Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Vol. 37, No. 6. Whole No. 211, June 1961

Carl Henry Rathjen Full Moon Tonight

Fire marshal Ed Manning sported the State Penitentiary envelope in the morning mail. Slitting it open, he glanced at the clock. In half an hour he was due at Grammar School Six to speak on fire prevention. Funny how he, a bachelor, could always reach the kids. Maybe because they reached him too.

The envelope contained a bulletin, the usual notice to Police and Fire Departments, announcing the release of habitual felons, deviates, and pyromaniacs. The Fire Marshal scanned it until the name Fischer shot a chill up his spine to his red head.

“The Parole Board’s done it again,” he snapped to Chick Sims, his assistant investigator who kept his gray hair long in an effort to cover scar tissue. “This time it’s Fischer. Only one-quarter of his sentence, right on the nose.”

“Our noses,” Sims said dourly. “Well, here we go again.”

Manning shot his gaze to the calendar, seeking the next phase of full moon. That was when Ray Fischer, a compulsive pyromaniac. always made his touch-offs. Manning too vividly remembered the last time. He’d been prowling a tenement neighborhood, seeking Fischer’s trail after losing him while trampling out a blaze he’d caught the pyro setting. Searching, he’d been only a half block from sudden shouts and screams fringing a second fire. Radioing an alarm, he assisted the escape of hysterical women, shrilling children, panicky men until the stairway became a roaring chimney. The rest waited for ladders, or morgue canvases, and he could still hear the sound of the woman who jumped from the fifth floor and hit the pavement beside him.

Fischer should have got life, but in court Manning didn’t have enough conclusive evidence — not even a flicker of admission — for the big touch-off. So Fischer got five years for the minor blaze and now, after serving fifteen months, he was out again.

Manning turned from the calendar. His thoughts grappled, angry, scared. Sims scowled, stretching his game leg.

“They ought to let us carry guns,” he said bitterly.

Manning gave him a look. Sims was hard to hold down sometimes, hating the only job the department could give him and taking it out on fire ordinance violators.

“You’re going soft on me, looking for an easy way out,” said Manning, cringing at the thought of explaining to crying mothers and widowed husbands why a firebug was on the loose. It couldn’t happen again with Fischer. He picked up the phone. “Get me the parole office,” he told the headquarters operator. A secretary finally answered. “Put Officer Redfield on,” Manning demanded. “I don’t care what he’s doing. Get him on the line.”

“Mr. Redfield is on leave of absence. I’m handling his cases. I’m Julia Worden. May I assist you? I didn’t get your name."

“Manning,” he said, frowning. “Marshal, Fire Department, Arson Bureau. Who’s assigned to that pyromaniac, Ray Fischer, just released from the state pen?”

“I told you, Marshall. / am covering Mr. Redfield’s cases.”

“I thought women were confined to juveniles and females.”

“As you know, Marshal,” she said firmly, “we’re always short-handed. I’ve come down from the capital to fill in. Ray Fischer is my case. Just what is it you wanted to know? I can tell you he has a family and a job awaiting him. He has been rehabilitated.”

“I’ve heard that before,” Manning snapped, picturing her as a cold fish. A tailor-suited, prim-rodded spinster who did no good for the enforcement guys who had to take the hell of running them down again.

“You sound prejudiced, Marshal,” she began.

“That’s right,” said Manning. “Me and a lot of people in the cemetery. Stay in your office. I’m coming over.” Hanging up, he turned to Sims. “Does the name Worden ring a bell with you?”

“I’ll find out,” Sims growled. “Let me see her while you give the little monsters of Grammar School Six some words of wisdom. I won’t have to watch my language talking to her.”

“I’ll handle both,” said Manning. “You stay on deck for calls. Get an alert okayed by the Old Man for a mimeo to all station commanders. I want it to include a complete description of Fischer. Tell them to pass the word around their districts to all building superintendents and managers. Get to it. Full moon’s coming in three days.”

Too mad to take the stairs, he slid the brass to the garage adjoining the headquarters apparatus floor. In his coupe he wished it were the sort of emergency where he could use red light and siren. This was one of those times when he wondered if the state had been wise in abolishing capital punishment. He had to admit it hadn’t been much of a deterrent, but neither were stiff sentences when the Parole Board went soft.

As he expected when he entered Julia Worden’s office, she sat very erect, was tailor-suited, but she was about thirty years younger than he’d imagined. Her dark eyes, matching wavy hair, looked a little tired, but friendly despite a faint flush on the set cheeks. A prim-rodder with interesting curves — not a cover girl, but good enough for somewhere inside the book. Plenty good. His angry words vanished, but he cut off her greeting.

“How long are you going to be handling the Fischer case?”

Julia Worden seemed amused by his dismay. “Please be seated, Marshal Manning. I don’t like people looking down at me.”

He sat. “Suppose I brief you in on why I’m so brusque.”

“Let me talk,” she interrupted. “It may save time and temper if I tell you what I have already learned.” Her slim hand touched a folder. “You first caught Ray Fischer for a residential garage fire when he was seven years old. All children, Marshal, go through the playing-with-matches stage.”

“I know.” Manning tried to be patient. “I hauled him and his parents before a juvenile judge who told them off too. It was a first offense — the first known one — and no charges were made since they paid the damages. But you’re supposed to be telling me, so go on.”

She did, coolly mentioning unproved neighborhood grass fires, but detailing the high school janitor’s closet which could have been spontaneous combustion. Anyway, it happened outside of school hours and Ray Fischer was in the building, claiming he had come back for some sports gear. Again no prosecution, but a judge ordered psychiatric analysis and then placed him on probation for six months.

Next came a gap in the record which Manning had never been able to fill officially — a series of apartment, hotel, and department store fires, all obviously arson jobs. At the times, he had interrogated all known suspects, particularly Fischer who, of course, claimed innocence. Finally Manning had got a conviction, less than two years ago, for the first of the two tenement fires. Now Fischer was out again despite numerous previous questionings about arson jobs in neighboring cities, though no convictions.

Julia Worden met Manning’s eye. “Did I overlook anything?”

“That’s what I’m hoping you won’t do,” he said. “I know your office is overworked, but this guy’s got to be watched.”

“If I don’t do it, you’ll hound him. Is that it, Marshal?”

Manning started to stand up, but recalled she didn’t like that. “I’ll give any guy a break if he deserves it. And I’d like to see one handed to my department and police friends sometime. We’re going round and round in a squirrel cage, grabbing pyros, perverts, known felons, and then having the Parole Board turn them loose. Fischer is only one of too many.”

“On the face of the record perhaps,” Julia Worden began.

Manning stood over her. “On the charred faces of victims. It’s bad enough that Fischer is a compulsive pyro — the psychiatric report confirms that — but he’s shifted his touch-offs to crowded areas for added thrill. He’s a menace.”

“He’s a human being, Marshal, and I don’t think he’s been given a chance to be one.”

Staring down at her, Manning ignored a revision of his original estimate. Give her some rest to remove that weariness about the eyes and she was a cover girl.

“He’s a menace to other human beings who are trying to live normal, adjusted lives. I don’t know what your background is, Miss Worden, but if you take my advice you’ll have this case transferred to a man.” He could see by her smile she regarded that as a victory. He couldn’t cope with her. A man would be an easier pushover. Manning thumped his fist on the desk. “Believe me, I know what I’m talking about. Fischer is dangerous, untrustworthy. You can’t handle him with a lot of do-good theories.”

She studied him. “You know, Marshal, I think you’re right.” She smiled. “Maybe you have got it in you to give a person a break.”

Manning hefted that in his mind, but couldn’t decide whether it was genuine or bail. “Let me know who’s taking the case until Redfield gets back.”

“I already told you, Marshal. I’m taking it.”

Manning went down to his car, swearing. At Grammar School Six, fine-combing his words, he felt he wasn’t reaching the gay little faces that looked like a huge bed of flowers in the auditorium. But when he finished, the kids cheered him, and…

“Pretty rugged, Marshal,” remarked the baldheaded principal. “You scared me, but I guess we all need it.”

“Oh, Marshal,” gushed a Mrs. Ackerman, willowy P.T.A. president, “you were so forceful and dynamic. I'm going to speak to our program chairman. The women’s auxiliary must hear you.”

Escaping, Manning headed determinedly for headquarters, but detoured to answer a battalion chief’s request for an investigator at a loft fire. Thinking of Fischer, the Parole Board, and Julia Worden, he barely checked himself from acting like Sims. He cited the loft tenant for misdemeanor, not criminal negligence. When he got to the office, Sims took his bum leg off the desk.

“Don’t tell me, Ed. I can see it. And I also found out why you didn’t get cooperation from the Worden dame. Her old man’s an ex-judge who once sentenced a guy to be hanged, then found out he was wrong, too late. He led the fight against capital punishment. Now he’s on the Parole Board.”

“So that’s where I heard the name before,” Manning muttered. “I guess, in his spot, I would have joined the abolitionists too.”

“For doing what you thought was your job?” Sims demanded. “But wait, you haven’t heard anything yet. At the time of the execution, Julia Worden was just plain housewife. Too bad she still isn’t.”

“What about her?” Manning asked irritably. He hadn’t noticed a ring on her finger.

“Her husband,” said Sims, “was a highway patrolman, the arresting officer in the case. Six months after the mistaken necktie party his car went off the road one night. It’s still a question of whether it was accident or suicide.”

Manning blew through his teeth. “She’s had it rough. You’d never know, though.” He stared at the calendar. “We’d better take over Chick. Put a twenty-four-hour surveillance on Fischer.”

The round-the-clock watch was a nightmare. Fischer had a job with a floor-covering outfit which specialized in public buildings — hotels, restaurants, theaters — places where a pyro could jeopardize scores of lives. Manning’s men crowded right after him.

Manning, taking over from an Inspector whose wife was going to have a baby, prowled the service hall and kitchen adjoining a hotel banquet room. It was the day after full moon, still too close for comfort. Sniffing, he poked around rolls of linoleum and other paraphernalia, opened closets and cabinets. Suddenly, a voice spoke very quietly behind him.

“If you find anything, Marshal, it won’t be my doing.”

Turning, Manning glimpsed intent brown eyes, blond crewcut, moonface tanned from working on the prison honor farm — part of the good behavior that had earned the parole. Then he stiffened inwardly when he became aware that Fischer, standing close, held a trimming knife, sharp and hooked, at stomach level.

“I hope you’re right,” said Manning, watching the knife indirectly. “Nothing pleases me more than not to find anything.”

Fischer’s cheeks bunched. “Thank you, Marshal.” He slipped the knife into a leather holder. “No hard feelings.”

“That depends on you,” Manning said evenly.

“I’m a changed man, Marshal. Didn’t Miss Worden tell you?”

Manning nodded, thinking that he’d also been told once that marriage would make a difference in Fischer. He’d almost believed it — until those two tenement fires.

“How’s the wife?" he inquired, offering a cigarette.

Fischer’s gaze hardened. “I gave them up,” he said curtly. Then, relaxing, he went on. “She's having to get used to being in nights by nine thirty. Miss Worden’s orders for me. My wife’s bothered more, though, by your men following us everywhere, hanging around outside all night.”

When Fischer didn’t dig for a match, Manning struck one for his cigarette and watched those eyes fasten on the flame.

“She’ll have to put up with it a while,” he said.

“Sure, Marshall. I know how it is. But those sudden things aren’t going to come over me any more." Fischer lowered his voice. “Don’t louse up my job for me, will you? The customers and my boss don’t like all this checking up.”

“We don’t like it either,” said Manning.

“Then lay off,” pleaded Fischer.

“It’s a promise,” Manning declared, “whenever we’re convinced you’re laying off for keeps.”

Fischer hooked his thumb above the leather holder. “You can count on it, Marshal.”

The moon went into its last quarter, then down to a sliver, and early one afternoon the Old Man sent for Manning.

“I've received a complaint from Fischer’s employer. He doesn’t want to have to fire Fischer. Says he’s a good worker.”

“They usually are,” Manning agreed. “That’s the hell of it. Makes them look like good old rehabilitated Joe Citizens — until the next compulsion comes along. Then we get the hell of it.”

“I’m not censuring you, Ed,” the Old Man said placatingly. “I’m just reconfirming my stand behind you.”

“Thanks, Chief.” Manning went back to his office. Sims raised his eyebrows. “Carry on as usual,” Manning said, “but be a little less obvious watching Fischer.”

Sims growled. “With two crowded conventions over where he’s working now? It’s enough to start gray hairs pushing through my bald spot. If I had my way—”

The phone gave the long ring which meant an alarm summons for the Arson Bureau. Manning grabbed it and, listening to the dispatcher, felt a chill and thought of gay little faces.

“Grammar School Six,” he repeated, as he snatched his white cap from the desk and hit the brass pole in the corridor.

Three screaming blocks from headquarters the dispatcher called again, via radio, “Cancel School Six. No blaze. Kids horseplaying in the cafeteria broke a sprinkler and flooded the place.”

“Ten-four, Car Seven,” Manning acknowledged, relieved, but sweating and wondering if kids would start knocking off sprinklers now that they knew reduced water pressure automatically rang in an alarm. He swung back to the office. Sims had gone home to sleep before taking the evening vigil on Fischer. He’d left a note.

“She called. Wouldn’t listen to me. Try your charm.”

Manning phoned Julia Worden.

“Well, Marshal,” she said, “full moon has come and gone.”

“It’s the new one, the dark of the moon,” he replied. “Now it starts building up to the full again.”

“In other words,” she charged, “as your crude assistant said—”

“My apologies there,” Manning interrupted. “Avoid conversations with him, Miss Worden. He’s had it rough and hasn’t learned to take it as gracefully as… as some people.”

When she spoke again, her voice was subdued. “You’re very understanding, Marshal.”

“Sometimes it doesn’t appear that way,” he answered. “I want to give Fischer a break, Miss Worden, but I don’t dare. I’ve been burned too many times — rather, too many innocent people have.”

“You’re still going to hound him then,” she accused sharply.

“We’re still going to watch him,” Manning corrected. “How do you think I’d feel if we backed off and something serious happened?”

“How does it feel not to let him live a normal life?”

“I don’t have any choice,” said Manning. “I’m sorry.”

“So am I, Marshal.”

She hung up. Manning reluctantly released the phone on the cradle and glowered at the calendar.

That evening in his bachelor apartment he was catching up on reports for the Old Man when the phone jangled at nine thirty-five.

“Marshal,” said the dispatcher. “You’re wanted at six-four-seven West Eighth.” Manning squinted. That was Ray Fischer’s home. “They said to tell you, Marshal, that they got him.”

Manning had his official car at home since his bureau was shorthanded by the stakeout and sick leaves. As he wailed across town he felt no vindicating elation. This was going to be a blow to Julia Worden. Did she have enough courage left after the other bumps she’d been over?

Swinging into Eighth he saw red flashers on turret tops, a black and white police sedan, and two red coupes. Sims came to Manning’s car with glowing eyes.

“I told you it would happen. The damn fool. With us right on his tail from a drive-in movie, he sets one in the alley.”

“Did you see him do it?” Manning demanded, getting out.

“He was standing right over it when I nabbed him. Stinnard called in an alarm, then blacked it down with a garden hose before the rigs got rolling. We got him cuffed in the prowl car.”

Manning started toward the police sedan, but a long-legged girl came running down the steps of the Fischer home to intercept him. Rivulets glistened on her cheeks.

“He didn’t do it,” she screamed. “I’m his wife. I was with him every second. He didn’t do it I”

This was the part Manning always hated. He waited until she ran out of breath. “Mrs. Fischer, you and his parents wouldn’t let yourselves believe it the other times either.”

“But I know,” she cried.

She’d known his record too when they eloped, but her folks just raised their hands and said what could you do with young people these days? And, Manning wondered, what could you do with some adults these days?

He opened the sedan’s door. Fischer leaned against the cushions, his hands cuffed behind him.

“Well, Ray?” said Manning.

Fischer shrugged. There was no animosity in his eyes as he replied, “You never believe me anyway.” He stared away, but his young wife, screaming, pulled at Manning. “Why don’t you leave us alone?”

“Elaine!” Julia Worden said sharply behind Manning. He turned. She wore a gray suit that wasn’t at all masculine.

Fischer’s wife sobbed. “I–I tried to call you. There was no answer.”

Manning stared at Julia Worden. How did she know then? What was she doing here? There was no friendliness in her gaze.

“I want to speak to you, Marshal, privately.”

Sims jeered. “Why don’t you be a good sport, Miss Worden?”

Her eyes flashed at him, then back to Manning.

“Will my car do?” he asked.

She nodded.

It wasn’t just night chill that Manning felt, following her. She turned suddenly on the curb, making him pause in the gutter. A bystander edged near in the darkness.

“Beat it!” Manning snapped, then faced Julia Worden.

“I keep vigils too, Marshal,” she said. “I kept one tonight to see that my case got in by nine thirty. I saw him start to obey my rule, then move toward the fire — which your man set!"

Manning started. “Sims?” he exclaimed in a shallow whisper.

“I’d like to believe, Marshal, that you didn’t order it. That is why I waited until you arrived. But that’s personal. What is more important — what are you going to do about it?”

Manning stared, stunned beyond belief. Julia Worden didn’t wait. She spread it all out for him to choose.

“It’s my word, one woman, one person — his wife wouldn’t be believed anyway — against two of your men, Marshal, against your own obsession about Ray Fischer.”

Manning felt the impact of her anger. His face burned, yet coldness clamped his chest, freezing any possible words. Turning, getting a flashlight from his car, he beckoned Sims to follow between houses to the rear alley. His sweeping light revealed sodden, blackened rubbish near a garage, close enough to have touched the garage off once the blaze got going, but the structure was scarcely scorched. He raised the light full into Sims’s face.

“Did you frame him?”

“Ed,” Sims began, “we all got separated when he left the drive-in during the pizza break. Stinnard took one route looking for him, and got here just as I was nabbing Fischer.”

“I didn’t ask you that.”

Sims tried to see through the glaring light. “What’s got into you, Ed? The dame knocking you off-center?”

“I’m dead-centered on that question, Chick. Answer it.”

Manning lowered the light. Sims swore bitterly.

“All right, Ed. But use your head. Fischer was going to do it sooner or later. So why shouldn’t we get him when there are no lives in danger?”

“For the same reason,” Manning snapped, “the department didn’t give you the boot before you got out of line.” He strode out to the police sedan. “Release the prisoner.”

He couldn’t look at Julia Worden. She went in the house with the Fischers. When she came out she didn’t glance toward Manning’s car.

In the morning, to protect the department, he had to tell the Old Man.

“Too bad,” the Old Man said gravely. “I’ll have to suspend him. On past performance he’s earned a pension. I don’t want to jeopardize it, charging him before a trial board, unless the Fischers sue or the parole office complains. What do you think Julia Worden will do?”

Manning sighed. “I wouldn’t risk asking. She might try to rig a deal for Fischer. And that wouldn’t be good either.”

A curved edge of moon cut through the dark sky again, grew into the first quarter, then bulged toward the full. Manning, really short-handed now with Sims on suspension, put in extra tricks, personally dogging Fischer’s movements as unobtrusively as possible.

He didn’t encounter Julia Worden, nor did anything come from her office regarding Sims. The uncertainty — about Fischer, about Sims, about Julia — made Manning irritable. When Mrs. Ackerman, the P.T.A. president, phones a request for him to speak to the women’s auxiliary on the eve of full moon, he curtly refused.

And then Fischer, that very afternoon, led him to Grammar School Six after lunch hour. The cafeteria tile linoleum was a tripping menace for little feet — it had buckled where the flood from the sprinkler had worked down in the seams. Mrs. Ackerman spotted Manning first. Her smile scarcely came through the make-up.

“How nice you managed to come after being so positive you couldn’t, Marshal. But we’ve arranged for an oldtime movie. I do hope you’re not planning a fire drill in the midst of it.”

Manning bowed slightly. His embarrassment became worse when he saw Julia Worden approaching in the corridor. Mrs. Ackerman moved on, head high. Julia Worden glanced into the cafeteria, side to side, then came on, frowning.

“At least you're not breathing over his shoulder,” she remarked coolly. “So I suppose I’ve got no cause to complain.”

“You had plenty of cause,” said Manning, thinking of Sims. “Why didn’t you?”

The sudden tinge of color was beautiful on her. “You gave my man a break, Marshall. It took courage to make that decision. It made me — well, re-evaluate some of my attitudes.” She hesitated, then went on quickly. “I haven’t come to any decisions as yet.”

“It’s pretty tough sometimes,” Manning agreed, and then Mrs. Ackerman came back into the corridor.

“Marshal,” she called, very upset. “Did that linoleum man come by here with reels of film? He must have picked them up by mistake when he removed his materials from our meeting room.”

Manning started to shake his head, then jumped to the cafeteria doors. Ray Fischer was nowhere in sight!

"He wasn’t there,” Julia Worden exclaimed, “when I glanced in. I just thought—”

Manning raced past tables with chairs upturned on them and thrust through swinging doors into the kitchen. At the far end two women, hanging up gleaming copper pots, turned curiously.

Manning barked. “Where’d he go? The linoleum man!”

One woman pointed. “Out there with some round cans.”

Manning lunged out to a deserted courtyard, then spotted another door with a warning sign, STAY OUT. Oh, no, he prayed, not in there, the school’s service plant, furnace, incinerator, air conditioning. Mrs. Ackerman had said the film was an oldtimer. That meant it was highly flammable. If its acrid, suffocating smoke got into the school’s ventilation ducts there would be a lot of choking, asphyxiating kids and teachers.

“Find an alarm box,” Manning snapped to Julia Worden behind him. “Pull it. Get them out.”

But she was already inside the door with him. Clattering metal jerked his gaze to the right. It was the cover of a film can flopping on the floor as Ray Fischer spun around, his feet in a tangle of film beside the papers of an overturned rubbish container. And worse, the pyro was beside the air conditioner with an inspection door wide open. The fumes would be drawn in, distributed throughout the school, into every classroom.

“Don’t move, Fischer!” Manning commanded.

Fischer flung himself behind the unit, trailing film. Manning charged around the other side. He didn’t intercept Fischer. Barging on around, he stopped short. The canny pyro had doubled back to seize Julia Worden just as she reached for an alarm box. Holding her, he poised the hooked knife by her white throat.

“Now you stand still, Marshall,” he warned.

Manning obeyed, trying to watch him, not Julia Worden’s terror. Fischer’s eyes gleamed. His free hand fumbled in a pocket and brought out wooden matches.

“Don’t be a fool, Fischer,” Manning called. "The fumes will floor us. You’ll never get out.”

“I’ll get out. But you won’t.”

Manning measured the distance. Too far. And a mass of film lay between him and Julia Worden’s captor, between him and the door. He eyed a length of pipe leaning against the wall. Would he have a chance to grab and hurl it to distract Fischer? He crouched. Julia Worden gasped as the knife touched her throat.

“I warned you,” Fischer snapped.

“All right,” Manning replied, trying not to sound tense. “But give her a chance, Fischer. She’s tried to be your friend. Pull her closer to the door.” He was also thinking of all the kids and their teachers, and aware of what was going to stream into each classroom.

Fischer hauled Julia Worden to the brick wall, extended his hand and scraped a bunch of matches. Manning didn’t wait to see if the pyro’s eyes would divert to the flaring flame. Gambling on it, he scooped up the length of pipe and lunged, shouting.

“Grab the knife, Julia!”

He had to chance that she would and could. But more important were the lives of all those kids. Swinging the pipe up, he desperately batted a projecting overhead sprinkler. There was time for only one blow. It had to be enough to shatter the brass loops holding the locking unit so that an alarm would ring in automatically.

The pipe slipped from his stinging fingers as Julia Worden struggled to hold the knife away. Fischer flung the flaming matches. Manning charged through them, feeling heat, smelling sulphur.

And then he had his hands on Fischer's wrist, twisting that knife away from Julia Worden. Behind him he heard film sputtering into flame. Cold water showered his face as he wrestled with Fischer. The school firebells clamored. It would ring in the alarm bureau too. Rigs would be rolling out, but they’d never respond in time to help him with this desperate maniac, strong from working on the prison honor farm — too strong for я guy who sat at a desk and rode around in a department coupe.

Manning suddenly stopped resisting. He relaxed, then suddenly ducked, flipping the off-balance pyro sprawling. Pouncing, he caught Fischer’s head between a smashing fist and the concrete floor. Again, and again until Fischer went limp. Manning looked around, coughing in the smoke, then scrambled to a fire extinguisher to complete the job the damaged sprinkler was trying to do.

It was a tougher fight, afterward, to rid himself of the teachers, the P.TA. mothers, the kids, the press, the officials downtown. He lost sight of Julia Worden, but she was waiting when he went off-duty at four.

“Fischer’s parole is revoked,” she said quietly as they strolled out to her car. “And I’ve also wired Redfield to come back and take over.”

“Why do that?” Manning asked, dismayed.

“I’m not quitting, Marshal. I want to get back up north — I have some things I want to discuss with my father and the other members of the Parole Board. I don’t know how much good it will do.”

“We can always hope,” said Manning. The light in her eyes, meeting his, blanked out the little lines of weariness. “You won’t be leaving tonight,” he suggested. She shook her head. “Then how about dinner?” he asked.

“If it’s out of the city, and away from…"

“Sure," he said. “I’ll pick you up about seven.”

As she drove off he looked at the sky and smiled. Full moon tonight too.