Decker picked up another photo. A blonde girl was fellating a fat man with a wart on his penis. Decker studied her face and then rejected it.

“Shit, Pete, get a load of the size of this—”

“I’m not interested.”

A moment later, Marge walked in.

“You know, MacPherson offered to trade Easter weekend with me if I’d give him this assignment.” She was incredulous. “Those boys are the horniest bunch of schmucks I’ve ever seen.”

“You don’t understand the male species, Marjorie,” Hollander said.

“You’ll explain it to me someday, Michael.”

He grinned lecherously. “Just give me a date.”

“Tell you what,” she said. “We’ll break in the twenty-first century together.”

Hollander was silent and appeared to be concentrating.

“Thirteen years from now, Mike,” Decker said.

Marge laughed. “Have a snapshot of Lindsey to refresh my memory?” she asked Decker.

He handed her one of their working pictures. It was Lindsey’s junior high school graduation photo—a head shot of an even-featured teenager ripening to womanhood—a flirtatious smile, a gleam in the eye. There was nothing stiff and frozen about the picture. Lindsey had presence. Marge made a face.

“Pretty little thing, wasn’t she,” Hollander said. “Damn shame.”

“She was Cindy’s age,” Decker said. “I asked around about her all day yesterday. Combed every mission, shelter, halfway house, and drug rehab center in the L.A. San Fernando Valley area, and nobody had ever seen her. I even took the photo down to Skid Row and tried some of the street people. Nada. This is a last resort and it probably won’t turn up anything. She was a nice kid according to everyone I’ve talked to. I don’t think we’ll find her in these archives.”

“Hey, Margie,” Hollander said, “Take a look at the—”

“Not interested, Michael.”

Hollander grumbled and chewed on his cold pipe stem.

Marge began sorting through a pile of pornography.

“How many boxes of this garbage do we have?” she asked.

“As many as you want,” Decker said, tossing photographs aside.

“You ever get hold of Mr. Bates?” Marge asked.

Decker winced and waved his hand in the air.

“That bad, huh?” Hollander said.

“One of those repressed types,” said Decker. “Midway through the questions, he cracked. It was bad. The floodgates opened and it was all downhill from that point on. God, I feel for that man. I don’t think I’d do any better.”

They sorted through some more photos—contorted positions designed for the camera rather than pleasure.

“Pete, what do you think of this?” Marge showed him a teenage girl masturbating.

Decker studied the photo and shook his head.

“The eyes are wrong.”

Marge shrugged and attacked another pile of pictures.

“What do we do if we find her in one of these?” Hollander asked.