“I pulled up a card-table chair behind the darkened window in my apartment. Made sure there were no lights on, so he couldn’t see me. By now he’d caught my attention some. Remember the old movie Rear Window? I tried to figure out why he might be down there sittin’, waitin’. Jealous lover, jealous husband, maybe some kinda night stalker. But he wasn’t botherin’ anybody far as I could see.”

I spoke again. “You never got a better look than that? Man sitting in the car?”

“Around the time I got up to pee, he got out of the car. Opened the door, but the inside light didn’t come on. That struck me strange, it bein’ such a nice car and all. Fueled my mind even more. I squinted my eyes, get a better look.” Another long pause.

“And?”

“He was tall, a blond gentleman. White fella. We don’t get too many of them around here at night, or even in the daytime, for that matter.”

Chapter 56

DETECTIVE PATSY HAMPTON’S INVESTIGATION of the Jane Doe murders was starting to show forward movement and positive results. She thought she might have something good in the works. She had confidence in her ability to solve the murders. She knew from experience that she was smarter than everybody else.

It helped to have Chief Pittman and all the department’s resources on her side. She had spent the past day and a half with Chuck Hufstedler at the FBI building. She knew she was using Chuck a little, but he didn’t seem to mind. He was lonely, and she did like his company. She and Chuck were still sitting around at three-thirty in the afternoon when Lancelot entered the Gamester’s Chatroom again. Laughalot, she remembered.

“He couldn’t resist, could he?” Hampton said to Hufstedler. “Gotcha, you fantasy freak.”

Hufstedler looked at her, his thick black eyebrows arched. “Three-thirty in the afternoon, Patsy. What does that say? Tell you what it says to me. Maybe he’s playing from work. But I bet our Lancelot is a school kid.”

“Or he’s somebody who likes to play with school kids.” She offered a thought that upset her even as she uttered the words.

This time, she didn’t try to make contact with Lancelot. She and Chuck just listened in on a stultifying discussion of several role-playing games. In the meantime, he was trying to trace Lancelot.

“He’s pretty good at this, a real hacker. He’s built a lot of security into his system. Hopefully, we’ll get to him anyway.”

“I have confidence in you, Cheeseman.”

Lancelot stayed in the chatroom past four-thirty. By then it was all over. Chuck had his name and address: Michael Ormson, Hutchins Place, Foxhall.