“Tell you what,” Bosch added, “why don’t you go out first and see if you can find some boxes. We’re going to be taking a lot of files out of here.”

Chastain left the office without a word. Bosch glanced at Rider and saw her give him a look that told him he was acting like an asshole.

“What?”

“Nothing. I’ll be in the file room.”

She left then, leaving just Langwiser and Bosch.

“Everything okay, Detective?”

“Everything’s fine. I’m going to get to work now. Do what I can until we hear about your special master.”

“Look, I’m sorry. But you called me out here to advise you and this is what I advise. I still think it is the right way to go.”

“Well, we’ll see.”

For most of the next hour Bosch methodically went through Elias’s desk, studying the man’s belongings, appointment calendar and paperwork. Most of his time was spent reading through a series of notebooks in which Elias had kept reminders to himself, lists of things to do, pencil drawings and general notes from phone calls. Each notebook was dated on the outside cover. It appeared that Elias filled the pages of one book every week or so with his voluminous notations and doodles. Nothing in the books jumped out at Bosch as being pertinent to the investigation. But he also knew that so little about the circumstances of Elias’s murder was known that something seeming unimportant in the notebooks at the moment might become important later.

Before starting to page through the most recent notebook, Bosch was interrupted by another call from Edgar.

“Harry, you said there was a message on the phone machine?”

“That’s right.”

“There ain’t now.”

Bosch leaned back in Elias’s chair and closed his eyes.

“Goddammit.”

“Yeah, it’s been cleared. I dicked around with it and it’s not a tape. Messages are stored on a microchip. The chip was cleared.”

“Okay,” Bosch replied, angrily. “Continue the search. When you’re done, talk to the security people about who’s been in and out of that place. See if they’ve got any video points in the lobby or parking garage. Somebody went in there after I left.”

“What about Chastain? He was with you, wasn’t he?”

“I’m not worried about Chastain.”

He flipped the phone closed and got up and went to the window. He hated the feeling growing inside — that he was being worked by the case, rather than the other way around.