“It’s still there.”

“Peter—”

“Swelling has gone down considerably. I feel a lot better.”

“That’s the Darvocet talking.” “Thank God for pharmaceuticals.” Decker put down the paper. “You sound rested.”

In fact, Rina hadn’t slept more than three hours in the last thirty. By the time she had made it into Orlando, it had been close to nine. Then it took another hour by car to get to the Deckers’, who lived outside of Gainesville. “I’m very happy to be here. I wish you were with me.”

“Soon, darlin’. How’s everybody treating you?”

“Wonderful. Hannah has already baked two batches of cookies.”

“Can I talk to her now?”

“She and your mother are out picking beets in the garden. Your mom is going to teach her how to pickle and can. Then they’re moving on to pie baking. Later on, Hannah and I may take a bike ride.”

“Weather must be a pleasure after New York.”

“It’s in the fifties right now, supposed to get up to the sixties. Full sun. Should be beautiful. Am I tempting you?”

“You jezebel.”

Rina stifled a yawn. “I really should see what they’re doing.” I really need to go to sleep. “Randy has been standing over my shoulder. He’s not pleased about your being there, either. He wants to talk to you.”

“What did you tell him?”

“Just a few salient details about the situation that you conveniently left out.”

“You’re making my life difficult.”

“That’s the idea. It’ll motivate you to get the heck out of there.”

“Put my brother on.”

She gave the receiver to Randy and mouthed that she was going to bed.

Randy nodded. Into the phone, he said. “How’s your face?”

His voice was serious—all cop. Decker said, “I’m fine. I’m sure Rina exaggerated.”

“I’m sure she didn’t. We’ve been talking, bro. I should get out the mustard cause someone’s been hotdoggin’.”

“I’m sitting at a table, reading the New York Times, drinking coffee. Does that sound like any Sam Spade you’re aware of?”

“We need to talk, Peter. Are you on a land phone?”

“I’ll call you back in two.” And he did. “I’m here. Are you calling just to blast me, or do you have actual information?”

“You can dish it out, but you can’t take it.”

Randy was talking from concern, so Decker held his tongue. “What do you have for me?”

“Okay, here we go,” Randy said. “Okay. I ran Lieber through the channels in Miami-Dade County, and nothing pulled up. Nothing on Chaim Lieber, nothing on Ephraim Lieber, nothing on the old man. I keyworded Lieber on extended counties. Again zero. Ran them through NCIC. Zilch. There are other databases, but it’ll take time. Since you’re supposedly done with the case on Friday, I say why bother.”

“You’re right. Don’t bother.”

Randy hesitated. “So you really are coming Friday?”

“Yes, I really am coming Friday. I promised Rina. I promised Hannah. And now I’m promising you.”

“Good. In that case, I’ll tell you what I did find. I keyworded Quinton into our local system, expecting to find nothing. Instead, I found out that some of the people from there own places on the Gold Coast—Miami/Dade, Boca, and Fort Lauderdale. I also pulled up information on some of the Chasidic Jews from Quinton, mostly having to do with them embezzling funds for the religious-school systems. Do you know about this?”