Decker said, “It’s totally possible that if you were to do that, you would find yourself in jail with a bunch of eager felons waiting to ram a hard rod up your butt.”

“Loo, you have a vivid way of describing things. So I won’t bother telling you the details that theoretically might be in Ernesto Golding’s file—a file that we could have gotten into anyway because Ernesto is dead and there’s no confidentiality with dead people.”

“Anything we can use?” Decker asked.

“Lots of jargon and abbreviations. Still, what came out was that he had a kinky sexual thing going on with this girl, Ruby Ranger.”

“Nazi shit?” Decker asked.

“Exactly. Except I think some of it might be fantasy because it was pretty wild. I think that was Baldwin’s conclusion, too.”

“We need to fix on this Ranger girl. Last we heard, she went up north. Earlier this morning, I called six police stations in the greater Bay Area. They’re looking for her and her car, but they’re going to forget unless we follow up. Wanda, I’ll leave the job of pestering to you.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You wanna see Ernesto’s file, Loo?” Oliver asked. “You went to college. Maybe you’ll understand it.”

“No, I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to even know about it until the warrants come through.”

“While we’re on the subjects of theoretical incidents…” Marge cleared her throat. “Just suppose I found some things lying around on Baldwin’s desk, copied them down, and had a question about the shorthand Baldwin used by his patients’ names?”

Decker stared at her. “I don’t believe this.”

Oliver said, “Blame it on me. Show and tell, Margie.”

“I don’t want to see it,” Decker said.

“So don’t look,” Oliver retorted.

But Decker did look. Marge had brought out several copies of what looked to be a desk calendar. She felt guilty—but not that guilty. “At first, we were thinking that the shorthand could be describing his patients’ psychiatric conditions. But the abbreviations don’t seem to correspond to psychiatric ailments.”

“Like C for ‘crazy’ or N for ‘nutcase’—” Oliver said.

“How about N for ‘neurotic’?” Webster said. “Not the kids, the parents. Doesn’t anyone ever just work things out anymore?”

Decker bristled. “Maybe these kids have real problems, Tom.”

“Yeah, the problem is they’re spoiled rotten. Y’all wouldn’t find any of us desecrating a temple and getting away with a slap on the wrist.”

“In the end, Ernesto got more than a slap,” Decker said.

Webster paused. “Yeah, that’s too bad. I’m not saying he deserved to die or anything. And I’m not saying that kids don’t have troubles. I’m just wondering if some of the parents aren’t using the Baldwins as high-priced baby-sitters?”