The door opened and Carl said, “Bohdan Kravchenko from Odessa, a survivor of the siege. Nice going, buddy. I’m Carl Webster, here in no official capacity to see Miz Vera Mezwa, the lady of the house.”

Bo had on a green smoking jacket with black lapels, his bare chest showing, and pajama pants. He said, “I’m sorry, but Ms. Mezwa is not entertaining callers this morning.”

Carl said, “I don’t need to be entertained, Bohunk. Run upstairs and tell her I have the means to search the house if I need to.”

Bo appeared to have turned to stone. He seemed to be trying not to move his mouth as he said, “May I see it?”

Carl pulled out the leather case he carried every day of his life and opened it to show his marshal’s ID and his star.

Bo said, “That only tells me who you are.”

Carl said, “It’s all you need to know.”

“But it’s not a court order.”

Carl said, “It’s better.”

They were both on the sofa at opposite ends, but turned to each other, Vera in a greenish silk dressing gown that was loose in front and she would let come open enough to catch his eye-Carl thinking these Detroit women came right at you. They were talking about Honey Deal.

Vera saying, “Yes, you dropped her off and she went home with Walter Schoen. That is to say I believe he drove her home. I can’t presume to know his intentions. Honey, quite openly, apologized to Walter for the way she left him, rather abruptly, and I sensed he was encouraged to renew their relationship. At least to try. I noticed at one point while they were talking Walter was wiping his eyes.”

Carl said, “No kidding.”

He couldn’t imagine her getting Walter worked up on purpose unless she was playing with him. Or she felt sorry for him, the reason she was being nice. Honey was out front in her way, not the least self-conscious. Carl believed she could walk out on a stage, face an auditorium full of strangers, and give a talk off the cuff. Tell about the funny thing that happened on the way there and make up the rest. Tell a few jokes. He felt he and Honey were alike in that they could talk their way in or out of situations. She always seemed herself, didn’t need to put on any kind of act. He said to Vera, “She left with Walter. Just the two of them in the car?”

“As far as I know.”

“What about Dr. Taylor?”

“You’re familiar with everyone.”

“What was he doing?”

“Talking to my houseman, Bo.”

“I understand Joe Aubrey arrived with Walter.”

“Honey told you that? Or, there actually is someone in the surveillance car?”

Carl smiled for a moment.

“Didn’t Joe Aubrey go home with Walter? That would be three of them in Walter’s Ford.”

“I don’t know, really. I had already said good night to my guests. They could stay and talk if they wished.”

“Maybe Aubrey went home with Dr. Taylor.”

“He might have.”

Carl said, “Who did Jurgen go home with?”

Vera was smoking a cigarette, at ease. She said, “Poor Jurgen. I understand for five and a half months no one can find him, and the Hot Kid arrives. Tell me, what does it mean to be a hot kid?”

“You start out being lucky,” Carl said.

“Twelve times,” Vera said, “you were lucky with your pistol, shooting criminals?”

“What you do with a gun isn’t luck,” Carl said. “I’m talking about, in the line of duty having chances to look good, like you know what you’re doing.”

Vera liked that. She smiled at him. “The newspapers write the story and you become a hero.”

“Once you get a name,” Carl said, “and somebody writes a book about you, you get referred to a lot. A clerk in a store stops a robbery. They might say he made a lightning fast Carl Webster move and brought up a revolver. Last month I was interviewed about escaped prisoners of war like I’m an expert on it. They call me ’cause my name’s familiar. Let’s see what Carl Webster has to say. It was a piece in Newsweek.”

“I saw it,” Vera said. “‘The Hot Kid’s War.’ Did you like what they wrote?”

“The writer and I got along pretty well.”

“Your wife I see is a marine?”

“A gunny. Louly teaches firing a machine gun from a dive-bomber.”

“Of the dozen people you’ve shot and killed in your career, were any of them women?”

“None. They were pretty much all wanted felons, bank robbers. One a cow thief caught in the act, but I don’t count him.”

“Why is that?”

“I wasn’t a marshal yet. If you’re counting people I shot in the line of duty.”

“Do you ever regret taking their lives?”

Carl said, “Does Joe Foss regret shooting down twenty-six Zekes? He flew a Wildcat in the Pacific.”

Vera said, “Yes, of course, why would it be different? Though I imagine Joe Foss never sees the faces of the ones he kills.” She said, “Forgive me, I’m making conversation.”

Bo came to the sofa looking only at Vera to say there was a call for the deputy marshal. “In the den,” he told Carl, still looking at Vera, and turned away.

Carl said, “Was he asking you if it was okay?”

“You must have said something he didn’t like.” Vera waved her hand. “He wants you to follow him.”

It was Kevin Dean on the phone.

“You’re talking to Vera?”

“I’m looking for Honey,” Carl said standing by the desk, shelves of leather-bound sets of books behind him, books he thought of as decoration, never opened.

Kevin said, “She doing you any good? I haven’t seen her since I was reassigned. You have trouble calling her Honey?”

“No,” Carl said. “Do you?”

“I did at first. In fact I still have trouble. It’s what you call your wife or your girlfriend. Anyway, listen, the reason I called, Dr. Michael Taylor, one of the useless spy ring guys, was shot and killed last night. It looks like his wife Rosemary did it with a Walther P38 and then used it on herself, blew her brains out. The cleaning woman said the gun belonged to Dr. Taylor. She came this morning surprised to see the car still in the garage, the doctor hadn’t left to go to his office, and found them in the living room.”

Carl was thinking, If Kevin had trouble calling her Honey, it meant he hadn’t gone to bed with her yet. He said, “The maid called the police?”

“Right away. Detroit Homicide got on the scene. One of the guys in the squad knew about Dr. Taylor being pro-Nazi, a member of the Bund back in the thirties, arrested on a misdemeanor, demonstrating in front of a synagogue. Homicide’s keeping us up on what they find.”

Carl was looking at Bo standing in the doorway, his back to Carl by the desk.

“Something else,” Kevin said. “They’re positive a third gunshot victim was in the lavatory, shot in the back of the head. They found traces of blood the shooter tried to clean up but did a half-assed job, so the evidence techs went over the entire lavatory and found bone fragments and brain tissue in the drain.”

Carl told Kevin to hold it a minute. He said to Bo, “Sweetheart, instead of listening to the conversation, how about getting me a cup of coffee?”

Bo walked away without saying a word.

“Maybe the doctor,” Carl said, “was in the can when she popped him.”

“Taylor was shot in the chest. It was someone else.”

“Who’s missing?”

“Joe Aubrey.”

“His plane’s at the airport?”

“It never was. He took the train this time. He’s having work done on the Cessna, in Atlanta.”

“Where’s Walter?”

“At his farm this morning.”

“Alone?”

“That German couple’s there. I asked the woman, she answered the phone, if anybody came home with Walter, she said no.”

“You know Honey crashed the spy party.”

“I heard, yeah. You believe it? I’ve been trying to get hold of her, but she hasn’t been home or at work all morning.”