“They’re here and then they’re there, and sometimes they don’t know the difference, and if you let them, they’ll keep making that the whole point of everything they’re doing to the city. They’ll break you down by not telling you what you already know, should already know, because that’s the way they operate. Knowledge is the lack they seek in us, and when they find it, they turn the key, open a window, and it’s all back to where we started.”

Finch endured the rant from the madman outside the hotel, then made his way back to the station.

The suspect from yesterday wasn’t in the cage. Instead, an old woman with light blue eyes staring from a face crisscrossed with wrinkles. As if from behind a fence of her own making. She could’ve been a thousand miles away for all the help Finch could give her. Ignored her as a casualty. Ignored Albin quietly feeding her questions like he was at a zoo. Continued on to his desk.

More of the same from the detectives around him. Indifference, absence, fear, boredom. Blakely and Gustat as always inseparable, whether in agreement or argument. Skinner out on a call, about to tell a man his missing wife was probably dead. Dapple drawing something on a piece of paper. Lost in another world.

Wyte had turned away from him for once and was hunched over as if Finch were trying to cheat from him on a test. He looked bulky, blotchy.

Finch leaned over. “Don’t let your pencil burn up.”

Wyte grimaced, said, “I’m busy, Finchy. Really. I am.” And kept writing. It looked incomprehensible to Finch.

“Last will and testament?” Wished he hadn’t said it.

“Shut up, Finchy,” Wyte said. Still scribbling.

“I’m not pathologically reporting on evidence I haven’t gathered yet,” Finch said, “and they haven’t come to cart me away.”

“You’re just lucky,” Wyte mumbled.

A light green stain began to spread across the back of Wyte’s blue shirt.

Finch cleared space on his desk. Brought the typewriter over. One of the best models Hoegbotton had ever made. A hulking twenty-pound monster that reminded Finch of just what Ambergris could accomplish back in the day. Hundreds of thousands had been shipped out to cities up and down the River Moth. “Combat-ready” went the slogan, and it wasn’t a joke.

Looked at his notes. Didn’t want to tell Heretic about everything he’d found. Not until he knew more about what the words meant. Discounted the symbol entirely. Even though it had burned its way into his head. “Focus on what you can control. The rest is just distraction.” Something his father used to say.

What could he report that was solid? A few moments gazing into space. Then he started to type. Stopped when he got to a part that bothered him.