He had not seen me. For a moment I considered pursuing the Croatian priest into the sacristy—if that was where he had gone—and killing him in there. Except that there were now questions he needed to answer. Questions for which I did not yet have the strength. Questions about Britta Warzok. Questions that would have to wait until I was feeling stronger. Questions that required a little more thinking before I asked them.

I picked up my tool bag and shuffled slowly out of the church and onto Viktualienmarkt, where the cooler air revived me a little. The bell in the church clock tower was ringing the half hour. I took a few steps and then leaned on the Nivea girl who was adorning a poster pillar. I could have used a whole tin of Nivea on my soul. Better still, a whole of tin of her.

Stuber’s beetle came quickly toward me. For a minute I thought he was going to run me down. But he came to an abrupt halt, leaned across the passenger seat, and threw open the door. I wondered why he was in such a hurry. Then I remembered he was probably working under the assumption that I had shot and killed someone in the church. I took hold of the car door.

“It’s all right,” I said. “There’s no hurry. I didn’t go through with it.”

He pulled on the brake and got out, calmer now, helping me into the car as if I had been his old mother, and lighting me another cigarette when finally I was stowed away. Back in the driver’s seat, he revved the car hard, waited for a small troop of cyclists to pedal past, and then fired us on our way.

“So what changed your mind?” he asked.

“A woman.”

“That’s what they’re for, I suppose,” he said. “Sounds to me like she was sent by God.”

“Not this one,” I said. I sucked on the cigarette and winced as the heat of it hit my most recent scar. “I don’t know who the hell sent her. But I’m going to find out.”

“A woman of mystery, huh?” he said. “You know, I got a theory: Love is just a temporary form of mental illness. Once you know that, you can deal with it. Deal with it. Medicate for it.”

Stuber started going on about some girlfriend he’d had who had treated him badly and I stopped listening for a while. I was thinking about Britta Warzok.