Not any of this. Not yet.”

But by the next morning the Kara Lane case had made the front page, and Gillian was standing outside the newspaper, looking a little more anxious than usual. When I was within a few feet of her, she held up a creased copy of the Express and pointed to Parrish’s photo. “He’s the one who took my mother.”

“It looks as if the cases have a lot in common,” I agreed.

“No. I mean, I know he’s the one. He used to live on our street — a long time ago.”

“What? How long ago?”

“Before my mom disappeared.”

“Have you told the police?”

She shook her head. I wasn’t surprised. Whatever faith she might have once had in the police had been damaged when the LPPD delayed searching for her mother, and was utterly destroyed when they had failed to find her. Gillian and I shared a dislike of Bob Thompson, the Las Piernas Police Department homicide detective who handled her mother’s case. Once or twice she had talked to other homicide detectives when a Jane Doe was found, but usually she relied on me to make contact with the police on her behalf.

“I thought maybe you could tell your husband,” she said now.

“Yes, sure,” I said, still reeling. “Parrish lived there alone?”

“No. I think his sister owned the house.”

“You ever see anything strange going on there?”

“No, not really. They were quiet. She moved away — don’t remember exactly when. I don’t know where she lives now. She wasn’t friendly.”

“Was he?”

She shrugged. “He kind of kept to himself. I guess he was nice to everybody — you know, smiled and waved. But he used to stare at my mom.”

Now, as I held fast to the armrests of my seat while the plane jolted in the choppy air above the southern Sierra Nevadas, I watched the killer awaken not far from me. It was not difficult for me to imagine Nicholas Parrish stalking his prey, staring at Julia Sayre as she left the house to run errands, or as she worked in her garden, or came home from the store. Staring at her, while she imagined herself safe from harm.

Staring at her, much in the same way he was staring at me now.

3

MONDAY AFTERNOON, MAY 15

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

After a bouncy landing on a rough patch of ground that served as the airstrip, there was a wait before we were allowed to disembark. Bob Thompson addressed one of the guards as “Earl” and muttered some order to him. Earl was the first to exit; he returned shortly and, giving an “all clear,” worked with the other three guards to remove Parrish from the plane. Thompson was next, followed by a quiet young man who seemed to be his assistant — though not his partner. Thompson and Phil Newly, Parrish’s attorney, were the only members of the group that I had met before that day. A few years back, I had covered some crime stories, and had seen Newly around the courthouse.

Thompson and I had known each other for close to ten years. The contempt was both strong and mutual.

I figured that made me the show horse in the race to capture the hostility of the other passengers. Parrish was first by a length, followed by Newly. As a member of the press, I was a distant third.

Newly and Bill “Flash” Burden, an LPPD crime scene photographer, stepped off after the guards; then the pilot came back into the cabin and stood in the aisle. “Rest of you wait until they get Parrish settled,” he said, then left the plane. Minutes passed.

“Do you know who’s meeting us from the Forest Service?” I heard David Niles ask.

“J.C.,” said Ben Sheridan, the other anthropologist. “Andy is coming up with him.”

“Andy who?” I asked.

Sheridan eyed me coldly, then turned back to the window, frowning. After a moment’s silence, David Niles said, “Andy Stewart, a botanist who works with us sometimes.”

“Thank you, Dr. Niles.”

“Call me David.”

Sheridan sighed loudly. This only seemed to amuse David, but he didn’t say more to me. I had known that we would be meeting a couple of people at this airstrip; men who were being flown in from another location, but Thompson had only said they were “part of Sheridan’s team.”

“Okay, folks,” Earl called. I stood, but gestured to David to let Bingle — fidgety since the landing — lead the way. “Thanks,” he said, then followed the dog. That left me with Ben Sheridan, who was still frowning as he gazed out the window.

“Listen,” I began. “I don’t want to—”

“I’m not leaving you here to snoop around on the plane,” he interrupted. “Go on outside.”

I felt a flare of temper, checked it, and left the plane without saying another word to him.

I stretched at the bottom of the steps, taking in the view before me. We were in a long meadow, near the center of a narrow valley that was already shadowed and cooling. The scent of pine from nearby woods mixed with the fragrance of late spring blossoms in the meadow, of grass and earth. When I saw the slender mown strip where we had landed, I felt new respect for the pilot.

A base camp would be set up here.

Bingle, once he had relieved himself, began cavorting wildly through the meadow, not so much running as bouncing through it, stopping now and then to try to lure his handler into playing with him. But David, Sheridan, and everyone who wasn’t involved in guarding Parrish were busy unloading gear from the plane. I gathered my own, then moved to help the others. I had only taken a few steps when a voice from behind me asked, “Are you the reporter?”

I turned to see a lean, golden young man smiling at me. I guessed him to be in his mid-twenties. His hair was short and spiky. He was tanned and had the kind of calf muscles a person can only get by moving his feet over long distances, on a bike or running or hiking. He wore a closely trimmed beard and a single earring in his right ear.

“Yes,” I said, setting down my backpack and extending a hand. “Irene Kelly.”

“Andy Stewart,” he said, with a firm handshake. “I’m the botanist for the team. J.C. and I got here at noon. We’re all set up. Can I give you a hand with anything?”

“I can manage this, but it looks as if Dr. Sheridan still has some gear in there.”

He grabbed another canvas bag and continued to chat with me, telling me that a Forest Service helicopter had brought them in earlier.

“Forgive me for asking, but why is a botanist needed for this search?”

“Well, whenever anybody like Mr. Parrish comes along and digs a hole, drops what will ultimately amount to a big chunk of fertilizer in it, and then covers it up again, nature doesn’t let that pass unnoticed. The plants he dug up, the new ones that begin to grow, the surrounding soil — he’s created a disturbance in the existing system. With enough practice, a botanist can learn to see the signs of that disturbance.”

“So you’re paid to look for changes in plant life?”

His face broke into a grin. “Paid? No, none of us are paid. Ben, David, and I do this forensic work voluntarily. I’m a grad student in biology; Ben and David teach in the anthropology department. David also pays for all of Bingle’s training and equipment. Even J.C. doesn’t get any special pay for coming along, although he’s on the Forest Service payroll while he’s here.” He paused. “If you don’t mind my asking the question you asked me — what’s a reporter doing here?”

“Good question. There are any number of folks, here and at home, who’d tell you I have no business being here.” I paused, trying to shut out the memory of the fight Frank and I had before I left.

“I don’t want you up there with him, no matter how many guards he has on him.”

“I don’t want to be up there with him, either, but I can’t get out of this one, Frank.”

“Refuse the assignment. Goddamn it, Irene, those amputations were antemortem. You know what that means?”

“Stop it,” I said.

“It means,” he went on ruthlessly, “that those women were alive when he began mutilating them, Irene. Alive.”

“But you’re here anyway,” Andy was saying.

“Yes. I know Julia Sayre’s family—” I began.

“Sayre’s the victim he claims he’ll lead us to?”

“Yes.”

I’m here to put an end to the last remnants of their hope, I thought. That small, impossible burden of hope that would ride in back of their minds like a stone in a shoe.

Years as a reporter had taught me that families would hold fiercely to whatever little hope they could find, whatever possibility they could imagine. If their son was on a plane that crashed, they wondered if perhaps he had missed the flight, pictured him giving his ticket to a friend.

The Sayres would have such hopes, I knew, although Gillian would never betray their existence to me.

Parrish’s announcement would have nearly put an end to that sort of fantasy. What a blow it must have been to Gillian. Still, the Sayres would wonder if Parrish was bluffing, or mistaken about the identity of his victim.

And so now there was only this, this final identification. We would unbury Julia Sayre’s remains and leave the last of her family’s hope in their place.

“Good of you to go to this much trouble for them,” Andy said, bringing me out of my reverie.

“No, it’s not,” I said. “I’m here because my boss insisted on it, and I wasn’t exactly pleased with the assignment. I got caught in police politics. The Las Piernas Police got a black eye recently—”

“When they tried to hide mistakes made in an Internal Affairs investigation,” he said, nodding. “But one of the reporters on the Express learned about it and made them look twice as bad.”

“Yes. So to prove to the public that they’re doing a great job, and everything’s aboveboard, the brass decided to let a local reporter get in on a success story — the resolution of an old case that has been given big play in the paper. The Express was already leaning on them to let me come along. I never dreamed they’d say yes, or I would have tried to head those plans off before they got this far.”

“I’d think this would be a reporter’s dream.”

“I’m not too fond of the mountains.”

“Not fond of the mountains?” he said, aghast. This, clearly, he considered to be sacrilege.

I swallowed hard. “I used to love them. But — I had a bad experience in the mountains once.”

“Backpacking?”

“No. In a cabin.” My mouth was dry. I could feel my tongue slowing, clacking over the simple little word, cabin.

Andy seemed not to notice. “But you’ve been backpacking before,” he said, puzzled.

“Yes. The gear give me away?”

“Yep. Not novice style — not like that lawyer’s bullshit outfit. Most of yours is broken in — like your boots. The attorney’s boots are brand new, and I’ll bet you he’s going to have blisters in no time. You’ve got a few new items, but they aren’t just for show.”

“It’s been a long time since I’ve used my gear.” I didn’t want to think about why.

“Then separate this from whatever happened in that cabin,” he said, with the easy logic of youth.

Before I could answer, a deep voice called from the other side of the meadow. “Your botanist is upsetting Ms. Kelly.”

Parrish.

I felt my face color under the sudden attention that came from almost everyone else — from all but his guards, one of whom was telling him to shut up.

“Am I?” Andy asked me.

“No. No, you aren’t. You’re making me feel much more comfortable about being here.”

He grinned again.

To some extent, I had told him the truth. At least he was speaking to me, being friendlier than the others. Maybe he was right about backpacking; maybe my fears wouldn’t be triggered in the same way they might be if I were driving to the mountains, staying in a cabin.

“I used to know a little about wildflowers,” I said, trying to keep my thoughts away from cabins and glove compartments and Nicholas Parrish. “Perhaps you can help me remember the names of some of the varieties in this meadow?”

4

MONDAY AFTERNOON, MAY 15

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

We ended up postponing our botany lesson; there was simply too much to be done to set up camp before nightfall.

I pitched my tent and set my backpack in it, then looked to see if anyone else might need help. I saw Earl, the one guard whose name I had heard spoken, taking some medication. He was a man who appeared to be in his late forties; I thought his partner might be a little older.

“Are you feeling all right?” I asked.

“Me?” he asked, quickly stashing the pills away. “Oh, I’m fine.” At my questioning look he added, “Just getting over an ear infection. If certain parties knew, they would have kept me off this assignment.”

“I won’t tell anyone.”

He grinned. “Especially not Thompson.”

“Right. I guess it’s pretty clear that there’s no love lost between us.”

“Lady, there’s no love lost between Thompson and anybody.” He put out a hand. “Earl Allen, by the way. I noticed Detective Shit-Don’t-Stink failed to introduce you to the peons.”

“Nice to meet you, Earl. I’m Irene.”

“Oh, we all know you. You’re Harriman’s wife.”

“Yes.”

“Good man, Frank. Any of these other jokers give you problems, you let me know.”

“Thanks.”

“Hey, Earl!” one of the other cops called out. He was the burliest of the crew, and seemed to be the oldest.

“My partner, Duke Fenly,” Earl said, moving off. “Looks like he needs help with that tent.”

“Duke and Earl? You’re kidding.”

“Naw — we’re real aristocrats,” Earl said over his shoulder. “That’s why they put us in charge of all the royal assholes.”

Even with Earl’s help, the pair had trouble pitching their large tent, so I decided to help out. As we worked, Earl pointed out Merrick and Manton, two other guards, and an officer named Jim Houghton, who was putting up Thompson’s tent.

“He’s young to be a detective,” I said.

Earl snorted. “He’s no detective. He’s a uniform, just like we are. Thompson’s got no regular partner at the moment.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Off the record? ’Cause nobody can stand working with the s.o.b. So poor Houghton got drafted to be Thompson’s assistant.”

“His flunky,” Duke growled. “But Houghton’s quiet — doesn’t let anything get to him. He’ll be okay.”

We had just brought the tent up on its poles when Thompson suddenly looked over from a discussion with Newly and shouted, “What the hell is wrong with you guys?”

Our hands stilled. Earl looked behind us, as if he couldn’t believe Thompson was yelling at him.

“What’s the problem, Detective Thompson?” Duke said icily.

“Get that goddamned reporter out of there!” Thompson said. “I don’t want her touching anything that belongs to the LPPD!”

“Gee, Bob,” Earl taunted, “that’s gonna be awful tough on Harriman when she gets home.”

The other cops laughed — even Houghton — which didn’t help Thompson regain his temper. “That’s his problem. Up here, I’m in charge. Got that?”

Duke and Earl didn’t look entirely convinced, but I decided to choose a better fight. I was tempted to loosen my grip on the tent and allow it to collapse, but again I saw Nick Parrish watching me. I looked away, seeking an ally. Andy was moving a wanigan — a chest full of cooking supplies — toward the cooking area. I was about to ask for his help, but before I could say anything to him, Ben Sheridan strolled over and took hold of the support I was clasping. “Go on,” he said.

My own small tent was on the edge of the clearing, on the lee side of some trees. I studied the sky for a moment, and decided to put the rainfly on. Then I chose a moment when even Nick Parrish wasn’t looking at me and backed myself inside the dome’s opening. I stayed facing the opening as I stowed my gear, an awkward process at times, but I needed to see the darkening sky, feel the cool air. I refused to let myself think about staying inside this confined space. I put on another layer of clothing, then stepped outside. I took out my little white-gas stove, and began to prime it.

Phil Newly saw me and hurried over. Watching his tense, jerky pace, it occurred to me that this trip into the woods might relax him, but I quickly snapped my thoughts back into reality — this wasn’t a vacation or some backpacking trip for a little R&R — we were on our way to unbury Nick Parrish’s horrible handiwork.

And here was his defender, smiling down at me. Charismatic at will. Newly had brown hair, chiseled features, and a pair of intense, dark eyes that were said to be able to unhinge a prosecution witness long before he asked his first question on cross. But decked out in his brand-spanking-new designer outdoorwear, he looked decidedly dudely. And harmless.

“Irene,” he chided, “you aren’t going to deprive us of your company at dinner, are you?”

“Deprive is hardly the word your opposition would use.” I’d been told to bring my own food supplies, although the others would be fed courtesy of the LPPD. Newly had bought steaks for this first night out.

“Hell,” he said, “if I can face all the loathing they express for my profession, you can manage, too. Come on and join us.”

“Thanks for the invitation, Phil, but if I don’t eat this meal I’m planning to make, I have to pack it on my back tomorrow. Besides, I don’t think I want to watch Nick Parrish enjoying a steak dinner.”

“I believe Earl will be serving a bologna sandwich to my client.”

I smiled. “And you didn’t object?”

“Not much.” He hesitated a moment before adding, “I don’t have to like my clients, Irene. I just have to provide them with the best legal defense work I can offer.”

“But Parrish didn’t seem to want much of a defense, did he?”

“I was opposed to this deal.”

“They had a solid case against him.”

“Irene, please—”

“Okay, okay. I’m not hopelessly naive about what can become of a solid case once you’ve had a crack at it.”

He laughed. “I’ll take that as a compliment. Now, say you’ll join us.”

“Sorry, Phil. The journalist in me says I’d write a better story if I tried to build a sense of camaraderie and all that, but I figure we’ll have plenty of time to be in each other’s faces over the next two or three days.”

“All right, then, I won’t pressure you. But don’t stay away all evening — you’ll just look as if you’re pouting.”

“You’re right,” I acknowledged, feeling a little disappointed that I’d have to lace up my gloves and go back into the ring. “See you later.”

Wondering if, during the years I was away from it, any aspect of backpacking had improved more than freeze-dried food, I cleaned up and rejoined the group, which had gathered around a small campfire. Earl and Duke had taken Parrish into his tent and were on duty there; but one of the other cops, Manton, was friendly to me, as was Flash Burden, the photographer. With two exceptions — Bob Thompson and Ben Sheridan — there wasn’t much after-dinner hostility at all.

Not long after I arrived, Thompson said he was going to bed. “I suggest the rest of you do the same.” The others, however, ignored him.

Manton noticed my uneasy glances toward the tent where Parrish had been taken and said, “Don’t worry, we aren’t gonna let him out of our sight. You’ll be okay.”

“Thanks,” I said, but could not rid myself of the notion that Parrish was lying wide awake, listening to every word, every sound from beyond his tent.

A sharp sound made me glance over at Ben Sheridan, who was snapping twigs into smaller and smaller pieces. I wasn’t the only one who was having trouble relaxing in the great outdoors.

The others soon distracted me, though, as they began to tease me about missing out on the steaks.

“Took less time to prepare the steaks than it took for old Dave there to make his dog’s dinner,” Merrick said, and launched into an exaggerated tale of David’s elaborate preparation of Bingle’s food.

“Hey, I’ve got to take good care of Bingle,” David said. “¿Estás bien, Bingle?” Bingle, sitting between him and Ben, leaned over to kiss David on the ear.

“Goddamn,” Manton said, “you let that dog kiss you after he’s gone around licking dead bodies?”

“Bingle, he’s slandering you!” David said, in a tone that caused the dog to bark. “Bingle only kisses the living. Of course, a guy with breath like yours might confuse him, Manton, so maybe he won’t kiss you.”

“What is that stuff you feed him?” Flash Burden asked.

“Oh, that’s my own secret Super-Hero-In-Training formula.”

“It produces its own acronym,” Andy chimed in.

“Just don’t step in it like you stepped on my punch line, kid,” David said, but without malice.

Bingle lay quietly, ears forward, watching David. David, I noticed, spent a lot of time watching Bingle, too.

Andy asked about Bool, and David explained that he had injured one of his paws during the search for Kara Lane. “Bool gets involved in finding a scent, he doesn’t exactly watch where he’s going. He’ll be okay, but he’s not ready for a search like this one. I’ve got a friend who trains bloodhounds, he’s keeping an eye on Bool while I’m here.”

“This shepherd must be the smarter of the two,” Manton said.

David smiled. “Bingle is certainly a highly educated dog. He’s bilingual, too. ¿Correcto, Bingle?” Bingle sat up again and gave a single sharp bark. “And besides his cadaver training, he’s had voice training.”

“Voice training?” Manton asked.

“Cántame, Bingle,” David said, and began singing “Home on the Range.” Bingle chimed in with perfect pitch at the chorus. I’d swear we all heard that dog sing the lyrics. Nobody could keep a straight face. Almost nobody.

“Enough, David,” Ben said sharply.

Silence.

Everyone shifted a little uncomfortably, except for David and Bingle. Both dog and man looked at Ben, Bingle cocking his head to one side, puzzled.

“Ah, the discouraging word,” David said softly, without a trace of anger. He began quietly praising Bingle.

Ben stood and walked off.

5

TUESDAY, MAY 16, 2:25 A.M.

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

Nothing can keep you up all night as effectively as calculating what sort of condition you’ll be in the next day if you don’t fall asleep soon. I heard soft snoring from most of the other tents, including a double set of saws from the one where Bingle was curled up next to David. I heard the pacing first of Manton and Merrick, and later of Duke and Earl.

My claustrophobia kicked in — not able to stay long in the tent, soon I was sitting in its opening, watching the stars, listening to the insects, wondering what animals were making the other noises I heard — occasional rustlings and snapping sounds. Our food had been hung up high in bear bags, a safe three hundred feet from camp, but I wasn’t so sure we weren’t the object of ursine scrutiny.

I thought a lot about Frank — wondered if he were also lying awake, if the pilot’s radio message that we had arrived safely had reached him. I thought of my cousin Travis, who was staying with us. I thought about my dogs, my cat.

I tried hard to keep my thoughts away from memories of a particular time I had spent in the mountains, in a small room in a cabin, the captive of some rather brutal hosts. The nightmares induced by all that had happened there were fewer now, but I knew what might trigger them again — enclosed spaces, stress, new surroundings.

Think of something else.

I thought of Gillian Sayre. I thought of her mother. I stayed awake.

I was wondering if I should give in to the old memories of captivity, go ahead and think about them — dwell on them for God’s sake, if that would relieve the tension — when there was a sudden brightness on my face. A flashlight, quickly lowered. Both the path of the beam of light and the sound of footsteps made it clear that someone was making his way toward me. As he drew closer, I saw that it was Ben Sheridan. I moved to my feet as he reached me.

“Why are you awake?” he whispered, his breath fogging in the cold air. “It’s three in the morning.”

“Just waiting for my big chance to look through all your gear and touch everything that belongs to the Las Piernas P.D.,” I whispered back.

He was silent for a moment, then repeated, “Why are you awake?”

“Am I disturbing you?”

“No.”

“Well, then, why are you awake?”

“Shhh. Not so loud. You’ll wake the others.”

I waited.

“I did sleep,” he said.

“Not for long,” I said.

“You haven’t slept at all.”

“Ben, if you’ve slept, then how could you possibly know I haven’t?”

He started to move away again.

“I have problems with enclosed spaces,” I said.

He halted, then said, “Claustrophobia? The tent bothers you?”

“Yes.”

“Sleep outside.”

“It’s not just that.” But I couldn’t bring myself to say more.

We were interrupted then. Bingle had heard us, and he emerged from David’s tent, shaking himself as if he had just stepped out of a bath. Tufts of fur around his ears spiked out from his head, making him look genuinely woozy. The effect was comical.

David soon followed him out of the tent. Before I could apologize, David was whispering drowsily, “Hi, Ben. Need to borrow Bingle?”

“She does,” Ben said.

“What?” I asked, startled.

“Okay,” David said, turning to Bingle. “Duerme con ella,” he commanded in Spanish, pointing at me. Sleep with her. Bingle happily trotted over — and flopped down next to me.

“Wait a minute—”

“Keep him warm and he’ll be okay,” David said, and went back into his tent.

I looked up at Ben in some exasperation.

“He’ll wake you if you start to have a nightmare,” Ben said, and started to walk off.

“Who said anything about nightmares?” I asked.

He looked over his shoulder, then said, “No one.” He kept walking.

Bingle was watching me, a look of expectation on his face.

I sighed and got into my sleeping bag. Bingle did a brief inspection of the interior of the tent, then lay down next to me. He moved restlessly for a moment or two, until he seemed to find a position he liked — resting his head on my shoulder.

“Comfy?” I asked.

He snorted.

I buried a hand in his thick coat, and found myself smiling. A few minutes later, I was asleep.

I awakened briefly when Bingle left me the next morning, but slept in a little longer, until the sounds of the camp stirring to life were too much to snooze through.

Not long after breakfast, we left the base camp. Only the pilot stayed behind with the heaviest gear. Parrish claimed that Julia Sayre was buried at least a day’s hike from the airstrip. Backpacks on, we began our journey into the forest.

Our progress was slow. Following the lead of a man who was handcuffed and heavily guarded — and perhaps savoring his last days outside of prison — was only part of the reason for our sluggish pace.

Ben and David had extra equipment to be carried, beyond the usual camping gear, and were heavily loaded down.

The group was large, and within it our level of experience varied from novice to expert. I suppose I fell somewhere in the middle; plenty of time spent hiking and backpacking, but nothing recent. J.C., the ranger, was undoubtedly the most seasoned backpacker, with Andy a close second; Flash, Houghton, David, and Ben only a little less so, but all were certainly at home in the outdoors. Bob Thompson and Phil Newly were the apparent novices. Duke was the oldest of the guards — he had shown me a photo of his new grandson, and a story about his high school days made me guess that he was in his early fifties. He was in better shape than Merrick or Manton, who were in their early thirties. Earl, somewhere in between in age, was also somewhere in between in fitness.

Flash Burden could have run circles around all of them. He was enthusiastically taking shots of wildflowers, double-checking with Andy before scribbling their names in his photographer’s notebook. Andy only corrected him once or twice. They soon fell into easy talk about places they had gone hiking or rock climbing.

It was difficult to judge Parrish’s experience on the trail. My suspicions were that in this forest, at least, he was absolutely at home. Perhaps in other forests as well. His boots, for example, were his own, and they were well made and broken in. He did not panic, as Phil Newly did, when a gopher snake hurried across the trail.

Bingle was not disturbed by wildlife, either. He didn’t chase squirrels or other small animals, even when it was clear that he had noticed them. For the most part, he stayed near David, his behavior alternately regal and clownish.

At times, he walked near Ben. I learned from David that there was good reason for Bingle’s attachment to Ben — for the last few months, Ben had been living at David’s house. Although David was reluctant to supply details, apparently Ben had split up with a girlfriend, moved out, and was staying with David until the end of the semester. “He plans to find a place of his own then, even though I’ve told him he can stay on if he’d like. The dogs and I have enjoyed his company.”

“Forgive me if I have a hard time understanding why,” I said.

He smiled and said, “No, I guess Ben hasn’t made a great impression on anybody on this trip. He’s not at his best right now.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Oh, all sorts of reasons,” he said vaguely, and moved on.

We eventually stopped for lunch in a small clearing that didn’t allow us to spread out as much as we had before. Nick Parrish used this opportunity to resume staring at me. Bingle, perhaps remembering who had shared a tent with him, took exception to this, standing rigid and growling at him.

“Tranquilo, mi centinela,” David said softly, and the dog subsided.

“What did you say to him?” Parrish asked.

David didn’t answer.

“You appear to have a protector, Ms. Kelly,” Parrish said. “For now, anyway.”

“Leave her alone, Parrish,” Earl said.

“But I think Ms. Kelly ought to be interviewing me, don’t you?”

I was spared having to answer as the last member of the group hobbled into the clearing. Phil Newly moved gingerly toward a large flat rock, then sat down on it with a sigh. It was obvious that he was about to cripple himself with those new boots. For the last half mile or so, he had been walking as if every step were over hot glass.

I was searching through my pack for some of the moleskin I had brought, when Ben Sheridan walked up to him and said, “Take your boots off.”

Newly blushed and said, “I beg your pardon?”

“Take your boots off! You’ve probably got blisters. You should have spoken up on the trail.”

“I’ll leave them on, thank you,” Newly said, with as much dignity as he could muster.

“Don’t make a bigger nuisance of yourself by being stubborn,” Ben said. “You’re endangering this whole trip by damaging your feet. Or perhaps that’s what you have in mind?”

“Now see here—”

“Ignore his manners, Phil,” I said. “He’s right about the blisters. Dangerous if they become infected.”

But he wasn’t ready to give in, and instead took out a Global Positioning System device and began the process of taking a reading. Not hiding his exasperation, Ben walked off.

“You ever use one of these handheld GPS receivers?” Newly asked me.

“No,” I said. “I manage okay with a compass, an altimeter, and a map.” And a little help from J.C., I added silently. His familiarity with the area had helped me identify features of the terrain more than once.

“These are pretty amazing little gizmos.”

He handed it to me and spent a few minutes showing me the basics of how it worked. As the display came up with a longitude and latitude reading, he said, “Of course, it won’t work in narrow valleys or in dense forests, or other places where it might have a hard time picking up signals from the satellites. I noticed Detective Thompson is using one, too.”

I handed it back to him. He tucked it away, started to stand up, and swore. “Excuse me,” he said, sitting down again.

“Why don’t you let me take a look at those blisters? If they aren’t too bad, this moleskin will help.”

But when he took the boots off, it was clear that he had already done some real damage. Over the years I’ve taken first aid classes, but I was relieved when J.C., much better trained and experienced, stepped in to do what he could for Newly.

We moved out again, Newly moving slowly but not giving up. When we stopped about an hour later to get our bearings, he didn’t hesitate to take the boots and socks off again. I could see new blisters forming. I was starting to cut another set of moleskin pads for him when we heard Parrish call out, “I want to talk with my lawyer. Privately.”

“What kind of idiots do you take us for?” Duke said. “You can’t just go off somewhere in the woods with your lawyer.”

Phil Newly sighed, and with a wince, stood on his bare feet. “I’ll talk to him over here, in plain sight of all of you. Surround us, if you like, but give us a little room to confer.” When Duke looked skeptical, he added, “I’m in no shape to ‘go off somewhere in the woods’ with anyone.”

Duke looked over to Bob Thompson, who nodded. “But I want them surrounded,” Thompson said. “And nobody else near them. Ms. Kelly, get the hell away from Mr. Newly.”

No one had to coax me to move out of range of Parrish, who was smiling at me. “Ah,” he said, feigning disappointment. “And I was hoping she’d play with my feet, too.”

That earned him a sharp push from Earl.

Wary, none of the guards stood too far away from him. “Newly,” Bob Thompson said, “you two will just have to whisper.”

Parrish looked down at Newly’s bare feet. “You’re moving too slow, Counselor,” he said, not trying to lower his voice.

“There’s nothing I can do about that now,” Newly said. “What do you want?”

“To move faster,” Parrish said, and brought one of his sturdy boots down hard on Newly’s bare left foot.

Newly gave a shout of pain, and Bingle began barking, but the guards had already moved in, shoving Parrish hard to the rocky ground and pinning him there. Houghton, gun out, covered them from a short distance away. Earl was on top, holding Parrish’s face against the earth, distorting Parrish’s smile of satisfaction.

J.C. hurried over to Newly, who looked as if he might faint. The ranger spent a moment examining the foot and said, “I think he broke some bones. It’s swelling up fast.”

He opened his first aid kit again and applied an instant cold pack to the foot. Soon it became clear that Newly would not only be unable to walk, he wouldn’t be able to put his left boot back on.

This led to a heated discussion over whether to end the entire trip then and there.

Thompson was the main proponent of calling it quits. The others pointed out the time and expense already incurred. “If we have him up here without his lawyer—” Thompson began, but Parrish interrupted.

“I fire him, then.”

“And I’ll take you right back to Las Piernas anyway,” Thompson said. “You think the D.A. won’t go for the death penalty if he finds out how you screwed up this expensive search? Which may just be a wild goose chase, after all.”

“I can promise you,” Parrish said with a cold smile, “that this is no ‘wild goose chase.’ ”

There was a long moment of silence before another round of arguments began. Newly agreed to allow Parrish to lead them to the grave out of his presence. “Leading you to her saves his life,” he gritted out, his face pale and drawn.

Thompson finally relented, and decided to let J.C. and Houghton take Newly back to the plane. “Houghton, you fly back with him, take him to a hospital, then get in touch with the D.A. as soon as possible. Let him know exactly what happened here, and that Newly agreed to these arrangements.”

J.C. and Houghton divided up the contents of Newly’s pack, then supported Newly between them. Newly, still white with pain, tried to give me the GPS, saying, “Mark the position of anything I need to know about, will you?”

“I’m sorry, I can’t,” I said, not wanting to be even vaguely involved with Parrish’s defense.

He managed a small smile and said, “You’ll be using your compass, then?”

“Yes, and although I don’t think any sane judge will let you get your hands on my notes, we both know Bob Thompson is using a GPS, too.”

He nodded, but seemed too distracted by the pain in his foot to keep talking.

J.C. asked Andy to keep an eye on things while he was gone. “Leave trail signs for me,” he said, “and don’t let them destroy too many acres of forest, if you can help it.”

We all watched the trio move slowly away from us.

I had a few chances to talk to Andy when he stopped every so often to mark a turning with a strip of cloth on a bush or small rocks in the shape of an arrow.

“Do you think J.C. will ever catch up to us again?” I asked.

“Absolutely,” Andy said. “He’s in great shape. He can cover distances in a day that would have most of us looking as wiped out as Phil Newly was at lunch.”

By late that afternoon, I began to wonder if we would make it to an area where we could set up camp, let alone to Julia Sayre’s grave. We had wasted a lot of time, and the air was cooling rapidly. Clouds were gathering overhead — cirrus clouds. We might be in for a storm.

Thompson apparently had the same concerns. He stopped the procession. “We don’t seem to be heading in the direction of the valley you indicated on the map,” he complained to Parrish.

“I was wrong,” Parrish said. “I know exactly where I’m going now.”

Just then the breeze shifted a little. Bingle lifted his nose and made a chuffing sound, then began to whine, looking at David, ears pitched forward.

“Is he alerting?” Ben asked softly from behind me.

David was focused on the dog. “¿Qué te pasa?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

The dog started to move ahead, and David hurried to catch up with him. I followed, ignoring Thompson’s “Get back here!”

The dog was moving rapidly now, and soon was out of sight. “Bingle! ¡Alto!” David called, but Bingle had already stopped. He was ahead of us, barking, then whining in distress.

We reached it at the same time, both giving a cry of revulsion at the same moment. Bingle was at the base of a pine tree that at first seemed draped in some strange, gray moss. But it was not moss. The objects dangling from its branches were animals. Coyotes. A dozen or so carcasses, hanging upside down, in varying states of decay, nailed to the lower branches, as if someone had started to decorate a macabre Christmas tree.

I put my hand over my mouth, fighting off the urge to be sick.

David was quieting Bingle, praising the dog, but I could hear the shakiness in his voice.

We heard the sound of the others, pushing their way through the woods behind us.

Nicholas Parrish looked up at the tree and smiled. “I told you we were headed in the right direction.”

6

TUESDAY, LATE AFTERNOON, MAY 16

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

Flash took pictures. Merrick, arms held back by Manton, red-faced with anger, shouted at Parrish that he was “one sick fuck,” while Manton did his best to keep his fellow guard from punching the prisoner. Parrish kept smiling.

I had watched the others arrive at the coyote tree; their faces had expressed first horror, then fury. Ben Sheridan, although briefly startled when he first saw the tree, now calmly studied it. He turned to Flash. “We’ll need photographs of this, Mr. Burden.”

Merrick, seeing Ben start to take notes, shouted, “That turn you on, Sheridan?”

“Shut up, Merrick,” Bob Thompson said without heat, moving closer to the tree, studying it as well.

“From several angles, please, Mr. Burden,” Ben said, then glancing at Merrick added, “if you videotape, please keep the sound off. David, perhaps it would be best to move Bingle away.”

“There’s a small clearing about fifty yards away — down that pathway, there,” Parrish said, pointing. No one thanked him for his help.

I stayed for a while, but no one else was talking. I saw Thompson take out his GPS. I used my compass to note the position of the tree.

I wondered if Thompson would ask for additional charges to be brought against Parrish for this — maybe J.C. could bring them on behalf of the Forest Service. I forced myself to count the coyotes — there were twelve of them. They appeared to have some sort of coating on them. Much as I tried to mentally brace myself, the sight made my stomach churn. I turned to Parrish. “Why?”

He grinned and said, “Feeling a kinship with them? Perhaps you’d like me to hang you here among them. Let them sway against you in the breeze.”

I felt a sudden surge of anger, but just as quickly saw that he enjoyed my reaction — so I clenched my teeth against a retort.

Quietly, Thompson asked me to leave, and for once, I was happy to comply with his request.

When I caught up with Andy and David, they were playing tug-of-war with Bingle, using a cotton rope toy that had the worn look of a favorite plaything. I joined in the game. The dog would shake the rope fiercely and then proudly prance around the clearing whenever he took it away from one of us, high-stepping as he let the others know who had won the encounter, looking slyly at each of us to dare the next comer. It was almost enough to take our minds off what was happening by the tree, but not quite.

“David,” Andy said, “you’ve been around this type of guy before. Why do you think Parrish did that?”

“There could be any number of explanations,” David said, “but if you’re trying to make any real sense of it, well, that’s something for a forensic psychologist to tackle.”

“He’s insane,” Andy said.

“Not by the legal definition,” David said. “He was found competent to stand trial.”

“According to Newly, Parrish was a severely abused child,” I said.

“Oh?” David said. “Maybe he was, maybe he wasn’t. His mother is dead and his sister has mysteriously disappeared, so we only have Parrish’s word about the abuse. In fact, he’s probably the only person on earth who knows where his sister is — either one of you believe she’s still breathing?”

Silence.

“Did he kill his mother?” Andy asked.

“No,” I said. “She died of natural causes. But one of the psychologists who interviewed him thought her death may have set him off.”

David shook his head. “I guess psychologists have to try to understand him. Me, in most ways, I don’t think I’ll ever really understand a man like Nick Parrish. Other people survive abuse and go on to lead productive lives — they don’t torture women and animals. Parrish is beyond explanation. Bingle’s actions make more sense to me.”

“So why is Ben back there studying that — that tree?” Andy asked.

“So that when the next Nick Parrish comes along, you catch him on his first coyote. Ben has done a lot more of this kind of work than I have. Maybe too much.” He glanced over at me. “He’s had a lot of tough cases lately. And a couple of back-to-back MFIs — he’s on the DMORT team for the region.”

“What’s an MFI?” I asked.

“Sorry. Mass fatality incident — anything that takes the lives of a large number of people. Natural or otherwise — earthquakes, riots, bombings—”

“Airplane crashes?”

“Yes. Ben was called out to one of those in Oregon a few weeks ago.”

“The commuter jet that crashed in the Cascades?”

“Yes. Eighty-seven dead. And we had just come home from working the flood up in Sacramento when the DMORT team got called to that one.”

“What’s a DMORT team?” I asked, pulling at the rope as Bingle nudged me with it.

“Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Team — it’s a federal program. Let’s suppose you’re a coroner or a mortician in a rural area, coping with — oh, at the most, a few bodies a week. A plane crashes in the local woods, and suddenly you’ve got two hundred bodies to deal with. Usually, in a mass disaster, the local coroner and mortuary facilities can’t handle it. If the coroner needs help with victim identification and mortuary services, the DMORT team can bring in a mobile morgue and the specialists to go with it. There are ten DMORTs, organized by region. Ben’s on the one for this region.”

“But this is different,” Andy said. “Even working on criminal cases, I’ll bet this is the first time he’s seen something like that coyote tree.”

David shrugged. “Maybe. You might be surprised at some of the things we’ve seen, Andy. Things that . . .” His voice trailed off. He shook his head, then called to Bingle. After a moment he said, “Ben wouldn’t take the time back there if he didn’t think he could learn something from it.”

“Like what?” Andy asked.

“Maybe they’re a way of keeping score,” I said.

“The number of victims?” David asked. “Maybe. Or maybe the coyotes are part of some warm-up ritual, a preparation for a kill. Or maybe when he couldn’t find the kind of victim he was looking for, he killed a coyote.”

“But that would mean they’ve been there a long time,” I said. “They would have been in worse shape.”

David nodded. “Unless he’s treated them with some sort of chemical to help preserve them — that’s the sort of thing Ben is probably trying to determine.”

Bingle’s ears suddenly went up, his posture rigid. He sniffed the air, then moved into a protective position near David, hackles raised. “Tranquilo. I’m okay, Bingle,” David said. The dog looked up at him, then sat at his feet.

Soon we saw what Bingle had heard and scented; the four guards and Parrish joined us, and not much later, Flash and Bob Thompson. Ben Sheridan came strolling along last of all, not greeting any of us, lost in thought.

Thompson looked at his watch and gave an exasperated sigh. “We’ve only got a couple of hours of daylight left. Can we make it to where the grave is before sunset?”

“Certainly,” Parrish answered.

He led us down a steep path through dense woods, to a small pond. Thompson was marking it on his GPS when Parrish said, “No, no, not here.” He moved off in another direction, back through the trees, crossing a stream, and after wandering through the forest, brought us to a long meadow.

“Not here, either,” he said, and led us off again.

I asked Thompson what position he was reading on his GPS and doublechecked it against readings I had taken with my compass. I was about to tell him what I had learned, when David called to him.

“Bingle is showing some interest in that last meadow,” he said. “It’s worth spending more time there—”

“We’ve marked it on the GPS,” Thompson interrupted. “I’m giving Parrish one more chance. We can go back to the meadow if he misses on this last try.”

“Look at the map,” I said, showing him the markings I had made. “He’s taking us in circles. That ridge he’s walking toward is the one with the coyote tree on it.”

“Yes, he’s had his little fun and games,” Thompson said. “I’ve told him this next place had better be it, or the whole deal is off.”

We crossed the ridge again, on a narrow path some distance from the coyote tree, and moving downhill again we found ourselves in another long, narrow meadow. It was nearly dark by then; the air was cold, but still.

“This place gives me the creeps,” Manton said.

“Never mind that,” Thompson said. He turned to David. “What does the dog say?”

“Conditions aren’t good to work him,” David answered. “If we get a breeze, I can tell you more.”

“Parrish — exactly where in this meadow did you bury her?” Thompson asked.

“Exactly? I’m not sure. But that’s why you brought the dog, right?”

Thompson’s eyes narrowed. He looked ready to deliver Parrish a beating. He clenched his fists, then turned from Parrish, pacing two stiff steps away before saying, “Make camp here. We’ll look for her in the morning.”

And so we all went to work setting up tents. No one spoke much that night; there was none of the joking or camaraderie of the evening before. Bingle stayed with David, which was all right, I wasn’t going to sleep. I’m sure I’m not the only one who lay awake that night, thinking of Julia Sayre being marched to this meadow, forced to dig her own grave. Not the only one, I’m sure, who thought it was worse somehow that Parrish had transformed this paradise into her hell.

And I’m sure I’m not the only one who wondered just how far away from us she lay.

7

WEDNESDAY MORNING, MAY 17

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

Just after dawn the next morning, I went for a short walk, telling Manton, who was on watch with Merrick, which direction I planned to go. I hadn’t hiked far when I found a shallow cave, not quite ten feet deep. If it had ever been the lair of an animal, it had long since been abandoned. There was nothing in the way of a cache of food or a nest, no scat, no bones of smaller prey, no bits of fur. In fact, the more I thought about it, the more it seemed to me that the cave looked a little too clean. No animal I could think of would leave so little evidence of its residence there.

I decided to ask J.C., the ranger, about it when he caught up to us again. It also occurred to me that Parrish could have made use of this place, and if so, the experts in our search group might be able to detect traces of his activities there.

I began to feel uneasy, and try as I might to chalk it up to another round of claustrophobia, I knew that wasn’t the case. I hurried outside and went through the routine of using the compass and altimeter to calm myself down. I made a note of the cave’s location and headed back to camp.

Although it was still early when I returned to the meadow, most of the others were up and about. Manton was studying a photograph of a blonde with shoulder-length hair, holding his thumb over part of the picture.

“Your wife?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“She’s pretty.”

“Thanks.”

I started to walk away, but as if it had just occurred to him, he said, “Hey, you’re a woman . . .”

I turned back to him. What woman can resist responding to that observation? You always know what’s coming next. Its equivalent is, “Hey, you speak Urdu, translate this.” On behalf of your Urdu-speaking sisters, you listen.

“Tell me something,” he continued. “You think her hair looks better like this?”

“Your thumb’s in the way.”

“No, that’s where she cut her hair, just before I came up here. Pissed me off. We argued.”

“Let me see,” I said, and he handed it to me. I studied it for a moment. “She’s pretty either way, don’t you think?”

He took the photo back. “Yeah, I guess so. I guess I just need to get used to it.” He yawned. “Nothing I can do about it now.” He moved off to his tent.

Several yards away, Ben and Andy stood on top of a large, rounded boulder. Both were using field glasses; Andy pointed down the field, seeming to indicate a particular location, and Ben focused his binoculars in that direction. They then lowered their binoculars and made markings on a piece of paper. As I watched, this process was repeated several times.

I moved closer to them. Andy saw me and called out a greeting. “Come up here,” he said. “I’ll show you some of the signs we look for.”

Ben was obviously displeased with this suggestion, and walked away before I reached the boulder.

“Here,” Andy said, handing me his binoculars. “Look out over there, just to the right of that tree.” He waited while I located the place he was indicating. “What do you see?” he asked.

I studied the meadow, which sloped gently upward from where we had camped. “Mostly grass and wildflowers,” I said.

“Is the grass all the same height?”

I studied it again, more carefully this time, then said, “No! There’s a patch of shorter growth.”

“Right,” he said. “It might be shorter because it’s newer. We found several places like that in this meadow, and mapped them out. We’ll need to take a closer look to get an idea of what caused the growth to be different there.”

“Is that where David will search with Bingle?”

“Maybe. Usually he likes to start by giving Bingle a chance to sniff around on his own, without any guidance from us — see if he gives an alert.”

“Like he did at the coyote tree?”

“No — not exactly. Bingle gives a very clear signal when he smells human blood or remains. He’s trained to look specifically for human rather than animal remains. The way he reacted to the coyote tree — I think he was just upset.”

“I don’t blame him.”

“Me, neither.” He was quiet for a moment, then said, “Anyway, Ben and I will be checking out the places where the plant life is disturbed while David works with Bingle. Any number of natural factors can cause a change in plant life, of course, but I think one or two of the areas we want to look at are typical of burial places.”

“Typical?” I asked. “What do you mean?”

“Studies have been done about how serial killers choose special burial places for their victims. Despite his claims to the contrary, we think Parrish knows exactly where to find the victim’s grave. Ben thinks Parrish likes to stage things precisely — and dramatically. Detective Thompson and Ben agree that Parrish has probably revisited the burial site; he most likely chose a site that he could find again and again. Ben said it would help Parrish relive the pleasure of the kill.”

“The pleasure . . .” I shook my head.

“I know,” Andy said, grimacing. “Ben says we have to try to think of this the way Parrish would, if we want to find her.”

“So what would we look for, then? Some sort of landmark?”

“Exactly. Anything that would help Parrish find the site again.”

At that moment, Ben called to Andy, so I gave Andy’s binoculars back to him and thanked him for the explanation. As I walked back toward the camp, I noticed that Bingle and David weren’t in sight. Bob Thompson joined Ben and Andy.

I heard Bingle give a single, happy bark from somewhere in the woods. I looked for the dog and found him pacing back and forth before David, hardly sparing me a glance, focusing his attention on his owner, who was opening one of Bingle’s equipment packs. David called a greeting to me, then commanded Bingle to sit. The dog immediately obeyed, but it seemed to be taking all his self-control to do so. His body was taut, his eyes watching David intently. His ears were pitched forward, his cheeks puffing slightly with excited breaths.

David smiled at me. “Don’t you wish you felt this way about starting your workday?”

He pulled out a leather collar and Bingle’s tail began swishing rapidly through the pine needles beneath it.

“For him, it’s play. Just a big game. His favorite game.” He replaced the bright-colored nylon collar Bingle had been wearing with the leather one.

“¿Estás listo?” he asked the dog. “Are you ready?”

Bingle got to his feet and barked.

“Can I join you?” I asked. “Or would it be too much of a distraction to Bingle?”

“No, he’s used to other people being with us. When my group of handlers trains together, we always have at least two people out with the dog. On most searches, there are detectives or rescue personnel or other people around. Bingle has learned not to be distracted by them.”

As we walked with the dog to the edge of the meadow, Bingle’s attention was so focused on David, I was afraid the dog would walk into a tree.

“Great conditions,” David said to me. “See how the grass in the meadow is moving?” He took out a small, rounded plastic object and squeezed it. A small cloud of fine powder puffed from it, and he studied its movement as it drifted by.

“Nice breeze, coming right at us,” he said, pleased. “Moist air. Let’s try to get some work in before it gets too warm. ¿Está bien, Bingle?”

Bingle barked sharply in impatience.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” David said.

“Rowl, rowl, rowl,” the dog answered, in near-perfect imitation.

“¡Busca al muerto, Bingle!” David said, sweeping his hand out in a flat and low motion. Find the dead.

The dog took off in a weaving pattern, not running full bore but moving in his steady, long-legged pace, David not far behind him. I was a close third.

Sniffing the breeze, Bingle stopped every now and then, sometimes doubling back a short distance, but almost always moving forward. David spoke to him, encouraged him as he made his way through the meadow.

I kept watching, puzzled. This search method seemed to be all wrong, at least according to all the movies I had seen — which usually portrayed dogs tracking escaped convicts. How did he know what to look for? Or where? Bingle’s nose was up in the air most of the time, not down on the ground. And he wasn’t baying. He was zigzagging quietly through a field, obviously pleased to be at his work, but not giving any indication that he was close to finding anything.

After about twenty minutes, David gave Bingle a command to rest, and gave the dog some water. When I caught up with them, I took out my notebook and the one item of special outdoor journalism equipment I had packed — a waterproof pen. I asked David about Bingle’s style of searching.

“The baying business is basically Hollywood, trying to combine a foxhunt with a manhunt, I suppose,” he said. “Bingle barks more than the average search dog, mainly because I let him — some handlers consider it a sign of poor training to let a search dog bark. They only want the dog to bark when he finds a missing person alive. There’s a lot of religion out there when it comes to handling dogs, if you know what I mean. I suppose if you had one that barked all the time, he might, oh, scare a lost child, for example. And if you’ve got a police dog trailing a killer in the woods, you don’t always want the dog to alert the criminal to your presence with a lot of baying and barking.

“But Bingle isn’t a police dog, and most of the people he looks for are dead. I guess I figure I know Bingle — and he’s got a personality that needs to let out with a bark every now and then. He’s a talker. None of the cadavers has complained about it yet. And if I ask him to work silently, he’ll do it.”

“Okay, so no baying. But how will he ever find Julia Sayre’s scent? You never gave him any article of clothing to work with, or—”

“If you ever meet Bool, my foolish bloodhound, you’ll see a tracking dog. I’m not saying that Bool never uses air scenting — he does, but primarily, he’s tracking. He spends lots of time with his nose on the ground. He was born with a truly amazing sense of smell — probably better than Bingle’s. Unlike Bingle, though, he’s not what you’d call smart. I’ve got to keep him on a lead, or God knows, if the person he was trailing happened to have fallen off a cliff, he’d follow the scent right over the edge. He becomes nose-blind.” He paused, smiling wistfully to himself.

I thought about the times my own dogs had relentlessly pursued some interesting scent, which usually resulted in holes in our backyard or knocked-over trash cans. “You’re searching areas that might include crime scenes,” I said. “I suppose the cops can’t just let every clown who thinks Fido is pretty clever put his pet on a leash and come on down to snoop around.”

“Right. Fido and his master are likely to destroy evidence — not to mention dozens of other legal and health problems. Search dogs are working dogs, and the handlers and their dogs all go through lots of training. It’s ongoing, and requires years of work — but it’s more than work. It’s a bond, it’s learning to read your dog, it’s — well, it’s hard to explain. Bool and Bingle work differently.”

“Different in what ways?”

“Bool needs to be pre-scented — given something of the victim’s to smell. He tracks that scent, nose to the ground. Bingle is primarily an air-scenting dog, and he is specifically cadaver trained.”

“Which means?”

“Every individual human being gives off a unique scent — with the possible exception of identical twins. Otherwise, we each have our own. We give off this scent because every minute, every living person sheds an estimated forty thousand dead skin cells, called rafts, that carry bacteria and give off their own one-of-a-kind vapor.”

“Even if you bathe and use deodorant?”

He smiled. “No getting away from it. You can mask it from your fellow humans, but not the dogs.”

“Okay, but what if I’m not near the dog?”

“Let’s go back to the rafts. Every minute, these tens of thousands of rafts come off us like a cloud, surrounding us and drifting away from us as we move, with the heaviest concentration very near us. As we move, it spreads into a wider and wider cone — that’s known as a scent cone. As they drift, some of these rafts will catch on other objects, especially plants.”

“And Bingle smells the rafts?”

“Yes. A dog’s nose is literally a million times more sensitive than ours for some scents. And it’s thought that their brains process scent information in a different manner than our brains do.”

“So he can follow this cone of scent?”

“Yes. He’s also trained to find the scent of human blood, body fluids, tissue, skeletal remains, and decomposing remains. And he can find any of these things in minute amounts.”

“I know I’m going to hate myself for asking this, but how were you able to train him to find bodies — to teach him what a dead body smells like?”

“In this line of work, I have access to bones and other biological material from cadavers. But some trainers use a synthetic chemical that’s made just for the purpose of training these dogs.”

I couldn’t hide a look of disbelief. “Fake cadaver smell?”

“Yes. Different formulas for different levels of decay.”

“Not the kind of thing you’d want to accidentally spill on your carpet, I suppose.”

He laughed. “No, but Bingle might not mind. Dogs aren’t bothered by what we think of as horrible odors. To them, the worse it smells, the more interesting it is. And for Bingle, that smell is associated with praise — finding it brings a reward.”

“But even decaying bodies must smell — well, unique, right? Because of the varying conditions they are left in, if nothing else — out in forests, in deserts, underwater—”

“Sure, to some extent. He’s not trained for one smell alone, of course. Best of all, Bingle has a couple of years of experience, so he knows what it is he’s looking for. Bingle’s nose is sensitive enough to find a single drop of blood. You let him sniff a car, he can tell you if a body has been in its trunk.”

“My husband and his partner made Bingle sound as if he were Super Dog.”

“Oh no. He has his limitations. Conditions have to be good for him to search, and there are things that can throw him off. But his biggest limitation is talking to you right now.”

“What do you mean?”

He smiled. “If I could understand everything he tries to say to me, we’d get better results. Lord, who knows what he could accomplish? More than once, I’ve looked back and realized that I just failed to read him; he was trying to show me where to find something, but I insisted that we do things my way. There are times when I can see he’s frustrated, trying to get things across to his dumb handler.”

“I don’t know,” I said, “you two seem to have a pretty good partnership.”

“Well, partner,” he said to Bingle, who immediately became alert, “ready to have another go at it?”

Bingle got quickly to his feet, but continued to watch David with anticipation.

“¡Búscalos!” David said, giving the same hand signal he had before. “Find ’em!” The dog immediately went back to work.

David worked him for another twenty minutes, and again provided water and rest. On the fourth round of work, the dog’s weaving pattern suddenly narrowed. He was still moving side to side, but faster and faster. He stopped and looked back at David, his ears forward, the look intent.

“That’s an alert,” David said excitedly. “Whatcha got?” he said to Bingle. “Show me where it is. Muéstrame dónde está. Sigue — keep going.”

Bingle moved off again, nearly in a straight line.

“How did you know it was an alert?” I asked.

“I know him,” David said simply, hurrying after him. “When his ears are straight forward like that, it’s as if he’s checking in with me. I’m part of his pack. He’s asking me, ‘Can’t you smell that?’ ” He kept watching the dog as he spoke, then said, “He’s got something. Look — the scent has caught on the grass.”

Bingle was rubbing his face against the grass, biting at it.

“¡Búscalo, Bingle!” David said. “Find it!”

The breeze came up again and the dog stopped, held his head high, and sniffed with a slight bobbing motion of his nose, as if trying to draw in more of a specific scent.

“Whatcha got?” David asked again. “Whatcha got, Bingle? Show me! ¡Muéstramelo! ¡Adelante!”

Bingle sang a high little note, then rushed on ahead of us. He stopped about twenty yards away — I could see him circling anxiously in one area, heard him making chuffing noises. Suddenly, he sat down on his haunches, lifted his head back so that his nose was straight up in the air, and began crooning.

“That’s his way of giving a hard alert,” David said, rushing forward.

Bingle met him halfway, and nudged at a pouch on David’s belt. “¿Dónde está? Where is it?” David said, and the dog loped back to where he had alerted and barked.

David reached the dog before I did. “Bingle,” he suddenly said, “you beautiful son of a bitch!”

Bingle gave a loud bark of agreement.

8

WEDNESDAY MORNING, MAY 17

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

If I hadn’t talked to Andy before following Bingle, I might not have understood why David was now enthusiastically praising his dog, pulling out a floppy toss-toy that was apparently the dog’s all-time favorite. On the ground where Bingle had indicated his find, I could clearly see the burial signs Andy had mentioned. There, in a long patch, the soil contrasted slightly in color with other nearby soil — it appeared to be less compact and there were more rocks and pebbles in it. The plants growing over it were not as tall or sturdy as their neighbors.

It was not a clearly defined grave-size rectangle with nice, neat edges. But it was not much bigger than a grave might be, and was obviously unlike the area immediately around it.

“Let’s move back from this site,” David said. “We don’t want to disturb evidence.”

We moved over to a level spot nearer to the tree, where David continued to play with Bingle and praise him. The other members of our group must have been watching us, because before David beckoned, Ben and Andy donned packs and headed our way, with Thompson and Flash Burden not far behind. Duke and Earl moved more slowly from the campsite, bringing Parrish; Merrick and Manton managed to sleep through the commotion.

“A hard alert?” Ben called as he came within earshot.

David smiled. “Yes, and my dog doesn’t lie.”

“Where?”

But Andy had already noticed the plants near the place where Bingle had alerted. “Wow. Right there.” Drawing closer, he pointed out several wildflowers and said, “You see? Most of them are shorter than others of the same species, growing right next to them. That might be happening because something’s preventing their roots from developing — the roots may be running into some type of barrier underground.”

David commanded Bingle to stay and we walked with the others to where Andy stood.

David conferred briefly with Bob Thompson and Ben, then said to me, “Would you mind keeping Bingle company while we check this out? You can watch from the shade over there — best spot in the house. You’ll be able to see and hear everything.”

“Look, I’m fond of the dog, but I have a job here, too. I don’t want to be shut out—”

“This is a crime scene—” Bob Thompson began, but Ben interrupted.

“Oh, I think Ms. Kelly should be allowed to stand as close as possible,” he said, and although he wasn’t smiling, I could hear some amusement in his voice.

“Ben—” David protested, in a way that made me all the more unsure of Ben’s motives for suddenly being so cooperative.

Ben ignored him. In quiet, considerate tones, he said to me, “Allow me to explain that we don’t just bring out our shovels and dig, Ms. Kelly. We start slowly and carefully, systematically surveying the burial area, setting up a grid system and so on. Perhaps you wouldn’t mind staying with Bingle while we do the preliminary work. I’ll let you know when we’re about to actually see the body — if there is a body here.”

“She’s there,” I heard a voice say. I turned to see Parrish looking straight at me, smiling. “Yes,” he drawled slowly, “her lovely body is right there.”

“Tranquilo,” David said to Bingle, who was standing between us. The dog had not growled or barked at Parrish’s approach, but I could see what had caused David to give the command to take it easy — Bingle’s stance was rigid.

“I’ll watch Bingle,” I said.

Parrish laughed. “Better let him watch you.”

“That’s enough out of you,” Earl said, pulling Parrish back from the group.

“Ve con ella,” David said to Bingle, and gave me a tennis ball. As he said this, he made a motion with his hand that evidently told Bingle that I was to receive all of his attention. Bingle stared at the ball with the kind of intense concentration that might have been used by a psychic to bend a fork. We played for a while, then sat together and watched as Flash videotaped and photographed the site, Thompson talked to Parrish, and David, Andy, and Ben hovered over maps and studied the ground, defining an outer perimeter several feet beyond the loosened soil.

Our place was, as David had said, the best spot in the house. We were only a few yards from the patch, we were in the shade, and the breeze had shifted toward us — both shade and breeze provided relief to Bingle, who lay panting softly, eyes closed in contentment.

Ben bent over a duffel bag, and handed out gloves. He next removed a set of metal rods, each about half an inch thick, bent at a right angle at one end — the handle. Working from different directions, the men each picked a spot, leaned on the probes — which did not go too far into the ground — then pulled them from the ground and moved them a little closer to the site of the alert. This process continued, until Ben’s probe sank easily into the earth. “Here,” he said. As he pulled it up, Bingle lifted his head, then came to his feet, ears pitched forward. The dog started to move toward Ben.

“Stay,” I commanded. He ignored me, but David had heard me, and snapped the command again — in Spanish this time. Bingle obeyed, but protested with a sharp bark.

“He smells it,” David said. Then, wrinkling his nose, added, “So do I.”

David went back to the duffel bag and took a small jar from it; he dipped a finger into it and then rubbed the substance just beneath his nose, making a small, shiny mustache of it. He offered the jar to Andy, who used it. He didn’t offer it to Ben.

Ben was putting a little marker — a small yellow flag on a wire — near the spot where he had probed. They continued in this fashion until they had a few other places marked. The yellow flags formed a rough oval, about six feet long.

Bingle was agitated — fidgeting but obeying David’s command to stay. Every now and then I would get a whiff of what he was reacting to — an unmistakable smell, a smell that is sweet and pungent all at once — a smell that you instantly know the meaning of, even if you have never smelled it before. Perhaps some primal memory repulses us from this scent, tells us that this is the smell of the death and decay of one of our own.

“I’ll show you what we’re doing,” David said, coming over to calm Bingle. As he moved closer to me, I said, “Vicks VapoRub.”

He moved his hand, just stopped short of touching his upper lip. “A menthol and camphor smell compound that’s sort of similar to it, yes. I use it to mask the decomp odor. Do you need some?”

“Not yet.”

“Don’t wait too long,” he said. “Once the smell is in your nose . . .” He paused, then said again, “Don’t wait too long.”

He began to show me the scene maps they were drawing, with nearby peaks as triangulation points to mark the position of the tree. The grid lines were shown, over which the position of the grave, the outer perimeter boundary, and a cluster of boulders were drawn.

“If we need to testify about any of this in court, we’ll have a precise record of where we found any evidence or remains, how the remains were positioned — and so on.”

Bob Thompson walked up to us. “What’s taking so long? Parrish says she’s there, about two feet down. He’s already confessed. I just need a preliminary identification.”

Behind me, I heard Ben ask, “And what if this is some other victim, Detective Thompson?”

Thompson hesitated, then said, “Fine, but let’s not dawdle, all right? We aren’t going to be able to stay up here forever.”

Ben simply walked off. From one of his duffel bags, he pulled two rolls of screen, one about one-quarter-inch mesh, the other about half-inch. David helped him use these and two sets of support pieces to build two sieves.

Bingle occasionally called out to David, and in Spanish, David answered, “It’s okay, Bingle. Stay with Irene.” Invariably, I’d get a quick kiss from the dog in response.

Whenever I looked over at Parrish, he was watching me, a knowing smile on his face. I repressed the urge to quickly look away, to show how uneasy I was under his scrutiny. But I was always the first to break eye contact, and once, when an involuntary shiver went through me as I turned away, I heard him laugh softly.

With Andy’s help, the anthropologists carefully scraped the surface level of the soil inside the markers away, and put it through the two sieves. They continued in this fashion, a few centimeters at a time — over Thompson’s impatient protests. Although they didn’t seem to be getting anywhere at first, before long I saw more clearly defined edges of the oval they had marked with the flags. The smell was getting stronger.

Ben took a moment to stretch. When he came over to say hello to Bingle, I said, “You wouldn’t happen to have any of that smell compound with you?”

“I don’t use it.”

“But how can you stand—”

“For professionals who deal with it all the time — well, I suppose it’s a matter of personal preference, but I don’t recommend using any compound to cover up the smell. Try to deal with it the way nature designed you to deal with it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Sooner or later, after your brain has received the message from your olfactory cells that something bad is out there — and received it again and again — the signal stops registering. There will be residual odor on your clothes and you’ll smell it again later, when you aren’t so near the grave.”

“Charming.”

“You’ll smell it later no matter what you do now. But if you use something that will open up your nasal passages, it will continue to stimulate your olfactory cells — which will keep you smelling decomp throughout the day. It may also result in your brain connecting the good smell to the bad.”

“You mean that every time I use anything with a menthol or camphor or eucalyptus odor—”

“Yes. Your brain might add decomp to the mix.”

I looked over at David. He had used the smell compound, why shouldn’t I?

“Of course,” Ben said, “I don’t expect you to be able to handle this situation at all, so do whatever you need to do.”

That settled it, of course. David obviously thought I was a fool, but didn’t say so — he just checked in with me every so often to see how I was bearing up. He offered the smell compound to the others; Ben and I were the only ones who didn’t take him up on it. As he was passing it around, he pointedly skipped Parrish. Parrish just grinned and drew a deep breath.

“Move him back to the camp,” Thompson ordered the guards.

The excavation went on, now even more slowly, as the sides of the grave were carefully uncovered. Ben focused on defining the grave’s edges with painstaking care; David gently scraped away at the inside layers; Andy sifted for objects that might have been missed, bagged certain portions of the removed soil, labeled it, and made notes as needed.

From time to time the odor from the grave would suddenly seem worse. Ben would look over at me, smirking. I smiled back, taking satisfaction in knowing that whenever he looked over at me like that, he must have just gotten a beak full of it, too.

Flash continued to videotape the process, and to take still photographs at Ben’s or David’s request. Ben and David had a second camera, and took some photos on their own.

“Why are you photographing the edges of the grave?” I asked Ben.

He hesitated, then said, “Possible tool marks.”

“From the shovel that was used to dig the grave?”

“Perhaps.”

“If you know who did this, why do you need to gather evidence?” I asked.

“We don’t necessarily know who made this grave,” he said. “We have to treat this site as we would any other. Objectively.”

“But Parrish has confessed—”

“Confessions can be recanted. Convictions are appealed. Deals fall apart, Ms. Kelly. We never know what we may need to prove, what evidence may become important. So we work carefully.” He paused, then added, “The rules of evidence are much stricter in courtrooms than in newsrooms.”

I turned away to keep him from seeing me grit my teeth.

After the first few layers of earth had been removed, a layer of large rocks appeared, scattered over the pit. When Thompson asked about them, Ben, not stopping his work, said, “My guess is that they were supposed to discourage carnivores from raiding the grave.”

“Coyotes?” Thompson asked.

Sheridan looked up. “Yes, we know he’s thought about coyotes.”

Once the rocks were removed, the slow, scraping process began again. David was working on the portion near the center of the grave when he suddenly said, “Hold up.”

Ben and Andy stopped what they were doing and began to focus on the area where David had been scraping soil away. They stepped back a little, and called Flash in to take a few photographs. After a moment, they called Thompson over.

I stood up and moved a little closer.

The object of all this scrutiny was a tuft of dark green plastic. Soon we would all come to realize what the forensic anthropologists already suspected.

This was a shroud.

9

WEDNESDAY MORNING, MAY 17

Las Piernas

Frank Harriman hung up the phone and turned to his wife’s cousin. “The lawyer’s back — he’s in the hospital.” He drew a deep breath, let it out slowly. “Courtesy of his client.”

“What happened?” Travis asked.

“Parrish stomped on Newly’s foot. Caused multiple fractures. They had a tough time getting him back out — fainted a couple of times from the pain.”

“She’ll be all right,” Travis said, knowing where Frank’s concern lay, repeating a refrain that might have been wearying had Frank not needed to hear it.

“All the guards right there,” Frank went on. “Watching him! And he still manages to injure his own lawyer.” He paused, shook his head. “She shouldn’t have gone up there.”

“You couldn’t have stopped her.”

“She shouldn’t have gone,” he repeated, not listening, pacing now.

“Frank,” Travis said.

But he was lost in unpleasant memories. He was thinking of the day they found Kara Lane’s body, of what had been done to her. His pacing came to a halt when he thought — ever so briefly, but far, far too long — about the possibility of his wife being at Parrish’s mercy, in as much pain, as much afraid, as much alone as Kara Lane had been in her last hours. He felt his stomach pitch.

“Frank,” Travis said again.

He looked up.

“She’s still surrounded by lots of other people. You know they’d kill him before they let him harm her.”

He didn’t answer. How could he explain this kind of foreboding? He knew it to be something more than simple fear for her welfare. It was the kind of uneasiness he sometimes got out on the job — instinct, gut feeling, the heebiejeebies — call it what you will. No cop worth a damn ignored it. Right now, it was irritating the hell out of him. He believed in it, trusted it, even though he couldn’t have testified about it in a court of law . . .

“You’ve got to find something to do with yourself,” Travis was saying. “You can’t just sit here, getting more and more freaked out about this. Find something to occupy your time.”

Lost in his thoughts about Parrish, for a moment Frank merely stared at Travis. The suggestion that he keep himself busy — which had at first seemed ridiculous — began to take hold, and now made perfect sense.

He reached for his car keys.

“Where are you going?” Travis asked.

“To visit Mr. Newly in his sickbed.”

10

WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON, MAY 17

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

J.C. caught up to us again when about half of the plastic had been uncovered. If he was weary from the additional hiking he had done or by difficulties in helping Phil Newly to the plane, he didn’t show it.

Bingle noticed J.C.’s presence at the other end of the meadow before I did. Because I had been watching the dog, I caught the change in the focus of his attention before the others did. During the last few hours, I had been spending much of my time ensuring that Bingle didn’t sneak closer to the open grave — after he made one nearly successful attempt, David taught me how to say “¡Quédate!” — which means “stay” — in a tone of voice that Bingle would obey.

“You can also say, ‘No te muevas,’ ” David said. “If you say it in a no-nonsense tone of voice — let him know you mean what you say — you’ll get him to set aside his other impulses, even the ones that tell him he was on to something really great and now we’re having all the fun. He’d like to join in, but his notions of amusement wouldn’t be too helpful for our purposes.”

I shuddered.

“I know, I know,” David said. “But in order to do this kind of work, he has to be interested in that smell. He behaves himself for the most part, but the trouble is, Bingle tends to feel a little proprietary about his finds.”

Now, as J.C. approached, Bingle’s ears were pitched forward and he watched the ranger closely. Dogs — natural hunters — see motion better than detail, and Bingle’s body posture said that he was on guard against this approaching figure. Eventually he must have managed to catch J.C.’s familiar scent — although how he could do so over the increasingly intense smell of the grave, I’ll never know — because suddenly he let out a happy bark of welcome.

For a time, work stopped as we greeted J.C. and caught up with one another. He applied some smell compound as he listened to the story of Bingle’s find, and praised the dog, who was happy to bask in his attention.

He had seen the coyote tree, and his disgust over it was plain; he was all for bringing charges against Parrish for it. “Not a big deal to someone going down on a double murder rap, I suppose, but still—” He shook his head, as if ridding himself of the memory of the tree. He bent down to pet Bingle. “So you’ve found Mrs. Sayre, eh, Bingle?”

“We don’t know who or what this is yet, J.C.,” Ben reminded him, handing him a pair of gloves. “We haven’t even opened the plastic.”

“Well,” the ranger said, looking amused, “the plastic seems to rule out an American Indian burial site, and I can tell you that there aren’t any legal cemeteries in this meadow, and no hunting allowed here, either. So whoever or whatever it is, it doesn’t belong here.”

“When will the plane be back?” I asked him.

“Tomorrow, weather permitting. Some rain in the forecast, so they might be delayed a day or so. Did you bring rain gear?”

I nodded.

“We’d better get back to work,” Ben said. “The last thing I want to cope with is a flooded site.”

J.C. had apparently done this work before, but even with his help, things could only progress at a certain pace. Eventually, the top surface of the plastic was uncovered. It was a dull, dark green. It appeared to be of a heavier gauge than the plastic used to make trash bags, more like the type used for ground cover by landscapers.

Thompson paced, muttering none-too-quietly about guys who think they’re working on a pharaoh’s tomb instead of a crime scene; about wishing to God he could bring in a backhoe; damning Parrish’s hide for picking this place out beyond East Jesus to bury a body — and other unhelpful remarks that made life a little less pleasant for everyone within earshot.

Ben didn’t gratify Thompson with a response. He walked over to him, though, while Andy, J.C., and David stood back from the grave to allow more photographs to be taken of the lumpy plastic.

“We want to dig down a little more on the sides,” Ben told the detective, “just to see if we can find the edge of the plastic. We’d prefer to keep it intact. But if we can’t find an edge, we’ll go ahead and cut it open.”

Thompson looked up into the sky and said, “Thank you, Lord!”

“We aren’t being careful just to irritate you,” Ben said. “My guess is that the plastic wrapping, the cool temperatures and altitude here, the lack of animal disturbance—”

“What is it you’re trying to say?” Thompson snapped.

“In terms you’ll understand?” Ben shot back.

Thompson’s face was red, but he said, “As a matter of fact, yes — I’d like the nonegghead version.”

Ben looked away from him for a moment, as if trying to regain his temper. “This body may be — let’s see, in ‘nonegghead’ terms? It may be a little soupy. With this much odor, I don’t believe we’ll be looking at completely skeletonized remains — what we’re smelling is not just the scent of bones. That’s one reason why I’m not sure these remains are four years old — perhaps they are, perhaps they aren’t. If they aren’t — you may have a different victim here.”

“Yes, you mentioned that possibility earlier, but—”

Ben raised a hand, and Thompson — with a visible effort — held his peace.

“There are lots of ‘ifs’ here, Detective — if the remains are human, if this is a homicide and if this is not Julia Sayre — if all those conditions are met, you will obviously have a new set of charges you can bring against Parrish.”

Seeing he had Thompson’s interest, he went on. “Obviously, you can bring new charges only if we can prove that he’s the one who put this body here. We’re going slowly, because trace evidence that will link Parrish — or anyone else — to this crime may have been left in the surrounding soil, and if so, we want to find it.”

Ben paused and smiled, not very pleasantly, then added, “Just think, Detective Thompson, if this is a different victim, you’ll go back to Las Piernas a hero.”

“The D.A.’s deal with Parrish wasn’t exactly popular, was it?” Thompson said. “We weren’t too happy with it.”

“The police weren’t the only ones who were outraged that Parrish was protected from the death penalty. I think the D.A. has regretted it. That’s partly why Ms. Kelly was allowed to join us, right?”

Thompson looked over at me and nodded. “Everybody knows he’s hoping she’ll make his decision look good. She’s been writing about the Sayre case for a long time.”

I knew he resented my stories about Julia Sayre. As far as Thompson was concerned, they were an ongoing, embarrassing announcement that he had failed to solve the case.

“With a new case to pursue,” Ben said, “the D.A. could redeem himself with both groups — he’ll claim he tried to find Julia Sayre, but won’t fail to seek the death penalty for a third murder. And with what may be the resolution of another missing persons case, I’m sure the Las Piernas Police Department would be pleased with you.”

Thompson glanced back toward the camp, where Parrish, surrounded by his guards, stood staring toward us. Parrish was too far away to see us very clearly, or to be clearly seen by us, but he seemed intensely interested in our activities. And even at this distance, the defiance in his stance was unmistakable.

When I looked back at Thompson, though, I saw that Ben’s words had produced the opposite effect of the one he had intended. If Thompson was anxious to proceed before — when he’d thought only of being able to get back home with his mission accomplished — Ben’s vision of his heroic return now only intensified his impatience to achieve it.

“Who else could have left the body here?” he said. “Parrish led us right to it!”

Ben sighed. “Believe me, Detective Thompson, I want to know what’s underneath that plastic as badly as you do. But remember what I told you about the possible condition of the remains? Lifting the plastic out of the grave might cause the remains to shift, and perhaps to be damaged. We need to proceed with caution.”

“Christ, Sheridan, you’ve been creeping along like a three-legged turtle! If what you’ve been doing up to now hasn’t been ‘proceeding with caution,’ we’ll all be skeletons by the time you’re ready to get that body out of here!”

“If you’d like to continue without my help—”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Thompson said, but cooled off a little. “Look, I don’t mean to push you—”

David laughed.

“I don’t mean to push you into doing anything that will destroy evidence,” Thompson went on, “but I also don’t have the time or resources to allow you to make this into a museum-quality archeological dig.” He glanced back toward the camp, and missed the derisive looks the others exchanged. He turned again to Ben. “Among other problems, I need to get Parrish back into a cell as soon as possible.”

“If we’re allowed to get back to work,” Ben said meaningfully, “you’ll get your answers sooner.”

It was, in fact, not much later that Ben said, “We’re not going to be able to unwrap the body without risking damage. We’re ready to cut the plastic.”

David, seeing me come to my feet, said, “I can get Bingle to stay there if you want to come closer — at least long enough for you to take a look.”

“If this is not Julia Sayre,” Ben objected, “there may be details here that we don’t want released to the public.”

Thompson said in exasperation, “Agree to keep it off the record, will you, Kelly? If it isn’t Sayre, you can report that another victim has been found. The rest you keep out of the paper — write about it only after we release the information.”

“The rest goes to the Express first,” I said.

“All right, fine. Sheridan, get on with it.”

Ben didn’t try to hide his contempt for me, but being in this line of work, I had my disapproval vaccinations a long time ago and don’t expect I’ll ever be killed by a snub. The sooner he realized that all his wishing I would go to hell wasn’t going to keep me from doing my job, the better for both of us.

“Acuéstate,” David commanded Bingle, and the dog lay down. “Bien, Bingle. No te muevas.”

David offered the jar of smell compound again, and a mask. I reluctantly took the mask after he told me that everyone who stood near the grave would have to wear one. I put mine over my head, but knowing how confining it would feel, didn’t pull it up over my mouth and nose just yet.

Watching me, David said quietly, “This isn’t going to be pretty. You’ve seen decayed remains before?”

“Yes,” I said.

“This will probably be worse. Much worse. My guess is that it’s going to be tough on these cops, because even though they see some horrible things, usually the bodies they find are — well, fresher. Seldom this far gone.” He paused, then said, “If you’re going to get sick, for God’s sake, run as far away from the site as you can to do it.”

Seeing my look of apprehension, he added, “Ben really hates the smell of barf.”

I laughed, felt better for it, and told him I’d probably try to pick some other way to get back at Dr. Sheridan.

He smiled. “You’ll be fine.”

But when the plastic was cut, I-shaped, and then — with a crackling sound — pulled back, I wasn’t so sure I would be fine. I held on by making myself think of the strange mass — the misshapen figure that was in some places bone, some places hair, or liquid, or leathery tissue — to think of this figure that lay before me as something to be studied, something that might tell a secret.

Even then, I could not manage to be a cold observer; perhaps those much touted tricks of divorcing one’s mind from the victim’s humanity worked for someone there, but not for me, and as I glanced at the faces of Ben and David, who had seen this sort of thing so often before, I realized that I didn’t see coldness there at all — only quiet compassion. Perhaps they felt as I did: for all its distorted aspect, there was no doubt that this had been a human being, that this had been someone, and although her fate had been terrible, it would not remain hidden.

Ben caught me studying him, or so I thought, until I realized that the reverse was true — he had quickly studied me, and the others as well.

“Mr. Burden, will you be able to continue?” he asked the photographer, whose face was drained of color.

“Mr. Burden?” Ben asked again.

Flash tore his wide-eyed gaze from the remains, and looked up at him. “Yes, sir,” he said shakily.

“The camera?” Ben prompted gently.

Flash looked down at his right hand in surprise; at some point he had dropped the video camera away from his face, and was now holding it limply at his side.

“Yes, I’ll start taping again,” he said, a little more steadily. He pulled the camera up.

“J.C., you’re taking the notes now?” Ben asked.

“Yes,” the ranger said, his own voice unsteady.

“Let’s get started, then.” Ben gave the date and time, named the persons present and gave the coordinates for the grave. As he calmly recited this information, I found my own nerves steadying, felt the first shock of the sight before me receding. I tried again to study the remains.

The body was lying faceup. The underside was, from all I could see, a gooey mess. The upper portion was part mummy, part skeleton, part waxwork figure — this latter, I was told, was due to the formation of adipocere, a soaplike substance produced during one of the phases of decomposition.

“These observations are preliminary,” Ben was saying, “and subject to verification in the lab. We have one, unknown adult female, of European descent. Age and stature yet to be determined. No clothing is apparent. Position is supine, with arms slightly outstretched. The individual’s head is positioned west along an east-west line. Hair is dark brown.” He paused, then said, “Focus on the left hand, please, Mr. Burden. . . . Subject is wearing a yellow metal band inset with three red stones on the fourth finger of the left hand . . . the left thumb, apparently severed antemortem through the shaft of the proximal phalanx, is not present.”

“It’s her,” Bob Thompson said quietly, and walked away.

11

WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON, MAY 17

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

Ben noted for the tape that Detective Thompson was no longer present, then made a few additional observations, most of which concerned “apparent antemortem trauma” and also some comments about damage that probably occurred perimortem — near the time of death — or postmortem. He paused, seemed to take a long moment to look at the body as a whole, then said, “Okay, that’s it for now.”

He asked Flash to take some still photos; he named specific shots he wanted. He asked David to tell Flash of any others he might need, and asked him to bag the hands and feet — to place plastic bags over them to help keep them intact. He asked me to follow him, and pulling his mask down, stepped back over to his stack of supplies. I was happy to pull my own mask down again, and wondered briefly if — having already guessed that I have problems with claustrophobia — he had suspected my dislike of having part of my face covered.

He didn’t mention this though, and simply asked me to help him assemble the lightweight stretcher he had brought. He gave me a body bag to carry, and we took both bag and stretcher back to the site.

Thompson had returned by the time these tasks were completed, and Ben, after conferring with him for a moment, gave him a pair of gloves and a new mask.

“You, too, Ms. Kelly, if you don’t mind,” Ben said, motioning to my mask, giving me a pair of gloves as well.

I took the gloves with some trepidation. “What do you want me to do?”

“It’s going to take all of us to lift her out of the grave and into the body bag,” he said.

I felt my mouth go dry. “Is she that heavy?”

“Probably not, maybe a hundred-and-fifteen, hundred-and-twenty pounds. But I’m trying to minimize damage.”

He knelt near the edge of the grave, leaned in and grasped one end of the plastic, near where the skull lay. He pulled slightly on the plastic, as if testing its strength. He then directed each of us to specific places near the edges of the grave; Bob Thompson and Andy were on her right side, David and J.C. on her left. Ben was at her head. I was at her feet. The stretcher and bag were near Bob and Andy.

Flash was back to operating the video camera. I hoped with all my might that he wouldn’t be getting a shot of anything splashing out of the plastic and onto my boots.

Following the others’ lead, I knelt down. David and Ben carefully folded the plastic back into its original position, covering her.

“Please try not to disturb the edges of the grave,” Ben said. “Ready? Take hold.”

The plastic felt cool and stiff beneath my gloved fingers. I told myself that I could cope with feeling the warm, close air of my breath in the mask. I told myself I would not fall into the grave. I moved back a few inches.

“I’ll count to three,” Ben continued. “When I say the number three, we’re each going to lift very slowly, very carefully, very evenly. The remains are fragile. They may shift inside the plastic. We may find that the plastic won’t be strong enough to hold them, and if not, we’re going to have to set them down again. I know this is an awkward way to lift; try not to strain your backs. Anyone having trouble, speak up right away. We’ll come straight up to just above ground level, then I’ll give you instructions from there. Everything should be done as if you’re moving in slow motion. Watch more than the section just in front of you — make sure we’re moving together. Everyone ready?”

We nodded.

“Gently. One . . . two . . . three . . .”

There was a crackle as we began lifting.

“Easy . . . easy . . .”

Ben was watching me as we began to feel the weight. I tried not to let my uneasiness show. The remains weren’t heavy, but knowing what we were holding was unnerving.

“Slowly. . . . What do you think, David?”

“It will hold,” David said.

There was a sloshing sound. The plastic moved as if it were alive, rippling toward me.

“A little higher, Andy and J.C.,” Ben said calmly. “Easy . . .”

We continued lifting, Ben guiding our way, watching one another, listening to the slight shiftings, the small rustling sounds of the plastic.

When it was above the burial pit, we slowly straightened our backs, so that we were sitting up over our knees, and the plastic was stretched a little tighter. Ben waited a moment, then he asked Bob Thompson and Andy to step away. The four of us edged the body away from the pit. Next, Ben and David briefly managed the body alone, placing it in the body bag. The bag was zipped up and locked with a crimped metal seal. The stretcher was already beneath the bag.

I turned to look back into the grave. “Oh, Jesus!”

The others hurried over, stood next to me, peering down.

Stained and moldy, but laid out in neat array, were articles of women’s clothing: a black jacket and skirt, a once white blouse, black pumps and purse. Underwear. A bra. A slip. There were other objects as well — some candles, some wire, a knife. A gold necklace.

Some objects were loose, some encased in clear plastic bags.

The Polaroid photographs were in bags.

As much as I knew that they were photographs that never should have been taken, of things that never should have happened to anyone, I could not keep myself from staring at them, all the while not wanting them to be there.

They stared back.

She stared back.

I felt a strong hand on my shoulder, and someone said, “Come away. Come and sit next to Bingle. Come on. He’s worried about you.”

Ben, I realized. He pulled the mask off my face, kept talking to me. I don’t know what he said. I let him lead me over to Bingle. The dog nuzzled me as I sat down next to him.

I held on to Bingle, and looked back toward the grave, toward the black body bag.

I thought of a girl who had once wished her mother dead, and knew that Julia Sayre must have wanted her daughter’s wish to come true long before it did.

12

WEDNESDAY NIGHT, MAY 17

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

I sat at the edge of my tent that evening, listening to laughter. The gathering around the campfire had been quiet and solemn at first. After a long day of laboring over the grave and its artifacts — photographing, mapping, collecting, and labeling its grim contents — the team of workers was tired and subdued.

Parrish, now being watched by Duke and Earl, was kept away from the rest of the group. He was taken to a tent after Merrick had another flare-up with him, this one undoubtedly resulting in Parrish receiving a bruise or two.

It had started when Parrish, handcuffed, had seen a moth fluttering not far from his face. He watched it intently, then snapped at it with his open mouth, and exaggerated the act of chewing and swallowing it. “Why the hell did you do that?” Merrick asked, disgusted.

Parrish stared at him, smiled, then glanced at the body bag. “It reminded me of someone.”

Merrick tackled him to the ground before Manton could stop him. Later, even Merrick acknowledged that Parrish seemed pleased to have goaded him into that loss of self-control.

No one blamed Merrick for his edginess. While yesterday Parrish might have been guided to a place and told to take a seat, today he was shoved down, and roughly yanked up again when his guards were ready to go. We didn’t protest at all. A line, it seemed, had been moved. Having just seen photos of Parrish pouring hot wax into one of his victim’s ears, I was not willing to champion his civil liberties.

All day, Parrish had met with increasing hostility and disgust; while most of us kept our tempers in check, no one wanted to be anywhere near him.

I looked toward the body bag, which had been brought to the camp and now lay nearby. J.C. sat next to it, taking his turn watching over it. David had told me that from now until it reached the lab, the body would always be guarded — not just from Parrish, whose request to see it had been denied — but also from any animals that might be attracted by the smell. “And it’s evidence, of course,” he said, “so we have to be able to account for it during every moment that it’s in our possession.”

Still, its nearness was unnerving. Again and again, I found my eyes drawn to it. I tried to force my thoughts along other channels, but before many minutes passed, I was thinking about it and its contents.

Duke, who was whittling a little wooden horse for his grandson, would stop every so often, look toward the long black bag, then return to his carving with a vengeance.

The others, I noticed, often looked toward the body, too.

David started the clowning. It began during dinner, while Ben was on duty near the stretcher. David gave Bingle a command to do a headstand, which — without lifting his hind legs — the dog attempted. The dog not only looked ridiculous, with his head upside down on the ground and his forepaws flattened next to it, he “talked” the whole time he held this position, making a sort of half-howling, half-barking sound. He brought the house down.

David said, “Bien,” and Bingle raised his head up, glancing around the laughing group with that grinning look that dogs sometimes get on their faces, wagging his tail, seeming for all the world to be enjoying the joke with the rest of us.

This set off a round of dog stories, and then a round of cop and forensic anthropologist stories, and next a round of bizarre homicide stories. The humor was often dark, and most of the tales would, I knew, never be repeated around those whom this group thought of as civilians.

I noticed that the stories and jokes never touched on this day’s work or this victim — subjects that by some unspoken agreement were taboo — and that the most any of them got out of Ben was a soft smile.

I called it a night long before most of them were ready to do the same. Now I sat wondering if I would ever get the smell of decay off my hair and skin, wondering if another day or so spent in proximity with the body would permanently mark me with its scent of death.

I heard footsteps in the darkness and gave a start.

“Ms. Kelly.”

I sighed in relief. “You scared the hell out of me, Dr. Sheridan.”

“Oh.” He paused. “I’m sorry.”

It must have nearly killed him to say it.

He came a little closer. “Ms. Kelly, you’re married to a homicide detective, right?”

“Yes. Frank Harriman. He’s with the Las Piernas P.D.”

“Then I suppose you understand . . . I suppose you’ve heard him tell stories or make jokes about things . . .”

“Dr. Sheridan, I’ve not only heard him make this sort of joke, I’ve joked with him. If you think I’ll misjudge what’s happening around that campfire, you misjudge me. But, come to think of it, that seems to be a specialty of yours.”

There was a long silence.

“They’re just releasing tension,” I said. “I know that. Under the circumstances, it’s probably one of the healthiest things they could do.”

“Yes,” he said quietly.

“I know you think that I’m one of a species other than your own — one of an unfeeling life form that crawled out of the sea a little later than the one that became forensic anthropologists — but miraculously, maybe sometime during the Paleozoic Age, reporters developed a sense of humor, too. Someday I’ll have to sneak you into a newsroom, Ben Sheridan, so that you can hear our own brand of sick humor. We’re getting pretty good at it; you should hear how quickly the jokes start whenever a particularly shocking story comes over the wire. And it works almost as well as it’s working over by that campfire.”

“Well, yes, I just—”

“You just thought I might write that these guys didn’t show proper respect for Julia Sayre. Just thought I wouldn’t understand that this really has nothing to do with her — that I lie in wait for anyone in this group to make a mistake or betray a little human weakness so that I can trumpet it to the world. That I don’t understand the horror and the strain of . . .” I suddenly felt that horror, that strain, and stopped talking.

He didn’t speak or move.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to lecture you,” I said. “And I owe you my thanks.”

“For what?” he asked, and I could hear the surprise.

“At the grave, when I — I kind of lost it there for a little while. I hadn’t expected to see — what I saw.”

“Your reaction was understandable, Ms. Kelly. And you don’t owe me thanks — I owe you another apology. It was cruel of me to ask you to help.”

“I’m not unwilling to help,” I said. “I just wasn’t ready for . . .”

“No one ever is,” he said. “No one.”

He started to walk off, then said, “David will want to keep Bingle with him tonight. Will you be all right?”

“Yes.”

He looked up at the sky. “Better put the rainfly on your tent.”

13

WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON, MAY 17

Las Piernas

When Frank arrived at Phil Newly’s hospital room, he found the lawyer looking disconcerted.

“Bad news about the foot, Mr. Newly?” he asked as he walked in.

Newly was frowning, but when he recognized Frank, he smiled broadly at him. Not exactly the reception Frank had expected. Outside of testifying against a couple of his clients, Frank had never spoken to Newly. There had been nothing personal, Frank knew, in Newly’s attempts to discredit his testimony on those occasions. Newly was better than most on cross-examination, but his efforts against Frank’s testimony had been unsuccessful. Each man had just been doing his job. He hoped Newly thought of it that way, too.

“Detective Harriman!” Newly said. “You cost me the Beringer case, and one other, as I recall.” He didn’t seem especially bothered by it. “You’re also Irene Kelly’s husband, right?”

“Yes, I am. That’s why I’m here. I’m hoping you can tell me how she’s doing.”

There was the slightest hesitation before Newly said, “Fine. She’s fine — at least, she was when I left the group. Listen, Frank — may I call you Frank?”

He was surprised, but said, “Sure.”

“Great. And please call me Phil.” He smiled again, this time in a way that Frank was sure was calculated to be disarming. “Now that we’re on such friendly terms,” Newly went on, “may I ask a favor of you?”

“Nothing that will cause me to be busted down to traffic division?” Frank asked warily.

“No, nothing like that. I just need a ride home.”

“You’re going home already?”

“Yes, they only kept me overnight for observation. If I weren’t a lawyer, they probably would have sent me home yesterday. Always afraid we’ll sue, I suppose. Anyway, I’ll have to wear this cast for a while, but there’s no reason for me to take up a hospital bed.”

He figured giving Newly a ride home would allow him the time he needed to talk to him, so he said, “Okay.”

“Great! And — if you don’t mind — my clothes — in the backpack there? Would you mind handing that to me?”

He supposed that Newly was probably perfectly capable of getting it himself, but he humored him.

The lawyer began emptying the pack out on the bed, which was soon covered with a camp stove, a cooking set, a flashlight, a poncho, a water bottle, matches, a roll of toilet paper, and all sorts of other gear, including an impressive array of clothing. It must have killed him to march around in the mountains with all of that on his back, Frank thought, making an effort to control his amusement.

Newly smiled up from the middle of the mess he had made. He held a pair of jeans in his hands. “Would you mind taking these to the nurses’ station and asking them to cut off the bottom half of this pant leg? The left one. Otherwise, I’ll never get these on over the cast. I’ll start getting dressed while you do that.”

Suppressing a desire to tell him what he could do with his pant leg, remembering that he needed the lawyer’s help, Frank said, “All right.”

“So your friend thinks I’m a tailor,” the nurse said, but took the jeans from Frank. She was a young, slender redhead — a woman with an air of self-possession that he thought must serve her well in this job.

“Don’t feel so sorry for yourself,” he answered, which made her look up at him. “He thinks I’m his chauffeur and valet — but he knows he’s not my friend.”

She held her head to one side, studying him, and smiled. “No, I don’t suppose you are his friend. What puts you in charge of his pants — dare I ask?”

“Just trying to get him out of here. I’m giving him a ride home.”

“Thank you! We can’t wait for that pain in the ass to leave.”

“I can understand that,” he said, smiling back at her.

She glanced at his left hand, saw the ring, and went back to cutting the pants.

He did his best to repack the backpack while Newly finished dressing. He had just fit the cookset in when he came across something that, at first glance, he thought was a cellular phone — but he quickly realized it couldn’t be.

“Is this a GPS receiver?” he asked.

Newly looked up from his efforts to put a sock on his right foot — although not broken or in a cast, it was badly blistered. Seeing it, Frank didn’t feel so bad about fetching the backpack.

“Yes,” Newly answered, holding out a hand. “Here — I’ll show you how it works.”

He spent a few minutes proudly demonstrating the unit, then asked Frank to help him put one of his hiking boots — the only shoes he had with him — on his tender right foot.

The nurse Frank had met earlier brought a wheelchair in and offered to escort them down to the hospital lobby.

“Everybody knows that you don’t let patients leave without wheeling them out of here,” Newly said.

“Undoubtedly thanks to people in your profession,” she said.

He laughed and cheerfully admitted that it just might be so. As she helped Newly out of the bed, Newly put an arm around her shoulder and winked broadly at Frank. Frank ignored it and answered the nurse’s question about what he did for a living. This resulted in an animated conversation that lasted until they reached the lobby. He left them to get the car; by the time he brought it around to where they waited, Frank could see that in another few minutes, she might have gladly rolled Newly out into traffic.

Frank had already put the backpack on the backseat, and now he opened the car door as the nurse was bending to lower the wheelchair’s footrest. Newly said, “Frank is married to a good-looking brunette, you know. But I’m available!”

“Phil,” she said, helping him to stand up, “as surprising as that news is to me, I have to tell you this: There are lots of women who would pursue Frank even though he’s married. But even though you’re single — well, let’s just say, I hope you’re rich.”

She was moving away before he shouted, “I am!”

She didn’t look back.

“Well, how do you like that!” he said, laughing.

He joked about himself when recounting the tale of blistering his feet. “And the worst part,” he said, “is the number of lectures I’ve endured from this foot specialist at the hospital.”

He proceeded to give an imitation of the man; it made Frank laugh, and in this good humor he gave in to Newly’s request that they stop off at a pharmacy not far from the lawyer’s home. Newly insisted on trying to walk into the store on his own.

“Look,” he said, “while I’m in there, could you rearrange my pack a little? I left the GPS on top, and I’m afraid it will fall out and break. Cost me about six hundred, you know, so I’d rather not smash it on my driveway.”

Frank looked at him sharply, and saw, for the first time that day, the intelligent member of the Bar Association he had met in the courtroom — not the clowning klutz of the past hour or so.

Newly smiled and said, “Play around with the GPS if you like. This may take a while.”

He was hobbling into the store before Frank could respond.

Frank knew a clear invitation when he heard one, and hesitated only long enough to try to figure out if Newly was setting him up somehow, or worse, setting the department up for problems by using him in some way. But he couldn’t see how Newly could use this against him, and if it meant he’d know where Irene was right now, he’d risk it.

He wasn’t going to ignore his instincts; he was going up there. If she didn’t need him, fine. She might even be angry with him. At that thought, he smiled to himself. It wouldn’t be the first time.

But the next thought sobered him — it was one thing to imagine that he might hike up there for no real reason, that she was fine. It was another to think of her hurt or in danger. If she was in trouble and he stayed home, he’d never forgive himself.

By the time Newly came out, he had written down every set of coordinates that had been stored in the GPS unit’s memory during the two days Newly was in the mountains, and the GPS unit had been returned to the backpack.

“Did you get everything you need?” he asked Newly.

“Yes. And you?”

He hesitated, then said, “Yes. Tell me why you’re helping me.”

“Oh, I could try to make this sound quite innocent, and say I’m returning a kindness; that your wife was very good to me while we were hiking. She even went so far as to doctor my smelly, blistered feet. But it wouldn’t be the truth.”

He fell silent, and Frank wondered if he was going to leave it at that. But then he said, “A policeman comes to my hospital room. A man not connected with the case. He tells me that he is concerned about his wife. I involve him in some foolish business so that I can consider my situation. I have no difficulty believing that he is there for the reason he says he is; he’s willing to take on demeaning errands in order to talk to me. He’s genuinely worried about her. I’m concerned about her, too.”

“Why?” Frank asked. “Has something—”

“Nothing. Nothing to be alarmed over. Not yet.”

Frank’s hands tightened on the wheel. “Does Parrish have something planned?”

“Undoubtedly.” At Frank’s look of alarm, Newly quickly added, “I don’t know what he has planned, and I don’t know if it involves your wife, except — well, no, I don’t have any idea of what he has in mind.”

“You’re his lawyer!”

“Yes, but he doesn’t confide in me. Not at all — I’ll swear that to you, if you’d like. If I didn’t feel certain that he’s about to do something that will endanger his chances of avoiding the death penalty, I wouldn’t be talking to you right now.”

They had reached Newly’s street, and the lawyer gave Frank his address. It was all Frank could do to concentrate on the house numbers painted on the curbs. It was an expensive neighborhood. Not many criminal defense lawyers made it this big, he knew. He found Newly’s sprawling Spanish-style home. He pulled into the driveway and turned off the engine.

“You think he has some plan for Irene,” he said to the lawyer. “You started to say so earlier.”

“Nick Parrish . . . studies her. Stares at her.”

Frank swore.

“Yes,” Newly said. “I agree.”

“I need to know — I need to know everything you can tell me about where they were headed. Yes — I wrote down the coordinates. But where were they going from the last position?”

“I don’t know.”

“Newly—”

“I don’t know! Punching me in the nose won’t help you.”

He relaxed his hands, made himself think. “The ranger who took you out — was he going to rejoin them?”

“Yes.”

“How? Did they name a place?”

“No . . .” Newly grew thoughtful. “I was not very clear-headed at the time, but . . . oh! Now I remember! He said something to Andy, the botanist, about leaving trail signs. Does that help?”

“Yes,” Frank said, almost laughing with relief. “Let me help you get settled in the house. I have a few more questions.”

Newly sighed. “I thought you might. But I demand a price.”

“Oh?” Frank said, wary again.

“I cannot tell you how anxious I am to throw these boots away. . . . I don’t think I’ll recover if I have to keep looking at them. Once we’re inside, would you mind dropping them in the trash compactor for me?”

“With pleasure,” Frank answered.

14

WEDNESDAY NIGHT, MAY 17

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

He lay on his back, drawing in one deep breath after another.

He modestly acknowledged to himself that he had failed to envision how magnificent it would be. The excitement of it bordered deliciously on the unbearable. A weaker man would have been forced to seek some kind of release. Not him. No, not him.

Earlier, before they had opened the plastic, he had dared to touch himself, just once, but he knew better than to try that now.

Her death scent was on all of them, but especially on those who had stayed closest to the grave throughout the day. The guards had taken turns, had gone to see her. They couldn’t resist, of course. Pilgrims drawn to a holy place, he thought, remembering his delight as each returned, bathed in her incense.

But that little tease had been nothing compared to the moment when they brought her back. The memories of their time together — he had almost grown dizzy under the spell of the recollection.

Sheridan and Niles positively reeked of her, of course. That was delightful. How he envied Sheridan. Yes, it really was something near to jealousy — he had touched her. Thinking of Sheridan’s gloved hand on her hand — oh!

He was drawn tight as a bow now, thinking of that, and so he made himself move his thoughts to safer ground.

He thought of Merrick roughing him up. Childish! Nothing could have made him feel better. He’d met Merrick before, in one form or another. Bullies. Schoolyard bullies, like Harvey Heusman in seventh grade. He knew how to handle them. He’d done it before. Harvey had been one of his first victims. He wondered idly whether they had ever found him. It had been many years since he had visited Harvey’s grave, and realizing this, he felt a moment’s remorse — not for killing Harvey, of course, but for failing to keep his appointed rounds.

Like a favorite story that had been read and re-read again and again, recalling the killing of his childhood enemy had long ago lost its power to excite him, but that did not make him less fond of the memory. Visiting the older burial sites could make him quite nostalgic, and he was not one to ignore them. He was good about paying homage to — well, to himself, really! The thought amused him.

Ah, that little humorous moment was enough to ease the tension a bit.

He returned to his very detailed recollections of this afternoon, about to reach his favorite moment. Yes, here she was, pale and looking a little tired — she didn’t sleep well. He would have liked to believe that he caused her late-night restlessness, but on the first evening he had heard the sounds of one of her nightmares, and knew some other terror visited her. That was all right. He’d focus her fear where it belonged, all in due time. For now, it was enough to see the dark circles beneath her blue eyes, her hair falling forward across her face as she looked down for a moment as she walked.

She was coming closer now, closer, and — oh yes! She had the scent. He had breathed in deeply as she walked by him, smelling her scent and the dead woman’s scent together, mingled and lovely, lovely, lovely. Thinking of it made him tremble.

Oh, it was so right, so exquisite! Anticipation hummed through him like an electric current. Everything was working so perfectly, and with everything working so perfectly, it was all that he could do to be still, to lie on his back in this tent, simply feeling his own blood moving through his veins, every nerve thrumming with the strength of his desire.

15

THURSDAY, EARLY MORNING, MAY 18

Southern Sierra Nevada Mountains

The rain held off until just before dawn the next morning. The rainfall was not hard or steady — just a series of intermittent gentle showers for the most part — but the first of these awakened me as its chilly droplets struck my face. In my fitful sleep I had moved off my open sleeping bag, and so I came awake lying faceup, halfway outside the tent. The part of me that was still on the thin insulation mattress was fine, but the other thirty percent or so wasn’t so comfy. Especially the part that was getting pelted by cold water.

I moved back inside only long enough to change and pack up my gear. When I emerged, I saw the others were already breaking camp. No one wanted to linger here. Although weather might delay the plane’s arrival, last night it had been decided that we would hike back to the landing strip to wait for it.

Occasional but unpredictable gusts of wind made taking down my small tent a tricky business, and those who were managing the larger tent that had housed Parrish nearly lost control of it more than once.

I wondered if the trail would be muddy. Our progress had been slow before, and even though some of the weight of the food was gone from our packs, the body would be an awkward burden to steer through the terrain we had covered on the way in.

The rain briefly lessened the body’s lingering odor, to which I had almost become accustomed, and brought the scent of dampened earth and woods to replace it. But when the first storm passed, and the air became still again, the scent returned. Perhaps it was the moisture in the air that seemed to increase the scent’s power, or that short respite now resulted in a renewed awareness of it, but whatever the cause, its presence was soon unmistakable.

We set out just after a quick breakfast, which I made myself eat because I knew I’d need the energy for the hike, although my appetite was nearly zilch. I tried to cheer myself with the prospect of going home, of seeing Frank again, of being finished with this sad business. But I would not be finished with it, of course; the Sayres awaited me, and my editor expected a story.

As we began hiking, I saw that while the ground and grass were damp, there wasn’t much mud yet. The wind had steadied, and was not much more than a strong breeze. J.C. was in the lead, assuring us that he could now take us on a much more direct route back to the plane. Bob Thompson and the guards followed with Parrish, who seemed lost in his own thoughts — I hoped they were distressing visions of spending the rest of his life in prison. Bingle walked with me, while David and Ben took the first turn with the stretcher.

We reached the ridge between the two meadows — not far from where the coyote tree stood — and stopped to rest so that Andy and J.C. could take over the task of bearing the stretcher. We only planned to stop for a few minutes. But here, just after David and Ben had gently laid down their burden, two things happened that changed the course of our journey.

The first was that Nicholas Parrish said to Thompson, “I thought you would have shown more initiative, Detective Thompson. To find only one body, when my lovely tree surely tells you there are more here.”

After a moment’s silence, Thompson said, “Are you volunteering information, Parrish?”

“Do I need to say more than I have? Not all of my works are as enchanting as dear Julia — I do wish you’d let me have a peek at her. Her fragrance is so enticing!”

“Out of the question,” Thompson said, then reconsidering, added, “if you show me the other graves, I might be able to work something out.”

Parrish laughed. “You’ve made your forensic anthropologists frown at you, Detective.”

“He’s just stalling,” Duke complained.

Thompson nodded. “We’ll discuss your other victims when you’re back in your cell, Parrish.”

“Oh no,” he said. “It’s now or never.”

Thompson began pacing.

“You can count, can’t you?” Parrish said. “Count the coyotes.”

“A dozen. I know, I know,” Thompson said, still not decided. “If you knew there were more, why did you get rid of your lawyer? You know we can use everything you say to us against you.”

“He was boring. As you are becoming boring. I will show you another grave, Detective Thompson,” Parrish said, “but if we continue to hike, we hike away from it. We both know that I won’t be allowed to accompany you on another expedition, so as I said — now or never!”

“It’s a trick of some kind,” Manton said. “If there were more bodies, he would have negotiated for whatever he could get while his lawyer was still here.”

“Ms. Kelly,” Parrish said. “Can you understand why I don’t want my dear ones to be left behind?”

I thought I knew the answer, and why he asked it of the only member of the media he could appeal to at that moment. But I didn’t especially want to be involved in this decision; I was there as an observer. And the things I had observed — after looking into Julia Sayre’s grave — made me certain that I didn’t want to aid Parrish in any way, shape, or form. The others were looking at me, waiting.

It was Ben Sheridan who answered, almost exactly as I would have. “Mr. Parrish takes pride in his work. He doesn’t want it to remain hidden. That’s why we’re up here in the first place.”

“Yes!” Parrish said warmly. “You surprise me! You understand perfectly!”

Thompson was besieged by arguments for and against, mostly against.

It was then that the second thing happened, the one that decided the issue.

The wind shifted.

Later, I would look back at that day and wonder what would have become of our group had the wind blown in some other direction. But it shifted — shifted toward us — a stiff breeze coming off the other meadow, up one sloping end of it, to the ridge where we stood, and beyond.

Bingle raised his nose and then pitched his ears forward. He looked back at David. I had seen that intent look the day before.

“¿Qué pasa?” David asked Bingle.

Bingle turned back into the breeze, lifted his nose in short quick motions, sniffing, eyes half-closed, then brought his ears up again and stared at David. This time, the dog’s tail was wagging.

“What’s going on?” Thompson asked.

“Bingle is alerting,” Ben said.

Thompson turned back to Parrish with a gleam in his eye. “Maybe we won’t need you to show it to us! Maybe the dog is going to take us straight to it!”

Parrish shrugged in indifference.

“I thought we needed to get to that airstrip,” Manton said.

“Go ahead,” Ben replied. “We’re going to see what the dog is after.”

“Maybe he’s just smelling the body J.C. and Andy are carrying,” Manton persisted.

“No,” said David. “He’s finding it on the wind. The wind is coming up the slope, off that meadow. The wind isn’t in the right direction to carry scent off the body. And he’s not excited about that find now. This is something new.”

But Thompson’s certainty had been shaken. “What if it’s just a dead deer or something like that?”

“He won’t alert to nonhuman remains,” David answered, after commanding Bingle to sit quietly. The dog shifted on his front paws like a kid that needs to go to the bathroom, but obeyed. “He was interested in that meadow when we walked there two days ago. I’m going to check it out.”

“I’ll stay with you,” Ben said, then turned to Thompson. “Go on to the plane. We’ll catch up.”

“Catch up?” Thompson said. “What if you find something? How are you going to get it out?”

“We’ll mark it and come back later,” Ben said.

But only yesterday Thompson’s mind had been filled with visions of glory for bringing in a second body, and he wasn’t going to be left out of a chance to make those visions a reality, especially not after Parrish himself had hinted that there were as many as eleven other burials. “No way,” he said. “You stay, we all stay. We’re in this together.”

“Suit yourself,” Ben said.

David had by this time put the leather working collar on Bingle. Bingle was staring at him intently, and began barking.

Andy and J.C., who had been standing near the stretcher, were deep in conversation. I saw Andy nodding. Just as David managed to quiet the dog, J.C. said to Thompson, “Let the two of us go on to the airstrip with the body.”

“That’s a lot of hiking for the two of you,” Ben said.

“True,” J.C. said, “but we can manage it. And I’ve got an idea. The plane should be back soon, if it isn’t waiting for us there already — the weather hasn’t been bad enough to keep it from landing. When we get to it, I’ll radio the ranger station for a chopper. They can pick me up at the landing strip, and I’ll show them where to find you. They won’t have any trouble landing in this meadow. And leaving by chopper won’t give your prisoner many opportunities to make a break for it — not as many as a walk through the forest might.”

The idea of skipping the hike back to the airstrip obviously appealed to Thompson, but he hesitated. “You can get one in here before nightfall?”

“No problem. Without Parrish leading us on his goofy side routes, it shouldn’t take us long to reach the airstrip. You can have him locked up before the end of the day.”

Thompson looked over to see Parrish frowning. Caught at this, Parrish gave a sugary smile to the detective. Thompson hesitated.

“The guards are looking tired,” J.C. said. “This hasn’t been easy duty. This way, they won’t have to backpack, watch the trail, and keep an eye on Parrish all at the same time.”

“Okay,” Thompson said.

Ben extracted a promise from Andy to stay with the body while J.C. came back for the others. “I don’t want anyone claiming that the body or evidence was out of our control at any time.”

David and Bingle went down into the meadow first, at a fairly fast pace. Ben and I followed not far behind them, carrying the excavation equipment. Flash carried some of this as well, along with his camera equipment. Thompson, Parrish, and the guards moved more slowly.

The wind died down, but David didn’t seem to be bothered. He used the opportunity to rest the dog, set down his backpack and equipment, and pick out a place to wait for the chopper. “J.C. was pretty optimistic about the weather,” he said, looking up at the sky. “I don’t know. It’s not bad right now, but I think we might get more rain yet.”

“I thought the same thing,” Ben said. “I have a feeling that we’ll be spending the night here. On the other hand, J.C. knows these mountains better than we do. If the plane is waiting for him when they reach the airstrip, and the chopper gets up here fast enough, we may be okay. But I don’t want to be rushed if Bingle finds something.”

“I’ll stay here with you even if Thompson and the others want to go back,” David said. He paused, took out the squeeze bottle with the powder in it and tested the air. The powder drifted slowly off toward the ridge. “Look at that. A really fine breeze. This is better for working than that wind — it could have been blowing scent from a mile away.” Bingle, standing a little apart from us, was alerting again.

“¿Quieres trabajar?” he called out. Do you want to go to work?

Bingle’s tail wagged, and he gave a bark.

“Find us a good spot, Ben,” David said, moving toward the dog. “Haven’t heard any thunder yet, but if there is a storm, I sure as hell don’t want to be standing out in the middle of a meadow like a lightning rod.” To Bingle he said, “¡Búscalo! ¡Busca al muerto!”

Dog and handler began to move in a crisscross path down the meadow, much as they had done when I followed them the day before.

From our earlier hike through this area I remembered that the woods were denser here than those near the meadow where Julia Sayre had been buried. Farther in from this meadow, there was a stream; beyond that, a small pond.

Flash, Ben, and I set up one of the smaller tents in the woods, to give Duke and Earl a place to catch up on their sleep. If necessary, we would set up camp there. While sheltering under a single tree, or even a small stand of trees, would be extremely dangerous in a bad storm, a forest of this size would be safer than the meadow. We would no longer be the tallest objects.

It wasn’t long before we heard Bingle crooning.

We hurried to the meadow, where David was praising the dog. “¡Qué inteligente eres! ¡Qué guapo eres!”

“Yes, he’s handsome and intelligent,” I said, “but what did he find?”

David commanded Bingle to stay, and walked with us to a place another few yards away. “A little newer, I suspect.”

The plants here were shorter and sparser than growth nearby. This time, it was not so difficult to see the oval shape formed by the edges of the grave; the fill soil within the grave had settled, so that the surface of the grave was slightly concave. The edges of this depression had cracked, outlining it.

“Great!” Bob Thompson said. “You did it! We’ve got the bastard now!”

“Detective Thompson,” Ben said coldly, “there is nothing to celebrate here — on any count. We don’t yet have any idea who or what is buried here, let alone who’s responsible for burying it.”

Thompson’s mood was not easily suppressed. Even though I disliked him, I recognized that he was not rejoicing over a victim’s grave, but over the opportunity to see Nicholas Parrish face the death penalty.

Parrish, who must have known what this new find would mean to his chances of avoiding that sentence, looked almost serenely at us. His eyes came to rest on me. He smiled.

“Soon, my love,” he said, “soon.”

Bingle’s hackles went up, and he began barking at Parrish.

A warning we should have heeded.

16