Tell me about it, Hodges thinks, but this time he doesn’t think she is, and says so.

Holly says, “You told me you didn’t think Janice Ellerton would take anything from a man in a mended parka and workman’s clothes.”

“Indeed I did.”

“So that means . . .”

Now he’s the one who stays silent, letting her work it out.

“It means two men were up to something. Two. One gave Janice Ellerton the Zappit and the bogus questionnaire while she was shopping, and the other watched her house from across the street. And with binoculars! Expensive binoculars! I guess those two men might not have been working together, but . . .”

He waits. Smiling a little. When Holly turns her thinking processes up to ten, he can almost hear the cogs spinning behind her forehead.

“Bill, are you still there?”

“Yeah. Just waiting for you to spit it out.”

“Well, it seems like they must have been. To me, anyway. And like they might have had something to do with those two women being dead. There, are you happy?”

“Yes, Holly. I am. I’ve got a doctor’s appointment tomorrow at nine thirty—”

“Your test results came back?”

“Yeah. I want to set up a meeting beforehand with Pete and Isabelle. Does eight thirty work for you?”

“Of course.”

“We’ll lay out everything, tell them about Alderson and the game console you found and the house at 1588. See what they think. Sound okay?”

“Yes, but she won’t think anything.”

“You could be wrong.”

“Yes. And the sky could turn green with red polka dots tomorrow. Now go make yourself something to eat.”

Hodges assures her he will, and heats up a can of chicken noodle soup while watching the early news. He eats most of it, spacing out each spoonful, cheering himself on: You can do it, you can do it.

While he’s rinsing the bowl, the pain on the left side of his abdomen returns, along with those tentacles curling around to his lower back. It seems to plunge up and down with every heartbeat. His stomach clenches. He thinks of running to the bathroom, but it’s too late. He leans over the sink instead, vomiting with his eyes closed. He keeps them that way as he fumbles for the faucet and turns it on full to rinse away the mess. He doesn’t want to see what just came out of him, because he can taste a slime of blood in his mouth and throat.

Oy, he thinks, I am in trouble here.

I am in such trouble.

14

Eight PM.

When her doorbell rings, Ruth Scapelli is watching some stupid reality program which is just an excuse to show young men and women running around in their small clothes. Instead of going directly to the door, she slipper-scuffs into the kitchen and turns on the monitor for the security cam mounted on the porch. She lives in a safe neighborhood, but it doesn’t pay to take chances; one of her late mother’s favorite sayings was scum travels.