Below the code were three additional carvings—a winged hourglass, a smoking urn, and two overlaid symbols of the Freemasons.

I figured that the hourglass with the wings symbolized how time flies. The urn, I wasn’t so sure about. Though I wasn’t a Mason, the compass and the level and plumb line were common enough symbols for me to recognize.

As I scanned the area, the light from my Maglite glinted off something that lay nearly hidden under a mound of freshly overturned dirt roughly the size of a human head. A white glimmer. Shiny and smooth, like clean, sun-bleached bone.

I expected it to be a skull, but when I knelt and carefully brushed away the soil, I found that it was the head of a mannequin. It’d been detached from the rest of the body and now stared up at me with its blank, unblinking eyes.

Blake and his silent ladies.

Mannie directing me to a grave that had a mannequin’s head beside it couldn’t be simply a coincidence.

It wasn’t unusual for Blake to have female mannequins stationed around him where he worked—or where he played. Often they were dressed in lingerie. A psychologist would’ve probably had a field day analyzing him and his fixation with them.

Memento mori.

Remember death.

Yes.

But what significance did it carry?

I tilted the mannequin’s head in my hand. Hollow. Clean and unblemished. Mimetic. How did this fit in with the rest of the case?

After setting it down, I began scouring the area for any other body parts from mannequins and any observers in the shadows, then called for a forensics unit to analyze the soil and the head. Thankfully, the nearest NYPD precinct had a CSI team, and they told me to plan on a six-minute arrival time.

I checked my watch.

9:56.

Okay, well, if ten o’clock was significant in any way, then it looked like I would be here in the graveyard when the team arrived.

Then a thought struck me—maybe there wasn’t someone waiting here for me, but maybe this was a tactic to get me out of the apartment and away from Tessa at a specific time so Mannie or Blake could make a move on her there.

With haste, I called the officers who were stationed outside our building and told them to go in, and to proceed with caution. “Make sure the girl is okay and no one else is there. I told her not to open the door for anyone. You’ll need to show her your badges.”

I texted Tessa that two cops were on their way up and to open the door for them. She replied: What?!

Just let them in, I typed back. I’ll be home soon.