Dead Center

Two police cars pull up, obviously having been called by Calvin. Laurie and three officers get out and come over to us. “Where is it?” she asks.

“In the living room,” I say.

“Have you checked out the house?”

I look over at Calvin, who shakes his head. “No. I just saw it and came out.”

Laurie nods and signals to the other officers. They draw their handguns, and two of them walk around the side of the house. Laurie and the other one move cautiously inside the house, and Calvin and I wait for about ten minutes for them to come out. Finally, they do, and Laurie comes over to us.

“So what do you think?” I ask.

“I think you should call Marcus.”

• • • • •

MARCUS CLARK answers the phone when I call. He says, “Unhh.”

That is Marcus-talk for “hello,” so I say, “Marcus, this is Andy Carpenter.”

“Unhh.” Marcus uses “unhh” the way Willie Miller uses “schnell.”

“Marcus, I’m in Wisconsin working on a case, and it’s getting a little dangerous, so I really need you here, if you can make it.”

“Unhh.”

“I’m representing someone against a murder charge, and public sentiment is running against him. There’s been some violence, a firebombing…”

“Unhh.”

I’ve never had much success conversing with Marcus, and this time it’s not going any better. “Listen, Marcus, Willie Miller is going to talk to you and give you all the details. Okay?”

This time he doesn’t answer at all, so I hang up and call Willie, who has always been able to communicate with Marcus. I tell him the problem, and he agrees to get in touch with him right away. “You need me up there too?” Willie asks.

“No thanks, Marcus should be able to protect me.”

“Hey, man, don’t you think I know that? Marcus could protect you if you had the Marines after you. I’m not talking about that. Maybe I could help you out with the case, do some investigating or something. Sounds like you can use some help.”

I decline, though I appreciate the offer, and Willie promises to call me back after he talks to Marcus. If Marcus is busy, perhaps if he is invading North Korea or something, then Willie vows he will make the trip himself.

Willie is a black belt in karate, and one of the toughest people I know, but compared to Marcus, he is a Barbie doll. I will feel much better if Marcus can come up here, because things seem to be getting rather dangerous.

When I get off the phone with Willie, I go back into the living room, where Calvin is working. He’s been talking to a lot of kids at the school and is going over his notes. Since the kids wouldn’t speak to me at all, I’m surprised that Calvin is making progress with them, and I ask him about it.

He shrugs. “It’s possible that they got the idea I was once a roadie for Led Zeppelin and lost my leg when some crazed groupies knocked a huge amplifier onto me during a concert.”

“Amazing how these stories get started,” I say.

One of the major difficulties we will face is in making it seem possible that someone other than Jeremy committed this crime. Unfortunately, young women, and other people, are murdered all the time. It is not hard to imagine that these murders could have been random, by some passing sicko. But the fact that the bodies were then buried on Jeremy’s property changes that equation dramatically. Sickos don’t often find out who their victim’s ex-boyfriend was, and they don’t set about framing them.

We certainly must focus on Elizabeth’s other ex-boyfriend, whose very existence is in question at this point. Jeremy says that Elizabeth referred to him, though never by name, and even said on that fateful night that they were running away together. Of course, I don’t have a clue why that boyfriend would have killed Elizabeth just as they were planning to run away together. In any event, we must find him.

The fact is that if Jeremy is innocent, then these women were a threat to someone, or at least a cause of rage. If we can’t convince the jury that such a someone is likely out there, we’re finished and our client is history.

The only way we are going to pull this off is to learn all we can about the victims, a task made infinitely more difficult by the lack of access we have to their hometown. This may or may not turn out to be significant. I have to be careful not to focus too much on that town simply because its residents are so decidedly insulated and unfriendly. All evidence is that they have been that way for well over a century without having committed any murders.

Calvin and I have a ten o’clock meeting with Dave Larson, a local private investigator. Calvin had heard of him but never dealt with him directly. Laurie had given him a recommendation, though not a ringing endorsement. She said he was as good as we were likely to find in the Findlay area, while admitting that Findlay was not exactly a hotbed of private investigation.

I had pressed her with, “But he’s good? He can handle himself?” And she responded with, “Have you called Marcus yet?”

Larson turns out to be in his early forties, about five foot eight, a hundred and fifty pounds. He wears glasses and carries two pencils in his shirt pocket, and keeps saying, “You got that right.” He is the anti-Marcus.

“I do mostly insurance work, some divorce stuff,” Larson says in response to my question about his background. “It can get pretty hairy.”

“I can imagine,” I lie.

“You got that right.”

“Ever do any work in Center City?” I ask.

“A couple of minor insurance cases; I think they were both motor vehicle accidents. Never did any divorce stuff, of course.”

“Why ‘of course’?”

He seems surprised by my lack of knowledge. “Those people don’t get divorced… it’s against their religion. They get married at twenty-one, and that’s it.” He laughs. “They’re stuck for life.”

“They get married at twenty-one?” Calvin asks, probably thinking about how many failed marriages he might have if he had started that early. “What if they don’t have anyone to marry?”

Dave laughs. “That hasn’t seemed to stop them so far.”

“Do they have to get married?” I ask.

He shrugs. “You got that right.”

“Why? Who makes them?” I ask.

“I don’t know for sure, but I think that guy they call the Keeper wants ’em to, so they do.”

“Amazing,” Calvin says.

“You got that right,” Dave says. “When that guy talks, those people would suck the Kool-Aid up with a straw, you know?”

I’m continuously being surprised by things I learn about that town. I’ve heard of religions prohibiting divorce, but dictating marriage by a certain age is outside of my experience. Of course, I’ve never let a spinning wheel or a guy in a dress dictate my life choices. I’d like to have the straw concession in Center City.

I roughly outline what Dave’s responsibilities would be if he takes on this job, which is basically to follow up whatever leads we give him, and report back to us. I tell him that anything he learns is confidential, since as a member of the legal team he falls under the attorney-client privilege. He looks at me as if I’m a dope for thinking he wouldn’t already know that.

Dave accepts the job, asking for a salary far less than I would pay an investigator back home. I give him a retainer and tell him we’ll contact him when we have a specific assignment, and he seems happy with that. I’m not sure we’ll actually need him, but it’s good to have him in reserve.

Calvin and I head over to the jail to see Jeremy. I like to meet with my clients fairly frequently, though it’s more for their benefit than mine. They usually tell me all that they know early on, so these subsequent sessions are not often helpful to the defense. However, they do seem reassuring to the client even when the news is not particularly positive. It must be the security of knowing that somebody is on their side, working on their behalf.

Richard and Allie Davidson are at the jail visiting with their son when we arrive. It’s the first time I’ve seen Allie since the night her house was set on fire. She thanks me profusely for helping her son, and Richard asks if they can stay while we talk. It’s fine with Calvin and me, and fine with Jeremy, so I tell him that they can.

We spend some time answering Jeremy’s and Richard’s questions about any progress we are making. Allie is content to let her men do the talking. So far there has been very little progress, and I tell them so straight out. Jeremy is facing a very serious situation, and I’m not about to sugarcoat it.

“We need to talk to people that Elizabeth knew well,” I say. “People from Center City.”

“Are you having trouble doing that?” Richard asks.

“It would be easier to penetrate NORAD.”

“The people in that town are crazy,” Jeremy offers.

“Have you met any of them?” I ask. “I mean besides Elizabeth.”

He shakes his head. “No. Sometimes when she’d go home for a holiday, I’d ask if she wanted me to come, to meet her family, but she said no. She said I didn’t know what it was like, but that I wouldn’t be welcome. She was embarrassed about it.”

“And nobody came to visit her at school?”

He snaps his fingers. “Of course! Her sister… she came there for a weekend. Liz said it caused a big fight with her mother. I think her name is Madeline.”

I had initially talked to a teenager when I called Jane Barlow. “How old is Madeline?”

“Probably seventeen. But she’s cool. She wants to go away to school like Liz, but she’s not allowed.”

“Did Liz ever talk about any other friends… ever mention any other names?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think so. Liz used to say that inside and outside that town were like two different worlds. But it’s not that she didn’t like the place. She was really religious; it wasn’t like anybody was twisting her arm about it.”

“Did she ever mention Keeper Wallace?”

He nods. “A couple of times. She thought he was a great man. A couple of times she went all the way home for some kind of big meeting that he led.”

“Did she ever describe those meetings?”

“No. Just that they were really important and that the whole town went.”

I have no trouble believing that, since I was first there during one of the meetings. The streets at that time were deserted except for the ever-present servants. “Never mentioned a wheel when she was talking about her religion?”

“A wheel?” he asks, clearly having no idea what I’m talking about, so I take that as a no.

Jeremy is taken back to his cell, and his parents leave with us. Once outside, Richard asks me again about progress in the case, as if I wouldn’t have been completely forthcoming in front of Jeremy, perhaps withholding something good so as not to get Jeremy’s hopes up. He is disappointed when I have nothing to add, but expresses his full confidence in me. I wish I shared it.

Calvin and I go back to the house, and as we approach, he stops short, a stunned expression on his face. “You must be kidding,” he mutters, almost to himself.

I look ahead, and there on the front porch is one of the scariest sights I have ever seen.

Marcus.

• • • • •

I HAVE ABSOLUTELY no idea how Marcus got here. He doesn’t fly, at least not on planes, and I don’t see any evidence of a car. It’s possible he hitchhiked, but if any driver willingly picked up Marcus Clark, that person should be immediately committed and placed under twenty-four-hour suicide watch.

Marcus sitting on the porch of this peaceful house in this sedate little town gives new meaning to the word “incongruous.” He projects pure menace and power, and Calvin says, “You’d better get him inside quick.”

“Why?” I ask.

“Because in two minutes, For Sale signs are going to be popping up on this street like weeds.”

“Hey, Marcus, how ya doing?” I ask. “I didn’t think you’d get here so soon.”

“Unhh,” Marcus says. His phone and in-person personalities are remarkably similar.

“This is Calvin,” I say. “Calvin, this is Marcus.”

“Hello, Marcus. Andy’s told me a lot about you,” Calvin says gently. Everybody talks gently to Marcus when they first meet him.

“Unhh,” Marcus says. He seems to have really taken to Calvin.

“Come on in,” I say. “You hungry?”

“Yuh,” he says. Now we’re getting somewhere.

I put Marcus in the kitchen and invite him to have whatever he’d like. It turns out that what he’d like is every single edible item he sees, including pistachio nuts with the shells intact.

Marcus is about ten minutes into the carnage when the doorbell rings. I go to answer it, hoping that it’s someone with a stomach pump, but it turns out it’s Laurie.

“I assume Marcus is here?” she asks.

“How did you know that?”

“We got four 911 calls from people who saw him on your porch,” she says.

“Was he doing anything wrong?”

“He was looking like Marcus.”

No more explanation is needed, and Laurie goes into the kitchen. She gets there just in time, as Marcus is preparing to eat the dead woman’s dinette set.

What follows is a transformation that I’ve seen a few times but still find hard to believe. The moment Marcus sees Laurie he breaks into a humanlike grin, moves to her, and hugs her. “Hey, Laurie,” he says.

“Marcus, it’s great to see you. How have you been?”

“Good.”

They wax eloquently like this for a few minutes, and then we all sit down and discuss what Marcus’s responsibilities will be here in Findlay. Laurie suggests that we make it a short list: that all he should have to do is protect my ass. I describe the situation in Center City, with the various servants ranging from burly to enormous, and he just takes it all in without responding or showing any concern. I’m not a doctor, but I don’t think Marcus was born with a “concern” gene.

What Marcus does have is a significant amount of ability as an investigator and an amazing talent to get people to tell him things. I wouldn’t describe it as cajoling or persuading; it’s more like scaring into submission. But it works, and I’m bottom-line-oriented enough to want to use these talents.

What we decide on is that we will use Marcus as an investigator, and as a protector when I think I’m going to be in a situation that could be dangerous. Laurie thinks so highly of my physical prowess that her view is that I’m in danger every time I cross the street, so she’s not thrilled with this resolution. But this time I’m calling the shots, and that’s how we leave it.

“Where’s Marcus going to live?” Calvin asks.

I hadn’t given it much thought, and now that I do, I’m not thrilled with the possibilities. “Do you have room at your place?” I ask.

Calvin shakes his head, as if he deeply regrets that he has to say what he’s going to say. “Damn… I wish I did. My aunt and uncle are in from Milwaukee, and they brought the twins.”

“Is that right?” I ask. “You never mentioned them.”

“I don’t talk about them much; they’re on my mother’s side.”

“I think Marcus should stay here,” Laurie says. “You’ve got three spare bedrooms upstairs, and it’s you he’s going to protect. Staying at Calvin’s house wouldn’t make much sense, even if he didn’t have his aunt and uncle and the twins on his mother’s side in town.”

I stare daggers at Laurie, but she fends them off. “What a wonderful idea,” I say through clenched teeth.

While I would never let on to Laurie, I’m relieved that Marcus has arrived, even if I’m less than thrilled that we’ll be rooming together. Physical courage has never been one of my defining qualities, and Marcus’s presence makes me feel much more secure. Now, if Clarence Darrow would show up and help us win the case, the team would be complete.

Having been protected by Marcus before, I know how to proceed. I rent him a car, get him a cell phone, and then forget about him. I don’t even have to tell him where I am going to be or when I am going to be there; he is just somehow always there when I need him. And I somehow always need him.

During the meeting, Calvin gets a phone call from one of the kids at the university who Calvin has been cultivating as possible information sources. It seems that one of Liz’s friends at school overheard phone conversations she had with someone named Eddie, and it was her sense that he was her ex-boyfriend from back home. This is a potentially important development for our side, and Calvin is quite pleased with himself that he has come up with it. At the very least, it gives us a much-needed avenue to explore.

Tonight is going to be a night that Laurie sleeps over. I know this, because after Calvin leaves and Marcus goes upstairs to choose a bedroom, I say, “You want to stay over tonight?” and she says, “Absolutely.” I am Andy the All-Powerful.

I’m not sure I’m doing the right thing by keeping her so close, even though she’s leaving it up to me. It’s feeling a little like those bad old movies where the girl says to the guy as they lie on the beach, “Is this just a summer thing, or will I see you in the city?” Well, this is just a winter thing, and I sure as hell am not going to see Laurie in the city.

On the other hand, I love her, and I love being with her, and it’s counterintuitive to not want her to stay over. I just have to discipline myself to understand what it is and what it isn’t, as well as where it’s going and where it isn’t.

I’m pretty much a master of mental self-discipline, but this is a tough one.

Laurie gives me a list, and I go to the market and buy food, since Marcus has consumed everything, and he’s going to have to continue to be fed. I have my cart full when I get stuck behind two women on the cashier line. I don’t know why it is, but I find that many women stand and watch their items being rung up, and only when that process is done do they open their purse and start taking out their means of payment. Do they think they are not going to be asked to pay?

When I finally get back home, Laurie starts to cook dinner. “You should ask Marcus if he wants to eat with us.”

“Oh, come on,” I say, though it sounds more like a whine than I intended.

“Andy, you can’t not invite him to dinner. He’s living here.”

“He didn’t sign up for the meal plan.”

“Andy…”

I nod with resignation and go upstairs. Marcus is not at home, which is good news and bad news. I can be alone with Laurie for dinner, but it means that Marcus is loose on the streets of Findlay. So it’s good for me, bad for Findlay. I can live with that.

After dinner we spend the kind of evening that I’ve missed even more than I realized. We open a bottle of wine and sit on the couch, with Tara between us. Golden retrievers are a master of positioning, and Tara arranges things so that I scratch her stomach while Laurie pets her head.

We watch a tape of one of our favorite movies, A Beautiful Mind, and I can see Laurie’s eyes tear up as Jennifer Connelly says, “I need to believe that something extraordinary is possible.” Well, extraordinary things can come in all shapes and sizes, and this is an extraordinary moment.

It is all so comfortable, all so wonderful, that I almost resist when Laurie asks if I’m ready to go to bed. Almost, but not quite.

Moments later we are making love, and while we are doing so, Laurie says, “Andy, I don’t want this to end. We have to figure out a way that this doesn’t have to end.”

I don’t know if she is talking about our lovemaking or about us, but either way it’s got my vote.

• • • • •

MRS. BARLOW HAS agreed to talk with you” is the first thing Stephen Drummond says after he says hello.

It’s a surprise to me, but I’m pleased at this first invitation to meet the good citizens of Center City. Maybe that ridiculous wheel okayed the interview. “Good,” I say. “When can that happen?”

“I’m available at three this afternoon,” he says.

“And why would that be significant?”

I can almost feel his smug smile through the phone. “Mrs. Barlow insists that I be there.”

This is likely to cut down on the chances of my actually learning anything, but I know there is no possibility I can get this reversed. I agree to meet at three at the Barlow residence. He asks that I not get there early, probably to spare Mrs. Barlow the nightmare of being alone without her Harvard-educated lawyer for protection.

Actually, protection is a serious consideration for me. It would be paranoid of me to think I’m being led into a trap, but that town and its people make me more than a little uncomfortable.

Marcus is not home, so I call him on his cell phone and invite him to the meeting. Based on his reaction, he’s either thrilled or asleep, but I think I get him to understand that I want him at the house at two-thirty so we can drive to Center City.

The culture shock of Marcus entering Center City will be such that I almost feel I should call ahead and warn them. It’s akin to when Tokyo woke up one morning and there was Godzilla strolling out of the water onto the beach. The townspeople are going to be running to the Keeper asking him what the hell is going on, because they’ve never experienced anything like Marcus before.

Marcus shows up promptly at two-thirty, and since he’s in his car already, I get in the passenger seat and let him drive. We’re about thirty seconds into the trip when I realize that classical music is coming out of the radio.

At least I think it’s classical music; I’m not an expert. But there are no lyrics, and it sounds like a large orchestra, and I feel like I should be dressed up to hear it, so that fits my definition pretty well.

It’s a rental car, so probably the radio was set to this when Marcus got it, and he was simply too oblivious to notice. There is as much chance that Marcus is intentionally playing classical music as there is that I’m playing center field for the New York Yankees.

“You listening to that?” I ask.

He nods. “Yuh.”

“You like classical music?”

“Yuh.”

“NOW PLAYING CENTER FIELD FOR THE YANKEES, NUMBER SEVEN, ANDY CARPENTER… CARPENTER… CARPENTER… CARPENTER.”

The twenty-minute drive feels like it takes about four hours. For the first fifteen minutes I try to make small talk, though I have no idea why. I say absolutely nothing interesting, and Marcus says nothing at all. I guess he’s enraptured by the music.

I use the last five minutes to explain to Marcus what i know about Center City, its inhabitants, and its religion. He not only does not ask any questions, he doesn’t nod or even blink. Yet for all his lack of inquisitiveness, Marcus has proven to be a smart guy, at least in a street sense kind of way. He’s a terrific investigator, and that is a job for which morons need not apply.

We get to Center City, and I point out the few landmarks that I know. When he sees the town hall, towering above the rest of the buildings, he says, “That the church?”

“And city hall,” I say. “Or both. They don’t like strangers inside.”

We drive on to the address we have for the Barlows, which is like pretty much every other house on every street in the town. The strange thing is that it is a farming community, yet there are no farmhouses. The farms are on the outskirts of town, while the farmers are most definitely on the “inskirts.” And speaking of skirts, every woman I have seen here has been wearing one; jeans or slacks are clearly not the clothing of choice for the fashionable women of Center City.

We park in front of the Barlow house; I would know it even if i didn’t see the number. That’s because two of the larger servants in the town are standing on the porch, awaiting our arrival. “Those are the local tough guys,” I say, but Marcus doesn’t seem to look at them.

We get out of the car and walk toward the house. One of the servants says, “Good afternoon, Mr. Carpenter.”

“Good afternoon,” I say. “We’re here to see Mrs. Barlow.”

“Yes, sir. The meeting will begin shortly.” He’s talking to me, but he and his partner are staring straight at Marcus.

I look at my watch and see that we’re five minutes early, and at that moment a car pulls up and Keeper Wallace gets out of the backseat, and the driver gets out as well. He is Drummond’s son, who seems to be the servant assigned to taking the Keeper around. Drummond told me that his son is also a pilot, so maybe Wallace does more than travel around town.

Wallace has obviously taken Drummond’s place as Mrs. Barlow’s protector during this interview. It won’t make any difference, despite the fact that they dress rather differently. Drummond is a suit-and-tie guy, while Wallace is clad in full robes and looks semi-ridiculous. I glance at Marcus to see if he has any reaction, but, of course, he does not.

Wallace walks toward the house. He greets me with a smile and a nod, and I introduce Marcus as my investigator.

He takes one look at Marcus and somehow avoids the temptation to hug him hello. Instead he turns to me. “The agreement with Mrs. Barlow was that she would speak with only you. I’m afraid Mr. Clark will have to leave.”

“Nunh,” says Marcus with a slight shake of the head. As an experienced and very capable bodyguard, he’s not letting me out of his sight.

What happens next is almost imperceptible, but I am Andy the Great Perceiver, so I pick up all of it. The two large guys on the porch start to move toward Marcus, who, even though he’s not looking at them, senses it and turns slightly toward them. He does so with an understated intensity that literally stops them in their tracks, as if somebody yelled, “Freeze.”

Wallace, apparently in my class as a perceiver of subtlety, observes it too. He’s smart enough to know that Marcus is not going to obey a guy standing on the street in a dress, so he decides to speak to the only people there who will listen to him.

“It is just a misunderstanding,” he says to the servants. “Please confirm with Mrs. Barlow that Mr. Clark’s presence will be welcomed.”

“Yes, Keeper,” says one of them, and he goes inside to do just that. The other one stays behind and stares ominously at Marcus, who seems to avoid shaking in fear. When the first guy comes back with the shocking news that Mrs. Barlow is okay with Marcus, we go in.

Mrs. Barlow and her seventeen-year-old daughter, Madeline, are waiting for us in the foyer. Jeremy mentioned that he met Madeline at school. There is no Mr. Barlow around, and I know from the discovery documents that he died a few years ago.

Both greet us very politely, and each makes a practiced bow to Wallace, accompanied by a “Good afternoon, Keeper.” Madeline is then sent off to her room, but I think I detect a slight rolling of her eyes, a move common to teenagers everywhere. It’s the first spontaneous sign of humanity I have seen in this town.

The interior of the house is perfectly kept. Everything is meticulously maintained, and although nothing in the house seems to be of any real financial value, the feeling is that each possession is cherished and appreciated by Mrs. Barlow. On some level it makes it even more painful to think that she has lost a daughter to a horrific murder.

“Thank you for agreeing to speak with me,” I say.

“The Keeper asked me to,” she says, leaving no doubt that there could be no request from the Keeper that she would not rush to grant. This guy has an extraordinary hold over his parishioners.

“I’m representing Jeremy Davidson, the young man accused of the murders. Do you know him?”

She gives a half-nod. “I’ve spoken with him on the phone… I believe twice. We’ve never met.”

“But you know he was your daughter’s boyfriend? That they talked of being married?”

“I don’t believe that. They were simply friends.”

She’s either lying or did not exactly have the kind of relationship in which her daughter shared her secrets. “So your daughter never referred to Jeremy as her boyfriend?”

She shakes her head. “No, and Liz was very open with me. If that was the case, I certainly would have known it.”

“Did she tell you about Eddie?” I ask.

I see something in her eyes, only for a moment. It isn’t a flash quite of fear, but maybe one of concern. She covers it up quickly, but asking her about Eddie, the name that Liz’s friends at school said she had mentioned, has definitely gotten a reaction.

“I’m not familiar with anyone named… with anyone by that name.”

She seems unwilling to even say the name, so I say it for her. “Eddie.”

She nods. “Yes.”

“Can you tell me the names of any boyfriends Liz ever had?”

Mrs. barlow glances quickly at Wallace, then looks back at me. “Not really. There was never anyone serious. She was so young.” Her last sentence may well be the first honest one she’s said to me, and the simple truth that her daughter died so young causes her eyes to fill with tears.

Keeper Wallace sees this and intervenes. “Must you maintain such a focus on this innocent young girl’s private life?”

“Did she have a public life?” I ask, perhaps too harshly because I’m annoyed. I’m trying to find out why this girl was hacked to death, and this guy thinks I should be asking about her favorite color.

The interview continues, but I get absolutely nowhere. At one point Madeline walks by the open door, and I request permission to speak with her, but Mrs. Barlow and Wallace rebuff me simultaneously. It’s a shame, because Madeline looks like the type to say what she thinks.

I thank Mrs. Barlow, and Marcus and I leave. He hasn’t said a word the entire time we were in there, but he got as much helpful information out of the session as I did. Zero.

I say good-bye to Wallace, who no doubt assumes I’m leaving his precious town for good. Instead we follow him in our car to the town hall. We all get out of our cars, me holding a manila envelope Calvin gave me, and I can feel Wallace staring at us as Marcus and I enter the building next door, in which I met Drummond.

I head to the office of the town clerk, which I saw on my previous visit. Marcus and I walk in without knocking, and the woman behind the desk seems about to have a stroke when she sees us enter.

“Good afternoon,” I say.

“I’m afraid that we don’t-,” she says, and since it doesn’t seem like the rest of the sentence is going to be terribly helpful, I interrupt her.

“We’re going to need some records,” I say, opening the envelope for her. “This request should speak for itself. We’ll need voter rolls, school enrollments, property tax lists… things like that. It’s all listed here.”

She has no idea what to make of this, but she’s frightened by it anyway. “I’ll have to speak to Mr. Drummond.”

I smile agreeably. “No problem. Just let me know when the information is ready, and I’ll come pick it up.”

Marcus and I leave, and I call Sam Willis on my cell phone. He seems happy to hear from me, and even more so when I tell him i need his help. Sam is a computer genius and can hack his way into any computer worth hacking into. It’s not always legal, but very often necessary.

Sam has helped me out with computer investigations in the past, and he enjoys doing so. He sees himself as Kojak with a keyboard. I always pay him for his efforts, but he would most definitely do it for nothing.

Sam is also a master at song-talking, and since he does it at every possible opportunity, proudly describing my “Town Without Pity” conversation with Laurie would only set him off, so I don’t. Instead I tell him what I need, which is to hack into both Center City and Wisconsin state computers to get exactly the same information I just requested of the town clerk.

“No problem,” he says. “When do you need it?”

“Yesterday morning,” I say. “But if that’s a problem, I’ll take it last night.”

“I’m on the case,” he says.

“Can you do it without them letting you know you’ve been in their computers?”

“Duhhhh,” he says, as a way of letting me know that he can certainly do that, and it was stupid of me to ask.

“Gotcha,” I say. “Call me when you’ve made some progress, Sam…”

“Hey, wait a minute, don’t get off yet. I haven’t talked to you in weeks.”a

He’s right; I’ve been so busy I haven’t had time to even contact any of my friends. “Sorry,” I say, “what’s doing?”

“Things here are fine,” he says. “How are things in Wisconsin? Nice women?”

“Nice women?” I repeat, to make sure I heard correctly. “Yes, very nice. Very nice women.”

“That’s what I figured,” he says. “I mean, East Coast girls are hip, I really dig those styles they wear. And the southern girls with the way they talk, they knock me out when I’m down there.”

“Bye, Sam,” I say, cutting him off before he can tell me that the Midwest farmers’ daughters will really make me feel all right. He is an incorrigible song-talker.

Marcus and I no sooner arrive back at the house than we receive a faxed letter from Stephen Drummond, refusing our request for the information asked of the town clerk. He cites the town citizens’ right to confidentiality, which means he must think that I, having not gone to Harvard, am a legal idiot.

I turn to Marcus. “Do I look like a legal idiot to you?”

“Unhh,” says Marcus.

“I’ll take that as a no.”

• • • • •

CALVIN HAS ALREADY prepared the motion, called a writ of mandamus, and we file it with the court less than an hour after receiving the refusal by Stephen Drummond to provide the documents. Included in the motion is a claim that the documents are crucial to our preparation of an adequate defense for Jeremy, and we have an expectation that this claim will prompt Judge Morrison to act quickly.

He acts even more quickly than we expected and notifies the parties that he will hear arguments on Monday morning. That gives me an entire weekend to both prepare for the hearing and further familiarize myself with every aspect of the overall case. I’m also going to watch a significant amount of college and pro football. Laurie is working both days, so it will be a guys’ weekend, and I’ll be the only guy participating in it.

I call my bookmaker back in New Jersey to bet on the college football games. It’s the first time I’ve spoken to him in more than a month. “Where the hell have you been?” he asks.

I can tell how concerned he is about my well-being, and it’s all I can do to hold back the tears. I place a bet against Wisconsin, sort of my way of getting back at the state for my confinement here. They’re playing Michigan State, but I would have bet against them if they were playing the Bonfire Girls.

Of course, Wisconsin rolls up four hundred yards on the ground and wins 38-7, leaving me thoroughly depressed. The only thing worse that could happen takes place a few minutes after the game, when Calvin comes over and tells me that he’s taking me to a party. He’s dressed ridiculously in gold pants and a green shirt; a sense of fashion is clearly not a requirement for admission to the party.

“A party? Are you insane?” I ask.

“Come on, you’ve got to get in good with the jury pool.”

He’s right, of course. It’s important that I reduce my posture as an outsider and become more accepted by this community before the trial. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

The party is at the home of Shelby and Tom Lassiter, and Calvin is going because Tom is a former client. Calvin informs me that it is something called hot-dish night, a traditional gathering to which everyone brings a hot dish, usually a casserole. The fact that we are bringing no such thing doesn’t seem to faze Calvin, so I’m fine with it as well.

When we enter, I see that almost everyone in the house is wearing a green and gold outfit as flamboyantly ugly as Calvin’s. It looks like a leprechaun convention, but it turns out that it is in honor of tomorrow’s Green Bay Packers game; local residents like to dress in the team colors. As best as I can tell, no one is wearing shoulder pads or a helmet.

Three women stand together off to the side, and they seem to be staring at us. I point that out to Calvin, who says, “Those are my three ex-wives. They call themselves the merry widows.”

“But you’re not dead,” I say.

He nods. “They live in hope.”

Shelby Lassiter comes over to inquire as to whether we want a drink, though she doesn’t seem interested in what type of drink we might want. Moments later we are holding glasses of peppermint schnapps, which doesn’t taste half bad. I try to picture Vince and Pete back at Charlie’s drinking peppermint schnapps; they would sooner sip Dra?248-175?no on the rocks.

The house we’re in is not particularly large, but people keep streaming in. Three couples come in together, probably in their late thirties, and look around the room, waving and nodding hello. I turn my attention away from them, but look back a couple of minutes later when I hear loud and apparently angry talking. I can’t make out most of what they are saying, but the word “murderer” comes through loud and clear.

The rest of the people in the room look as if they are watching a tennis match, glancing first at the commotion, than at Calvin and me, and back and forth, back and forth. It’s making me uncomfortable, but Calvin seems unconcerned, even amused.

“I’ve got a feeling there are detractors in our midst,” I say to Calvin.

He nods. “Story of my life.” Then, “The tall guy that’s the most upset is Donnie Kramer. He’s got twin daughters at the university.”

I understand immediately. “And we’re the defenders of a guy who slashed his daughters’ classmates to death.”

He laughs. “Well, when you put it that way, I’m not that crazy about us either.”

I find myself torn between wanting to leave because of the problems our presence is creating, and wanting to leave because the party is so insufferably boring. “I think we should go,” I say.

“Leaving now in the face of this intolerance would violate every principle I hold dear,” he says.

“There’s a late college game on ESPN,” I say. “And I’ve got a refrigerator full of beer.”

“I’ll get the coats,” he says.

Thus begins twenty-four hours of almost nonstop football watching and beer drinking. Calvin is the perfect couch potato companion; I even feel comfortable allowing him to handle the remote control. Higher praise I cannot bestow on a fellow human.

But all good things must come to an end, and on Monday morning we find ourselves in the courtroom, prepared to argue our motion to get Center City to turn over the information we have requested. At the opposing counsel’s table is not Lester, but Stephen Drummond.

Drummond is smarter and taller than Lester, but Lester has a better case. As a smart lawyer, Drummond must know that, but he no doubt feels that he has to go through the motions for his client. His client is Center City, and that client wants to maintain its privacy.

Morrison asks for oral arguments, and since it is our motion, I go first. For the record I list the documents we are requesting and then cite the Wisconsin Development of Public Access law. It is the state version of the Freedom of Information Act, and the writ we have filed basically insists that the government officials in Center City abide by it.

While there is virtually no question that we will prevail as a matter of law, my greater concern is to get the documents immediately. “Your Honor,” I say, “Center City is basically a closed society. I have only been able to secure one interview with anyone in the town, and that was a supervised session. Yet the victims were from Center City, and it is crucial that I be able to examine various aspects of their life there. That task, difficult as it is, is made infinitely harder by our not even knowing who it is we’re not reaching. Yet the unlawful withholding of these documents does just that.”

Judge Morrison asks Drummond to respond, and he stands to do so. “Your Honor, Mr. Carpenter refers to our community as a closed society. Yet I drove here from there this morning, and I did not have to pass through any gates or walls or fences to do so. I am confident the same will be true on my return.

“I would submit to you that our society is not closed. It is private, and its people cherish that privacy. That has never been more true than now, when two of our children have been brutally taken from us. Now, when media people that had heretofore never heard of us shove microphones in our faces and ask us to proclaim our grief and anger.

“Mr. Carpenter has a job to do, a job we respect, but our citizens have no obligation to help him do it. We ask that you preserve our privacy by denying his request.”

It’s an impressive speech, but one that runs head-on into the law, which is firmly in our corner. Judge Morrison is thoroughly aware of this and rules in our favor.

The crucial moment for us comes when Drummond asks the judge for injunctive relief, which would consist of his delaying implementation of his order so as to give Center City time to appeal to a higher court. This would effectively negate our victory, since an appeals court would not act nearly as quickly.

The judge turns to me. “Mr. Carpenter?”

“We are absolutely opposed to that, Your Honor, and we believe the law could not be clearer on this. In the interests of full disclosure, I should point out that if there is a delay in our receiving these documents, we will be seeking a continuance in the Davidson case of the same length as the delay.”

Game, set, and match. There is no way that Morrison wants the Davidson trial delayed, and he turns Drummond down flat. He instructs Drummond to give the documents to the court clerk within seventy-two hours. The clerk will then examine them to make sure they comply with the order. Assuming they do, he’ll turn them over to us.

Drummond does not seem crushed by the news, and after Morrison adjourns the session he comes over to me and shakes my hand. “Nicely done, Mr. Carpenter, but ultimately futile.”

“How so?”

“We are what we are, and no court can change that. So now you will know our names, just as we know yours. And you will know where we live, just as we know where you live.”

That sounds vaguely like a threat, but I’m not at all sure. “Is that a threat?” I ask.

He laughs. “A threat? Certainly not.” With that he gathers his papers and leaves.

Calvin has overheard the exchange and comes over to me. “The scumbag was threatening you. You gotta tell the judge.”

“There’s nothing he can do. It wasn’t that overt.”

Calvin is incredulous. “ ‘We know where you live’ isn’t overt enough for you? He sounded like Michael Corleone.”

I decide not to tell the judge, since there’s essentially nothing he can do. He might help in providing police protection, but if I want that, I can go straight to Laurie. My going to the judge might also get back to Drummond, and I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing that he frightened me, even a little. Which he did.

Besides, I have Marcus, and I plan to ask him to watch over me even more closely from now on.

I spend the rest of the afternoon visiting Jeremy at the jail and then taking Tara for a walk. I briefly wonder if I’m being unfair to Tara by keeping her in Wisconsin so long. Maybe she misses home, the sights and smells, and the neighborhood dogs. Maybe I’m being selfish assuming she’s happy just to be where I am. I make a mental note to speak to her about it.

When I get home, I call Laurie at her office and ask if she’d like to have dinner tonight. She jumps at the opportunity but balks slightly when I suggest we go out to a restaurant. She’s still feeling uncomfortable with exhibiting our relationship publicly, so we compromise and decide on a restaurant in Warren, about twenty-five minutes away, out past Center City.

During the ride I bring her up-to-date on our progress, or lack of it. I have no qualms about doing so; she can be trusted implicitly. Besides, we basically have the same interest: If there’s a bad guy other than Jeremy, we want to catch him.

The restaurant is called the Barn and is just that, a fairly large, spacious barn converted into a cozy restaurant, with six wood-burning fireplaces positioned throughout and sawdust on the floor. I like it as soon as I walk in, and that feeling increases when I see the TV monitors along the walls showing basketball games. Add the jukebox playing U2 in the background, and it’s a fair bet that I’ve found my restaurant of choice in Wisconsin.

Laurie is staring at me as we walk in, watching my reaction. When I notice her doing so, she smiles. “Not bad, huh?”

There’s no way I’m going to admit that Wisconsin has anything worthwhile about it, so I say, “It’s not Charlie’s; I can tell you that.”

“That’s my open-minded Andy. Wait until you taste the hamburgers and fries.”

The waitress takes our drink orders and within minutes comes back with my Bloody Mary. It’s got three olives and a celery stick, not too spicy, exactly the way I like it.

I order a burger and fries, and as is my policy, I ask the waitress to make sure that the fries are not only well-done, but so burned that they would have to be identified through dental records. I do this because many places have an irrational resistance to serving their fries extra crispy, and it’s necessary to emphasize it in this way to overcome that resistance. It doesn’t always work.

It does this time. The fries are perfect, the burger is thick and juicy, the pickles crisp and delicious. Laurie continues to watch my reaction, loving every minute of it. “Admit it, Andy, this place is perfect.”

“Perfect? You must be kidding. It’s filthy… there’s sawdust all over the floor.”

But it really is perfect, and being here with Laurie makes it even more so. I can tell that she feels the same way, because we hardly talk through the entire meal. It’s a gift we’ve always had together, the ability to go long periods without saying a word yet remaining totally connected.

After dinner we drive back to my house, take Tara for a quick walk, then settle down with a glass of wine and a DVD of Ray. I didn’t see it when it came out, despite the fact that I am a huge Ray Charles fan. Jamie Foxx’s performance blows me away, as it did everyone else.

The movie ends, and Laurie takes me by the hand and leads me to the bedroom. It’s the perfect end to a perfect evening, and in the moments after we make love and before she falls asleep, Laurie says, “Andy, is there any chance this trial can last forever?”

“I’ll just keep asking for continuances,” I say. “And even if we win, I’ll ask for a penalty phase, just for fun, to see what would have happened.”

She smiles groggily. “Good boy.”

• • • • •

THE PHONE WAKES us just before midnight. I answer it, and an official-sounding voice I don’t recognize asks for “Acting Chief Collins.” That’s quite a coincidence, since at this very moment I’m sleeping with an Acting Chief Collins. It’s a requirement for Acting Chief Collins and all other officers that they leave word as to where they can be reached at all times. It must be somewhat uncomfortable for her to have to leave my number, but she has done so.

I hand the phone to Laurie, whose voice sounds wide awake and does not betray the fact that she has been sleeping. “Collins here.”

She listens for a few moments, then says, “I’ll be right there.” She hangs up and immediately starts to get dressed. I like watching her get dressed; it’s my second favorite thing to watch, with her getting undressed maintaining a comfortable lead in first place.

“What happened?” I ask.

“Some kind of traffic accident. Car on Highway 11 went off the road.”

“And the chief has to go out to handle a traffic accident?”

She shrugs. “It’s a small town, Andy. And it must be a bad accident.”

Laurie’s out of the house within ten minutes, and I’m back asleep within eleven. As I doze off, I realize that I might not be a good chief of police. If I got woken up by a call informing me of a traffic accident, I would tell them to call AAA and I’d go back to sleep.

The clock says that I’ve been asleep for two hours when I hear Laurie come back into the house. She hadn’t said she was coming back, and I’m pleased that she chose to. I slide over to give her room to get into bed when I realize the person entering the house could be Marcus. I slide back, just in case.

I turn on the light and am relieved to see that it is Laurie entering the bedroom. That relief is short-lived when I see her face; I know this woman well, and I know that something is wrong. Horribly wrong.

“Andy, I’ve got something to tell you,” she says.

“What is it? What’s the matter?”

“It’s Calvin Marshall. He’s dead.”

Her words hit me like a punch in the side of the head. A punch so jarring it feels like it could have been thrown by Marcus. “How?” is the longest sentence I can muster.

“Get dressed,” she says. “I’ll tell you on the way.”

“On the way where?”

“To the scene.”

Once we’re in the car, Laurie says, “His car went off the road and down an embankment. His neck was apparently snapped on impact.”

“I see,” I say, even though I don’t.

“You think that might be too easy an explanation?” she asks.

I nod. “Perhaps a tad.”

“You don’t believe in coincidences? You don’t think it’s likely that a lawyer investigating a recent murder who is himself suddenly killed might be the victim of a tragic accident?”

“I don’t,” I say, “and you don’t either.”

“Why do you say that?” she asks.

“Because you’re taking me to the scene. You think I should see it, which means you don’t think it’s an accident.”

We’re quiet the rest of the way, which is a relief. I need to clear my head, to push aside the pain as best I can, and to think.

The place where Calvin’s car went off the road is twenty minutes west of Findlay, about ten minutes from the town of Carwell. As we approach, I see Laurie sag, as the sadness hits her in waves. “I’ve known Calvin since I was a kid,” she says.

“I’ve only known him a few weeks,” I say. “But it didn’t take long to know he was funny and smart and a lunatic, and a good guy to be around. I really liked him.”

The scene of Calvin’s death is still a busy place. I count four state police cars, one Findlay police car besides Laurie’s, an ambulance, a county coroner van, and two tow trucks.

We get out, and Laurie leads me down to where Calvin’s car went off the road. It’s not a particularly treacherous turn, and although it’s only partially lit, I don’t see skid marks. I assume Calvin hadn’t been drinking-he was smarter than that-so it doesn’t seem a very likely place for an accident.

Laurie notices me noticing this. “Strange, huh?” she asks, not really expecting an answer. “Come on.”

She leads me down to where Calvin’s car landed. The coroner’s people are in the process of removing his body, which I studiously manage to look away from. I’m squeamish in general, but particularly so when it comes to criminal defense attorneys dying in the course of doing their jobs. And even more particularly when those criminal defense attorneys are close friends.

“Is your coroner competent to handle this?” I ask, even though Dr. Peters-Clem-seemed knowledgeable when he testified at the hearing.

Laurie shakes her head. “Not really. So we ask the local veterinarian, Doc McCoy, to help out. And if he’s not in, the pharmacist takes care of it.” She stares at me. “Asshole.”

I look around from the outskirts of the scene as Laurie goes off and confers with the state cops. It gives me more time to reflect on the tragedy of Calvin’s death and how much I’m going to miss him.

It also gives me a chance to do some well-deserved self-flagellation. I called in Marcus to protect myself from the people that seemed to violently want to avenge the murders of the two girls. Probably because the break-in and the hanging figure were at my house, I assumed I was the target. It didn’t enter my self-centered mind that Calvin was also Jeremy’s lawyer and that he might need protection as well. And now he’s dead, his neck broken, while I had a nice dinner and then snuggled up in bed with Laurie.

The more I think about it, the more I’m literally in danger of throwing up.

Laurie spends another half hour making sure that things are handled correctly. She and the state cops are treating it as a crime scene, even though that hasn’t been close to being scientifically established. But it eventually will be established; I have no doubt about that.

Laurie drives me back home, and it’s about five o’clock in the morning when we get there. She’s going to her office to do some paperwork, so she just drops me off. As I’m getting out of the car, she takes my hand and holds it, for maybe thirty seconds, and we are completely connected, sharing the sadness that we both feel.

I enter the house, and Tara comes over and nuzzles her head against me. She has an unerring ability to know when I need comforting; unfortunately, this time it’s an assignment that even she can’t handle.

I go into the kitchen to make myself a drink, and I see that the phone machine is flashing, telling me that I have a message. It could have come in at any time; I never checked it when I got home from the restaurant with Laurie.

I press play, and with the first words I get a chill down my spine. The voice belongs to Calvin.

“Hey, hotshot. You’re probably out doing whatever the hell you bilegged people do to have fun. Well, don’t worry, ’cause I’m on the case. I’ve got a lead on our boy Eddie, and I was gonna let you come watch a master in action. I’ll call and update you when I get back.”

Calvin never updated me because he never got back. He died following a lead, working on our case, while I was out having dinner. And he probably got his neck broken for his trouble, just about the time I was having dessert.

Sometimes I make myself sick.

• • • • •

THE FUNERAL SERVICE to honor Calvin attracts just about everyone in Findlay, Lester Chapman being a notable exception. Calvin’s family consisted only of one brother, who has flown in from California, and he and five of Calvin’s closest friends tell humorous and poignant anecdotes about his life.

Calvin’s three ex-wives, the ones he referred to as the merry widows, are here and sitting together. They’re all softly sobbing, and all in all don’t look very merry.

One of the nonhumorous moments comes when one of Calvin’s friends describes how he lost his leg in combat in Vietnam, an episode that earned him the Silver Star. Apparently, his bone cancer story was just as fake as his mountain boulder story. I find myself hoping that his death is one of his more elaborate lies and he’ll show up and laugh at us for buying it. Unfortunately, he doesn’t make an appearance, at least not today.

The media are back out in full force, covering the funeral as a major news event. I’m always amazed at how quickly media people can mobilize themselves to appear when something happens; I have this image of them as firefighters, waiting for a phone call to propel them down their poles and onto their vans.

The reason they are here is that they don’t think Calvin’s death was an accident any more than Laurie and I do. Actually, they don’t have the slightest idea how or why Calvin died, but murder sells a hell of a lot more newspapers and generates far higher ratings than a simple automobile accident.

Laurie and her fellow officers are on duty at the funeral so as to ensure that there is no additional violence. I’ve asked her to update me on the progress of her investigation into Calvin’s death, but she has properly told me I have to go through Lester or the court. At this point those reports would not be due us in discovery because it has not been established that the death is related to the Jeremy Davidson case.

Marcus surprises me by attending the funeral with me. He does so, according to Laurie, not for my protection, but to show his respect for Calvin. It’s a nice gesture, and I appreciate it on Calvin’s behalf.

Marcus and I walk back to the house, and I realize how dramatically the landscape of this small town has changed. It seems like every few hundred feet there is a television truck with a satellite on its roof, and newscasters are stopping townspeople and interviewing them on the street. They want their opinion as to whether Calvin’s death was really accidental and their view of Jeremy’s guilt or innocence. They’re after local opinions, and they’re in luck, because everybody has one.

As we approach the house, I am stunned to see Kevin, my associate, standing on the porch. At least I think it’s Kevin; he’s buried under so much clothing that he’s twice his normal size, and round in shape. It’s almost as if someone put an air hose up his ass. It’s maybe thirty degrees, and I’ve gotten used to the weather, but apparently, the hypochondriac Kevin is worried about catching a cold.

“I heard about what happened to… ,” he starts.

“Calvin,” I say.

He nods. “Calvin. And I thought you might need some help.”

Kevin has made the kind of terrific gesture that only a good friend would make, but one that immediately triggers my overactive guilt gland. “What about Carol and the wedding?” I ask. “And then the honeymoon?”

“I asked Carol to marry me. She said no.”

“Gee, I’m sorry, Kev. Maybe she’ll change her mind.”

He shakes his head. “After she said no, she said ‘never.’ ”

“She said ‘never’?”

He nods. “Right before she said ‘not in a million years.’ So I was thinking I should come here and pitch in… if you want me.”

Kevin is a terrific attorney; there’s no question that I want him, and I tell him so. But I remind him about the pitfalls, like the need to be rather flexible with our fee structure and the fact that the person he’s replacing was killed while doing his job. None of this deters him, so I welcome him on board.

“But, Kev, it’s not winter yet. You might not need quite so much clothing. This is Wisconsin in October… not the Russian front in January.”

“It’s a preemptive action,” he says. “If I catch a cold early in the season, I have it all winter. Remember how much I was sneezing last year?”

I don’t remember anything about his sneezing, but I don’t want to hurt him by saying so, so I nod. “That was a nightmare,” I say.

We go into the house, and Kevin begins to describe in excruciating detail his other cold-prevention measures. When he starts listing the different forms of zinc he takes, Marcus, who has barely said a word since Kevin arrived, shakes his head and goes upstairs.

“Marcus is staying here?” Kevin asks.

“Yes.”

“Have you got room for me as well?”

This is getting worse by the day; pretty soon the house is going to need a resident adviser. “Sure. There’s an extra bedroom next to his.”

“I’m going to need to keep the house at a minimum of seventy-two point five degrees,” he says. “For my sinuses. Are you going to be okay with that?”

“Seventy-two point five?” I ask.

He nods. “Minimum.”

“Okay with me,” I say. “But why don’t you clear it with Marcus?”

• • • • •

THE FAX MACHINE in the kitchen is already going full blast when I wake up in the morning. As I walk toward it, I notice that Kevin is wearing an overcoat while cooking breakfast, and one of the windows is open. My guess is that Marcus didn’t think much of his 72.5 temperature plan.

Marcus, meanwhile, sits shirtless at the kitchen table, drinking an entire pitcher of orange juice without seeming to pause to swallow.

I feel like I’m in a fraternity house: Phi Loony Toony.

I check the fax coming in and am not surprised that Sam has once again come through, providing us with copies of the same documents that we’re scheduled to receive from Stephen Drummond. Right now they’re of no value to us, but when Drummond provides us with his, we’ll be ready to swing into action.

Word has come from Lester that he will not provide us with investigative reports on Calvin’s death in discovery, claiming, as I anticipated, that it is not related to Jeremy’s case. Judge Morrison has agreed to my request for an urgent hearing on the matter, and it’s been scheduled for three o’clock this afternoon.

For breakfast Kevin and I eat the five percent of the food that Marcus leaves behind, and then we continue the process of familiarizing ourselves with every bit of the prosecution evidence. More discovery documents are coming in every day, and the new ones are the ones I read. Kevin, since he just arrived, has started from the beginning.

Very often discovery documents contain an item that is understated so as to seem an insignificant fact, yet it will turn out to be a key part of the prosecution’s case. It is for that reason that I must know everything before I enter the courtroom; there must be absolutely no chance that I will be surprised.

It is while I’m reading through a new statement by one of the people at the bar the night of the murder that I find something that troubles me. I take Kevin and we drive out to the bar, which I have visited twice before. It is basically midway between Center City and Findlay.

We park in the lot and get out, taking the statements with us, so that we can re-create in our minds what took place.

“Jeremy’s truck was here,” I say, “and Liz’s car was parked over there.”

“Right. Under the light.” He adds that last fact because Jeremy said he couldn’t see who was in the car with her, yet the prosecution will use the presence of the light to try to discredit that.

“So she gets out of the car and comes over here, they talk, then argue, and she leaves. Then, according to Jeremy, he debates whether to go into the bar and get drunk, decides against it, and goes home.” I point. “Which is that way.”

“Shit,” Kevin says, realizing what I’m getting at.

I hold up one of the statements. “But Stacy Martin of Lancaster says she was leaving the parking lot at the same time as Jeremy and that she drove off behind him, going west.” I point in the opposite direction that I pointed before.

“Which is towards Lancaster and Center City,” Kevin says.

If Stacy Martin is correct, then Jeremy did not drive back to Findlay.

If Stacy Martin is correct, Jeremy Davidson lied to his lawyer.

Me.

Kevin and I go back to Jeremy’s house to look around there again. I had always been vaguely troubled by the fact that the bodies had been buried out behind the house, with the only access road to that area being in the front. Yet Jeremy, who claimed to have been home, never heard a thing.

My point of view on this was that the bodies may well have been put there the next day, when Jeremy might not have been home. Jeremy’s apparent lie about where he went after leaving the bar raises two more possibilities: Jeremy did not hear anything because he wasn’t at home that night, or Jeremy was the one doing the burying.

Richard Davidson is home when we get there, and I ask to look around inside, while Kevin does so outside. Davidson seems surprised by the sudden request, especially since I’ve been there before. “Anything new?” he probes.

“Nothing much… just going over things again. Where is Jeremy’s bedroom?”

“In the guesthouse, second floor. But you can’t go in there now… it’s not stable.”

The Davidsons haven’t started rebuilding the damaged guesthouse from the firebombing, so I walk outside of where Jeremy’s window was. I can clearly see Kevin, perhaps seventy-five yards away, standing near the area where the bodies were buried. This makes it even less likely that Jeremy was home and didn’t notice anything going on.

Kevin and I leave without sharing our concerns with Richard, and we head down to the jail to meet with Jeremy. He is brought into the meeting room, and a guard remains posted outside.

“What’s going on?” Jeremy asks, hopeful as always.

This is no time for small talk. “You didn’t drive home from the bar that night. You drove to Center City.” I don’t know if that last part is true, but since it’s a worst case, I say it as if I know for sure, to see how he will react.

I can see a flash of panic in his eyes. “What are you talking about? I told you, I-”

“This isn’t a debate, Jeremy. I know where you went. What I want you to tell me is why you went there and why you lied about it.”

He seems about to argue that point again and then sits back, as if defeated. I am going to hate what he has to say.

“I did go to Center City. I wanted to talk to Liz again.”

“What did you do when you got there?”

“I parked about six blocks from her house, because I figured if I just drove up, her mother would call the police and throw me out. I walked the rest of the way.”

“Did anybody see you?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think so. People don’t stay up real late in that town. Liz used to tell me that the last show at the movie theater was at seven o’clock at night, and-”

I’m not really in the mood to hear about movie night in Center City, so I cut him off. “How did you know where her house was?” I ask, since Mrs. Barlow told me she never met him.

“Liz took me there once… she just wanted to show me where she lived. I actually had to crouch down in the car so her mother wouldn’t be able to see me as we drove by.”

“What did you do when you got to her house?”

“Her car wasn’t there, so I waited. I hid behind some bushes,” he says with apparent embarrassment.

“How long did you wait?” I ask.

He shrugs. “Probably a few hours. Hey, I know it sounds stupid, but the longer she wasn’t there, the more upset I got. That’s why I figured she was with her ex-boyfriend, and he probably wasn’t ‘ex’ anymore.”

This is a disaster. Not only will Lester be able to show that Jeremy’s statement to the police contained a very significant, material lie, but the truth is very incriminating. The defendant hid in the bushes waiting for the murder victim, growing more and more upset, jealous and angry over her betraying him with another man. The only way this statement could be worse is if he said he stopped to pick up a machete on the way to her house.

I make eye contact with Kevin, and his look confirms that he thinks this is just as bad as I do. Since eye contact has never been my specialty, Jeremy notices it. “Hey, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have lied, but I was scared, and I figured it would look bad if I told the police where I really was.”

I give my standard stern lecture to Jeremy about the devastating consequences of lying to one’s attorney, but it’s a halfhearted speech. I will never fully trust him again and will always be worried that there’s another freight train coming around the next bend. His lie doesn’t make him a murderer, but it certainly makes it more likely he will be convicted as one.

But what are we worried about? We’re in great shape. After all, in less than two months we’ve already discovered that there is probably somebody in Center City named Eddie.

We’re the kind of lawyers you’d mortgage the farm for.

• • • • •

IRONICALLY, THE MOST fertile ground for our investigation might well be Calvin’s death. I doubt very much that it was accidental, because I simply don’t believe in those kinds of coincidences. If Calvin was murdered, it was almost certainly in the pursuit of exculpatory information for Jeremy; if that information did not exist, then Calvin would not have been a threat.

In any event, the hearing that Judge Morrison convenes is crucially important to our case, and when he calls on me to speak, I tell him so.

I basically repeat what is in the brief that Kevin wrote and submitted. I end with, “In conclusion, the defense believes that the death of Calvin Marshall might well be relevant to the matter before this court, but it is only through discovery that we can test our theory.”

Judge Morrison peers down at Lester. “Mr. Chapman?”

“Your Honor, the statute could not be more clear on this matter. The defense is entitled to all investigative work done on this case relating to the murders for which the defendant is to be tried. They do not have license to receive police documents for anything else that they believe might somehow be relevant. Where would that end? Would they be entitled to examine every crime committed in this county in the hope that it would somehow tie in to their case? At this point in time, pending further investigation, I simply do not see the relevance.”

Morrison turns to me, and I stand up again. “Your Honor, there has not been a murder prior to this case in Findlay in eight years. In those same eight years, only four murders have been reported in the entire county. Yet the lawyer for this defendant dies under suspicious circumstances while pursuing evidence in this very case. This is not a fishing expedition, and if Mr. Chapman cannot see the possible relevance, he is the Stevie Wonder of prosecutors.”

Lester jumps to his feet. “Your Honor, I resent the personal attack in that comparison.”

“Think how Stevie would feel,” I say.

Morrison comes down hard on both of us, but I bear the brunt of it. When he’s finished, he turns back to Lester.

“Mr. Chapman, have you reviewed the police reports in question?”

“Yes, Your Honor, in order to prepare for this hearing.”

“Is the investigation into Mr. Marshall’s death concluded?”

Lester shakes his head. “Certainly not, Your Honor. It’s barely begun.”

“So it’s not definitive in its conclusions?” the judge asks.

“For the most part, no.”

“I will look at the reports in camera. If I consider them relevant to this case, I will turn them over to the defense.”

This is a win for us; in a major case of this kind the judge will bend over backward not to handicap the defense. He will only keep the documents from us if they are absolutely no help at all, in which case we wouldn’t want them anyway.

“Thank you, Your Honor, that is quite satisfactory to our side. I would further request that if you do provide them to us, that you also see to it that we get all subsequent documents as the investigation proceeds.”

He nods. “I’ll make that determination when I see the materials, which you will provide forthwith, Mr. Chapman.”

Lester gives a combination nod and sigh. “Certainly, Your Honor.”

We’ve got what we wanted, but on some level it bothers me that Calvin’s death has now become part of our case strategy.

I’ve always considered myself a semi-hermit; I have my small group of friends and no desire to expand that circle. Yet events caused me to meet and get to know Calvin, and though it may sound corny, that relationship has enriched my life. How many other millions of people are out there that could do the same, if I’d only let them? It’s causing me to reevaluate how I should live my life, and I’m thinking I should make some changes. I’m sure I ultimately won’t, but right now I’m thinking that I should.

I would love to stay and torture Lester some more, but the clerk tells me that the Drummond documents have been delivered to our house, so I want to hurry back to compare them to those that Sam faxed us.

As soon as we get home, we lay them in front of us and start to compare. It’s a time-consuming process. I literally call out a name from Drummond’s documents, and Kevin tells me if it matches the documents Sam faxed us. On the voter registration list there are two instances where Sam’s copies have a name not on Drummond’s, and one case where a name on Drummond’s list does not appear on Sam’s. None of them are named Eddie, Liz’s mysterious boyfriend.

The property owner list yields two discrepancies, neither obviously significant. We’re halfway through the motor vehicle records when Kevin, reading from Sam’s list, says, “Edmond Carson, born 1985.”

I check twice to make sure, but there is no such person on Drummond’s list.

Edmond Carson, missing from Drummond’s list, and the right age to be Liz’s ex-boyfriend.

Eddie.

It’s a sad commentary on the state of our case that we’re so excited about the fact that we may have discovered the name of the victim’s ex-boyfriend, who probably knows nothing about her murder. But it’s all we’ve got right now, and we’ve got to pursue it as vigorously as we can.

I’ve had enough experience with Center City to know that it will not be terribly productive for me to go there and ask, “Can Eddie come out to play?” So Kevin and I head down to the police precinct to try to get Laurie’s help.

Laurie is not in her office when we arrive, and we wait almost an hour for her to get back. When I start to tell her why we’re there, she tells me to wait until she calls in Cliff Parsons. As the cop assigned to Center City, he certainly should be included, but that’s not why Laurie calls him in. She’s still very sensitive to how things between us will look to both local government officials and citizens alike, so if she’s going to help us, she wants to do it out in the open.

I’m not a big fan of Parsons, mostly because he’s good-looking, single, and around Laurie all day. I also don’t like the fact that he is not particularly deferential to her, despite her higher rank. She tolerates it, explaining that sensitivities being what they are, she doesn’t want to start her time as acting chief by being too heavy-handed.

To his credit, Parsons does not seem particularly annoyed that I embarrassed him on the witness stand during the preliminary hearing. He behaves professionally; if I got under his skin, he’s hiding it well. I can add this to the reasons I don’t like him.

I lay out what we’ve learned about the apparent deception by Drummond in the documents, and Parsons’s first question is, “Why not take this to Judge Morrison?”

“Because there’s nothing he can do that will help us. He could reprimand Drummond, he could even hold him in contempt, but it won’t get us any closer to Eddie. And Drummond will just say it was a clerical error, and that will be that. But we’ll have tipped him off on what we’ve learned.”

“So what are you asking us to do?” asks Laurie.

“To locate Eddie,” I say. “We can’t make him talk to us, but he’ll talk to you. The Centurions are very careful to pretend to cooperate with outside authorities.”

“We’re not your investigators,” Parsons says. “You can’t send us out to conduct interviews.”

I know Laurie’s being careful to remain independent and impartial in front of Parsons, but it’s starting to annoy me that she isn’t cutting him off. “We are talking about a young man who is very possibly a material witness in a murder investigation,” I say. “I’ve got reams of paper turned over in discovery on interviews you conducted in that town. You probably talked to fifty people. Why would you refuse to talk to one more, when that person is apparently being deliberately hidden from you and from us?”

Laurie asks Kevin and me to wait outside for a few minutes, and when we’re let back in, she tells us that she and Parsons have agreed to look for Eddie. Obviously, she’s asserted her will but didn’t want to do so in front of us. She and Parsons will drive to Center City right after lunch without calling ahead and alerting Drummond and the others as to what is going on.

“But you should know that I’ll be informing the district attorney about this,” Laurie says. “A report will be prepared for him when our interviews are concluded.”

I’m not happy about this, but it is unavoidable. Laurie has an obligation to keep the prosecuting attorney updated on all aspects of this ongoing investigation. Not to do so would be to abdicate her responsibility, and she is too good a cop for that.

A plus is her comment that he will receive the report when the interviews are concluded. To tell him in advance would be an invitation for him to intervene and possibly find a way to derail things.

• • • • •

KEVIN AND I PLAN to hang around the house for the rest of the afternoon, waiting for word from Laurie about her Center City visit in search of Eddie. Marcus is not in the house; I can tell simply by the temperature. When Marcus is home, the windows are open and it is cold enough to hang meat in here; when he is out, Kevin maintains his 72.5 degrees.

The investigative reports into Calvin’s death arrive around one o’clock; Judge Morrison has obviously decided they are relevant to our case.

I read the summary page, which contains the conclusion that Calvin’s broken neck was the cause of death, but that it’s unlikely it was caused by the impact of the car hitting the ground. If this is true, it’s significant news for our side.

I place a call to Janet Carlson, the best medical examiner in New Jersey and the best-looking medical examiner in the entire world. Janet has been incredibly helpful to me since I did her a favor a number of years ago, and now I’m calling on her one more time. I tell her that I’d like to fax her the information contained in this report and get her professional opinion on it.

“Wonderful,” she says. “We haven’t had nearly enough deaths to keep us busy here. I was just about to call other states to see if they had any they could lend us.”

“Serendipity,” I say.

“Whatever,” she says.

As always, Janet complains for a few minutes but then agrees to help me out. Kevin starts faxing the documents to her, even while we continue talking. I like Janet a lot, and if I decide that Rita Gordon represented the beginning of my sleeping with every woman in the justice system in New Jersey, Janet is going to be right at the top of my list.

I owe her at least that much.

At about four o’clock a squad car pulls up, and Lieutenant Parsons gets out. He comes inside and gets right to the point. “Chief Collins wanted me to report back to you on what we learned.”

It takes me a moment to mentally process that Chief Collins is Laurie, so Kevin jumps in. “And what is that?”

“Well, we interviewed six people familiar with Edmond Carson. All said basically the same thing: that they had not seen him in at least six weeks.”

“Did you check his house?” I ask.

He nods. “His apartment. He abandoned it at about the same time that people last saw him. He appears to have left quickly; some of his belongings are still in the apartment. He left without paying the rent that he owed, which was apparently uncharacteristic.”

“So no idea where he is?”

Parsons shakes his head. “No idea at all.”

“Are Stephen Drummond and Keeper Wallace aware that you are looking for Eddie?” I ask.

He looks at me for a few moments before answering, as if making sure I realize I just asked the dumbest question imaginable. Then, “I believe that is a safe assumption. There is little that goes on in that town that they are not privy to.”

Parsons leaves, after claiming that the search for Eddie will remain an open investigation. I certainly respect any police department that Laurie is a member of, but his statement doesn’t exactly fill me with optimism. Findlay is a small town with limited resources; we are not talking about the FBI here.

Kevin and I are about to go to the diner when Janet Carlson calls, having gone over the faxed copies of the Findlay coroner’s report.

“What did you come up with?” I ask.

“The victim is definitely dead,” she says.

“Wow, you big-city coroners are incredible. Anything else you can tell me?”

“The report seems mostly correct. Cause of death is a broken neck… the head was twisted clockwise, and death would have been instantaneous.”

“Could the impact of the car have been the cause?” I ask.

“Definitely not.”

“The report says ‘probably not,’ ” I point out.

“That’s because the local ME had to sign his name to it. I don’t have to sign, so I say definitely not.”

“Keep talking,” I say.

“Okay. Falling forward into the steering wheel on impact, even at a tremendous speed and even allowing for the head to be slightly angled when contact is made, could certainly cause a broken neck. But the head would twist at a maximum ninety-degree angle. This head was virtually screwed off, at least two hundred seventy degrees.”

“Linda Blair,” I say, referring to the head-revolving star of The Exorcist.

“Linda Blair,” she agrees. “Except her head turned on its own. This one had help.”

“What kind of help?”

“A pair of hands. Large, powerful hands.”

“Are you sure?” I ask.

“Almost positive. There are certain indentations on the skin, which the local doctor thought might be consistent with the impact of the car. I don’t think so; I think they were made by large fingers pressing down very hard. But I would have had to examine the body to be sure.”

“Thanks, Janet, I really appreciate it.”

“Andy, I understand the victim was an attorney and he was working with you. Just be careful, okay? The person who did this is very strong. And there was no hesitation; the neck was snapped instantly, like a twig.”

“How did you know it was an attorney that was killed?”

“I spoke to Laurie. We talk all the time.”

It’s amazing. For the last four and a half months I thought Laurie had completely cut off from her life and friends in Jersey. It turns out that I seem to be the only one she wasn’t speaking to on a regular basis.

• • • • •

DINNER TONIGHT IS more than a little weird.

Laurie comes over and cooks my favorite, pasta amatriciana. We sit at the table, Laurie across from me and Kevin across from Marcus. Quite the little family. I half expect Kevin to say to Marcus, “And how was your day today, honey?”

Laurie and I have always tried not to talk about our work during dinner, but we rarely succeed. Tonight, since the entire team is present, we have no chance at all. Laurie is the guilty party this time, when she tells us that “I got Calvin’s phone records from the night he died.”

“Anything interesting?”

She nods. “And upsetting. He called me at the office.”

“Any idea why?”

“Even before I called you and told you about this case, I had spoken to Calvin and expressed my doubts about Jeremy’s guilt. I told him that he should call me at any time if he needed my help.”

“Did anyone at the precinct speak to him that night?” Kevin asks. He is apparently going to be the designated speaker for him and Marcus, since Marcus’s mouth is processing pasta at an unprecedented rate.

“Apparently not,” Laurie says. “I have to assume that when he found out I wasn’t in, he hung up. The call only lasted about thirty seconds.”

I know Laurie is feeling guilt over not having been there for Calvin that night, and I am as well, even though our feelings are irrational. We had no way of knowing he would call that night, and obviously no reason to have waited around for that call. But the fact that Calvin died while we were enjoying a relaxing dinner is locked in our minds, so we can still feel the pain.

After dinner Laurie goes off to answer a duty call, probably a cheese overdose, and Marcus goes wherever it is that Marcus goes. It leaves Kevin and me to kick around our strategy for finding the elusive Eddie Carson.

“Why don’t you call Sam Willis?” Kevin asks.

“What for?”

“Maybe he can track the kid down on the Internet. Maybe through credit card usage, or something like that.”

It’s a very good idea, made even better by the fact that we have no other ideas, so I call Sam.

“So how did it go?” asks Sam when he hears it’s me. “Was the stuff I got helpful?”

“Very helpful,” I say. “It identified our guy for us, but he’s missing. Any chance you could find him online?”

Sam is uncharacteristically dubious about the prospects for doing so. “Theoretically, I could do it, but it would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. I wouldn’t know where to look; I would have to stumble onto it.”

It’s while I’m talking to Sam that I get an idea that could work. I try to get him off the phone quickly, but he asks me about Laurie and how things are going between us.

“They’re fine, Sam, but I’ve-”

“Watch out for yourself, Andy, I mean it. I’ve been there myself.”

“What are you talking about?” I ask.

“Sometimes you have to be the one to end things no matter how tough it seems.”

My fear is that he’s going to start song-talking and maybe tell me that “breaking up is hard to do.” I don’t want to be rude, since Sam has been such a big help, but I really want to get off this call.

“Sam… ,” I start, to no avail.

“I thought I told you about her,” he says. “Her name was Margaret… we were both twenty, and I was leaving school to run away with her. She drove me crazy.”

“Sam, can we talk about this some other time?”

Apparently, we can’t, because he continues as if I hadn’t said anything. “Things started going sour, my parents were freaking out that I wouldn’t graduate, and I wanted to break it off, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. Then one night I couldn’t sleep, and about four o’clock in the morning I got up the nerve.”

I give up. “What did you say?”

“I leaned over and said, ‘Wake up, Maggie, I think I got something to say to you. It’s late September and I really should be back at school.’ ”

“Bye, Sam.”

“Bye, Andy.”

Once I’m off the phone, I immediately dial Cindy Spodek at her house in Boston. Cindy is an FBI agent whom I got to know on a previous case. Her boss at the Bureau was directing criminal activities, and Cindy blew the whistle on him. It took considerable courage, and Cindy had to deal with strong internal resistance afterward. She has persevered, moved to the Boston office, and gotten a promotion. I’ve called on her for a number of favors since, and she’s always come through, albeit grudgingly.

“Hello?” she answers, her voice sounding simultaneously groggy and worried. I check my watch and realize that it’s eleven-fifteen in Boston.

“Cindy, Andy Carpenter. How are you? Am I calling too late? I forgot what time it is back East.”

“Andy… yes. Much too late.”

“Well, the damage is done. I need a favor.”

“That’s a major surprise. Can it wait until morning?”

“I suppose so, but I don’t want you beating yourself up all night over not helping me when I needed you.”

“I can handle the guilt,” she says, at which point I hear a man’s voice say, “Cindy, who is it?”

She answers him with, “It’s for me, honey.”

“What ‘honey’ are you talking to at this hour?” I ask.

“My husband, if that’s okay with you. Remember, the wedding was in May? It’s the one you didn’t come to.”

“Right. But I sent a gift.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“Right. But I planned to, which is really what’s important.”

“Hey,” she says, “what do you mean you forgot the time back East? Where are you?”

I tell her about being in Findlay and about taking on the case. All she really cares about is that Laurie and I are in the same town. “So what’s going on with you two? Are you back together?”

“You really want to know?” I ask, sensing an opening.

“Of course,” she says.

“So listen to my favor, and then I’ll tell you about me and Laurie.”

“You’re a shithead,” she says, defeated.

“You got that right,” I say, victorious. “Now tell ‘honey’ to go back to sleep while you help your friend Andy.”

I proceed to explain our need to find the elusive Eddie, and ask her whether she can utilize the FBI computers to do so. I know from past experience that if they are tracking someone, they can find out on a moment’s notice whenever that person does something that enters a computer anywhere, like using a credit card.

“Are you insane?” she asks. “You think you can use the FBI as your own private investigative agency?”

“You won’t believe what’s going on with Laurie and me,” is my response.

“You think I have nothing better to do than track down your witnesses?” she asks.

“Our life is like an episode of The Young and the Restless,” I say.

She thinks for a moment. “It better be. What’s the guy’s name?”

I give her the information, and she agrees to get on it starting tomorrow. “Now tell me about you and Laurie,” she says.

“Can’t it wait until tomorrow?” I ask.

Suffice it to say that she doesn’t feel it can wait, and I spend the next hour describing our situation, stopping every thirty seconds or so to answer questions.

Cindy, like everyone else, has always liked Laurie, and her final question is, “So where is this going to wind up?”

“I wish I knew,” I say, understating the case about as much as a case can be understated.

• • • • •

THREE DAYS IS a long time to sit around and watch the temperature drop, but that’s basically what we’ve been doing. It was absolutely freezing when I took Tara out for our walk this morning. It is as if Wisconsin spent these last days hurtling away from the sun, and based on the temperature, we must be passing Pluto about now.

Kevin started sniffling a couple of days ago, which sent him on a mission to find the best ear, nose, and throat man in the area. His task has been made more difficult by the fact that there aren’t any ear, nose, and throat men in the area. Kevin has thus been reduced to seeing an internist, but his sniffling is increasing in frequency, as is his complaining about it.

I’ve heard nothing from Cindy about Eddie’s whereabouts, though I’ve called her twice at her office. Each time she was too busy to come to the phone and had her assistant tell me that when she has anything, she’ll let me know.

Laurie is unofficially aware of what is going on, but if I learn anything, I’m going to handle it myself. I have no legal obligation to inform the police of my investigative efforts, and I certainly don’t want Lester privy to them. Nor have I told Jeremy or his parents; this has to be done with some discretion.

With nothing else productive to do, I spend my time trying to understand why any of the earliest humans could possibly have chosen this place to live. The planet was barely inhabited… they could have settled anywhere. It was before money was invented, so land had to be cheap in places like San Diego. Yet people said no, they’d rather live in some place so cold that frostbite occurs in about eight seconds.

And it’s not like winter clothing was particularly advanced back then. Skiing also hadn’t been invented yet, so there couldn’t have been ski jackets, and I don’t know if there was even underwear, no less long underwear. Yet for some reason someone decided that this was the place to be, and the other prehistoric losers followed.

I’ve always been fascinated by firsts; I like to ponder who made strange initial decisions and why they made them. Who was the first person to try a parachute? Who first looked at a slimy, disgusting raw oyster and decided to chow down on it? And who saw a tobacco plant and figured it would be a good idea to stuff some of the leaves in their mouth and set them on fire?

I probably think about these things as a way of taking my mind off the upcoming trial. It’s a defense mechanism, which I need because I have not come up with an actual defense. We’re two weeks away from jury selection, and unless we wind up with a jury consisting of twelve of Jeremy’s relatives, we’re in a lot of trouble.

It’s while I’m attempting without success to convince Tara that in this weather she should take herself out for walks that Cindy Spodek calls. She doesn’t even take the time to say hello.

“He just used a credit card to get forty bucks at an ATM in a convenience store. The address is 414 Market Street, Warwick, Wisconsin.”

“Thanks,” I say. “I’ll let you know how we make out.”

“I don’t know if I can stand the suspense,” she says. What could be worse than an FBI wiseass?

“We’ve got the address,” I say to Kevin as I hang up. “It’s in Warwick.”

He grabs the map we bought for this occasion and opens it on the table in front of us. “It’s about a two-hour drive.”

I’m already on the way to the door. “Let’s go.”

“What about Marcus?” he asks.

I can tell by the temperature in the house that Marcus is out. “I don’t know where he is. Come on, this is a nineteen-year-old kid we’re talking about. You can handle him.”

“Me?” he asks. Kevin is about as tough as I am.

“If he gives you a problem, sneeze on him.”

Once we’re settled in the car and on the way, I have time to reflect on the situation we’re in. We’re heading to a strange town to find someone, without any idea where he’s living or what he looks like. All we know is that he got some cash there; the fact is, he may have just been driving through. Another possibility is that someone else is using his credit card, as a way to throw pursuers like us off the track.

Possibly more problematic is what will happen if we find him. What we know about Eddie is that he was Liz’s ex-boyfriend, that he was probably with her the night she and Sheryl were killed, and that he suddenly left Center City shortly after that night. At the very least that makes him a suspect in the murder, which in turn makes him a suspect in Calvin’s murder. The first two murders were done with a knife, while Calvin’s was apparently done with bare hands. Eddie may wind up being a very scary guy; I should have taken the time to find Marcus.

Halfway to Warwick we pass a lake with a posted sign heralding this weekend’s ice-fishing tournament. It gives me something to do during the drive; I can ponder if there could be anything on this planet more uncomfortable and boring than sitting on the ice with a fishing pole. Do the fish come out already frozen? I think it just might be the one sport that even I wouldn’t bet on.

It starts to snow about fifteen minutes outside of Warwick, and it’s falling fairly heavily by the time we reach the town. We catch a break when the convenience store where Eddie used the ATM turns out to be one of the first things we see.

We park and enter the store, which is empty except for the clerk behind the counter. He’s about fifty, and wears a shirt with the word “Manager” above the pocket, though at the moment he doesn’t seem to have much of a staff to manage.

“How ya doing?” I say, chummy as always.

“Fine, thanks,” he says. “What can I get you guys?”

I take on the spokesman role, since Kevin seems to be eyeing the Sudafed. “We’re looking for a kid, maybe eighteen, nineteen years old, who used that cash machine a little more than two hours ago.”

He looks at me warily, trying to figure out what this is about. “Are you police officers?”

“No. We’re lawyers, and the young man we’re looking for is a potentially crucial witness in a criminal case.”

“How do you know he used this cash machine?”

“We were so informed by the FBI,” I say, hoping that will sound important enough to get him to tell us what he knows, which may well be nothing.

“I don’t want to get in the middle of anything… or get anyone in trouble,” he says.

“Someone is already in trouble. This young man might be able to help… that’s all.”

He nods. “There was a kid in here around that time… he used the machine. He was wearing a Brett Favre jersey.” That won’t exactly make him stand out in a crowd; here in Wisconsin everybody wears a Brett Favre jersey. The clerk continues. “No coat… he must have been freezing to death. That’s why I noticed him.”

My expectation level immediately triples; Eddie left many of his things in his apartment in Center City. His coat could easily have been one of them.

“Did you talk to him?” Kevin asks with some excitement in his voice. Either he agrees with me that we’re getting close to Eddie, or he’s hopeful that Warwick has an ear, nose, and throat guy.

“Yeah. I asked him if he was okay. He didn’t seem right… and it wasn’t just not having a coat. I don’t know what it was… but he was the only customer, and I felt bad for him.” This is small-town Wisconsin at its finest; back East the clerk would have reported Eddie for vagrancy.

“Do you know if he lives around here?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “He doesn’t. He asked me if there was a cheap place he could stay. He was afraid the roads would get closed because of the storm.”

This is rapidly approaching “too good to be true” territory. “Did you recommend a place?”

He nods. “Two of them. The Days Inn out on Route 5 and the Parker Motel.”

“Where’s that?” I ask.

He points. “Four blocks that way, then make your second right.”

Kevin and I both thank him and head for the door. Just before I leave, I stop and ask, “By the way, how big was this kid?”

“Maybe five eight, a hundred and forty-five.”

I allow myself a quick sigh of relief; between us, Kevin and I should be able to handle someone that size. Unless, of course, he has a knife. Or a gun. Or an attitude.

The proximity of the Parker Motel makes that the likely first choice for us to try, so we drive the four blocks and park in front of the office. The two-story place is a borderline dump, and the fact that the sign advertises vacancies is not a major shock.

We enter the small office, which basically consists of a counter and a display with flyers advertising the tourist attractions in the area. There’s a coffee machine, which looks like it hasn’t been cleaned since the invention of decaf.

There’s a girl behind the desk, maybe twenty-one years old and incongruously perky for these surroundings. “Hi, I’m Donna. Welcome to the Parker,” she says. “Snowing pretty hard out there, huh?”

The office is mostly glass-enclosed, allowing her to see “out there” quite easily, so I assume the question is rhetorical. “Sure is,” I say, trying to keep up the banter level.

“You need a room?”

I explain that we’re looking for a guy named Eddie Carson, most recently seen wearing a Brett Favre jersey and no coat. Since the FBI mention worked so well in the convenience store, I trot it out again.

Donna’s brow furrows in worry, but she’s nothing if not cooperative. “I think I know who you mean… but we’re not supposed to give out room numbers.”

“I’ll tell you what,” I say as I write Cindy’s office phone number on a piece of paper. “Call this number. It’s the Boston office of the FBI. Just ask for Agent Spodek, and she’ll tell you what to do.”

There is as much chance that Donna will call the Boston office of the FBI as there is that she will put on a bikini and go outside and catch some rays. But the offer has its desired effect, and she looks up the room number in her register. “He’s in room 207. Second floor, back towards the parking lot.”

“Thank you,” I say, and Kevin and I go outside. We start walking around toward where the room is when I see a car leave the parking lot at as high a speed as the snow-covered pavement will allow.

“Uh-oh. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”

We move more quickly toward the room, and my bad feeling is confirmed. The door is open, and no one is inside. Eddie must have been watching our arrival and put two and two together. We should have been far more careful, and by not being so, we let him off the hook. Simply put, he outsmarted us, which doesn’t exactly qualify him for a Rhodes scholarship.

A few items of clothing are strewn on the floor, and a toothbrush and toothpaste are on the bathroom sink. Poor Eddie keeps having to leave places in a hurry, and his possessions are dwindling by the moment.

Kevin leans over the balcony and looks in the general direction that Eddie’s car went. There is no way we are going to catch him, and the idea of trying holds little appeal for either of us.

For the most part the trip here was a fiasco, and the ride back is going to be an endless one. But one good result is that what we suspected is now a virtual certainty. Eddie either did something bad or knows something important, and it is more crucial than ever that we find him.

• • • • •

SOUNDS LIKE IT wasn’t exactly a textbook operation.” Laurie is talking about the unsuccessful invasion of the Parker Motel that Kevin and I executed. “If the Mexicans had tried the same approach at the Alamo,” she continues, “Davy Crockett would be doing talk shows today.”

We’re in my house, having just finished dinner, listening to an Eagles CD. Kevin is up in his room practicing his sneezing, and as always I have no idea where Marcus is.

Laurie and I are in our favorite spot, sitting on the couch and simultaneously petting Tara. If I have to be mocked and humiliated, this is as good a place as any to have it done.

“I admit we could have handled it a little better, but I just didn’t think the kid would be so paranoid. He’s really scared of something.”

“You think he killed the two girls?” she asks.

“It’s possible, but I doubt it. Janet Carlson was pretty sure the person who killed Calvin was very strong. I’m betting it’s the same person.”

“But if Eddie was Liz’s ex-boyfriend, and she was going to see Jeremy that night, maybe Eddie thought she was going back with Jeremy,” Laurie says. “So he went crazy and killed her, and Sheryl was unlucky enough to be with her friend at the time.”

I nod. “And he would have known who Jeremy was, so framing him makes sense. It all fits; I just don’t believe it.”

“Why not? Just because of what Janet said? She didn’t even see the body.”

“No, it’s more something that Calvin said the first time I met him. He said that his gut doesn’t trust anything that comes out of Center City.”

“Eddie came out of Center City,” she points out.

“And Mrs. Barlow denied that there even was an Eddie. She lied right to my face. That really pisses me off.”

“You want me to tell her so tomorrow?”

“You’re meeting with her tomorrow?” I ask.

Laurie nods. “A follow-up interview; I’m going out to her house. She doesn’t drive, if you can believe that.”

“I think you should tell her what happened. Tell her she’s going to be answering questions about Eddie under oath. Maybe she’ll give something up.”

Laurie agrees to do it, and we both agree not to talk business any more tonight. We’ve got other stuff to do, stuff that a couple of months ago I thought we wouldn’t be doing together anymore.

Laurie leaves at six in the morning, and I call Cindy Spodek to ask her to remain on the computer lookout for Eddie. I tell her that we missed catching him, but I make it slightly more heroic than it was in real life. In my version Eddie had a dozen bodyguards, plus a helicopter in which to make his getaway. For some reason Cindy doesn’t believe me, but she does agree to keep the search going.

I need to focus less on the search for Eddie and more on the rapidly approaching trial. There is no guarantee that we are going to find Eddie, and we must be prepared to create a reasonable doubt in jurors’ minds even without him.

To that end I’ve agreed to Kevin’s request that we meet with a jury consultant this morning. I’ve used consultants before but lately had stopped doing so. It’s not that I don’t believe they can be of value, it’s just that I trust my instincts more than I trust theirs.

I’m making an exception in this case because of my feeling that there’s a lot that I don’t know about small-town Wisconsinites. Of course, there’s a great deal that the jury consultant, a woman name Susan Leidel, doesn’t know about them either, because it turns out that she’s come up from her office in Milwaukee.

What Ms. Leidel proposes is that we do a substantial amount of research within the greater Findlay area to get a handle on what the people think, in general, and how they view this case, in particular.

Once I learn that she has no special knowledge about the area and its people, I mentally disconnect from the meeting and let Kevin carry the ball. I sit there quietly and spend about half the meeting trying to think of a way to find Eddie and the other half recalling last night in bed with Laurie. Kevin is smart enough to make the meeting mercifully short.

While we’re having lunch, Kevin says, “It’s nice to see you and Laurie together like this.”

“It’s sort of a work in progress,” I say. “I’m just not sure what we’re progressing towards.”

“This is not such a bad place to live, you know?” he says.

“You mean except for the part where people kill lawyers?” I ask.

“You know what I mean,” he says. “There’s crime everywhere, but this place sure has less than most. I’m just saying it’s a nice community, and you could do worse, if you decided to stay here when this is over.”

“I’d go absolutely insane, and within a year I’d kill myself,” I say.

He smiles. “But that’s really the only downside.”

Laurie calls right after lunch to tell me that she confronted Mrs. Barlow with the latest news about Eddie but that the woman continued to deny any knowledge of him or his relationship with her daughter. I’m sure she’s lying, and I continue to be amazed that she would be so resistant to finding out the truth about her daughter’s death.

With jury selection rapidly approaching, I head home to start preparing for my opening statement. I jot down little notes and phrases that pop into my head, but I resist the temptation to actually write out the statement. I like to make it as extemporaneous as possible; I feel I connect better with the jury that way.

Kevin, as is his practice, gives me a lengthy memo presenting his view of what should be included in the opening statement. It is a perfect example of why Kevin and I complement each other so well.

If Kevin has a weakness as an attorney, it is that he’s too detail-oriented. This fourteen-page memo brings up every imaginable nuance in the case but perhaps lacks a “big picture” approach. A fair criticism of Kevin, as evidenced by the memo, might be that he doesn’t see the forest for the trees.

I, on the other hand, have a tendency to see only the forest, without even noticing that there are any trees. I pay far too little attention to detail, which is a substantial weakness. Fortunately, it is amply compensated for by Kevin’s working alongside me.

Another of my weaknesses is that, while I make some effort to prepare in advance for things like this opening statement, I find it hard to get really serious about it until it is imminent. So after spending an hour or so at it tonight, my mind wanders and I wind up falling asleep on the couch while watching an NBA game on ESPN. Tara’s head rests on my leg as she sleeps, and that’s how we wake up in the morning.

The phone is ringing when Tara and I return from our morning walk. I rush in to pick it up, and I get it simultaneously with the answering machine.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Carpenter, this is Eddie Carson.”

I’m shocked at this piece of news, but I attempt to conceal that and talk calmly. “Eddie… I’ve been looking for you.”

He speaks haltingly, apparently nervous. “I know… I’m sorry I ran away… but I didn’t know who you were. I thought Drummond might have sent you.”

I have a thousand questions I can ask him, including why he might be afraid of Drummond, but I don’t want to ask him over the phone. I know so little about what is going on that I’m afraid I could stumble upon a question that could scare him off. My sole priority now is to get Eddie in a room.

“When can we get together?” I ask. “All I want to do is talk to you.”

“Okay… yeah… I’m ready to do that. I’m gettin’ real scared.”

“Where are you?”

“You’re the only one coming?” he asks, obviously wary.

“I’ll bring my associate along, if that’s okay. He’s a lawyer like I am.”

A pause, then, “okay.”

He tells me the name of another motel, on a highway about four hours from here. I’m getting a little tired of driving all over Wisconsin looking for this guy, but there’s no alternative. “Just wait for me, okay? I’ll be there around one o’clock.”

He promises that he will, and gives me his room number. Kevin comes into the house as I’m getting off the phone, and I tell him what just happened. As I’m doing so, I get out the map, to figure out what our route will be.

“I’ll call Marcus,” Kevin says, heading for the phone.

“I told him I’d just bring you,” I say.

“Well, you just changed your mind,” says Kevin, and I don’t argue. He calls Marcus and tells him where we are going.

I speak to Kevin while he is still on the phone with Marcus. “Tell him to follow us at a distance.” I want it this way so that Eddie doesn’t see Marcus with us, since that could easily get him to run away again. I also don’t want to have to listen to classical music for four hours.

Kevin and I are in the car within fifteen minutes. I don’t see Marcus, but then again I never do. I trust that he will be there if we need him, but my hunch is that this time we won’t.

This time Eddie has come looking for us.

Luckily, the weather today is fine, if one doesn’t mind freezing cold, so the drive is much easier. I’m also anxious to get there before Eddie can change his mind, so my foot is a little heavier on the gas pedal than last time.

The motel that Eddie has directed us to is the Peter Pan Motor Hotel, a two-story establishment that makes the Parker Motel look like a Ritz-Carlton. As with the Parker, the parking lot wraps around the place so that guests can park in front of their rooms. My guess, based on the classiness of the place, is that many of their guests only take their rooms for an hour or so in the afternoon.

Eddie told us his room number, so there’s no reason for us to stop off at the front desk. We park near the outdoor staircase, since his room is on the second floor. I look around for Marcus but can’t find him… business as usual.

Kevin and I walk up the stairs and then around the building toward the room. I feel a flicker of nervousness at what is about to happen. It’s unlikely that Eddie would be leading us into a trap, but there is always that possibility. Kevin was absolutely right to call Marcus.

We reach room 223, and I knock on the door. As I do so, I see that it is only half closed and can be pushed open. I wait for someone to answer, but no one does. I hope Eddie has gone out, maybe for a bite to eat, and will be back soon. I’ll be really pissed if he’s bailed out on us again.

I push open the door and call out, “Eddie?”

No answer, so Kevin and I enter the room. The bed is unmade, there are some papers on the desk, but no sign of Eddie. I go toward the open bathroom door and look in.

There is a skylight in the bathroom, with a metal latch. One end of the rope is tied to this latch, and the other end is tied to Eddie’s grotesquely twisted neck as he gently swings, his feet about eighteen inches above the bathroom floor.

• • • • •

I’VE SEEN DEAD bodies before, both murder victims and otherwise, but it’s not something I’m likely to get used to any time soon. For some reason the image of Eddie’s shoes, slowly drifting in the air, is one I believe that I will never forget.

Kevin comes to the door to see if I’ve discovered anything. “Holy shit,” he says, mostly to himself.

I close the door with us on the outside of it. I ask Kevin to call 911 as I look around the room, and it doesn’t take long to find the note sitting on top of the desk.

It’s a rambling two-page letter, in longhand but legible. I’m careful to just nudge the edges of the pages so as not to smudge any fingerprints, but there is no way I’m not going to read this. It consists of a confession of guilt to the murders of Liz Barlow and Sheryl Hendricks, as well as an apology to the victims, the victims’ families, and God, for what he has done.

Included are three paragraphs in which he describes the murders as having been committed because Liz broke off their “engagement” and he just went “crazy” at the prospect of a life without her. His last paragraph is a specific apology to Jeremy for the pain he has caused him. He acknowledges burying the bodies on Jeremy’s property, as well as putting specks of the victims’ blood in Jeremy’s truck, which he says was parked in Center City.

Kevin and I wait outside the room for the local police to arrive, since we have neither a desire to contaminate a crime scene nor hang out with a dead body. Four local patrolmen arrive in two cars, and after confirming that we are the ones who called the discovery in, they proceed to enter the room without waiting for any detectives. It is clear that their training regarding crime scenes consisted of watching two episodes of CSI: Miami, but that’s not my problem.

The state police arrive about ten minutes later, and the officer in charge, Detective Woisheski, immediately removes the local officers from the scene, instructing them to set up a perimeter in the parking lot. My guess is, he does this just to give them something to do and get rid of them, and if a perimeter had already been set up, he might have instructed them to open a lemonade stand in the parking lot.

He tells Kevin and me to wait where we are, and it’s about a half hour before he comes out of the room and over to us. “And you would be who?” he asks.

“I’m Andy Carpenter and this is Kevin Randall. We’re attorneys.”

He looks skyward briefly, as if for help. “Just what I need. All right, tell me what you’re doing here.”

“The kid hanging in the bathroom was a potential material witness in an upcoming murder trial in Findlay.”

“The one where the two college girls got sliced up?”

I nod. “The very one; we’re representing the accused. Eddie-that’s the kid in there-has been on the run, and we’ve been trying to find him. He called this morning, told me where he was, and we drove right out.”

“So rather than talk to two lawyers, he hung himself. Makes sense.”

“Sounds like you cracked the case, Detective,” I say.

“Did you read the suicide note?” he asks.

“He left a note?” I say, putting on my best shocked expression.

“Don’t bullshit me, Counselor.”

“I may have read part of it,” I admit.

“Which part?”

“The part where there was writing.”

“So if this is legit, your client walks,” he says.

“I would describe it more as a horrible injustice having been averted.”

“I bet you would,” he says.

He questions us for another half hour, but it’s clear that he sees nothing in the room or situation to make him think this is other than the suicide it seems. I’m not so sure, but I’m certainly not about to tell him that. Before we leave, I reverse the roles and get some information from him, mostly concerning what office will be the base of the investigation, and where the note will be held. That note, as Woisheski correctly noted, could well be Jeremy Davidson’s get-out-of-jail card.

On the way back I call Laurie and bring her up-to-date on what has transpired. She has, of course, not been at the scene, yet she shares my immediate suspicions of it. “Why would he call to talk to you and then kill himself before he was able to?” she asks.

“Maybe he wanted to turn himself in because of his feelings of guilt, but then those feelings became so overwhelming he couldn’t deal with them,” I say. “Or maybe he would rather be dead than in prison.”

“Maybe,” she says, not believing it. “Did the scene look legit to you?”

“Pretty much,” I say. “Though hangings are not in my area of expertise.”

She asks if I’ll give her a formal statement when I get back, and I agree, providing it’s over dinner. I am a hell of a negotiator.

Kevin and I spend the drive back kicking this around from a legal standpoint. I debate whether to inform Lester of what has happened, but decide against it. I’d rather he find out from Judge Morrison, who we plan to tell tomorrow morning. We are going to tell him about it in the form of a motion to dismiss the charges against Jeremy Davidson.

Kevin and I are still discussing our legal strategy when Laurie arrives, and she volunteers to make dinner for us. We include her in the conversation, since we trust her completely. Also, whatever strategy we decide on will soon be part of our motion and therefore no secret from anyone.

During one of our breaks I turn on CNN, only to discover that Eddie’s suicide is the lead story. A quick switch to the other news stations finds the same thing; it’s all anyone is talking about.

I have to assume that the leak came from either the state police or the local police that arrived on the scene. I’m not happy about it; I would have preferred to spring it on Lester. But it’s not all bad, since this will certainly elevate the pressure on Judge Morrison to strongly consider a dismissal of the charges against Jeremy.

There’s also another benefit to the TV coverage. The cable networks have called in what seem like hundreds of former prosecutors, former judges, and current defense attorneys to comment on the developments, in the same fashion they always called on me. Since the goal is to foster disagreement among the expert guests, at least half disagree with my position. The half that agree provide their legal reasoning for doing so, and it’s actually somewhat helpful in our preparation. The legal issues are fairly thorny ones, and in a way it’s as if we are able to consult and pick the brains of all these people. One of them, Doug Burns on Fox News, just about provides my entire oral argument for me.

Richard Davidson calls, having just heard the news but not wanting to believe it until I have confirmed it for him. I do so and honestly say that there is a chance, but only a chance, that Jeremy will be set free. Either way, I tell him, Eddie’s bad news appears to be very good news for Jeremy.

I call the court clerk first thing in the morning, asking her to inform Judge Morrison that I am requesting an urgent meeting with him and Lester. The judge is attending to personal business early this morning, but a callback tells me that I should be in his chambers at noon. The speed of the response means that it’s likely the judge has also seen the news.

Kevin and I stop at the jail so that we can bring Jeremy up-to-date on what is going on. Unfortunately, his father has spoken to him already, and based on Jeremy’s euphoria, Richard must have substantially overstated our prospects for success. I think if I were to hand him a cell phone, Jeremy would use it to try to get a date for Saturday night.

The only slight glimmer of worry that I see is when he says, “So this guy Eddie was her boyfriend?”

“Apparently so,” I say.

“And he admitted he did it? His letter says he killed Liz?”

“Yes.”

“If he lied for some reason, if he didn’t do it, what’ll happen then?” he asks.

I detect doubt in Jeremy’s voice, so I call him on it. “Do you have reason to think he lied about it?”

“I don’t know… I mean, I never met the guy. It’s just hard to imagine that anybody who knew Liz could have killed her like that.”

Jeremy’s statement moves him up a major notch in my mind and increases the pressure on me to use these recent events to get a dismissal.

When Kevin and I get to the courthouse, Lester and his staff are already there, attempting unsuccessfully to look confident and unconcerned. This case was going to make Lester a star, and there’s a decent chance that it is suddenly going to cease to exist.

Judge Morrison calls us into his chambers precisely at noon and basically turns the floor over to me. I relate in substantial detail the events that led to our finding Eddie in the motel bathroom yesterday, and I describe the note as I read it.

After I do so, I state my modest goal for this meeting. “At the very least, Your Honor, these are events which can have an enormous impact on this case. I would request that this court instruct the state police to turn over all relevant information and that a hearing then be held to consider it.”

It’s a simple request, and perfectly logical, but Lester has brought some verbal ammunition with him, and he lets fire. “Your Honor, we are dealing with an uncorroborated confession, and a hearsay one at that. This case has received substantial media coverage, and as I’m sure you are aware, confessions in such situations are frequent and notoriously unreliable.”

Morrison offers me the opportunity to respond, and I say, “That would be the main purpose of the hearing, Your Honor. We could collectively examine the events of yesterday, including the veracity of the confession.”

“It is for our jury to examine those facts, should they be ruled admissible at trial. I am sure that we will choose a jury quite capable of doing so,” Lester says.

I let my annoyance into my voice. “If Eddie Carson killed these two young women, we shouldn’t be choosing a jury. We should be setting Jeremy Davidson free, so that he can go back to college and get on with his young life.”

Judge Morrison comes down on our side, which is really the only thing he could do. He instructs Lester to deal with the state police and secure all current investigative information about Eddie’s death, including independent handwriting analysis. He tentatively schedules a hearing for next week and moves jury selection back to a time to be determined.

Jeremy Davidson won’t be going out on a date this Saturday night, but his future just got a whole lot brighter.

• • • • •

FINDLAY HAS NEVER seen anything like this. The national media have descended on the small community for today’s hearing in numbers dwarfing those here at any time before. Eddie’s suicide and confession have in a bizarre way added a cachet to the case that has made it even more appealing to those who report on the human condition.

I would imagine that the assembled reporters have mixed emotions about today’s hearing. If it goes our way, Jeremy is released and the story is over. If it goes against us, they will have to spend the winter on the frozen tundra covering the trial in long underwear.

The state police have cooperated in turning over whatever they have on the case, and we have promptly received the documents in discovery. The investigation is far from complete, but a substantial amount of work has already been done. The bottom line is that the state police have found nothing inconsistent with suicide, and their handwriting expert has no doubt that it is Eddie’s handwriting.

My goal is a simple one: It is to say that this evidence should be admissible if Jeremy goes to trial, and that its very admissibility should preclude Jeremy from having to go to trial at all.

The gallery is packed as Judge Morrison takes his seat at the bench. Both Lester and I have submitted briefs in support of our respective positions, but if the judge has not already formed an opinion, then it is the oral arguments that will sway him.

My only witness at the hearing is Detective Woisheski, and I take him through the entire investigation into Eddie’s apparent suicide. He is an excellent, experienced witness; his answers are concise and exactly on point. My questions merely provide the road map; he’s driving the car.

There is little that Lester can do with him on cross-examination, other than to repeatedly make the point that the investigation is not concluded and that it is certainly possible that information might still turn up that could lead Woisheski to believe that Eddie was murdered.

Lester then calls Laurie to the stand, in order that she can report on the Findlay side of the “Eddie investigation.” His hope is that she will be able to learn that Eddie could not have committed the murders of Liz and Sheryl and that therefore his confession in the note was either fabricated or coerced.

Lester knows that Laurie is not about to do that at this point, and she does not. But she does at least slightly bolster Lester by saying that she has uncovered no independent evidence of Eddie’s involvement in the murders. I cross-examine her briefly, only to get the alternative truth that she has not found anything to exonerate him either.

Once Laurie leaves the stand, the main event begins: the oral arguments. Judge Morrison decides to address the admissibility question first, and Lester states his position that the only reason Eddie’s death has any bearing on our case at all is the note. And the note, continues Lester, is hearsay and therefore not admissible. Should Judge Morrison issue such a ruling, reasons Lester, then our case is unaffected. Our jury could not be influenced by a note that they are never permitted to see.

“Your Honor,” I say, “the prosecution knows full well that the note represents a ‘dying declaration’ and is an exception to the hearsay rule.” The law makes this exception in the belief that a person about to die is likely to be truthful, as well as the obvious fact that since the person is dead at the time of trial, hearsay is the only way his views can be introduced.

Lester interrupts with the expected counterargument that a dying declaration, under Wisconsin law, is only an exception to the hearsay rule to show how the declarant died. For example, a person who is in the process of dying from a gunshot can identify the shooter, and that statement would be admissible. But that’s all.

I rebut, “I can only assume the prosecutor is not familiar with the law, Your Honor. He should know that the statement is in fact admissible, since it is a ‘statement against interest.’ Were Mr. Carson to have been unsuccessful in his suicide attempt, the statement that the note represents could have exposed him to a criminal prosecution and is therefore legally considered against his interest.”

My belief is that the only area in which the law is ambiguous and not totally favoring our position is the question of whether the dying declaration can be in writing, and not spoken. There is insufficient case law on this, and it will be up to Judge Morrison to decide.

We go on to my basic premise, which is that the facts behind Eddie’s demise create so much reasonable doubt about Jeremy’s guilt that had it been known two months ago, Jeremy would not have even been arrested, no less brought to trial.

“There may have been probable cause at the time of the indictment,” I argue, “but it effectively has ceased to exist. And based on Detective Woisheski’s testimony, it is reasonable to believe that Eddie Carson made this confession of his own free will. How, then, could a jury find Jeremy Davidson guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the same murders that Eddie Carson credibly confessed to?”

Lester responds by repeating his argument that bogus confessions are very common in high-profile murder cases and that if the actual defendant were released every time someone else confessed to the same crime, no one would ever get convicted. It’s a decent point; I just have to hope Judge Morrison doesn’t feel it carries the day.

Judge Morrison promises to rule quickly on the matter and adjourns the hearing. Before the guards take Jeremy away, he asks me how I think it will turn out, and I tell him truthfully that I just can’t predict.

As a defense attorney I’m single-minded of purpose: I want to get my client off. As a thinking human being I’m troubled by what I see.

Basically, I don’t believe that Eddie committed suicide; nor did he kill Liz Barlow and Sheryl Hendricks. He ran away the first time we came for him, and that is not the act of a person who has lost his desire to live. Additionally, he told me on the phone that he ran because he was afraid I was sent by Drummond. If this were as straightforward as the suicide note makes it seem, why would Eddie fear Drummond?

Add to this the fact that Janet Carlson was convinced Calvin’s neck was broken by a powerful man. I simply cannot see Eddie fitting that description, nor can I imagine him luring Calvin to his death. Eddie strikes me as a guy who had information, information that he realized it was dangerous to have. He may even have tried to convey that information to Calvin, then watched as Calvin was himself killed.

If I’m right, then Eddie took off and ran, until he was tired of running and saw contacting me as a possible way out. But one of the problems with this scenario is why he didn’t contact the police instead.

And hovering over all this is a strong feeling of guilt that I have over Eddie’s death. I believe that had I not been searching for him, he would not have been killed. I can’t prove it; I just think it, and it bugs the hell out of me.

I consent to three evening interviews on the various cable news networks. They are all done from the house, and I do them in case Judge Morrison rules against us. Should he rule for us, Jeremy will be free and there will be no need to sway public opinion. But if Jeremy faces trial, I want the public, including our future jurors, to know how significant I consider Eddie’s confession to be.

I wake up in the morning to two pieces of good news. First, the court clerk calls to say that Judge Morrison will issue his ruling from the bench tomorrow morning. This is amazingly fast compared to larger jurisdictions, but it fits in with what I have come to expect in this case.

Even better, Laurie calls to tell me that she has today off, and asks if I’d like to go for a drive out to the lake. It’s the perfect solution for a day in which I would otherwise do nothing but obsess about the case. And if we actually walk outside near a lake in this weather, I’ll freeze to death and be able to forget about the case permanently.

Laurie asks that I drive, and she sits in the passenger seat. Even though it seems that Wisconsin has more lakes than people, the one we are driving to turns out to be about two hours away. This is fine with me; I’m feeling so comfortable we could be driving to Anchorage for all I care. Besides, it’s got to be warmer there.

Fortunately, the only time we spend outside is walking from the car to the restaurant we arrive at for lunch. We are brought to our table along the glass wall at the far end of the restaurant. We are overlooking Lake Netcong, which is as beautiful a place as any I have ever seen. The air is so clear that it feels like I’m wearing magnifying lenses on my eyes.

“This place is amazing,” I say.

She nods. “I know. I used to come here when I was a kid. The lake hasn’t changed at all.”

“Was this restaurant here?”

“No… there was just a small stand, sold hot dogs and hamburgers. My father would take me here for picnics and rent a boat for the day so we could sail. It feels like it was yesterday, but it was a hundred years ago.”

If I was harboring any hope that Laurie was longing to come back to Paterson with me, the look on her face is blowing that out of the frozen water. “I can see how much you love it here,” I say.

“I do, but that’s not how I would describe it. It’s more like I’m connected here. It feels like where I’m supposed to be.”

“Haven’t we had this conversation before?” It’s sounding to me like the talks we had leading up to Laurie leaving me, and I don’t relish having another one.

She nods. “I’m sorry, but I’m not handling this well,” she says.

“Handling what well?”

“I’m also connected to you, Andy. I love you and I’m connected to you. But you love your home and you are connected there. So I don’t see a solution that gives me what I want.” She points to the lake. “This and you.”

“Laurie, Findlay is a nice place to live. The people are great, there’s cable TV, and I find I can go outside for ten or fifteen seconds without getting frostbite. But I can’t stay here forever.”

“I know.” Then, “Did you ever think about having a child?”

“I am a child.”

She laughs, but tells me she’s serious. “Do you ever think about it?” she asks again.

“Sometimes, but I always get scared by that Harry Chapin song.”

“You’re not going to song-talk again, are you?” she asks.

“No, there’s a song called ‘Cat’s in the Cradle.’ ” She nods that she knows the song, but I continue. “It’s all about this guy who can never find the time to be with his son, and then the son grows up and can’t find the time to be with him.”

“And you worry that you’ll be like that?”

I nod. “I do.”

“I think you’d be a great father,” she says.

“I have my doubts,” I say.

“I’m not asking you to father my child, Andy.”

“Good.”

She’s quiet for a few moments, and I feel like I’m cowering in a foxhole, waiting for the next bomb to drop.

“Judge Morrison is going to rule in your favor tomorrow, and then you’re going to leave.”

“I’m not so sure. He could go either way on it.”

“I still don’t believe Eddie murdered those girls,” she says.

I’m feeling relief and less tension now that we have seemed to change the subject. It might be a sad commentary on me that I’m more comfortable talking about vicious murders than an intimate relationship. “I don’t either,” I say. “But among the many things that trouble me, one in particular stands out.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, let’s assume Eddie was murdered because of what he knew, probably who the real killer was. Then it makes perfect sense that the killer would get rid of Eddie.”

She nods. “Right.”

“But why force Eddie to write the note confessing to the murders? The real killer wouldn’t need that for protection; the murders were already blamed on Jeremy. So why would he bother to connect Eddie to the original murders? Why wouldn’t he just bury Eddie’s body somewhere and let Jeremy continue to take the fall?”

She thinks for a while and then says, “Because if Jeremy goes to trial, you will still be investigating the murders, trying to find the real killer. If everyone believes Eddie did it, you go home and the book is closed.”

“You’re a smart cop, you know?” I ask.

“Aw, shucks,” she says. “I love it when you compliment me.”

“I’m glad,” I say.

“And aren’t you also glad I changed the subject?” she asks.

“You have no idea,” I say.

• • • • •

RICHARD DAVIDSON is standing outside my house at seven-thirty in the morning when I take Tara out for our walk. It’s probably ten degrees out, and I don’t know how long he’s been standing here, but he looks like a Popsicle.

“I’m just real nervous,” he says, “but I didn’t want to wake you.”

“You want to go in and get de-iced?” I ask. “Or you want to walk with us?”

“I’ll walk, if that’s okay.”

“Fine.”

We walk around the block twice, which gives Richard time to ask me a hundred and fifty times if I think Judge Morrison will let Jeremy go free without trial. I give him my standard “It’s hard to tell” five or six times, but then start shrugging, since I’m afraid my tongue might freeze if my mouth is open too much.

The pressure he is feeling is not unlike waiting for a verdict. It should be easier, since even if this goes against his son, they’ve still got the trial, but that is offset by the fact that Richard has no experience with these kinds of things.

I invite him to have coffee with Kevin and me before court starts, and he leaps at the opportunity. He feels that he can get some special insight into what might happen by being with us.

As I’m getting dressed, the phone rings, and the woman calling identifies herself as Catherine Gerard. She tells me that she has seen the coverage of the hearing and that it’s important that she talk to me.

“What about?” I ask.

“Center City… that religion.”

I’m running late and wishing she would get to the point. “Can you be more specific than that?”

“My husband was a Centurion,” she says. “He left to marry me.”

The name hits me… Gerard. “He wrote those articles,” I say.

“Yes, that’s right. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

I tell her that I would like to talk to her very much, though in truth I’ll have no need to if Judge Morrison rules in our favor. I take her number and tell her I’ll be calling her back later to set up a meeting. “Is your husband willing to talk about this as well?” I ask.

“My husband is dead,” she says. “They killed him.”

“Who did?”

“The Centurions.”

My curiosity is through the roof on this, but I have to leave. I promise her that I will be in touch, and I finish getting dressed. I meet Richard and Kevin at the diner just as Kevin is saying, “I don’t know… it’s really impossible to predict these things,” when I arrive. Going by the look on his face, I doubt it’s the first time he’s had to say it.

I haven’t had the time to think about what Laurie had to say yesterday, but right now it hits me that if Judge Morrison rules the way I am hoping, Tara and I will be out of here by tomorrow. If I am, I hope I never see another bratwurst again; the diner has reacted to the media frenzy by renaming their bratwurst sandwiches after news celebrities. Their special for today is the “Brat Lauer.”

The street in front of the courthouse is the closest that Findlay can come to a mob scene. Media trucks dominate the landscape, and the townspeople are hovering in the hope that they will be admitted into the court. I see Laurie and her officers taking charge, making sure that order is maintained. It’s a scene that seems completely incongruous in this town.

We have to fight through a crowd to make it into the courthouse, and we’re brought into an anteroom to meet briefly with Jeremy. He seems so nervous that I’m actually concerned he is going to faint.

The entire scene feels weird to me; there is all the tension of an upcoming verdict without having had the trial. It is as if opposing football captains went out for the pregame coin toss to learn who has won the game.

Within moments the gallery is packed, and I see that Laurie has taken a position along the side wall of the room. She and I make eye contact, and I believe we are thinking the same thing: that in a few moments Judge Morrison will be the one deciding how long we are together.

The bailiff announces the judge’s arrival on the bench, and the hearing begins. It will be an unusual one for me in that I will not be called on to speak. Judge Morrison will just read his decision, and that will be that.

Unfortunately, Judge Morrison decides to do more than just read his decision. He suddenly seems to relish being in the media spotlight, and he makes a long, rambling speech about the effect of this case on the community, and the need for people to come together when it is over.

“And now to the matter at hand,” says the judge before citing the voluminous case law that he studied to help him reach his decision. I glance at my watch to confirm that he has spoken for twenty minutes without giving so much as a hint which way he will rule.

I actually start to lose concentration for a moment and steal a look around the courtroom to see if I can spot Laurie again. It is a change in the judge’s tone that causes me to once again pay attention. “… this court does not have the benefit of a final determination of the investigation into the death of Edmond Carson. Yet in the interests of justice, both for this defendant and this community, further delay is unacceptable.”

I sit up slightly; here it comes…

“It seems clear to this court that the facts as they are currently known would make it a miscarriage of justice for a jury to render a verdict of ‘guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.’ Therefore, until and unless these facts change, no jury should be called upon to consider doing so. I hereby dismiss the murder charges against Jeremy Davidson, without prejudice.”

The room explodes, and in the moment Jeremy looks at me, hoping that I will confirm that it means what he thinks it means. I smile the confirmation, and he puts his head in his hands and starts to sob his happiness. Richard and Allie Davidson move up from their seats in the front row and hug their son, then me, and then Kevin.

Judge Morrison’s ruling was an obvious victory for our side, but not necessarily a permanent one. The phrase “without prejudice” means that the charges against Jeremy could be brought again at some future time, should the facts change. Because the trial against Jeremy had not actually started, jeopardy did not attach, so double jeopardy cannot come into play.

I start to move toward the exit doors when I see that Laurie has made her way over to me. “Will you stay until tomorrow? Maybe we can have dinner tonight?”

“Sure,” I say. “I’d like that.”

“Congratulations on the ruling.”

“Thanks.”

Laurie leaves to attend to her business, and I head back to the house with Kevin. Marcus comes over to confirm that I’ll no longer be needing his services.

“Unhh,” he says. Saying good-bye to Marcus is always a poignant event; right now I don’t think there’s a dry eye in the room.

Marcus starts walking toward the door but stops and turns to me. “Kid didn’t hang himself.”

I nod. “I know. I think this time both the good guys and the bad guys go free.”

“Unhh,” says Marcus, and leaves.

I sit down on the couch, apparently looking unhappy, because Kevin says, “You down about the case or leaving Laurie?”

“I’m not down. I’m one happy camper,” I say.

“Yeah… right.” He tells me that he’s on an evening flight back home and that this has been a positive experience for him. Even more positive is that Carol has left a message on his answering machine at home, saying that she wants to “talk.” It’s nothing definite, but I think that Kevin harbors the hope that before long he can get back on WebMD and start planning that honeymoon.

Kevin goes off to pack, and I get a phone call from Richard Davidson, once again thanking me for saving his son and asking me to send him a bill for my services. I tell him I’ll get around to it, but not to mortgage the farm.

I have a genetic resistance to packing until moments before I am about to leave for somewhere, so instead I use my monthly ten-minute allowance for introspection to think about why I’m down. It’s not about the case; I’m delighted that Jeremy is free, and although I believe the real murderer is still out there, that can’t be my concern. Guilty people get away with things all the time; my job is to make sure that innocent people don’t get put away in their stead.

I’m also not about to miss Findlay. It hasn’t been an unpleasant stay, and it really is a nice town, but I can take just so much fresh air and wholesomeness. I feel more at home in a place where crime and grime are far more prevalent.

That leaves Laurie, and leaving Laurie is without doubt the reason I’m depressed. She put it very well at lunch the other day, and her words apply to me as well as her. We love each other, but there is no way we can live in the same place.

Laurie comes over at five o’clock with three bags full of groceries. She vows to make me a dinner I will never forget, but she knows better. Food has never been that important to me; give me a burger and fries and I’m happy.

Laurie makes some fantastic fried chicken and mashed potatoes, and we spend a quiet evening together, capped off by a far-from-quiet time in the bedroom. But as wonderful as this all could be under different circumstances, it suffers from a general sadness that we both feel. We are splitting up again, and this time likely for good. It would be unrealistic to expect Findlay to have more brutal murders resulting in wrongly charged defendants to lure me back.

When Laurie left last time, I at least had anger to fall back on; now I don’t even have that. All I feel is the impending loss, and there’s no conflicting emotion to deflect the pain. She warned me this could happen, and she let me call the shots, but here I am.

We wake up in the morning, and Laurie asks if I’ll come down to her office with her. Now that Jeremy has been freed, it is incumbent on her to restart a full investigation into the deaths of Liz and Sheryl. It’s likely that the investigation will be forced to conclude that Eddie was the killer, but she has to go through the process anyway. As the person who discovered Eddie’s body, I’m a witness who has to be interviewed.

“Can’t you interview me here?” I ask. “Or do you have to put me under hot lights and sweat it out of me?”

She smiles. “I wouldn’t have to pressure you… you’d cave quickly enough. But I do need to record it.”

I agree to meet her there at ten-thirty, giving me plenty of time to take Tara for one last walk around Findlay. I run a little late, so I bring Tara with me to the police station. The sergeant at the desk doesn’t look terribly kindly at that.

“You can tie her up outside while you meet with Chief Collins,” he says.

“Are you familiar with the phrase ‘no way, no how’?” I ask. “Please call Chief Collins and tell her that Andy Carpenter and his trusted companion are here to see her.”

The sergeant does that, though he substitutes the word “dog” for “trusted companion.” Laurie comes out and smiles when she sees Tara, telling the sergeant that they can bend the “no canines” rule just this one time.

Laurie brings us into the interview room, and I sit down. She closes the door behind her.

“You’re going to do this alone?” I ask.

She smiles. “I believe I can handle the likes of you on my own.”

She starts the recorder, gives the time and date, and then asks me to identify myself. Once I do so, she launches right into questions surrounding my involvement with Eddie and my presence in his motel room on the day he died.

I take her through my actions, leading up to the day he ran away from me at the Parker Motel. I don’t include everything, since some insignificant details are subject to lawyer-client privilege, but I so inform her when I leave something out.

“So when you arrived at the Parker, what did you do?” she asks.

“Kevin and I went into the office and convinced the clerk to give us his room number. Then we went outside, up to the second floor, and around to his room. The door was open, and he was nowhere to be found. Some of his possessions were still there, as if he had left in a hurry.”

“When did you hear from him next?” she asks.

“The next day. He called me and…” My mouth is searching for the words to finish the sentence, but my brain has intercepted them on the way and is in a state of shock.

Laurie prompts me. “He called you and…”

“Turn off the recorder,” I say.

“What? Andy…”

“Turn it off, please.”

She does so, probably because my tone of voice has changed so much. “What is it?” she asks.

“Laurie, when Eddie called me that day, he told me that he had run away from the Parker because he thought it might be Drummond that was chasing him. He said he hadn’t known it was me.”

“So?”

“So how did he find out it was me? I didn’t leave a card in his room… I didn’t give my name to the clerk. It wasn’t on television or in the newspaper. Yet by the next day he had found out that it was me at the Parker. Someone had to have told him.”

“Who did you tell?” she asks.

“You,” I say.

“No one else?”

“No. Kevin knew, of course, because he was there, but that’s it.”

I can see her mind racing to answer the next question even before I ask it. “Who did you tell?” I ask.

“Some of my officers,” she says, “but I’d vouch for them completely.” She pauses as the realization hits her. “Damn.”

“What is it?”

“I told Liz Barlow’s mother. You said I should confront her with it.”

“Was Drummond or anyone else there?”

She shakes her head. “No, I wouldn’t allow it. Wait a minute, her daughter was there. She heard the whole thing. I forget her name…”

Madeline.

Bingo.

• • • • •

EDDIE CARSON DIED because of me. There can be no doubt about that now. I got Cindy Spodek to help find him, and then I set him up to be murdered. It doesn’t matter that I didn’t do it intentionally; what matters is that I did it.

I can’t be sure that it was Madeline Barlow who told him I was the one looking for him. It could have been her mother, though that seems to defy logic. Or he could have found out some other way that is not yet apparent to me.

Also unknown right now is how whoever murdered him learned his new location. “Maybe they followed you,” Laurie suggests.

I shake my head. “No, Marcus followed us out there. If there were someone else following us, Marcus would have seen them. Besides, Eddie had been dead for a while when we got there.”

“I’ll check to make sure your phone isn’t tapped,” Laurie says, and then makes a quick phone call to get that accomplished.

“I’ve got a feeling it was Madeline,” I say. “There was something about that kid. She was the only one in that town who seemed like she had a mind of her own.”

“She could have set Eddie up to be killed,” Laurie says, “without necessarily realizing she was doing it.”

The idea that I was a setup man for Eddie’s murder is burning a hole in my stomach, and Laurie can see it in my face. “It’s not your fault, Andy,” she says. “Let it go.”

“Let it go? Let it go?” She must know me well enough to know that is impossible. “Earth to Laurie, come in, please. Come in, please.”

She tries to suppress a smile but can’t. “What’s so funny?” I ask.

“You’re thinking of staying to try to solve this.”

“I’m doing more than thinking about it,” I admit, realizing it for the first time myself.

“Sorry. I love having you around, but I’m the police here, Andy. This is my job. Besides, you don’t catch slimeballs, you defend them. Remember?”

“I won’t get in your way.”

“All right,” she says, “let me try another approach. You’d be going after people who may well have killed four people that we know of, including a lawyer.”

“I’m not going to subdue them, Laurie. I’m going to find out who they are and then turn them over to the proper authority. And if you play your cards right, that proper authority might be you.”

She’s not willing to accept this. “You’re a lawyer, Andy. With no case, no client, and no role to play in this.”

“I’m staying, Laurie.”

She smiles. “Good. So how about dinner tonight?”

“You got it. Now you can turn on the recorder.”

“After you tell me you’re going to get Marcus back here.”

I shake my head. “No, I don’t need a babysitter… at least not now.” I can see that she’s not thrilled with my answer, so I continue. “I’m not going to do anything stupid or dangerous… honestly. Besides, with the trial canceled, the bad guys would have no reason to think of me as a threat anymore.”

She frowns but turns on the recorder, and we continue the interview. I tell her the events as they happened, but my mind is elsewhere, trying to figure out how to trap what is rapidly becoming a mass murderer.

Reestablishing myself in Findlay is not a difficult matter. Basically, all I have to do is tell the real estate agent I’ll be taking the place for at least another month, and dump the stuff in my suitcases back into drawers. Tara seems understanding as well, especially since I give her two biscuits to soften the blow.

I feel fairly confident that the people I’m after are in Center City; what is disconcerting is how little I know about the place. To that end I call Catherine Gerard, the woman who contacted me before the hearing. She dropped the bomb that the Centurions killed her husband, a charge that carries some weight with me in light of the recent carnage.

She answers the phone in the middle of the first ring, as if she has been waiting by the phone for my call. She is very anxious to meet with me, as I am with her. Currently, she is living in Winston, about a four-hour drive from Findlay, and expresses a nervousness about coming back to this area because of its proximity to Center City.

Winston is out in the direction of the lake where Laurie and I had lunch, so I suggest we meet at the same restaurant. It has the double advantage of being midway between Findlay and Winston and having fantastic french fries. We agree to meet tomorrow.

The tech guy that Laurie sends to my house to see if the phones are tapped, or if bugs have been placed, turns up nothing. The information about Eddie did not come from me, increasing the likelihood that it was Madeline or Mrs. Barlow. I’m still betting it’s Madeline.

The obvious difficulty is how to talk to Madeline without Drummond, Wallace, and the rest of Center City finding out and either preventing or monitoring our conversation. The trick is in luring her out of that town and away from their oversight.

I come up with an idea to do just that, a plan that would require the help of Jeremy Davidson. I had planned to speak with him and his parents anyway, partially to explain an ethical dilemma that I have. Simply put, the purpose of my continuing investigation is to prove that the real killer of Liz Barlow and Sheryl Hendricks was not Eddie Carson and that his suicide note was coerced. Since that note is what prompted the dismissal of the charges against Jeremy, there is a risk that my success in this investigation could expose him to renewed jeopardy.

I call Jeremy and ask if he and his parents are available to meet with me. They are surprised that I haven’t left town already, and Jeremy himself was just leaving to go back to school. Allie is not home, but Richard and Jeremy agree to wait for me, and I head right over there.

I start off by taking them through the ethical dilemma I’m facing over possibly exposing Jeremy to renewed jeopardy. I can see the concern and confusion on their faces as I do so.

“So what would have to happen for the police to come after Jeremy again?” Richard asks.

“Two things,” I say. “One, I would have to prove that the note was faked and that Eddie did not murder Liz and Sheryl. Two, even though I could prove that Eddie was murdered and the note coerced, I could not show who did it.”

“But Jeremy couldn’t have murdered Eddie. He was in jail,” Richard correctly points out.

I nod. “But someone could have done it on his behalf.”

Richard is obviously troubled by this situation, as any father would be. “Let’s say all this happened… would you be allowed to go to the police? Isn’t your first obligation to Jeremy, your client?”

“Generally, but in this case it’s a gray area. I would be telling the police what I learned about Eddie’s death, without mentioning or referring to Jeremy. But it could have an indirect effect on Jeremy if the prosecution and police then turn their attention back to him.”

“Andy, I know your intentions are good here, but it makes me a little uncomfortable,” Richard says.

Jeremy, who hasn’t spoken up yet, responds, “No, I’m okay with it. Please do what you have to do.”

“Jeremy… ,” Richard says.

“Dad, if Eddie didn’t kill Liz and Sheryl, then whoever did shouldn’t be walking around. He should be strapped to a goddamn table getting a needle in his arm.”

I can tell that Richard is as surprised as I am by the intensity of Jeremy’s remarks. Richard relents, and after I once again make sure that Jeremy understands the complexities of the situation, I tell him I need his help in getting to Madeline Barlow.

“I hardly know her,” he says. “I only met her that one time when she came to see Liz at school.”

“Did she meet any of Liz’s friends?” I ask.

“Definitely. She hung out with them for a whole weekend. I was studying for a midterm I had that Monday, but Liz said she had a great time. She kept wanting to come back, but her mother wouldn’t let her.”

I describe my plan, which is to have Jeremy recruit a couple of Liz’s friends to call Madeline and ask her if she wants to come to the school to pick up some of Liz’s things, things that had been in the possession of those friends. It could be CDs or makeup or anything that might be appealing to Madeline to retrieve. They should also dangle in front of Madeline the prospect of hanging out and perhaps going to a party. When Madeline arrives, I’ll be there waiting to talk to her.

Once again it is Richard who is leery and protective of his son, and once again it is Jeremy who steps up and embraces the idea. He tells me that as soon as he gets back to school, he will speak to two of Liz’s friends, and he’s confident they’ll jump at the opportunity to help in any way they can.

I leave them, satisfied that I have a plan of attack, but all too aware that attacking is not my strong point. I’m a lawyer; my version of aggressive confrontation is to file nasty motions.

This promises to get even rougher than that.

• • • • •

HENRY WAS KILLED four and a half years ago. About a year after he left Center City and about six months after the articles appeared.”

Catherine Gerard is wasting no time in getting to the point; we haven’t even looked at our menus yet. “How was he killed?” I ask.

“A hunting accident. At least the police ruled it an accident, but it wasn’t. They killed him.”

“They being the Centurions?”

She nods. “Yes.”

“Why would they kill him? Because of the articles?”

She nods again. “He exposed the secrets of their religion. No one had ever done that before, and they wanted to make sure that no one did it again.”

“Why did he leave Center City in the first place?”

“Because of me,” she says. “He was an accountant, and so am I. We met at a conference; they send some of their people out into the world to learn specialties. Mostly professional people. Henry and I hit it off right away; he didn’t tell me until later that he was married.”

It’s clear to me that this is a woman here to tell a story and that probing questions by me are not necessary, at least not at this point. So I just nod and let her continue.

“He told me that it was an ‘arranged’ marriage and that he never loved her. He said he was planning to divorce his wife even before we met, but that I made him realize he had to do it right away.”

The idea of an arranged marriage is completely consistent with what I already know about the Centurions, but divorce certainly is not. “But you would not have been welcome there,” I say.

“That’s for sure, but it was his wanting a divorce that made him leave. He asked the creep they call the Keeper for permission, but there was no chance. So he left, and as far as I know, he’s the only one ever to do so.”

“Why is that?” I ask. “What keeps people there?”

Her grin reflects the irony of what she is about to say. “Faith. They really believe in that wheel and in the Keeper. Hell, even Henry believed it. He never really forgave himself for leaving.”

“Tell me about the wheel.”

“Well,” she says, “I’ve never seen it, so I can only go by what Henry told me. It’s like this huge carnival wheel, the kind you try and guess what it will land on when you spin it. And it’s got all kinds of strange symbols on it that supposedly only the Keeper can read.”

“And that’s how everything is decided?”

“That’s right. There’s some kind of ceremony that each person goes through when they’re six years old. That’s when the wheel tells them what their occupation will be, who they will marry, where they will live, everything.”

She continues describing what she knows about the town and its religion, and her bitterness comes through loud and clear. “So why did Henry write those articles?”

“I suggested it; I thought it might help him deal with his guilt by getting things out in the open.” She can see me react in surprise, and she nods. “Yes, he felt guilty every day of his life for leaving, and the articles only made it worse.”

“What makes them listen to the wheel, no matter what it says?” I ask. I already know the answer, I just want her to confirm it for me.

She does. “They’re not listening to the wheel, and they’re not listening to the Keeper. Those people have no doubt they are listening to God.”

The rest of our time at lunch is more of the same, with her remembering other stories that her husband told her about life in Center City. She keeps going back to his hunting accident, and how positive she is that the Centurions murdered Henry to keep him quiet. It makes little sense to me that they would kill him after he had told all in the articles, but I don’t feel like I should point that out.

As we’re ready to leave, she says, “The ironic thing is that the articles had pretty much no effect. People read about the Centurions, and if they gave it a second thought, they just dismissed it as a kook writing about other kooks. It changed nothing.”

Catherine Gerard wants this lunch to do what her husband and those articles did not do. She wants it to change life in Center City and to make the leaders there suffer like Henry suffered.

I’m afraid she might well be in for another disappointment.

I spend the drive back being surprised by my reaction to what Catherine had to say. In the Centurions she painted a picture of a group of people who are eccentrics at best and intolerant lunatics at worst. Yet there is a certain logic to their life.

We are a country that reveres faith, and to be a person of faith is to occupy a position of respect. The Centurions are people who take ordinary, run-of-the-mill faith and quadruple it. They turn their lives over to it.

Yet who’s to say they are wrong? I certainly think they are, but what the hell do I know? They believe what they believe; and the fact that the world may disagree with them has little significance. Don’t most religious people who have a particular faith believe that believers of other faiths are wrong? For example, can Christians and Buddhists both have it one hundred percent right?

Over dinner with Laurie I relate my conversation with Catherine Gerard. Laurie is less interested in the religious aspect of it than I am; she dismisses them as misguided wackos. What she focuses on is the wheel and the fact that these people can completely give up their freedom of choice to it.

I assume my normal role, that of devil’s advocate. “Are they really giving up their freedom of choice if that’s what they choose to do?”

“What do you mean?” she asks.

“I mean that, as stupid as it may sound to us, they believe in this wheel. They think that God talks to them through it. So because of that belief, they choose to follow it.”

She’s not buying it. “No, they’re brainwashed from birth into following it. You think it’s a coincidence that everybody born in that town just happens to believe in the wheel? It’s pounded into their heads from the day they’re born.”

“Of course,” I say, “but isn’t that true everywhere? Don’t all parents naturally instill their belief system in their offspring?”

“Not to that degree,” she says. “And what kind of life is that? Everything is dictated to you. Can you imagine how horrible it would be to learn who you’re going to marry, how you’re going to earn a living, at six years old?”

“It certainly wouldn’t be my first choice, I’ll tell you that.”

“It would be stifling,” she says.

I shake my head. “For you and me, but apparently not for them. Name a tough decision you’ve had to make, one you’ve agonized over.”

She answers immediately. “Whether or not to leave you and return to Findlay. It was torture, but it was a decision that I knew I had to make myself, and I finally made it.”

“Okay, but what if you had turned it over to someone else and gave that someone full power to tell you what to do? The torture is gone, isn’t it?”

She shakes her head adamantly. “Absolutely not; it would be replaced by a different kind of torture. I would feel helpless… childlike.”

“But if you believed, if in your heart you knew, that it was God making the decision? Wouldn’t that be incredibly freeing, if you could talk to God and let him tell you what is right?”

“No one can do that. Not like that,” she says. “And certainly not the Centurions.”

“It doesn’t matter if they can. It matters if they believe they can. That’s why they’ll do whatever the wheel tells them to do.”

“Including murder?” she asks.

I smile my holiest smile. “That, my child, is still to be determined.”

• • • • •

AS PATHETIC AS it sounds, this is my first time in a girl’s dorm room. It’s not for lack of trying… back in college there’s no place I would have rather been. It was off-limits back then, even if a girl wanted to invite you in, or at least that’s what the girls told me. Which is just as well, since none of them ever expressed anguish that they were so constrained.

It only took Jeremy one day to set this up. According to him, Madeline jumped at the opportunity to come here and get Liz’s things when one of Liz’s friends made the phone call. Even better, she said that her mother was going to be working, so she would never realize that Madeline was gone.

Liz’s friend Emily checked me in at the downstairs desk as her father. She’s twenty and I’m thirty-seven, so it’s slightly annoying to me that the person at the desk had no trouble believing the relationship. She’s left me alone in her room as we wait for Madeline to show, and I’m sitting on the bed feeling like a pervert, Peeping Tom, dirty old man, or something.

I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to say to Madeline. I’ll probably act as if I know she’s the one who was in contact with Eddie, even though I don’t. I hope she’s a typically transparent seventeen-year-old and that I’ll therefore know from her reaction whether I’m right or wrong.

Madeline said she would be here by one o’clock, and at ten of one I hear people coming down the hall. The doorknob turns, and I move slightly to the side so that I won’t be in her line of sight when she enters.

The door opens, and Emily says, “Come on in. There’s somebody I want you to see.” Madeline walks into the room and Emily backs out, closing the door behind her and leaving Madeline alone with me.

Madeline sees me, and her reactions are astonishing and completely easy to read. First there is a look of surprise, then one of recognition, and finally, a pain like I haven’t seen in a very long time. I don’t say a word as she starts to sob, sinking to her knees in the process.

I walk over and place my hand on her shoulder as she continues to cry. Finally, it starts to slow down, and she gets up and goes over to the bed. She sits down on it, puts her head in her hands, and gets the remaining sobs out of her system.

“They killed him,” are the first words out of her mouth. “They killed Eddie. Just like they killed Liz and Sheryl.”

This starts her crying again, so I wait the minute or so that this lasts before responding. “I need you to tell me all about it, Madeline.”

She nods her understanding but composes herself a little more before speaking again. “I wanted to call you, to talk to you… but I was scared. I am so scared.”

“It’s okay… I understand. I would be scared in your position as well. But we’ll make sure you’re completely protected. Nothing will happen to you.”

She nods again. “I don’t know that much,” she says.

“Why don’t you just tell me what you do know?”

Another nod. “The night Liz died, she was really afraid of something. She was with Sheryl and Eddie, and I never saw them like that. They were like frightened out of their minds.”

“What scared them so much?” I ask.

“I’m not sure… they wouldn’t tell me. They said it was better if I didn’t know.”

“Was this before or after Liz went to see Jeremy at the bar?” I ask.

“Before. She went there to tell him she wasn’t going to see him anymore. She was running away with Sheryl and Eddie. Sheryl went with her, and Eddie stayed behind to get some things together.”

That explains why Liz and Sheryl were killed and Eddie ran away. His staying behind to get some things saved his life, at least for a couple of months, until I set him up to be killed.

“Were you in touch with Eddie after he ran away?” I ask.

“Yes. He called me a few times. The last time he asked me to send him some money.”

“So he told you where he was,” I say.

She nods. “But I didn’t have the money; I was trying to get it. Then that police lady told my mom you had been looking for Eddie, so when he called back, I told him that. I said he should call you… that you could help.”

“Why didn’t he just call the police?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know.”

It’s possible that Eddie was distrustful of the police because Stephen Drummond represented authority to him. Maybe he thought that contacting the police was the same as contacting Drummond. He told me that he had run that day because he thought I might have been sent by Drummond. Whatever was scaring him, Drummond was behind it.

“You’ve got to think, Madeline. What could have scared Liz and Sheryl and Eddie like that? Maybe they said something, some little thing, thinking you wouldn’t understand.”

She thinks for a moment. “All I know is it had something to do with Sheryl’s boyfriend.”

I was so focused on finding Eddie, Liz’s boyfriend, that I spent almost no time thinking about Sheryl, and whether she might have had one as well. Yet Catherine Gerard told me that boys and girls are matched up at six years old. There’s no reason to think Sheryl would have been an exception.

“What about him?” I asked. “Was it something he did? Something he said?” I’m probing for information that she unfortunately does not seem to have.

“I just don’t know… I’m sorry,” she says, getting upset at her inability to give me what I want. “They wouldn’t tell me.”

“Do you know her boyfriend’s name?” I ask.

She nods. “Alan.”

“Do you know his last name?”

She nods again. “Drummond.”

Alan Drummond.

Son of Stephen.

When Eddie told me he was afraid that Drummond was coming for him, he wasn’t talking about the father; he was talking about the son.

“Is it possible that Eddie was afraid of Alan?” I ask.

She says it simply, almost matter-of-factly, but it sends a chill through me. “Everybody’s afraid of Alan.”

I continue to question Madeline, but she has little else to offer in the way of information. Finally, she tells me that she should be going so she can get back before her mother returns home.

“If you’re worried, afraid for your safety, I can get you taken into protective custody. That way no one can get near you.”

“You’re not going to tell anyone we talked, are you?” she asks.

“Only Laurie Collins. She’s the chief of police in Findlay, and she won’t repeat it. I trust her with my life.”

Madeline thinks for a moment, perhaps cognizant that it’s not my life we’re trusting Laurie with… it’s her own. Finally, she says, “Okay. How can I reach you if I hear anything important?”

“I don’t want you to. I’ll take it from here.”

“But I want to help if I can,” she says. This seventeen-year-old girl is easily the bravest person in this room.

I write my phone number out for her. “Call me any time of the day or night. But not from your house; call from a pay phone.”

“I will,” she says.

She leaves to make the drive back to Center City, and I head back to Findlay. I’m not anywhere near knowing the “why” behind the murder of three young people, but I may have just learned the “who.”

• • • • •

WE WOULDN’T have anything on Al Capone if he lived in Center City.” This is Laurie’s way of telling me that my request to check if Alan Drummond has a criminal record is not going to be productive. I’m sure she’s right; they are not about to share any details about their citizens with the outside world, and especially not negative ones. And most especially not negative ones about the son of Stephen Drummond.

We’re sitting on the couch drinking wine, and Laurie is gently and absentmindedly rubbing my thigh as we talk. If she continues doing that, I’m going to forget what the hell we’re talking about.

So I’ve got to focus. “That’s a shame, because Madeline said that everyone was afraid of him,” I say. “He must have done some bad things; you don’t generate that kind of fear by not cleaning your plate at lunch.”

“Have you ever seen him?” she asks.

I nod. “Twice. Big, powerful kid. He was wearing one of those servants of the Keeper uniforms and driving Wallace around.”

“So whatever he’s up to, there’s a good chance Wallace and his father are behind it.”

“Probably, but not definitely,” I say. “You know, until now I’ve been thinking that this was all about the religion, about keeping everything secret. I figured these kids were going to run away, and the town leaders decided they couldn’t have that happening. But this is something else… something bigger.”

“Why do you say that?” she asks.

“Well, first of all, Henry Gerard already told the secrets, and nobody cared, remember? Why would anybody listen to these kids, when he wrote articles about it in the damn newspaper and nothing happened? But Madeline said the three kids knew something, probably about Alan Drummond, and it scared them so much they were leaving their town and their families.”

“They had nobody to turn to,” she says. “Alan’s father is the number two guy in town, and his regular passenger is number one.”

Something pops into my head. “Hey, I remember something else. The kid’s a pilot; I saw a picture of the family in his father’s office. They were standing in front of a plane, and Stephen told me that his son was the pilot in the family.”

“So maybe he does more than drive Wallace around in a car,” she says. “The question then is, where would Wallace be flying to?”

I shrug. “Maybe the wheel sends him on trips. Probably to conventions with other wackos.”

“Shouldn’t be too hard to find out.”

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“If they’re flying around, they’ve got to declare flight plans with the FAA. I should be able to get the records.”

“It’s worth a shot. When can you do it?”

“Well,” she says, “I can spend a few hours on the phone now trying to find someone who can help, or we can go to bed now and I can make one phone call in the morning.”

I think about this for a moment. “In which scenario are you likely to be naked faster?”

“The ‘bed now, call in the morning’ one.”

“Then that’s the one we go with.”

It turns out to be a great choice, but like all good things, it comes to an end when the alarm goes off at six A.M. Laurie is showered, dressed, and out of the house in forty-five minutes, leaving me and Tara to reflect on just what the hell we think we’re doing here.

I’m pleased with the progress I’ve made so far, and certainly not regretting deciding to stay, but I am feeling somewhat out of my element. I’m an attorney, not a detective, and I’m finding that this new role requires a different mind-set and strategic outlook.

Generally on a case I view events and information through the prism of the legal system in general and its likely effect on a jury in particular. Even though a trial is often referred to as a search for the truth, that’s not my job. My job is to convince a jury to accept my truth, which is that my client is not guilty of the crime for which he or she is charged.

This detective stuff comes with a different mandate. I’ve got to find the real truth, actually extract it from people who don’t want to give it up. By definition those people are dangerous, and by definition I am not. I have a natural inclination to avoid danger, an inclination often referred to as cowardice, which leaves me with a dilemma. It’s hard to avoid danger when the truth is hiding behind it and I’m after the truth.

I’m finding that another difference between lawyering and detecting is the gaps between events. When I’m on a case, I can fill those gaps with preparation for trial. In my detecting mode, I often find that I’m sitting and waiting for something to happen, like right now, when I’m waiting for Laurie to find out information regarding the flight plans in and out of the tiny Center City Airport.

It’s almost four in the afternoon when Laurie calls me. “You got a pen?” she asks.

“I’m a lawyer… what do you think?”

“Take down this number,” she says, and then reads me a phone number with a 202 area code, which I recognize as Washington, D.C. “It’s the FAA. We got really lucky: Sandy Walsh has a cousin whose wife works there. Ask for Donna Girardi.”

“Didn’t you find out the information?” I ask.

“I did, but I want you to hear it from her directly. And you might have some additional questions.”

We hang up and I dial the number. Within moments I’m talking to Donna Girardi. “Chief Collins said you had information about the flight plans coming out of Center City Airport.”

“I do,” she says. “There are no such plans.”

I’m taken aback by this news, but less than fully confident that Ms. Girardi has taken the time to check through all the records. “How were you able to find this out so fast?” I ask.

“Because there is no such airport.”

“It’s not really an airport… it’s more of an airfield,” I say. “There’s just a runway, a small hangar, and one other building. I think they just use it for their personal planes… it’s not like United Airlines is flying in and out of there.”

“Every facility that’s used for takeoffs and landings, no matter how small, is required to be registered with our agency. Not to do so is a federal crime.”

“It would be really great if you didn’t investigate this particular federal crime for a while.” One thing I don’t need right now is the FAA entering the picture and tipping off the Centurions that something is going on.

“Chief Collins mentioned something about that as well. Let’s just say that a landing strip in Wisconsin is not a particularly high priority for our investigators. Especially in December.”

“When might it become a priority?” I ask.

“Without some incident requiring our attention, I would say you’re looking at July,” she says.

I look outside at the frozen tundra that is Wisconsin and the snow that is starting to fall.

“Ms. Girardi, right now there is nothing I would like better than to look at July.”

I thank her and end the call. The fact that the FAA has no record of the Center City airstrip could be crucially important. It could indicate that something illegal is happening there, and it could be the information that led to the death of Liz and Sheryl, and later Calvin and Eddie.

Or it could be of no significance whatsoever, merely a reflection of Center City’s resistance to outside authority. They never reported the airstrip’s existence and never filed flight plans, and no one has bothered them about it.

It does me no good to believe that this new information is unimportant. I have to focus on the airstrip, both because it’s a very good lead and because I have nothing else nearly as good.

My shortage of things to focus on disappears with the ringing of my telephone.

“Hello?”

The voice is young and near panic. “Mr. Carpenter, it’s Madeline. They know I talked to you. They were looking for me, but I got away.”

“Where are you now?”

“I’m at a pay phone on Route 5… a picnic area that people use in the summer. Near the Hampton Road exit.”

“I think I know where it is. Are you alone?”

“Yes.”

“Is there a place where you can go inside? To get shelter?” I’m thinking such a place would be good to hide in, but I don’t mention that.

“Yes. There’s a small building, they sell drinks and things in there in the summer.”

“Okay, go inside. I’m coming to get you.”

“Okay,” she says, but her voice doesn’t sound like she thinks everything’s okay at all.

“It’ll be fine, Madeline. I promise. No one will hurt you.”

“Please hurry, Mr. Carpenter.”

“I’m on my way.”

I rush out to the car. It should take me about fifteen minutes to get there, providing I actually know where the hell it is. Either way, it won’t be enough time to beat myself up over putting another teenager into jeopardy. My mind’s eye has been flashing all week to Eddie hanging from the skylight in that bathroom, and I will simply not be able to stand it if anything happens to Madeline.

I’m five minutes away before I realize I should be calling Laurie to tell her what’s happening and where I’m going. I dial her number on my cell phone, but the sergeant at the desk says that she’s out of the office.

“It’s Andy Carpenter. Please reach her and tell her that it’s urgent she call me on my cell phone.”

“She should be back in a few minutes.”

“It can’t wait that long. This is life-and-death.” It sounds like a cliché when I say it, but I really believe it’s true.

He agrees to contact her right away. I tell him where I’m going to be, and that if she can’t reach my cell for any reason, she should go there immediately. I add the strong suggestion that she bring some of her fellow officers with her.

So as not to drive by it, I slow down as I reach the area where I believe Madeline called from. I spot it and pull off the road. A sign directs me to the picnic area, though the area is frozen over with snow and ice.

Off in the distance I can see picnic tables and a few sets of swings, all of which have at least another five months’ vacation ahead of them. Just past them is a small building, with a car parked nearby. I assume and hope that it’s Madeline’s car.

I drive and park about twenty yards from the building. “Madeline?” I call out, but I get no response.

I walk toward the building, continuing to call her name and getting no response. Finally, I hear, “I’m in here.”

I don’t like the way this is setting up. She should have heard me the first few times I called, but she didn’t answer. And if I were her, I wouldn’t be calling me to come inside. I’d be coming outside, so as faster to get away to safety.

My hope is that I’m just being paranoid, but either way I have no choice. I’ve got to go inside. I walk up the three steps and see that the door is open. “Madeline, are you all right?”

“Yes.” Her reply is shaky, worrying me even more. I reach the door. Here goes…

When I get inside, I don’t see her at first, and then there she is, at the far corner of the room. My worst fears are realized because standing next to her is one of the servants of the Keeper. I’ve seen him before in the town, but he looks even larger and stronger now.

His hand rests on the back of Madeline’s neck, and she’s cowering from it. She’s trying to control her sobs and repeating over and over how sorry she is. She and me both.

“Come in, Mr. Carpenter,” says her captor. I’m already in, but there’s an open door behind me, and he obviously doesn’t want me running out through it. It’s not the worst of ideas, but even I couldn’t leave Madeline behind like that.

“Don’t hurt her,” I say. “She’s done nothing to you.” I have no expectation that anything I say will make him any more conciliatory or compassionate, and that’s not my goal. My goal is to keep him from doing anything until Laurie and her officers can get here.

“She spoke to you,” he says.

“She told me nothing. She didn’t know anything at all.”

“You believe that?” he asks.

I start to tell him that I do, and then I realize that he’s not talking to me. I half turn and see that behind me is another one just like him, only even larger. They probably represent close to five hundred pounds between them, and with a feeling of panic and dread, I realize that they are not here to warn us. They are here to kill us.

“You expected him to tell the truth?” number two asks. “You know what he is.”

I can feel number two start to walk toward me, so I turn toward him, not wanting to be attacked from behind. Suddenly, he seems to turn horizontal, almost suspended in midair, as something smashes into the side of his head. That head and his shoulders fly to the left, and his feet leave the ground to the right. When he hits the ground, standing in my line of vision is Marcus Clark.

Marcus just stands there, expressionless, as his victim lies on the ground, moaning. His eyes are trained on the other servant, who no longer looks quite so confident. His hand is still on Madeline’s neck, but it seems as if he’s doing so to get support rather than to threaten.

“I can break her neck,” he warns, and there is no doubt he is capable of just that. There is also no doubt that Marcus is undeterred by the threat as he walks slowly toward them.

I pick up motion back near the door, and I see that the guy who Marcus hit has gotten shakily to his feet. “Marcus!” I yell, and Marcus turns to see what is going on.

Apparently, Marcus didn’t knock the first guy senseless, because he’s maintained enough of his faculties to know that he doesn’t want any more of Marcus. He runs out the door, and as he does so, the guy holding Madeline throws her across the room. She crashes into a counter as her former captor runs out a side door.

I go to make sure that Madeline is okay, while Marcus goes out the side door to see if he can catch the two servants. I hear the sound of motors starting, and I look out the window. They are taking off in snowmobiles, which had been parked behind the building. It’s why I only saw Madeline’s car when I drove up.

Madeline seems shaken but all right. My cell phone rings; it’s Laurie calling as directed. “We’re on our way there now. What’s wrong, Andy?”

“Everything’s under control now, thanks to Marcus. But you should get an ambulance out here as well… Madeline Barlow may be injured.”

I hang up and do my best to comfort Madeline, who seems to be in shock. Marcus comes back in from outside; there was no way he could go after them on the snowmobiles.

Laurie arrives within five minutes with Cliff Parsons and two other officers. The officers attend to Madeline until the ambulance arrives, while I give Laurie and Parsons a detailed accounting of what happened.

When I get to the part about the second servant coming up behind me, I say that Marcus arrived just in time. “Which is amazing, because he came here all the way from New Jersey,” I say pointedly at Laurie.

“I’m sorry,” she says, “I know you told me you didn’t want him here, but I thought you might need him.”