Time I dealt with my in-box. Predictably, I had several urgent messages from Bernie, wanting to know why I hadn’t been in touch and where was August??? Since she’d already texted me four times today, I wrote a snarky reply, then deleted it: no reason to take out my frustrations over my lack of progress on Bernie. I wrote jointly to her and Angela: “It’s a slow business, and I’m having trouble picking up a thread in a strange town, so hang tight for a few more days, okay?”

One thing I’d like someone on the ground in Chicago to do was canvas August’s neighbors in the evening, when people would be home from work, but that was a job for the Streeter brothers, not two impetuous young athletes. I sent Tim Streeter a long e-mail with the details of what I wanted and then turned to the hardest message, the no-progress report to the client.

For help with that, I poured myself a generous shot of Johnnie Walker while I explained to Troy Hempel what I’d done and who I would talk to in the morning.

“If the churches and her childhood home prove dead ends, I could retrace the road back to Fort Riley, to see if anything happened to Ferring and August on the way. It’s eighty miles with a lot of small towns in between and might take several days to cover. My opinion—it’s a needle in a haystack, but if you want me to do it, I’m game. Let me know.”

When I’d finished that, I started working through my in-box—seventy-three new e-mails since this morning, including, of course, the piercing bleats from politicians and Nigerian princes, desperate for two hundred or even just five dollars, whatever I could spare, the situation is dire.

Two clients had problems I could solve long-distance. Mr. Contreras had written a chatty message from St. Croix, filled with goodwill and the endearing typos of a hunt-and-pecker. I wrote back, mostly highlights from my visit to Fort Riley, which a veteran of Anzio would care about, and included a photo that Dr. Dan had sent from Wisconsin of Mitch stalking a chipmunk.

I’d written Jake this morning before my visit to the Lawrence Police Department, when it had been 3:00 p.m. in Basel. It was 3:00 a.m. there now, and he hadn’t had time to fit in a response.

No estés lejos de mí un solo día. The Neruda sonnet that Peter Lieberson had set to music for his wife came into my mind. Do not be far from me for a single day. Jake used to play the melody for me over Skype when he was on tour, and I had worked hard on the song so I could sing it to him when he’d been in Australia for six weeks last year. Now—not even an e-mail.