“That’s left us with just over two thousand possible matches in Los Angeles County. As a matter of triage, we’ve been focusing on civilian call-ins. We’re still getting dozens every day—people who own a blue Suburban and don’t know what to do about it; or people who’ve seen one, or thought they might have seen one, or maybe just know someone who’s seen one. The hard part is recognizing the worthwhile point zero zero one percent of calls from the other ninety-nine point ninety-nine.”

“So why did this one spike?” I asked.

It was a combination of things, Snyder told us. Plenty of leads had some individual compelling detail to them, but this one had a convergence of suspicious factors.

“This guy called in about his neighbor, who’s also his tenant. She drives a blue Suburban, of course—and goes by the name Mary Wagner.”

Eyebrows bobbed around the room. This was the stuff coincidence was made of, but it wouldn’t have shocked me to know that our killer—with her penchant for public attention—was actually using her own first name.

“She’s a virtual Jane Doe,” Snyder went on. “No driver’s license here, or in any state for that matter. The plates on the car are California, but guess what?”

“They’re stolen,” someone muttered from the rear.

“They’re stolen,” said Snyder. “And they don’t track. She probably got them off an abandoned car somewhere.

“And then, lastly, there’s her address. Mammoth Avenue in Van Nuys. It’s only about ten blocks from that cybercafe where the one aborted e-mail was found.”

“What else do we know about the woman herself?” Van Allsburg asked Snyder. “Any surveillance on her?”

An agent in front tapped some keys on a laptop, and a slide came up on the conference room screen.

It showed a tall, middle-aged white woman, from a vantage point across a parking lot. She wore what looked like a pink maid’s uniform. Her body was neither thin nor fat; the uniform fit but still looked too small for her mannish frame. I put her age at about forty-five.

“This is from earlier this morning,” Fred said. “She works in housekeeping at the Beverly Hills Hotel.”

“Hang on. Housekeeping? Did you say housekeeping?”

Several heads turned to where Agent Page was sitting perched on the window ledge.

“What about it?” Van Allsburg asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe this sounds crazy —”

“Go ahead.”

“Actually, it was something in Dr. Cross’s report,” Page said. “At the hotel where Suzie Cartoulis and Brian Conver were found. Someone made the bed. Perfectly.” He shrugged. “It’s almost too neat, but . . . I don’t know. Hotel maid . . .”