Lincoln Rhyme muttered, "I don't believe it." He'd just spoken with a furious Lucy Kerr and had learned that Sachs had taken several shots at a deputy under the Hobeth Bridge.

"I don't believe it," he repeated in a whisper to Thom.

The aide was a master of dealing with broken bodies and spirits broken because of broken bodies. But this was a different matter, far worse, and the best he could do was offer, "It's a mix-up. It has to be. Amelia wouldn't do that."

"She wouldn't."Rhyme muttered. This time offering the denial to Ben. "There's no way. Not even to scare them off." He told himself that she'd never shoot at a fellow officer, even just to scare them. Yet he was also thinking about what desperate people did. The crazy risks they took. (Oh, Sachs, why do you have to be so impulsive and stubborn? Why do you have to be so much like me?)

Bell was in the office across the hall. Rhyme could hear him as he spoke endearments over the phone. He supposed that the sheriff's wife and family weren't used to late-night absences; law-enforcement in a town like Tanner's Corner probably didn't require as many hours as the Garrett Hanlon case had taken.

Ben Kerr sat beside one of the microscopes, his huge arms crossed over his chest. He was gazing at the map. Unlike the sheriff he hadn't made any calls home and Rhyme wondered if he had a wife or girlfriend or if the shy man's life was wholly consumed with science and the mysteries of the ocean.

The sheriff hung up. He walked back into the lab. "You have any more ideas, Lincoln?"

Rhyme nodded at the evidence chart.

FOUND AT SECONDARY CRIME SCENE -

MILL

Brown Paint on Pants

Sundew Plant

Clay

Peat Moss

Fruit Juice

Paper Fibers

Stinkball Bait

Sugar

Camphene

Alcohol

Kerosene

Yeast

He reiterated what they knew about the house where Mary Beth was being kept. "There's a Carolina bay on the way to or near the place. Half the marked passages in his insect books are about camouflage and the brown paint on his pants's the color of tree bark so the place is probably in or next to a forest. The camphene lamps are from the 1800s so the place is old, probably Victorian era. But the rest of the trace isn't much help. The yeast would be from the mill. The paper fibers could be from anywhere. The fruit juice and sugar? From food or drinks Garrett had with him. I just can't -"

The phone rang.

Rhyme's left ring finger twitched on the ECU and he answered the call.

"Hello?" he said into the speakerphone.

" Lincoln."

He recognized the soft, exhausted voice of Mel Cooper.

"What do you have, Mel? I need some good news."

"I hope it's good. That key you found? We've been looking through sourcebooks and databases all night. Finally tracked it down."

"What is it?"

"It's to a trailer made by the McPherson Deluxe Mobile Home Company. The trailers were manufactured from 1946 through the early '70s. Company's out of business but according to the guide, the serial number on the key you've got fits a trailer that was made in '69."

"Any description?"

"No pictures in the guide."

"Hell. Tell me, does one live in these things in a trailer park? Or drive 'em around like a Winnebago?"

"Live in them, I'd guess. They measure eight by twenty. Not the sort of thing you'd cruise around in. Anyway, they're not motorized. You have to tow it."

"Thanks, Mel. Get some sleep."

Rhyme shut the phone off. "What do you think, Jim? Any trailer parks around here?"

The sheriff seemed doubtful. "There're a couple along Route 17 and 158. But they aren't even close to where Garrett and Amelia were headed. And they're crowded. Hard to hide out in a place like that. Should I send somebody to check them out?"

"How far?"

"Seventy, eighty miles."

"No. Garrett probably found a trailer abandoned someplace in the woods and took it over." Rhyme glanced at the map. Thinking: And it's parked somewhere in a hundred square miles of wilderness.

Wondering too: Had the boy gotten out of the handcuffs? Did he have Sachs' gun? Was she falling asleep just now, her guard down, Garrett waiting for the moment when she slipped into unconsciousness. He'd rise, crawl closer to her with a rock or a hornets' nest…

The anxiety racing through him, he stretched his head back, heard a bone pop. He froze, worried about the excruciating contractures that occasionally racked the muscles that were still connected to extant nerves. It seemed completely unfair that the same trauma that made most of your body numb also subjected the sensate part to agonizing tremors.

There was no pain this time but Thom noticed the alarm on his boss's face.

The aide said, " Lincoln, that's it… I'm taking your blood pressure and you're going to bed. No argument."

"All right, Thom, all right. Only we have to make one phone call first."

"Look at what time it is… Who's awake now?"

"It's not a matter of who's awake now," Rhyme said wearily. "It's a matter of who's about to be awake."

Midnight, in the swamp.

The sounds of insects. The fast shadows of bats. An owl or two. The icy light of the moon.

Lucy and the other deputies hiked four miles over to Route 30, where a camper awaited. Bell had pulled strings and "requisitioned" the vehicle from Fred Fisher Winnebagos. Steve Farr had driven it over here to meet the search party and give them a place to stay for the night.

They stepped inside the cramped quarters. Jesse, Trey and Ned hungrily ate the roast beef sandwiches that Farr had brought. Lucy drank a bottle of water, passed on the food. Farr and Bell – bless their hearts – had also dug up clean uniforms for the searchers.

She called in and told Jim Bell that they'd tracked the pair to an A-frame vacation house, which had been broken into. "Looked like they'd been watching TV, you can believe that."

But it had been too dark to follow the trail and they'd decided to wait until dawn to resume the search.

Lucy picked up the clean clothes and stepped inside the bathroom. In the tiny shower stall she let the weak stream of water course over her body. Her hands started with her hair and face and neck and then, as always, tentatively washed her flat chest, feeling the ridges of scar, then grew more certain as they moved to her belly and thighs.

She wondered again why she had such an aversion to silicone or the reconstructive surgery that, the doctor explained, took fat from her thighs or butt and remade the breasts. Even nipples could be reconstructed – or tattooed on.

Because, she told herself, it was fake. Because it wasn't real.

And, so, why bother?

But then, Lucy thought, look at that Lincoln Rhyme. He was only a partial man. His legs and arms were fake – a wheelchair and an aide. But thinking about him reminded her of Amelia Sachs and anger seared her again. She pushed those thoughts aside, dried herself and pulled on a T-shirt, thinking absently about the drawer of bras in the dresser in the guest room of her house – and recalled that she'd been meaning to throw them out for two years. But, for some reason, never had. Then she put on her uniform blouse and slacks. She stepped out of the bathroom. Jesse was hanging up the phone.

"Anything?"

"No," he said. "They're still working on the evidence, Jim and Mr. Rhyme."

Lucy shook her head at the food Jesse offered her then sat down at the table, pulled her service revolver out of its holster. "Steve?" she asked Farr.