I said as much to Durkin. He switched off the shaver, reached for the photographs, went through them carefully and deliberately. “It’s hard to see her hands in some of these,” he complained. “All right, there’s definitely no ring on that hand. What’s that, the left hand? No ring on the left hand. Now in this shot, okay, definitely no ring on that hand. Wait a minute. Shit, that’s the left hand again. It’s not clear in this one. Okay, here we go. That’s definitely her right hand and there’s no ring on it.” He gathered the photos together like cards to be shuffled and dealt. “No ring,” he said. “What’s that prove?”

“She had a ring when I saw her. Both times I saw her.”

“And?”

“And it disappeared. It’s not at her apartment. There’s a ring in her jewelry box, a high school class ring, but that’s not what I remember seeing on her hand.”

“Maybe your memory’s false.”

I shook my head. “The class ring doesn’t even have a stone. I went over there before I came here, just to check my memory. It’s one of those klutzy school rings with too much lettering on it. It’s not what she was wearing. She wouldn’t have worn it, not with this mink and the wine-colored nails.”

I wasn’t the only one who’d said so. After my little epiphany with the bit of broken glass, I’d gone straight to Kim’s apartment, then used her phone to call Donna Campion. “It’s Matt Scudder,” I said. “I know it’s late, but I wanted to ask you about a line in your poem.”

She’d said, “What line? What poem?”

“Your poem about Kim. You gave me a copy.”

“Oh, yes. Just give me a moment, will you? I’m not completely awake.”

“I’m sorry to call so late, but—”

“That’s all right. What was the line?”

“Shatter / Wine bottles at her feet, let green glass / Sparkle upon her hand.”

“Sparkle’s wrong.”

“I’ve got the poem right here, it says—”

“Oh, I know that’s what I wrote,” she said, “but it’s wrong. I’ll have to change it. I think. What about the line?”

“Where did you get the green glass from?”

“From the shattered wine bottles.”

“Why green glass on her hand? What’s it a reference to?”

“Oh,” she said. “Oh, I see what you mean. Her ring.”

“She had a ring with a green stone, didn’t she?”

“That’s right.”

“How long did she have it?”

“I don’t know.” She thought it over. “The first time I saw it was just before I wrote the poem.”

“You’re sure of that?”