“Tell you the truth, I don’t know. I’d have to go to Delgado; he’d have to go to Waldron; he might even have to go to the mayor. The thing is, even if an analyst says it’s her handwriting, even if the prints are hers, what have we got to go on? We can’t trace the letter. It looks like pretty ordinary stationery to me; it was mailed in the biggest post office in the city. What could we do?”

“We’d know she’s alive.” He pushed the letter back across the table. “That’s a start.”

Dino laughed and shook his head. “You still got a hair up your ass about that, ain’t you? All that crap about cats bouncing off concrete and walking away. You know, if I had come to you with that kind of a theory, you’d have kicked my ass.”

Stone laughed. “I don’t know, Dino, I think I’d have given your idea a hearing.”

“I gave your idea a hearing,” Dino said.

“For about fifteen seconds.”

“That was all I needed.”

“Okay, okay, but will you have the lab look at the paper and anything else they can find?”

“All right, but I’ll have to get somebody to do it on his own time. If word got around about this, I’d be pounding a beat, pronto.”

“Thanks, Dino.”

“I’ll owe somebody a favor, too.”

“I’ll owe you one.”

They paused outside the restaurant.

“One forty-five, Sunday, at the church?” Dino said. “You got the address?”

“I’ve got it.”

“Tuxedo. I’ll pick up the rental.”

“I own one.”

“We’re coming up in the world, aren’t we?”

“I’ve actually used it a couple of times. A firm party, that sort of thing.”

“I’ll see if I can have something for you on the letter by then. Otherwise, it’ll have to wait till after the honeymoon.”

“Where you going?”

“Vegas—where else?”

“Sounds great. I’ll see you Sunday.”

“You ever been to an Italian wedding?”

“No.”

“You got an experience coming.”

Dino turned out to be right.

Chapter

41

Frank Woodman was at his desk, dictating something into a recorder, but, when he saw Stone at the door, he waved him in. “How are you, Stone?” he said, pointing at a chair.

Stone sat down. “I’m fine, Frank. There’s something I want to ask you about.”

“First,” Woodman said, “there’s something I want to say to you, and I’m sorry I didn’t seek you out and say it sooner. Stone, only Bill Eggers, Charlotte Harkness, and I have seen that tape, and I’m the only one who knows you knew Cary Hilliard. I want you to know that it won’t go any further than that.”

Stone nodded. He couldn’t think of anything to say.