Busby had already told me that Graham was originally from London and now worked as a porter and maintenance man at the semiprivate golf club. He had also lived in New York City and Miami and had a criminal record for selling crack in New York.

“I already told him everything I saw,” Perri Graham said defensively as soon as he opened the front door of his room and saw the two of us standing there. “Go away. Let me be. Why would I hold back anything or —”

I cut him off. “My name is Alex Cross. I’m a homicide detective from Washington. The woman you saw was my fiancée, Mr. Graham. May we come in and talk? This will only take a few minutes.”

He shook his head back and forth in frustration.

“I’ll tell you what I know. Again,” he finally said, relenting. “Yeah, come in. But only because you called me Mr. Graham.”

“That’s all I want. I’m not here to bother you about anything else.”

Busby and I walked inside the room, which was little more than an alcove. The tile floors and all the furniture were strewn with wrinkled clothes, mostly underwear.

“A woman I know lives in Hamilton,” Graham said in a weary voice. “I went to visit her this Tuesday past. We drank too much wine. Stayed the evening — you know how it is. I got up somehow. Had to be at the club by noon, but I knew I’d be late and get docked some of my pay. Don’t have a car or nothin’, so I hitched a ride from Hamilton, out South Shore Road. Walked along near Paget, I suppose. Damn hot afternoon, I remember. I went down to the water, cool off if I could.

“I came back up over a knobbly hill, and I witnessed an accident on the roadway. It was maybe a quarter of a mile down the big hill there. You know it?”

I nodded and held my breath as I listened to him. I remembered the stifling heat of that afternoon, everything about it. I could still see Christine driving off on a shiny blue moped, waving and smiling. The memory of her smile, which had always brought me such joy, now put a tight knot in my stomach.

“I saw a white van hit a woman riding a blue moped. I can’t be sure, but it almost looked like the van hit her on purpose. Driver, he jumped out of the van right away and helped her up. She didn’t look like she was hurt badly. Then he helped her inside the van. Put the moped inside, too. Then he drove off. I thought he was taking her to the hospital. Thought nothing else of it.”

“You sure she wasn’t badly hurt?” I asked.

“Not sure. But she got right up. She was able to stand all right.”