Quickly scanning the area around him, he got the phone back up to his ear in time to hear Hardwick yell, “Christ! What did he blow up now?”

The answer came in a second series of similar explosions—with geometric lines of light and bursts of colored sparks streaking across the night sky. Gurney’s tension was released in a sharp single-syllable laugh. “Fireworks! It’s just the summer-fair fireworks.”

“Fireworks? What the fuck for? Fourth of July was a month ago.”

“Who the hell knows? It’s a tradition at the fair. They do it every year.”

A third series went off—louder and gaudier.

“Assholes,” muttered Hardwick.

“Right. Anyway. We have work to do.”

Hardwick was silent for a few seconds, then switched directions abruptly. “So what do you think about Jonah? You didn’t react when I brought it up. You think I’m right?”

“Right about him being the mastermind behind Carl’s murder?”

“It’s all to his advantage. All of it. And you gotta admit, he’s one oily operator.”

“Where does Esti come out on this? She agree with you?”

“Hell, no. She’s all zeroed in on Alyssa. She’s convinced the whole thing was payback for Carl raping her—even though there was no real evidence for that. It was all hearsay, through Klemper. Which reminds me, I have to let her know about Mick the Dick’s demise. I guarantee she’ll do a happy dance.”

It took Gurney a few seconds to get that image out of his mind. “Okay, Jack, we need to get to the job at hand. Panikos is here. With us. Within reach. Let’s go find him.” As he ended the call, a final deafening display of fireworks lit up the sky. It made him think, for the twelfth time in the past two days, of the case of the exploding car. That made him think of the events in the alley shooting described by Esti. Which made him wonder yet again what revealing element they might have in common with the Spalter case. As important as that question seemed, however, he couldn’t let it divert his attention now.

He resumed his progress through the fairgrounds, fixating on the face of every short, thin person he came upon. Better to study too many than too few. If someone of the right size happened to be looking away, or if their features were obscured by glasses, a beard, the brim of a hat, he followed them discreetly, angling for a better view.

With a rising sense of possibility, he followed one tiny, ageless, genderless creature in loose black jeans and a baggy sweater until a wiry, sunburned man in a John Deere hat greeted her warmly in a tent sponsored by the Evangelical Church of the Risen Christ, called her Eleanor, and asked about the condition of her cows.