“About how you like to figure stuff out. How important it is to you. While that software was downloading, I was thinking … if Madeleine was a detective, she’d want to solve the puzzle so she could catch the bad guy. But I think you want to catch the bad guy so you can solve the puzzle.”

Gurney was pleased, not by his own position in the comparison—which didn’t strike him as especially laudable—but by Kyle’s perception in noting it. The young man had a good mind, a fact that meant a lot to Gurney. He felt a little surge of camaraderie. “You know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking that you use the word ‘think’ almost as much as I do.”

As he was speaking, the house phone was ringing. He went into the den to answer it. As if summoned by Kyle’s reference to her, it was Madeleine.

“Good morning!” She sounded cheerful. “How are things going?”

“Fine. What are you up to?”

“Deirdre and Dennis and I just finished breakfast. Orange juice, blueberries, French toast, and … bacon!” The final item was voiced with the faux guilt of having committed a faux sin. “We’ll be going out in a few minutes to check on all the animals and get them ready to transport to the fairgrounds. In fact, Dennis is out there by the little corral already, waving to us to come out.”

“Sounds like fun,” he replied in a not very fun-filled voice, marveling once again at her ability to find compartments of pure enjoyment within a larger landscape of serious problems.

“It is fun! How are our little hens this morning?”

“Fine, I assume. I was just about to go down to the barn.”

She paused, then in a more subdued tone stepped tentatively into the larger landscape, the one in which he was so deeply mired. “Any developments?”

“Well, Kyle showed up here at the house.”

“What? Why?”

“I asked him for some computer software advice, and he just decided to come up and do what needed to be done. Actually, it was very helpful.”

“Did you send him home?”

“I’m going to.”

She paused. “Please be careful.”

“I will.”

“I mean it.”

“I know.”

“Okay. Well … Dennis is waving more urgently, so I better go. Love you!”

“Love you too.” He replaced the handset, then sat staring at the phone unseeingly, his mind drifting back to Panikos’s face on the video and the words “very fucking crazy.”

“Did I hear you say your video call was at eight?” Kyle’s voice from the den doorway pulled Gurney back to the moment. He glanced at the time in the corner of his computer screen—7:56 a.m.

“Thanks. Which reminds me—I wanted to ask you to stay out of the camera’s field of view during the call. Okay?”