Maggie scooted down the gentle slope to the water. There, she could imagine Finn tucked behind the brush, crouched down, binoculars in hand, zooming in on the pretty young face a hundred yards away. When she studied the area, however, she didn’t see any remnants of someone lurking there. She would get the ev techs to come back and examine the spot in detail, but she wasn’t optimistic.

Frustrated, Maggie retraced her steps up the slope. When she pushed her way back onto the main trail, she was surprised to find a man watching her, no more than ten feet away.

It was Clark Biggs.

“Oh!” Maggie exclaimed. “Mr. Biggs. I’ve been looking for you.”

Clark nodded but said nothing. His hands were jammed in his pockets. He hadn’t shaved, and he looked as if he hadn’t slept. Maggie thought that big men always took it hardest. The burly ones were used to thinking of themselves as strong, but when it came to something like this, a strong man was nothing in the face of disaster. His muscles didn’t matter. His courage didn’t matter.

“Why are you here?” she asked.

“Talking to Mary,” he said.

“I understand.”

“She loved the water,” he continued. “It’s so ironic, because the water is what killed her. I used to take her down to the Wisconsin Point, and we’d spend hours on the beach there. She hated to leave. It was her favorite place.”

Maggie said nothing.

“Tell me you found this bastard.”

“We’re pursuing some promising leads, but I don’t want to get your hopes up, because this could all come to nothing. But I do need your help.”

“Anything.”

Maggie took a breath. “If you don’t mind my asking, how are you? I can only imagine what you’re going through. And your ex-wife, too. I know that families are often reluctant to get help, but there are people you can talk to.”

“I don’t want that kind of help,” Clark said.

“If you should change your mind, call me. I can give you some names.”

“I know a little about you, Ms. Bei. I know you lost someone close to you earlier this year, too.”

“Losing a husband isn’t the same as losing your daughter,” Maggie said. She didn’t add that Eric’s murder had come at a time when their marriage was largely over, when their love had wasted away to contempt.

Clark shrugged. “Loss is loss. Just tell me, how can I help? I want to see this man rotting away behind bars where he belongs.”

Maggie reached into the pocket of her shorts and extracted an eight-by-eight postcard with six photos pasted in two rows. All the photos were from driver’s license records. All the men were bald, in their forties.

“I’d like you to look carefully at this photo array and tell me if you recognize any of the men here.”

Clark took the wrinkled postcard from her hand and held it up at arm’s length from his face. Maggie watched his eyes as he studied each photo. He hesitated at the man in the upper right corner, then moved on. When he was done, he went back to that photo and squinted at it for nearly a minute. Finally, he tapped the picture with his finger.