Supervolcano: All Fall Down

XXII

When Bryce Miller waited at the campus bus stop for the ride back into the town of Wayne, it was twenty-one below zero. It was the late afternoon, to be fair. The day’s high hadn’t been anywhere near so frigid. It had only been eleven below then.

Not much snow was falling. The air couldn’t hold much moisture when it got this cold. But every flake that touched his cheeks and nose-the only skin he showed-burned as if it were dipped in battery acid.

“Hope the bus comes,” said a woman standing there with him. “Can’t wait around real long in this. Gotta go inside and warm up.” It wouldn’t be hot inside, either. It would be above freezing, though. No matter how many layers you had on, you’d turn into an icicle pretty damn quick in this. Bryce had known it would be cold here when he left SoCal. He hadn’t dreamt it could get this cold.

He was thinking hard about retreating to a building when the bus grumbled up. “Extra blankets on the seats,” the driver said. She was using one. Bryce gratefully swaddled himself as the bus pulled away from the curb. It helped-a little. Nothing could help much, not in this, hellfire probably included.

He didn’t want to unwrap and get out when the bus got to his stop in downtown Wayne, such as downtown Wayne was. Only a couple of blocks to his apartment. He counted himself lucky not to be devoured by a polar bear before he made it.

It was above freezing in the apartment. Not a lot, but it was. Susan wore almost as many clothes as he had on. “Brr!” he said. “That’s just brutal out there.” She hugged him and kissed him. When they both had on so many layers, the hug seemed hardly more than virtual. The kiss was fine, though.

Then Susan said, “Colin Ferguson still works for the San Atanasio Police Department, doesn’t he?”

“Sure,” Bryce said. “How come?” It wasn’t as if Susan brought up Vanessa’s dad very often-or at all, if she could help it.

“Because the chief of the San Atanasio PD just killed himself. It was on CNN. Michael Pit. . Pitsomething. Something weird.”

“Pitcavage,” Bryce said, and Susan nodded. He went on, “That’s awful! Did they say why? Colin didn’t like him a whole bunch, but you wouldn’t wish that on anybody.”

“They said his son’s in jail on drug-dealing charges, but they don’t know if that’s what made him do it or not. It sounds like they don’t know. He didn’t leave a note, they said.”

“Holy crap,” Bryce said, and then, “Do you mind if I call Colin?”

“After this? Of course not. It’s not like you’re calling to dish about Vanessa,” Susan said. Bryce chuckled uneasily. She knew he wasn’t a hundred percent over his ex. She knew he wouldn’t be any time soon, either, too. As long as she also knew he had zero intention of doing anything about it (assuming Vanessa wasn’t over him, which she totally was), that was. . pretty much okay with her.

He got out his cell and pulled up Colin’s number. On the second ring, the familiar voice said, “Hey, Bryce” in his ear. After a beat, Colin went on, “So you heard even back there, huh?”

“’Fraid so,” Bryce answered. “I’m sorry.”

“Me, too. Everybody’s saying that a lot today. Listen, let me call you back in five minutes, okay? I want to walk out into the parking lot.”

“Sure. ’Bye,” Bryce said. Colin wanted to talk without fifty people listening in on his end, but he didn’t want to say so while they were listening in.

“What’s going on?” Susan asked when he took the phone away from his ear. He explained. He’d just finished when the opening chords of “Came Along Too Late” came from the phone. Hey, how many Hellenistic ring tones could you find?

“I’m here,” he said, raising it again.

“Yeah, and I’m here, which is more than Mike Pitcavage can tell you right now,” Colin replied. “I always knew he cut his rotten kid too much slack. If Mike hadn’t, Darren never would’ve turned into a dealer, and he damn well did. The evidence we’ve got, not even the dumbest jury in the world’ll acquit him, and that’s saying something. But Jesus H. Christ on a pogo stick, Bryce, I never dreamt Mike would go and do anything like that.”

“I believe you,” Bryce said. Colin sounded plaintive, almost pleading. Those were notes his voice almost never struck. The last time Bryce could remember hearing them was when Louise left him. Colin had never dreamt she would go and do anything like that, either.

Of course, Bryce wasn’t sure how reliable his own memories of that time were. Vanessa had just traded him in on a new-no, actually on an older-model, so he also hadn’t been at his own dynamic best.

“I know you do. It means a lot to me.” Colin hesitated, then went on, “Means a lot to me right now that anybody believes me. Some of the people here, it’s like they think I drove Mike to it on purpose when I set it up so we went after Darren and dropped on him.”

“Oh, Lord!” Bryce hadn’t thought of that. He realized he should have. “Talk about blaming the messenger!”

“Yeah, well, that’s how it looks to me, too.” Colin sighed. “But it sure doesn’t look that way to everybody. Funeral’ll be in three, four days-after the coroner’s office finishes the autopsy and releases the body. All the crap you have to go through to make sure what looks like a suicide isn’t a homicide. This one looks as cut-and-dried as they ever do, but you still have to connect the dots.”

“Sure,” Bryce said. The Hellenistic kingdoms had had their bureaucratic rituals, too.

Colin sighed again. “Not too long before you called, my landline rang, and it was Caroline Pitcavage. She uninvited me-disinvited me? whatever the hell-from the funeral. Said she was sorry and everything, but seeing me there would only remind her of what I’d done to their family.”

“Ouch!” Bryce wished he could have found something more consoling than that, but it was the best he could do.

“Ouch is right.” This time, Bryce judged, Colin’s pause was for a nod. “I’ve known Caroline Pitcavage. . gotta be twenty years now. Yeah, Mike beat me out for chief. Doesn’t mean I want to see him dead. Doesn’t mean I’d try to make him dead, either. She’s known me twenty years, too. If she doesn’t get that, she’s never known me at all.” Plaintive was the word, sure as the devil.

“She can’t be thinking straight right this minute.” Coming up with that made Bryce feel a little better. He hoped it helped Colin some, too. Whether it did or not, it was bound to be the truth.

“I know she can’t. I understand it. In my head, I understand it,” Colin said heavily. “In my gut. . She might as well’ve kicked me in the gut when she said that. And she’s not the only one who feels that way, either. I don’t know what I can do about it. I don’t know if I can do anything, this side of quitting the force.”

“Don’t!” Bryce exclaimed. “If you do, they win.”

“I know. But if I don’t, they’re liable to win, anyway. Too damn many of ’em. Happy day, huh? Listen, good to talk to you and everything, but I’ve got to go back in there and make like I’m useful,” Colin said. “Take care.” Bryce started to answer, but found himself talking to a dead line.

* * *

A skeleton crew of uniformed cops patrolled the streets of San Atanasio. Some rode black-and-whites. More pedaled bicycles. There was talk of buying horses. The glut of rain in the L.A. basin had produced a glut of grass. Feeding them would be cheap. It would certainly be cheaper than buying gas for the police cars. But then, what wouldn’t?

And another skeleton crew of cops and clerical personnel kept the station open. The rest of the San Atanasio PD, along with the city council and the mayor, had gone to pay Mike Pitcavage their final respects.

Colin Ferguson sat at his desk. He wished he were at the funeral, even if Caroline and most of the other cops on the force screamed abuse at him there. That, at least, would be out in the open. He could have stood there and taken it or he could have screamed back at them. What he really wanted to do was scream at Darren Pitcavage, who’d got out of his cell to attend the services.

Instead, he had to stay here by himself and be miserable. Well, almost by himself. His secretary was one of the handful of clerical people who’d stayed behind to catch phone calls and do whatever else needed doing. Josefina Linares practically radiated indignation. “It’s not fair, Lieutenant, the way they treat you,” she said. “It’s not even close to fair.”

“Thanks, Josie. I appreciate that.” Colin meant every word of it. “But it’s the way things are.”

“Is it your fault Chief Mike had a kid who’s a dope pusher? I don’t think so!” Josie said. “Darren shoulda got in trouble a long time ago. He might’ve known not to be such a jerk then. But Chief Mike kept going to bat for him, so he decided he could get away with anything. I’m here to tell you, though, the world doesn’t work that way.”

“I don’t think it does, either. You’re right,” Colin said. With some Hispanics, he might have made that last Tienes razon. He spoke Spanish-not well, and with a horrible Anglo accent, but he did. It would only have annoyed Josie, though. She was American American, as she would tell you at any excuse or none. She had less sympathy for illegal immigrants than Colin did, and was more likely to call them wetbacks.

“But when Chief Mike had to see what kind of little shit he raised, when he couldn’t stick his head in the sand any more, he got too ashamed to live. That’s what happened. It’s not your fault.” Josie sounded positive.

That was how it looked to Colin, too. That was how he hoped it was. But he was less sure than Josie seemed. Mike Pitcavage hadn’t left behind any reason for killing himself. He’d just gone ahead and done it, damn him. That left plenty of room for people to blame Colin. And people, starting with Pitcavage’s widow, were blaming him.

Josie didn’t notice he hadn’t answered. “It will blow over, Lieutenant. You wait and see. Have faith, that’s all.”

If his having faith was a prerequisite, it would never blow over. After working with Colin so long, Josie had to know as much. She said it anyway. She had faith. Maybe that would do.

When she saw Colin didn’t feel like talking, she shrugged and walked away. He might sit there moping, her attitude declared, but she had work to do.

It was getting toward noon when Rodney Ellis came over to Colin’s desk. “Want to go to Heinrich’s for lunch?” the black detective asked. Caroline had also called to invite him to stay away from the funeral. He was getting the same kind of almost silent treatment Colin was, too. If anything, he was getting it worse. He’d run the Darren Pitcavage bust. And he was black, which sure didn’t make his life any easier.

“Hey, why not? I’m accomplishing so much here.” Colin grabbed his slicker. It had been raining when he pedaled in this morning. The minister would probably say the heavens were weeping for Mike Pitcavage. Ministers said that kind of stuff. Just because they said it didn’t make it so.

It was still raining-drizzling, anyhow. Luckily, the Hofbrau and Sushi Bar was close. On the way, Rodney asked, “So how do you like being a nigger, man?”

“Say what?” Colin wondered if he’d heard that right.

“How do you like being a nigger?” Rodney repeated. He laughed harshly. “Yeah, I know-if you called me that, I’d clock you. But it’s sure as hell how they’re treating you since Mike decided to punch out for good. They leave you out of everything. They do their best to pretend you aren’t around, even when you are. That’s what being a nigger in a white man’s world is all about, or part of what it’s about, anyway. Welcome to the club, dude.” He held out a hand.

Colin shook it. “Thanks. Thanks a bunch. If it wasn’t for the honor of the thing, I’d rather walk.”

If you had to be a restaurant these days, a Japanese-German restaurant was the right kind. You could still get raw fish, or squid and octopus if you couldn’t. And German cuisine ran to the kinds of things people raised in a cold country. Potatoes. Turnips. Pork if you happened to have a pig. It might not be exciting food, but it was there.

They took a long lunch. When they got back, the station had filled up. The cops and clerks and secretaries had returned from the memorial park. “How was it?” Colin asked Gabe Sanchez-somehow, Caroline had left him off her we-don’t-want-his-kind-here list.

“Not so good.” Gabe hesitated, then went on, “Better you hear it from me than from somebody else, I guess. The preacher didn’t quite come out and say you put the rubber band around Mike’s neck to hold the bag in place. Not quite-but he might as well have.”

“Christ! Just what I need!” Colin said. “Let me guess-a bunch of people bought it, starting with Caroline and Darren.”

“Right the first time.” Gabe nodded unhappily. “I’m sorry, man. I’m sorry as hell. No good deed goes unpunished, is what they say.”

“Yeah, that’s what they say, all right,” Colin agreed. The conventional wisdom wasn’t worth a pitcher of warm piss most of the time. This once, the multiheaded they monster had hit the nail right on the thumb.

* * *

Marshall Ferguson had told his father what he knew. Because he had, one man was in jail and another man was dead. When you were sort of on the edge of making your living as a writer, you thought you knew how powerful words could be. They could make people think. They could make people feel. And there you were at the strings, as if you had a violin or a guitar.

Words could make people die.

He’d never imagined that. If he hadn’t talked to his dad, Mike Pitcavage would still be wearing fancy suits and getting expensive haircuts. It wasn’t as if Marshall had had any great liking for the chief or his son. Getting Darren busted didn’t break his heart. He wouldn’t have been bummed if Mike had resigned in disgrace. He might even have been proud, though he never would have shown it.

But when Mike Pitcavage killed himself. . Marshall wasn’t proud of that. He’d always pretty much skated through life. The worst things that ever happened to him were grandparents passing away and his folks breaking up. He’d been little when his grandparents died one by one, and they hadn’t been young. He’d grieved, yes, but not enormously. And, while the breakup hurt like hell, he knew more people with divorced parents than with fathers and mothers who’d stayed together.

He didn’t know anybody else who’d driven someone to suicide. Vanessa might have wanted to, to show what a femme fatale she was. That was different, though. For one thing, it was bullshit. For another, even if it weren’t, dying for unrequited love was a long way from dying because your son was looking at a felony rap.

No way could he talk to his friends about any of this. If they found out the chief’s suicide had rocked him, they would also have to find out why. He didn’t want them knowing he’d talked to his father.

He couldn’t talk about it with Dad, either. If anything, Dad was hurting worse than he was. A lot of the cops seemed to have decided it was his fault Mike Pitcavage no longer occupied the big office with the window.

“This really sucks, you know?” Marshall said to Kelly. He could talk to her, after a fashion. But she was bound to be hearing it from his father, too. Getting it in stereo was the last thing she needed, especially when she was taking care of Deborah, too.

“It totally sucks,” she agreed. “I’d like to go to the cop shop and bash their stupid heads together, you know?”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “Like we expected Pitcavage to do that, or wanted him to. No way!” When he said we, he meant I.

For a wonder, she got that. “You did the right thing, Marshall. You-” Deborah chose that moment to wake up with a yowl. “One moment, please,” Kelly said, like an old-time telephone operator.

She came back with the baby and started nursing her. For modesty’s sake, she covered her breast with a blanket. It didn’t bother her, but she’d discovered it did bother Marshall.

For a bigger wonder, she remembered what she’d been saying when she got interrupted, and picked up where she’d left off: “You did the right thing. You can’t help it if Mike Pitcavage did a back flip into an empty pool on account of it. That’s not your fault.”

Marshall desperately wanted to believe it wasn’t, but he couldn’t help asking, “Whose fault is it, then?”

“His. Or Darren’s, for dealing drugs to begin with. Or nobody’s. Sometimes stuff just happens. The supervolcano wasn’t anyone’s fault. It just happened.”

“People aren’t like that, though. I don’t think they are, anyhow.” Marshall believed in free will. But if he was predestined to believe in it, how much good would that do him?

“Well, I don’t, either,” Kelly admitted. “Would turning it into a story make it any clearer in your own mind? Or I guess I mean, would that make it any better for you? I know you’ve got some of your story ideas by taking off from things you went through.”

She paid enough attention to him to notice something like that! The only other person who did was his father, and Dad paid such close attention that half the time Marshall wished he wouldn’t. Right now he felt like that about the whole thing with the Pitcavages.

Which didn’t answer her question. Slowly, Marshall said, “When I do that, I, like, file the serial numbers off first, know what I mean? I don’t see any way to do that with this one. And it doesn’t look like the kind of story that’s got a happy ending for anybody.”

“No, it doesn’t, does it?” Kelly nodded. “Stories don’t have to, though.”

“No, they don’t. But the ones that don’t are a lot harder to sell.” Marshall wouldn’t have thought of it in those terms if not for the lessons from his still-struggling career. He’d sent out a couple of pieces he’d been proud of, to have them come back over and over with rejections that said something on the order of We’d like to see more from you, only not so gloomy next time.

Kelly raised an eyebrow. “I hadn’t looked at it like that. You don’t see many tragedies on TV, either.”

“Part of it, I guess, is that most people’s lives are pretty miserable a lot of the time. They don’t need stories to remind them about it-or editors sure don’t think they do,” Marshall said. “That’s always been so, I bet, but it’s got worse since the supervolcano blew.”

“Everything’s got worse since the supervolcano blew.” After two or three seconds, Kelly corrected herself: “Almost everything. I’m married to your father now, and I wasn’t before. And we’ve got this little portable air-raid siren here now, too.” She grabbed one of Deborah’s pajamaed feet. The baby hardly knew she had feet yet. Marshall remembered John Henry discovering his. Tiny people could be pretty goddamn funny. That was bound to be one of the things that kept their parents from booting them.

“You know what? I think she looks like you,” Marshall said. Talking about his half-sister was one way not to dwell on the bigger problems of Life, the Universe, and Everything.

“Babies look like babies, is what babies look like.” But Kelly went on, “You really think so?”

“I do,” Marshall said. “Dad’s face is kinda squarer than yours, and a kid with his nose would already have a bigger one than she’s got. Take a look at Vanessa’s baby pictures if you don’t believe me. He takes after Dad more than Rob or me.”

“Well. .” Kelly, Rob realized belatedly, didn’t want to look at Vanessa’s baby photo. She slid Deborah out from under the light blanket and raised her to a shoulder. “I sort of thought the same thing, but I wasn’t sure. I know my folks think she does, but they aren’t exactly objective.”

“No, huh?” Marshall said. They both laughed.

Kelly quickly sobered, though. “I hope this story has a happy ending. It’s eating up your father, too.”

So much for babies. So much for distraction. “Yeah, I know,” Marshall said. “He’d be even worse if it wasn’t for you.”

“Thanks. That’s one of the sweetest things anybody ever told me,” Kelly said. “I just wish I could do more. I wish anybody could do more. . ” Deborah burped lustily, then spat up. Babies could be distracting in all kinds of ways.

* * *

Colin Ferguson chained his bike to the rack outside the San Atanasio Police Station. Some people made a point of greeting him as he walked to his desk. More made a point of pretending he didn’t exist. It had been like that ever since Caroline Pitcavage found her husband’s body. He kept hoping things would loosen up-a hope looking more forlorn by the day.

“Good morning, Lieutenant!” his secretary said loudly. She left no doubt about whose side she was on.

“Hey, Josie,” Colin answered, at a much lower volume. He wished there were no sides to be on. His wish seemed no more likely to be granted than his hope.

On his desk was a report about a home-invasion robbery from two nights before, at an old tract house near Sword Beach and 135th Street. The bad guys hadn’t shot anybody, but they’d had guns. Jesus Villarobles, the homeowner, was still at San Atanasio Memorial with a concussion from the pistol-whipping they’d given him.

He turned the page. Had they left fingerprints behind? Things would be easier if they had. Before he could find out, his phone rang. He picked it up. “Colin Ferguson, San Atanasio PD.”

“Hello, Lieutenant. This is Lucy Chen, over in the lab. Could I see you for a few minutes, please?”

“Sure,” Colin said, thinking Nice anybody wants to. “What’s cooking?”

“I’d rather talk about it here than over the phone, if that’s all right.”

“O-kay. Be right over.” Colin didn’t scratch his head, but he wanted to. He felt eyeballs boring into his back as he got up and walked out of the big, communal office. He might have been doing nothing more dramatic than taking a leak. Those eyeballs skewered him anyway.

The lab was down the hall, a couple of doors past the men’s room. The air inside it held a faint chemical odor. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it was always there.

“What’s going on?” Colin asked Lucy. Whatever it was, he felt sure it would be something he needed to know about and no one else did. The DNA tech didn’t get excited without a good reason, or sometimes even with one-yet another reason she reminded Colin of his wife.

“This is a DNA analysis I ran last night,” Lucy Chen said, handing him a printout. “Tell me what you make of it.”

Colin wasn’t a DNA expert. He wasn’t a fingerprint expert, either, but he made a pretty fair amateur. He made a pretty fair amateur at DNA patterns, too, also because his line of work had turned him into one. And the pattern on the printout looked familiar. He’d seen it, or one much like it, way too many times. He whistled softly. “Lucy, if this isn’t the South Bay Strangler’s DNA, it’s mighty darn close.”

“It isn’t.” She took another printout off the countertop and gave it to him. “This one is from the Strangler.”

He held one in each hand. Excitement tingled through him. They were close. A break! At last, a break! After so many years, a break! If you had a relative’s DNA, you at least knew who the perp’s relative was, which put you a hell of a lot closer to grabbing him, too. He hefted the printout that didn’t come from the Strangler. “So, who does this belong to?”

She looked at it. She looked at him. “Darren Pitcavage,” she answered.

“You’re kidding,” he said automatically. One look at her face told him she wasn’t. He floundered: “But that’s crazy. It’s impossible. If that one’s from Darren, who-?” He ran out of words, but waved the other printout.

“It may be crazy. It is not impossible. We did the autopsy on the chief just a few days ago, so I had easy access to a DNA sample from him.” Lucy handed Colin one more printout. “This is from Darren’s father.”

He examined it. He examined the Strangler’s pattern. No, he wasn’t a DNA expert, but he was a pretty fair amateur. He was plenty good enough to understand what he was seeing. “They’re the same,” he said dully. “Mike Pitcavage’s DNA and the South Bay Strangler’s DNA are the same.”

“That’s right.” Lucy Chen’s mouth twisted as her head bobbed up and down. “I didn’t want to believe it, either. I still don’t want to believe it. But that’s what the evidence shows. Unless the chief has an identical twin I don’t know about. .”

“He doesn’t.” Almost blindly, Colin reached for the countertop. He needed something to steady himself. Who wouldn’t, with the underpinnings of his world knocked out from under him? Yes, cops went bad. That was why police departments needed internal-affairs units. But bad like this? “Jesus!” he choked out.

“Are you all right?” Lucy sounded genuinely alarmed. What did he look like? How gray had he gone? He wasn’t just pale-he was sure of that.

And he wasn’t all right, either-nowhere close-so he answered, “No.” Before Lucy could ease him down into a chair or start CPR or do whatever else she thought he needed, he made haste to add, “But it’s nothing you can do anything about. It’s nothing anybody can do anything about, not any more.”

“No, not any more,” the DNA tech agreed.

Almost in spite of itself, Colin’s mind started working again. Things that hadn’t added up before suddenly made a lot more sense. “Well, now we know why he killed himself,” he ground out.

“That also occurred to me,” Lucy said. “No arrest. No trial. No jail cell. No waiting for them to stick the needle in his arm, if they ever get around to it. He took the easy way out.”

“He sure did,” Colin said grimly. “And now I understand why he always worked so hard to keep Darren from catching a felony rap. He wasn’t just playing softhearted daddy. You get arrested for a felony, you have to give your DNA sample. And that would have pointed at him along with his worthless kid. No wonder he went off the deep end when Darren landed in trouble too deep for daddy to get him off. He totally flipped out-at me, mostly.”

“I heard. . something about that,” Lucy said. Colin wasn’t surprised. A police department was like any other small town. News got around fast. The cops smoking in the parking lot had heard Mike Pitcavage melt down. Their stories wouldn’t have shrunk in the telling.

Once Colin’s brain started grinding away, it didn’t want to stop. “Remember how, when we were at poor Mrs. Mandelbaum’s house, he knew his way around like he’d been there before? He, uh, darn well had.”

“I do remember!” Lucy Chen exclaimed. “I didn’t think much of it then, but I do. I just thought he’d been in a hundred places like it, so he’d kind of know where all the rooms were.”

“Uh-huh. Exactly what I figured, too,” Colin said. “He was a cop for a long time. Of course he’d seen places like that before. Right. He sure had.”

“Hadn’t he, though?” Lucy clicked her tongue between her teeth. “Where. . Where do we go from here?”

Colin didn’t answer directly, not right away. “Who else knows, besides you and me?”

“As soon as I was sure, I told Dr. Ishikawa and showed him the results,” she said. “He told me to call you.”

I owe the coroner one, Colin thought. Yes, Ishikawa would have told Lucy to call him because he’d been chasing the South Bay Strangler so long. But Colin judged that wasn’t the only reason. Ishikawa would also know what was going on in the department. Nobody could blame Colin for the chief’s sudden shuffling off this mortal coil now.

He made himself come back to the business immediately at hand. “Okay. Good, even,” he said. “But this will have to get out. Not just to us-to all the other departments who’ve been after the Strangler.” He let out a long, regretful sigh. “It’ll have to get out to the TV and the papers, too. The suicide already has. San Atanasio’s gonna be in the news for a while. So will I. And so will you, I’m afraid. Get used to it.”

Lucy winced. “Can I go on vacation for about the next three years?”

“You wish!” Colin said. By her expression, Lucy did. You didn’t go into her racket because you wanted your mug on TV. You didn’t go into geology for the media exposure, either. Kelly’d survived it, back when the supervolcano was warming up for the big show. Colin was sure Lucy also would. He went on, “For now, though, give me enough time to get back to my desk, then call Neil Schneider and ask him to come in. I’m not gonna say boo. Let somebody else get the word out.”

“Okay.” She sent him a shrewd look. “He’s one of the people who aren’t real happy with you right now, isn’t he?”

“Yup.” Colin didn’t waste time pretending he didn’t know what she was talking about. “I don’t even know whether he’d believe it hearing it from me. He will from you, though. He’d better.”

“All right, Lieutenant. I’ll do that, then.” Lucy spread her hands. “This is gonna be pretty horrible, isn’t it?”

“It won’t be anywhere near that good,” he answered. She laughed as if he were joking. They both knew too well he wasn’t.

As soon as he came back into the central office, the dueling cones of overdone greetings and angry silence surrounded him again. He sat down at his desk and tried to do some useful work on the home-invasion robbery. The clock on the wall insisted he’d been in the lab less than twenty minutes. It only felt like years.

Sergeant Schneider’s phone rang. He talked for a moment, then got up and headed for the door Colin had just used. Colin watched him out of the corner of his eye. As far as he could tell, he was the only one who did. When he himself moved around, everybody’s gaze followed him. Maybe he could shed that, too.

For now, he waited. When Schneider came back in, he looked like someone who’d taken a left hook right on the button. He headed straight for Colin’s desk. That made people stare at him, all right. Talking with the enemy, was he?

He was. He sat down on-sank down onto-the chair by the desk. Like a spooked horse’s, his eyes showed white all around the iris. “My God!” he said.

“Yeah.” Colin nodded. He saw no point in gloating. He didn’t want to gloat. He wanted to cry, and he couldn’t do that, either. He wondered if Caroline Pitcavage would be able to cry when she found out. That would be for later. More collateral damage, he thought miserably.

“Lieutenant, I’ve been kind of mad at you since. . since. . Well, you know since when,” Schneider said. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry as hell. It wasn’t your fault, not in any bad way.” He held out a hesitant hand.

Colin took it. “Thanks, Neil. Don’t worry about it. I know how you felt. Lord, I felt the same way myself half the time. I did.” His voice hardened. “But I sure don’t any more.”

“I hope not! Neither do I. Neither will anybody, once I talk to a few people and they talk to some people, too. But I wanted to come to you first.”

“Well, thanks. Some of them won’t want to believe you, you know.”

“Hey, I didn’t want to believe Lucy, either. Who would? But there’s the DNA.”

“Uh-huh. There’s the DNA. I still don’t want to believe it. It all fits together too well not to, though,” Colin said.

“It does, doesn’t it?” With some effort, Schneider got to his feet. As he’d said he would, he started talking to people. Some of them did believe him. Some stormed off to the lab to see if he was making it up. Some who’d been angry at Colin came over to his desk to apologize-some, but not all. Well, in a world full of human beings, that was as much as you could hope for.

Not quite half an hour after Sergeant Schneider started spreading the word, Colin’s phone rang. “Grab that for me, will you, Josie?” he called-he was talking with two cops and a secretary.

“Sure thing,” she answered proudly. She’d been on the right side all along. A moment later, she said, “Lieutenant, it’s a reporter from Channel Two. He wants to talk to you. Right away, he says.” By her expression, she was trying to tell him it wasn’t her fault.

Colin knew that-not that it would help. He sighed one more time. “Thanks, Josie. Put him through.” Yes, it was beginning.