“That’s impossible!” Brazil exclaimed. “Those are my details! How could he know the stuff about the bloody money, the washcloth, any of it! He wasn’t there!”

“Andy, please lower your voice.”

Lights were blinking on. Dogs were barking. Hammer stood.

“It’s not fair. I play by the rules.” Brazil felt as if his life were over. “I cooperate with you, help as much as I can. And get crucified for it.” He got up, too, the swing moving, slowly swaying, and empty.

“You can’t stop doing what’s right just because others do things that are wrong.” She spoke quietly and from experience as she opened the door that would lead her back inside her fine home. “We’ve done some pretty wonderful things, Andy. I hope you won’t let this ruin it.”

Her face was kind but sad as she looked at him. He felt the ache in his heart, and his stomach was doing something strange, too. He was sweating and chilled as he stared at her, unable to imagine what it must have been like for her children to be raised by such a person.

“Are you all right?” Hammer thought he was acting oddly.

“I don’t know what my problem is.” He wiped his face with his hands. “I think I’ve been trying to get sick or something. It’s none of my business, but is your husband all right?”

“A flesh wound,” she replied, weary and depressed again as moths fluttered past, into her house, where soon they would die from pesticide.

Misfires rarely occurred with double-action revolvers. But when Hammer had demanded that Seth return the .38 to her, he had gotten angry and mean. He’d had enough of being bossed around by this woman, who next would begin searching him and his bedroom. There was no way out. Unfortunately, she’d walked in before he’d had a chance to stash the gun in a place she couldn’t find it. Worse, Seth had been sleeping in a drunken position that had resulted in tingling and numbness in his right hand. When he had decided to send this same hand down to his crotch to fish out the revolver, it had not been a wise move. It was also Seth’s bad luck that the one time he did not want the cartridge lined up with the firing pin was precisely then.

“His left buttock,” Hammer was explaining to Brazil, who was inside the house with her now, because she could not leave her front door open all night.

Brazil looked around at vibrant oriental rugs on polished hardwood floors, at fine oil paintings and handsome furniture in warm fabrics and rich leathers. He was standing in the foyer of Chief Hammer’s splendid restored home, and no one else was around. It was just the two of them, and he began sweating profusely again. If she noticed, she did not let on.

“They’ll X-ray, of course,” she was saying, “to make certain the bullet isn’t lodged close to anything important.”