‘So where were we, Riker?’

‘The early warning signs.’

‘Right, the early warning is in the money area. That would be a natural for Mallory. Have her check the credit card accounts for favourite bars and restaurants. A gym membership is a good giveaway. They like to keep in shape for the new one. Is the guy buying his own underwear? Something with a little flash? That’s another one.’

‘If there’s so many signals, how come the wives don’t catch on?’

‘They do. The husbands aren’t too quick to spot a cheating wife, but the wives always know what the husbands are doing. Even when they come in here and tell me that for years they had no idea. They knew what was going on – they knew from the beginning. It’s the blind spot that won’t let them acknowledge it. That damn blind spot. They’re staring straight at it, they can describe everything around it, but they don’t see it.’

‘Ah, Peggy. I can’t buy – ’

‘They rationalize it away. The amount of rationalization these women do is in direct proportion to what they’ve got to lose. With no kids and no mortgage, a woman can be pretty cynical about a cheating husband. With eight kids, she will sit down with the man and help him work out the lies she can believe in.’

Riker pulled out his notebook. A silver ornament on a chain was entangled in the spiral. It freed itself and dropped to the bar. Peggy picked it up. ‘So what’s with the Star of David? You’re an Episcopalian.’

‘No, I’m not. I’m an alcoholic.’

‘Ah, Riker, you’re dreaming those social-climbing dreams again. If you want to be an alcoholic you have to go to meetings.’ She handed him the six-pointed star.

‘Okay, I’m a drunk with aspirations.’ He stared at the star in his hand. ‘Lou Markowitz used to carry this around with him. Mallory thought I might like to have it.’

‘You sentimental slob.’

‘That’s what Mallory calls me, but she doesn’t think I’m sentimental.’ His pen hovered over the notebook. ‘Okay, markers for the runaround husband. Suppose he’s not a regular cheat, suppose it’s a first-time fling?’

‘He’ll start changing his habits. Maybe he walks the dog without being asked four times. Or he takes up a new sport for two – like tennis. Look for out-of-town trips that don’t match up with his job description, late hours at the office as a change in routine.’

‘Is he a good liar?’

‘Oh, they all think they’re great liars, but the wives have probably caught them in more lies than they can remember. It’s a pity you can’t just ask the wives. And a pity that most of them wouldn’t tell you.’

In Riker’s notebook, it said only DOGWALKING.

‘So, Riker, you think Mallory’s right about the perp? He panicked and ran?’

‘I think she underestimates him. She thinks the guy is a wimp who’d run if a mouse screamed.’

He liked it when they screamed. But he loved it when they howled.

Bitches. All women were bitches.

Did she think he would not recognize her as an enemy? How transparent and stupid she was.

He stood in the shower and let his hatred of her wash over him with the water. She was the enemy. He stepped from the shower, and water pooled at his feet as he rubbed a clear place on the glass. He stared at the mirror until his eyes seemed to float independent of his flesh.

What intelligence lay therein, what quickness of thought, thoughts running to the color red. But that insect in the background of his reflection crawling on the tiles, it marred his serenity. Better step on it quick. He did, and each time he did this, his enemy screamed and died. He beat her face in as he beat his pillow and then wondered why he could not sleep. When sleep did come, his dreams were all of death, angry death. Now the cancer of hatred was all, waking and sleeping. He was complete and invincible.

Mere humans had never proved a match for cancer. There was no cure.

With one long red fingernail, Mallory tapped the wad of papers which had traveled from Edward Slope’s hand to Charles and thence to her. She stared into the troubled face of a young investigator from the Medical Examiner’s Office. The man would not meet her eyes. His hands were worming around his coffee cup which had grown cold. A waitress was standing near them. Mallory waved her away.

‘Slope doesn’t figure you’re dirty, but I do. I know how much you have in your bank. I know every transaction in your stock portfolio, and I know your salary.’

‘Your old man never ratted on anybody.’

‘No, he didn’t. He just transferred them to hell. Most of them quit. They decided they’d rather live than do hard time in death precincts. I know that because I did the computer work for him. And what I did to them, I can do to you – and more. I can send you to a worse hell than early retirement on a partial pension.’

Ease up, Kathy, a memory of Markowitz cautioned her. If you scare them too much on tke first go-round, they go for a lawyer. You don’t want that.

She sat back in her chair. ‘I just wanted to give you a little something to think about over the holidays – give you a little time to go over your notes on the Coventry Arms visit. Merry Christmas. I’ll get back to you real soon.’

Nice touch, kid, said the memory of Markowitz which would not go to that part of the mind reserved for the dead.

Pansy Heart lay in her bed, watching him rise and walk back into the bathroom. She was imagining, for a few moments of quiet horror, that her husband crawled along on eight legs.

She was quiet for all the bathroom noises and the sheet rustling and the click of the bedside light switch. She sighed in the dark and wondered if he heard. And then she felt she could breathe again, breathe but not sleep. Not till she heard his own regular breathing and knew he would not wake until morning. And even so, she lay awake until the exhaustion of fear overtook her in the dark.

Angel Kipling looked up as Harry walked into the kitchen.

His face was still dazed from sleep. He hovered in the doorway as though debating whether this was safe ground or battle ground. Between coming and going, she nailed him with the first shot.

‘So what have you done now, Harry?’

‘Nothing,’ said Harry Kipling, opening the refrigerator and pulling out the leftover chicken from dinner.

She stared into his smiling face, and she wanted to hit him with a closed fist.

Pansy woke with a blow to her head. It was not a sharp blow but glancing. In the dim light of the bedroom, she saw the fist flying in the air, and her hand moved out to fend it off. It fell back to Emery’s side. She turned on the bedside lamp, and the pearls of night sweats glistened in the light. The longish hair was an aureole of gray spreading on the pillow around a face of eyes-closed anguish.

‘Emery, wake up!’

The brown eyes snapped open and looked into hers. She detected a wince, and she shrank back as if from an unkind word. He had trained her in that behavior, much the same as the dog had been trained. And what had he done to the dog? And why did he have to lie about it? What had he done?

‘Having a nightmare, Emery?’

Were you dreaming of Rosie or your mother?

‘Yes, a nightmare. I look in this hole and it’s alive with maggots, and I’m going into it. It’s all coming undone. Who’s doing this to me?’

If Pansy had believed in ghosts, she might have had an answer for that. It was the face of Emery’s mother she saw in the mirror across the room, and it was her own face.

The bouncer and the bartender each had the frowzy redhead by one flabby arm, and even so, she was giving them trouble as they led her out the door. The two large men had loud, hollered words with the woman on the sidewalk and out of Betty Hyde’s earshot.