The clerk at the information desk called my name. Everard walked over with me and leaned an elbow on the countertop.

“What’s she after, Sharene?”

“An old file that’s disappeared, Deke. I’m sorry, miss. We’ll put in a message to the clerical staff to hunt around for it in case it got misfiled, but for now it’s just plain missing.”

Everard picked up my request form. “Jenny Perec’s incident report? Why do you want that, Warshawski? You keep telling me and everyone else that the only reason you came down here was to find Emerald Ferring.”

“You don’t need to remind me that I’m failing miserably,” I said. “So I’m grasping at straws. Ms. Ferring’s life intersects with the Perec family in a lot of places. Did you know it was Ferring’s mother who found Cady Perec, saved her life?”

“Before my time. Do you think looking at Jenny Perec’s death certificate will tell you where to find Emerald Ferring?”

“Stranger things have happened. What I really wanted to see was the autopsy report. And I wouldn’t mind knowing what Sheriff Gisborne found in the car when he pulled it out.”

“Mud, that’s what.” Gisborne had appeared in the room: someone must have told him I was here, looking for the file. “Mud and stink. No one goes through a car that’s been in the water, Warshawski.”

“Not even to find any valuables? Or a hint as to who Cady Perec’s father was?”

We were starting to draw a crowd. The foreign detective who attracted death like a blowfly was confronting the sheriff.

“You’re looking for Cady’s father now, Warshawski? Don’t you have enough to do in Chicago?”

“You told me not to leave Douglas County. I’m making hay while the sun shines.”

The homely farm metaphor didn’t endear me to him. “Leave the Perec family alone. If Gertrude Perec wanted to find Cady’s father, she’d have started that search while the trail was still hot.”

“Right, Sheriff. We all know that Gertrude doesn’t want to know. Maybe doesn’t want Cady to find out would be a better way of putting it. If Cady were three, her grandmother could make a case for being her spokesperson, but Cady’s thirty-three, so she gets to choose for herself.”

The sheriff looked at the deputies and clerks hovering in earshot. “Don’t you people have jobs to do? Or has Warshawski cleaned up all the crime in Douglas County, making your jobs unnecessary?”

The crowd melted, although Everard continued to lean against the counter. City employee—his promotions didn’t depend on the sheriff.

Gisborne started to leave as well but stopped in midstride to look back at me. “You asked what I found in the car. The incident report is gone, so how did you know I caught that call?”