Smith’s house was several houses to Pike’s right on the opposite bank not far beyond the mouth of an adjoining canal. The location offered a good view of Smith’s backyard, half the ground-floor windows, and the second floor, but Pike thought Gomer was an idiot for having parked where he was openly visible. Pike could see families in the houses across the canal and people crossing the footbridge that spanned the adjoining canal, and knew any of them could see him just as they could have seen Gomer. One of the people who’d seen Gomer that night had left him soaking in blood.

Pike studied the houses and the shadows beneath the pedestrian bridge and the play of light on the water. He felt he understood everything that had happened until Mendoza and Gomer returned to the canals to be murdered. He did not understand why they had returned, why they were killed, or who had killed them, and now this business about Dru and Wilson made him rethink himself, and them, and everything he had believed was true. Maybe that was good. He believed the answers were here in this place, so his task was to recognize the signs. If he found them, he could re-create the events, and then he would know what happened. The same as reading the words in a book. Reading each word and adding it to the next to build a sentence, then connecting the sentences to learn the story. The task was to find enough words.

Pike slipped out his cell phone and called John Chen, who answered in his typical paranoid whisper.

“Yes? Who is this?”

“Pike. Two bodies were bagged on the Venice Canals this morning. You know about them?”

Chen didn’t answer.

“John?”

“Sorry. I thought you were asking about something else.”

“Their names were Mendoza and Gomer.”

“That’s Sandy Lancaster. I’m not on it, but she’s here in the next cube. What do you need?”

Pike asked if either showed signs of defensive wounds or ligature marks, and whether the police had located the place of Mendoza’s murder. Chen told him to hang on, and Pike could hear murmurs as Chen spoke with the criminalist in the next cube. A few moments later, Chen was back on the line.

“Nah, man. Nothing defensive and negative on the ligatures. These guys didn’t see it coming, if that’s what you’re after.”

“What about Mendoza?”

“They think so, but they can’t confirm until the blood work comes back. She said they found a good-sized splatter on one of the pedestrian bridges they have down there. I don’t know which one.”

“That’s okay, John. I can figure it out.”