Lon Sellitto was gone and, inside Lucy Richter’s apartment, Sachs was just finishing packing up the evidence. She turned to Kathryn Dance and thanked her.

“Hope it’s helpful.”

“That’s the thing about crime scene work. Only a couple of fibers, but they could be enough for a conviction. We’ll just have to see.” Sachs added, “I’m heading back to Rhyme’s. Listen, I don’t know if you’d be willing but could you do some canvassing in the neighborhood? You’ve sure got the touch when it comes to wits.”

“You bet.”

Sachs gave her some printouts with the Watchmaker’s composite picture and left, to head back to Rhyme’s.

Dance nodded at Lucy Richter. “You’re doing okay?”

“Fine,” the solider replied and offered a stoic smile. She walked into the kitchen and put the kettle on the stove. “You want some tea? Or coffee?”

“No. I’m going to be outside looking for witnesses.”

Lucy was staring down at the floor, a good semaphore signal to a kinesics expert. Dance said nothing.

The soldier said, “You said you were from California. You going back soon?”

“Tomorrow, probably.”

“Just wondering if you’d have time for coffee or something.” Lucy played with a potholder. On it were the words 4th Infantry Division. Steadfast and Loyal.

“Sure. We’ll work it out.” Dance found a card in her purse and wrote her hotel name on it, then circled her mobile on the front.

Lucy took it.

“Call me,” Dance said.

“I will.”

“Everything okay?”

“Oh, sure. Just fine.”

Dance shook the woman’s hand, then left the apartment, reminding herself of an important rule in kinesic analysis: Sometimes you don’t need to uncover the truth behind every deception you’re told.

Chapter 25

Amelia Sachs returned to Rhyme’s with a small carton of evidence.

“What do we have?” he asked.

Sachs went over again what she’d found at the scene, then added details on the boards.

According to the NYPD crime scene database on fibers, what Sachs had discovered on Lucy’s uniform was from a shearling coat, the sort of collar found on leather jackets that used to be worn by pilots—bomber jackets. Sachs had field-tested the clock for nitrates—this one wasn’t explosive either—and it was identical to the other three, yielding no trace except a recent stain of what turned out to be wood alcohol, the sort used as an antiseptic and for cleaning. As with the florist, the Watchmaker hadn’t had time to leave another poem or had chosen not to.

Rhyme agreed to go public with the announcement about the calling card of the clock, though he predicted that all the announcement would do would be to guarantee that the killer didn’t leave a clock until he was sure the victim was unable to call for help.

The trace that Sachs had found along the route where the killer had most likely escaped revealed nothing helpful.

“There wasn’t anything else,” she explained.