Bad eyes in a box. Was the box a coffin? Peake's imagery of the dead child. Reliving the crime and feeding off the memory, the way lust killers did?

It all hinged on learning more about Claire, and so far her ghost had avoided capture.

No entanglements, no known associates. Not much impact on her world.

Ardis Peake, on the other hand, had been a star in his day.

I drove to Westwood and used the computers at the U's research library to look up the Ardullo massacre. The murders had been covered nationally for one week. The periodicals index offered half a page of citations, and I went looking for microfiche.

Most of the articles were nearly identically worded, lifted intact from wire service reports. An arrest headshot showed a young Peake, stick-faced, hollow-cheeked, sporting a full head of long, stringy, dark hair.

Wild-eyed, startled, a cornered animal. The Edvard Munch screamer on jet fuel.

A large bruise spread beneath his left eye. The left side of his face swelled. Rough arrest? If so, it hadn't been reported.

The facts were as I remembered them. Multiple stab wounds, crushing skull fractures, extensive mutilation, cannibalism. The articles filled in names and places.

Scott and Theresa Ardullo, thirty-three and twenty-nine, respectively. Married six years, both UC Davis agricultural grads. He, "the scion of a prosperous farming family," had developed an interest in winegrowing but concentrated on peaches and walnuts.

Brittany, five years old.

Justin, eight months.

Next came the happier-times family photo: Scott hand in hand with a restless-looking little girl who resembled her mother, Theresa holding the baby. Pacifier in Justin's mouth, fat cheeks ballooning around the nipple. Ferns wheel in the background, some kind of fair.

Scott Ardullo had been muscular, blond, crew-cut, grinning with the full pleasure of one who believes himself blessed.

His wife, slender, somewhat plain, with long dark hair held in place by a white band, seemed less certain about happy endings.

I couldn't bear another look at the children's faces.

No picture of Noreen Peake, just an account of the way she'd been found, sitting at the kitchen table. My imagination added the smell of apples, cinnamon, flour.

A ranch superintendent named Teodoro Alarcon had found Noreen's body, then discovered the rest of it. He'd been placed under sedation.

No quote from him.

Treadway's sheriff, Jacob Haas, said: "I served in Korea and this was worse than anything I ever saw overseas. Scott and Terri took those people in out of the goodness of their hearts and this is how they get repaid. It's beyond belief."

Anonymous townspeople cited Peake's strange habits- he mumbled to himself, didn't bathe, cruised alleys, pawed through garbage cans, ate trash. Everyone had known of his fondness for sniffing propellants. No one had thought him dangerous.

One other attributed quote: