“But I warned you,” he said. “There is no going back.”

She felt fear but forced a laugh. “What are you talking about? We can’t stay out here all night. We’re not fish.”

It was then the stranger’s face began to melt. His nose and ears fell away, like chunks of unheated clay left to dissolve in water. Even the hand that held her own fingers seemed to disintegrate. But she was able to hear him as he spoke, even though his mouth had vanished and had been replaced by silver scales. At last she understood that he was speaking only in her mind; that he had never really used his mouth to form words.

“But I am a fish. And now you will be a fish too, Mai Mai. Because you have betrayed the love of a good husband, you have become what you hate. For the rest of your life you will swim these cold waters, alone, and never again walk on land.”

Mai Mai wept in terror. “How is this possible? Why did you come to me?”

“You brought me here. You created me.”

She felt her limbs dissolving, her face changing into a slippery mass.

“But I want to go home! I want to be with my husband!”

“It is too late.”

Mai Mai looked over and the stranger was gone. In his place was a huge fish. Her own body felt changed and foreign. She was too scared to look at what she had become. “But I didn’t know!” she cried. “You didn’t even smell like a fish!”

“It has always been this way, Mai Mai. In the same way a fish cannot smell itself, a cheating wife never sees herself as unfaithful.”

Those were their last words together. A wave came and they were pulled under. And there Mai Mai stayed, cold and lost and alone, for the remainder of her life.

“A FISH cannot smell itself,” Kelly whispered to herself. Betrayal and revenge, the Acid Man’s message—both present in the tale. It could not be a coincidence. The Acid Man must be referring to Mai Mai. But how did he find out about the story? Was he as Slate suspected—a meticulous killer with a vast literary background? To think, just two hours ago she had mocked the Acid Man’s quotes as too general. Kelly had to remind herself that Slate was no dummy.

Plus there was another reference the Acid Man had made. It had been right in front of her, and yet she had failed to see it. In each killing, he had spoken of how the women—with their infidelities—were causing holes in their husband’s hearts. Then he had turned around and burned a hole in their hearts. Why did he choose that particular form of execution? Obviously, there was an excellent chance his heart had been broken by a woman, but he was not fixated on just any kind of hole. For example, he never stabbed a woman in the heart.