“Sometimes it’s what’s missing that gets my attention. And because of the nature of the reigning hypothesis in this particular case, there’s a hell of a lot missing—unexplored avenues, unasked questions. The basic assumption from the beginning was that these murders were identical components of a philosophical statement the killer was making. As soon as everyone accepted that, no one looked at them as individual events that could have different purposes. But it’s possible the murders were not all equally important, or even all done for the same reason. You with me, Jack?”

“Hard to say. You got any specifics?”

“You ever see a movie called The Man with the Black Umbrella?”

He’d never seen it, never even heard of it. So Gurney told him the story, ending with the “what if the snipers shot them all?” speculation he’d raised with Madeleine.

After a long silence, Hardwick asked a variant of one of Madeleine’s questions. “You’re saying that the first five attacks were mistakes? And the shooter finally got lucky with the sixth? Help me understand this. I mean, if he was a professional, like the guys in your movie, what target ID was he given? Just that the target drove a top-of-the-line Mercedes? So he ought to drive around at night, shoot through a few Mercedes windows with the biggest fucking gun on earth, and see who he hits? I’m having trouble with this.”

“Me, too. But you know what? I’m starting to get the feeling that I might be in the right ballpark, even though I’m not sure yet what the game is.”

“Not sure? How about not having a fucking clue what it is?”

“You need to think more positively.”

“You have any more words of wisdom, Sherlock, before I puke?”

“Just one thing. Special Agent Trout is fixated on the fact that I might have access to privileged information I’m not legally entitled to. Watch your back, Jack.”

“Fuck Trout. Is there any other secret shit you want me to shovel your way?”

“Long as you’re asking, do you have any tracer progress on Emilio Corazon?”

“Not yet. He’s managed to become a surprisingly invisible man.”

At eight forty-five, Madeleine left for her part-time job at the clinic. It was still raining. Gurney went to his computer, brought up a copy of his e-mail to Hardwick, and went over the list of questions he’d included—stopping at the one that read, “Why did the murders occur when they did, in the spring of the year 2000?” The more certain he was that the murders were essentially pragmatic, the more significant the timing element became.