“She was great,” Kloughn said. “She was amazing. I don’t know how she did it. I’ve never seen anything like it. I don’t know how she got that baby out of there. It was magic.” Kloughn’s face was still flushed and his surgical gown was sweat stained. He looked dazed and a little disbelieving. “I’m a father,” he said. “I’m a father.” His eyes filled and his smile wobbled. He swiped at his eyes and his nose. “I think I’m still flub-a-dubbed,” he said.

Valerie smiled at Kloughn. “My hero,” she said.

“I was good, wasn’t I? I helped you, right?”

“You were very good,” Valerie told him.

The baby was in the room with Valerie. She was wrapped in a blanket and she had a little knit cap on her head. She seemed impossibly small and at the same time too large to have exited through a vagina. When I was in school I’d taken all the usual courses in human reproduction and I knew the process . . . the uterine dilation, the flexibility of the pelvic bones, the muscle contractions. So I knew some of the biology, but it still looked to me like this was a case of threading a walrus through the eye of a needle. There were days when I wasn’t sure how Morelli fit. I didn’t want to contemplate trying to pass a baby.

“We’ve named her Lisa,” Valerie said.

“Was it hard to pick out a name?” I asked.

“No,” Valerie said. “We both agreed on Lisa. It’s the family name that’s giving us problems.”

Valerie looked tired, so I gave her a hug and a kiss. And then I gave Kloughn a hug and a kiss. And then we left. I’m not a huggy-kissy person, but this was a huggy-kissy occasion.

MORELLI AND I left the hospital and went straight to Pino’s. We ordered takeout and ten minutes later we walked into Morelli’s house carrying a six-pack of Corona and a bag full of meatball subs. Bob was real happy to see us. Bob can smell a sub a quarter mile away.

I dragged myself into the living room, flopped onto the couch, opened the sub bag, and handed them out. One for me. One for Morelli. And two for Bob. Morelli cracked open two beers. We each took a long pull and dug into the subs. Morelli channel surfed while he ate, finally settling on wrestling.

“I’m tired,” Morelli said. “You scare the hell out of me and it makes me tired.”

I was way beyond tired. I was numb. I had a lot of questions for Morelli, but I didn’t want the answers tonight. I wasn’t up to thinking. I could barely chew and swallow.

Tomorrow morning I had to go to the station and tell a recording machine everything I knew about Fisher Cat and the game. Tomorrow would be a big questions-and-answers day. Hopefully when I woke up my brain would be back in thinking mode.

Good thing wrestling was on. You don’t need a brain to enjoy wrestling. Lance Storm was kicking the beejeezus out of some new guy who looked like King Kong’s mutant brother. Storm was wearing little bright red panties that made him easy to find in my befuddled state. I opened a second beer and silently toasted Storm’s panties.