We parked near condominiums and followed a path that led to a dune. From there we made our way through sand spurs and sea oats. The beach was more narrow here, the sand less firm, and driftwood marked the memory of many storms.

Marino was in a pinstripe suit he was sweating through, and a white shirt and dark tie, and I thought it might have been the first time I had ever seen him so properly dressed. Lucy was in black, but I knew I would not see her until later, for she had something very important to do.

McGovern had come and so had Kenneth Sparkes, not because they had known him, but because their presence was their gift to me. Connie, Benton’s former wife, and their three grown daughters were a knot near the water, and it was odd looking at them now and feeling nothing but sorrow. We had no resentment, no animosity or fear left in us. Death had spent it all as completely as life had brought it about.

There were others from Benton’s precious past, retired agents and the former director of the FBI Academy who long years before had believed in Benton’s prison visits and research in profiling. Benton’s expertise was an old, tired word now, ruined by TV and the movies, but once it had been novel. Once Benton had been the pioneer, the creator of a better way of understanding humans who were truly psychotic, or remorseless and evil.

There was no leader of a church, for Benton had not gone since I had known him, only a Presbyterian chaplain who had counseled agents in distress. His name was Judson Lloyd, and he was frail with only a faint new moon of white hair. Reverend Lloyd wore a clerical collar and carried a small black leather Bible. There were fewer than twenty of us gathered on the shore.

We had no music or flowers, no eulogies or notes in our heads, for Benton had made it clear in his will what he wanted done. He had left me in charge of his mortal remains, because as he had drafted himself, It is what you are so good at, Kay. I know you will guard my wishes well.

He had desired no ceremony. He had not wanted the military burial he was entitled to, no police cars leading the way, no gun salutes or flag-draped casket. His simple request was to be cremated and scattered over the place he loved best, the civilized Never-Never Land of Hilton Head, where we had sequestered ourselves together whenever we could, and had forgotten for the brevity of a dream what we battled.