Maybe I don’t like the idea of you locking her up. Maybe I believe she has critical work to do, and that the stakes for the human race could not be higher.

Two hours earlier, before our initial departure from DivSix, I had handed Manning a quickie report, gleaned by me from overseas trial transcripts and airline passenger manifests.

Ellie Landau, it turns out, has assisted in the defense of both Russian “LV” victims when they were charged with crimes by the Kremlin.

She was in Russia on four separate occasions.

As a foreigner, Ms. Landau could not officially represent the accused. But she stood present to aid their domestic counsels. She was in Moscow at the time Russian Victim #2, Alexsandr Golokoff, was murdered.

I have found as well, on Instagram, a video from January 2031. The tape is of Ms. Landau praying at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. The caption identifies her as part of a delegation from the United States. The group was led by the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

MANNING

They know each other, don’t they? All of them.

ELLIE LANDAU

To whom do you refer, Detective?

MANNING

Stop breaking my balls.

ELLIE LANDAU

And how might I do that, Jim? By telling you I believe in the devil? Clearly you do.

MANNING

I’m a Catholic, Ms. Landau. I believe in everything.

The courthouse at Centre Street shuts down when the last auxiliary power generator crashes. It’s 3:40 in the afternoon. We still haven’t received a hearing. Over Ellie Landau’s objections Manning compels the traveling troupe back to DivSix’s offices and begins the interrogation.

MANNING

Where did you first meet Instancer?

RACHEL

On a dig. An archaeological dig in Israel.

Rachel turns to the button camera mounted in the ceiling of the interrogation room.

RACHEL

The “Gehenna dig.” Look it up, Dewey. November to January 2031.

(to Manning)

He said he was a graduate student from Columbia, studying at Bar-Ilan University for the semester.

MANNING

And you believed him?

RACHEL

You did.

Ellie Landau again objects to Manning’s hectoring tone. She cites her client’s fraught state, as well as her history of emotional instability. She threatens Manning with administrative action if he continues in this “truculent and confrontational” manner.

Manning takes a breath.

He resumes.

If Ms. Davidson is indeed a rabbi, why is she living like a street person?

If she is truly a Ph.D., why is she camping in a van “under the steel”?

Why does she carry no ID, no credit cards, no phone, no money?

How did she come to compile her list of Righteous Men? For what purpose? Whose idea was it?

Again Ellie Landau refuses to let Rachel answer.

ELLIE LANDAU

(to Manning)

Are you familiar with the Hebrew term herem?

MANNING

I’m not familiar with any Hebrew terms.

ELLIE LANDAU

It means excommunication.