Bayliss and Nelson looked at each other. Nelson said, “Well, he’s planning a robbery . . .”

“Wrong,” said Salzman.

“Yes. Wrong,” said Woolrich. “He’s already done the robbery. Last night.”

Nelson sat up. “But how is that possible? The swamis told us he was putting together an operation for the night of the new moon.”

“Well, he changed his mind. Or something scrambled the psychics’ readings. Whatever it was, he’s already committed the crime and is in possession of the object.”

“Oh, crap,” said Bayliss.

“Yeah,” Nelson said.

“If that’s the bad news, what’s the extremely bad?” said Bayliss.

“It’s your fault,” said Salzman.

“How is it our fault?”

“Yeah. How is it her fault?” said Nelson.

“Because he was your case. You were supposed to be watching him and you dropped the ball,” Woolrich said.

“But we only did it because we were told it was tonight,” Bayliss said.

“That’s no excuse. You should have been watching him,” said Salzman.

“We have other cases,” said Nelson. “And Bayliss is right. We only took our eyes off him because there was supposed to be nothing going on.”

“Where is Cooper now?” said Woolrich.

“He’s been staying with his jailbird buddy, Morton.”

“I suggest you find this Morton or, better yet, Cooper and clean up this mess. The object is the department’s responsibility. You need to get it for us.”

“By any means necessary,” said Salzman.

Bayliss felt a little cold inside. “By any means, you mean . . .”

“Any.”

She looked at Nelson. He shrugged.

“You ever shoot anybody?” he said.

“No.”

“You’ll love it. It really clears out the sinuses.”

Bayliss looked at Woolrich. “Do we have to shoot him?”

Woolrich scratched his cheek, trying to cover up a twitch. “Shoot him. Don’t shoot him. Cut off his head and turn him into a Christmas ornament, I really don’t care. Just get the object. Forget all your other cases. Take care of this.”

“Yes, sir,” said Bayliss.

“Yes, sir,” said Nelson.

Woolrich leaned back in his chair and glanced at a trophy on the wall. A head mounted on a plaque. Bayliss looked too. The head wasn’t quite human, it was more like . . . actually, she wasn’t sure what it was, but there were a lot of heads on a lot of plaques on the walls. Either Woolrich enjoyed collecting rare zoological species or he just really liked killing things.

He shuffled some papers on his desk and spoke softly. “You know, there are alternatives to continuing with your current jobs. For instance, because of the high mortality rate, they’re always looking for new recruits in the Transdimensional Arachnid Department.” He raised a finger toward a photo of himself standing next to a black widow spider that came up to his shoulder.

“And, of course, we’re always looking for a few good people in the mook department,” said Salzman with a toothy undead grin.