“I said stay where you are!” the man said. “And Lord, I mean it!” He emphasized his point by shooting into the air again. Marge jumped.

“Police, sir,” Marge said. Her voice was surprisingly strong.

The man seemed unimpressed.

“What the hell you doin’ on my property?”

“No one was in the office,” Decker said.

“Don’t give you no right to come steamrolling over my fields. Scaring my bees.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” Decker said. “Truth is we just wanted to talk to the owner of this honey farm. He wasn’t in the office. We figured we’d try the house.”

“Don’t bullshit me, slick,” said the man. “Your plain-folk manner and southern drawl don’t fool me none. You’re one of them builders. My pappy told you we ain’t interested.”

“Mister,” Decker said, “I’m going in my pocket and gonna pull out my badge. I’m a police detective, and I’m wearing a gun. I’m telling you what I’m doing, so don’t let your finger get itchy on that trigger.”

The man didn’t answer. Decker moved deliberately, fishing into his pocket and finding the fold containing his badge and ID. He showed it to the man.

“Don’t prove nothin’.”

“Are you Mr. Howard?” Marge asked.

“One of ’em,” Howard answered. He removed his veil hat, exposing a bald head and a leathery face colored nut brown. His eyes were close-set, his nose was fleshy and full of veins, his lips were cracked. “Who the hell are you?”

“A detective, also.”

“Suppose you got a badge, too?”

Marge started to open her purse.

“Forget it,” said Howard. “L.A. don’t have enough crime that it’s got to send two of its po-licemen to come up and bother us.” Howard spit behind his shoulder. “Get off my pappy’s land. This is swarming weather. Bees might decide they don’t like you any better than I do.”

Decker pulled out a picture of Baby Sally. “Know this little girl?”

Howard’s face drained of its color. Marge started to say something, but Decker interrupted.

“I sure as heck don’t know who she is. She’s living in a foster home, mister. You know that’s no place for kids. I don’t know who her parents are, but I was kind of hoping they might live around here.”

The men stared at each other for a minute or two. Howard’s denuded head was coated with sweat. He stared upward, squinting in the sunlight, then put his veil hat back on. Decker licked salty sweat from his lips.

Howard said, “Whychu think she lives around here?”

“Because the poor little thing had bee stings on her arms—”

“City don’t got no bees?” Howard asked.

“The doc we took her to thinks she has a whole lot more stings than a city girl should have.”

Howard spit again. He said, “I got work to do.”