As the Baltimore skyline rose into view, Patrick signaled to get off the highway. He glanced down at the seat beside him, trying to read the address Jim had offered up. “Look,” he said. “There's a chance I'll be heading up to Cape Hawk myself in just a few days. If I do get up there, I'll see what I can find out.”

“I'd really appreciate that,” Liam said. “Are you going to the ceili?”

“If things work out,” Patrick said, following Jim's directions, “I'll be delivering one of the musicians.”

Liam thanked him, and they said goodbye.

Once Patrick got off I-95, he began to smell the salt water. He thought about how Marisa had basically followed the Atlantic coastline her whole life. From Newport down here to Baltimore, then north again, through Boston, and up to Cape Hawk. Patrick was the same way, feeling most alive when he was breathing salt air. It spurred him on now as he wound his way through the narrow streets.

He found the address Jim Hanley had given him, drove around the block until he found a parking space. The neighborhood was behind the hospital, and he heard a siren in the distance, getting closer. The frame houses were two-family, neatly kept, with small yards and front porches. Kids played on the sidewalk, and older people sat on the stoops. Patrick walked up the front sidewalk of 64 Fish Street, up the steps, and knocked on the door.

Waiting a few minutes, he felt his heart pounding, just the way it always had when he was on a case and the stakes were very high. He tried to peer through a crack in the curtains at the door window. They were lace, pretty. Although many other houses on the street had gardens or window boxes, this one didn't. He figured that if Sam traveled a lot, she didn't have time to tend flowers.

When she didn't come to the door, he went back to his car. Jim had said six at the Crab Claw, and Patrick was a little early. He drove around the city a little, heading toward the hospital. This was where Marisa had gotten her start as a nurse, he knew. He looked up at the big brick building, wondering how many people she had helped in there.

Maybe Sam was back at work, here in the city. He wondered what had happened between the two sisters, what he was doing here—this was really none of his business. But he couldn't forget the look in Marisa's eyes, when he'd been up in Cape Hawk, and the sound of her voice, singing that song to him over the telephone line, and he just kept driving.