‘I’m afraid I know.’ He winced. ‘He’s taunting us, showing his contempt. He’s playing his games, only it’s getting worse.’

‘It’s getting much worse. But we shouldn’t focus only on him,’ I said.

He listened, eyes locked on mine, hands folded on the case file of the murdered man he had just been discussing on the phone.

‘It would be all too easy to become so obsessed with Gault that we don’t really work the cases. For example, it is very important to identify this woman we think he murdered in Central Park.’

‘I would assume everyone thinks that’s important, Kay.’

‘Everyone will say they think it is important,’ I replied, and anger began quietly stirring. ‘But in fact, the cops, the Bureau want to catch Gault, and identifying this homeless lady isn’t a priority. She’s just another poor, nameless person prisoners will bury in Potter’s Field.’

‘Obviously, she is a priority to you.’

‘Absolutely.’

‘Why?’

‘I think she has something yet to say to us.’

‘About Gault?’

‘Yes.’

‘On what are you basing this?’

‘Instinct,’ I said. ‘And she’s a priority because we are bound morally and professionally to do everything we can for her. She has a right to be buried with her name.’

‘Of course she does. NYPD, the Transit Police, the Bureau - we all want her identified.’

But I did not believe him. ‘We really don’t care,’ I flatly said. ‘Not the cops, not the medical examiners, and not this unit. We already know who killed her, so who she is no longer matters. That’s the black and white of it when you’re talking about a jurisdiction as overwhelmed by violence as New York is.’

Wesley stared off, running his tapered fingers over a Mont Blanc pen. ‘I’m afraid there’s some truth in what you’re saying.’ He looked back at me. ‘We don’t care because we can’t. It isn’t because we don’t want to. I want Gault caught before he kills again. That’s my bottom line.’

‘As it should be. And we don’t know that this dead woman can’t help with that. Maybe she will.’

I saw depression and felt it in the weariness of his voice. ‘It would seem her only link to Gault is that they met in the museum,’ he said. ‘We’ve been through her personal effects, and nothing among them might lead us to him. So my question is, what else might you learn from her that would help us catch him?’

‘I don’t know,‘1 said. ‘But when I have unidentified cases in Virginia, I don’t rest until I’ve done all I can to solve them. This case is in New York, but I’m involved because I work with your unit and you have been invited into the investigation.’