For starts, the physical resemblance was remarkable. Earl’s features were a little softer and less brooding, but the faces could have been Xeroxes. What was even more noteworthy were the activities that the younger brother had chosen—student council, the scholastic achievement organization, Spanish club, and the B-string football team. The group picture showed him squatting in the front row, padded heavily and looking absurdly beefy under a thin face.

The brothers seemed to have followed the identical trail to a point. What had happened?

Nineteen seventy-seven was the year of the fire, the year of their mother’s death. And in ’77 Earl’d dropped out of school.

Decker stared at the team picture. Some of the boys had tried to look scary and menacing, often ending up looking tentative and scared.

And one looked unusually familiar.

Quickly Decker flipped the pages back to the eleventh-grade class roster.

Baby-faced Cameron Smithson.

The detective looked at the ’78 album. Smithson had graduated, but no honors were listed under his name. His only distinction was his position as a tailback, second string on the B football team. Closing the book, Decker frowned.

The hyperactive woman had come back smiling, with sheets of paper in her hand.

“Here are the records, Sergeant,” she said, rocking on her toes. “I told you we’d find them.”

He scanned through the health charts noting their illnesses—lots of flu, infections, colds, broken bones from falls. He knew some of those falls were manufactured—the results of abuse rather than accidents. Then he found what he was looking for. In fourth grade Dustin had lost a front tooth in a fight during recess. Next to the entry was the name of a dentist. Using the school phone, he made a call and arranged to see the man.

Onward and upward…

An hour later Decker left the office of David Bachman, DDS. The dentist, an elderly blue-eyed leprechaun of a man, remembered both boys as being polite and slightly troubled. (“I’m no headshrinker, but I’ve seen an awful lot of people and have gotten to know human nature pretty damned well.”) Bachman said it would take a couple of days to dig up the records, but when he did, he’d send a copy over to Anne Hennon, whom he knew. (“A great-looking gal with a fine pair of gams.”)

As Decker got into his car his beeper went off. He called in from his car radio, and a moment later Marge’s voice was patched through the line.

“I’m over at Cecil Pode’s home,” she said. “The place was torched this morning.”

“I’ll be right down.”

“You can come down, Pete, but there’s nothing left except ashes. Mike and I are sifting through the rubble.”

“Arson?”

“Yeah. Incendiary material all over the place—rags and newspapers soaked with gasoline.”

“Have they determined the hot spots?”

“Three. In the bedroom, the kitchen—stove blew up—and the living room.”