I think I got them all” Rita said with a last slap at my back. “Give me your shirt.” She took it, shook it out vigorously, and handed it back to me. “Here, you better put this back on” she said, and although I could not imagine why all of Miami was suddenly so obsessed with fighting partial nudity, I put the shirt back on, after looking suspiciously inside for any lingering fire ants.

When I poked my head out of the shirt and into the daylight again, Rita had already grabbed Cody and Astor by the hand again.

“Dexter,” she said. Tou said —how could you, I mean ... Why are you here?”

I was not sure how little I could tell her and still answer satisfactorily, and unfortunately, I didn't think I could just clutch at my head and moan again -1 was pretty sure I'd worn that out yesterday.

And to say that the Passenger and I had agreed that Weiss would come here and take the children because that's what we would have done in his place probably would not go down well, either. So I decided to try a rather diluted version of the truth. “It, ah —it's this guy who blew up the house yesterday,” I said. I just had a hunch that he might try again.” Rita just looked at me. I mean, to grab the kids as a way to get at me.”

“But you're not even a real policeman” Rita said with a certain amount of outrage in her voice, as if somebody had broken a basic rule. “Why would he try to get at you?” It was a good point, particularly since in her world —and generally speaking, in my world, too —blood spatter experts don't end up in blood feuds. I think it's about Deborah” I said. After all, she was a real policeman, and she wasn't here to contradict me. “It's somebody she was after when she got stabbed and I was there.”

“And so now he tries to hurt my children?” she said. “Because Deborah tried to arrest him?”

“That's the criminal mind” I said. “It doesn't work like yours.” Of course, it actually did work like mine, and right now the criminal mind was working on a thought about what Weiss might have left behind in his car. He had not expected to flee on foot —it was quite possible that there was some kind of hint in the car about where he would go and what his next move would be. And more —there might be some kind of horrible clue that pointed a blood-soaked finger in my direction. With that thought, I realized I needed to go through his car now, while Lear was busy and before any other cops arrived on the scene.

Seeing that Rita was still looking at me expectantly, I said, “He's crazy. We may never really understand what he's thinking.” She looked nearly convinced, so in the belief that a quick exit was often the most convincing argument, I nodded at Weiss's car. I should probably see if he left anything important. Before the tow truck gets here.” And I stepped around the hood of Rita's car and up to the front door of Weiss's, which was hanging open.

The front seat held the usual assortment of car garbage. Gum wrappers littered the floor, a water bottle lay on the seat, an ash tray held a handful of quarters for tolls. No butcher knives, bone saws, or bombs; nothing interesting at all. I was just about to slide into the car and open the glove compartment when I noticed a large notebook on the back seat. It was an artist's sketch book, with the edges of several loose pages sticking out, all held together with a large rubber band, and as I saw it the voice in the back of Dexter's Dark Room called out, Bingo!

I stepped out of the car and tried to open the back door. It was jammed shut, dented in from impact with Rita's car. So I knelt on the front seat and leaned over, grabbing the notebook and pulling it out. A siren wailed nearby, and I stepped away from Weiss's car and moved over next to Rita, clutching the book to my chest.

“What is it?” she said.

I don't know” I said. “Let's have a look.” And thinking only innocent thoughts I removed the rubber band.

A loose page fluttered to the ground and Astor pounced on it.

“Dexter” she said. “This looks just like you.”

“That's not possible” I said, taking the page from her hand.

But it was possible. It was a nice drawing, very well done, showing a man from the waist up, in a kind of mock-heroic Rambo-esque pose, holding a large knife that dripped blood, and there was no doubt about it.

It was me.

I ONLY HAD A FEW SECONDS TO ADMIRE THE SPLENDID likeness of myself before, in rapid succession, Cody said, “Cool” Rita said, “Let me see” and —happiest of all —the ambulance arrived. In the confusion that followed I managed to slip the portrait back into the notebook and usher my little family over to talk to the Medical Techs for a brief but thorough examination. Although they were reluctant to admit it, they could find no severed limbs, missing skulls, or mangled internal organs at all and so, eventually, they were forced to allow Rita and the kids to go, with dire warnings about what to watch out for just in case.

The damage to Rita's car was mostly cosmetic —one headlight was broken and the fender was pushed in —so I bundled the three of them into the car. Normally Rita would drop them at an after school program and go back to work, but there is an unwritten law granting you the rest of the day off when you and your children are attacked by a maniac, so she decided to take them all home to recover from the trauma. And since Weiss was still out there somewhere, we decided that I had better do the same, and come home to protect them. So I waved them away into traffic and started the long and weary walk back to where I had parked my car.

My ankle was throbbing and the sweat that ran down my back irritated the ant bites, so in order to take my mind off the pain I flipped open Weiss's notebook and paged through it as I walked.

The shock of that picture of me was past, and I needed to find out what it meant —and where it might be leading Weiss. I was reasonably sure it was not a mere doodle, something he had absentmindedly scratched out while talking on the telephone. After all, who did he have left to talk to? His lover Doncevic was dead, and he had killed his dear pal Wimble himself. Besides, everything he had done so far had been pointed at a very specific purpose, and without exception it had been a purpose that I could do without quite happily.

So I studied the drawing of me again. It was idealized, I suppose —I could not remember noticing that I had such clearly defined washboard abs when last I looked. And the overall impression of a vast and happy menace was, while perhaps accurate, something I tried very hard not to show. But I had to admit he had captured something here, possibly even suitable for framing.

I went through the other pages. It was quite interesting stuff, and the drawings were good, especially the ones that featured me.

I was sure I didn't look that noble, happy, and savage, but perhaps that was what artistic license is all about. As I looked at the other drawings and began to get an idea what it was all leading up to, I was also quite sure that I didn't like this, no matter how flattering.

Not at all.

Many of the drawings showed ideas for ways to decorate anonymous bodies in the spirit of what Weiss had already done.

There was one that featured a woman with six breasts; where the extras would come from was not mentioned. She was wearing a flamboyant feathered hat and a thong, the kind of costume we had seen at Moulin Rouge in Paris. It hid almost nothing, but made everything seem so glamorous, and the effect of the sequined bras that barely covered all six breasts was absolutely riveting.

The next page had a letter-sized piece of paper wedged into the binding. I took it out and unfolded it. It was an airline schedule from Cubana Aviacion, printed from a computer and listing their flights from Havana to Mexico. It was tucked in with a drawing that depicted a man wearing a straw hat and holding an oar. A line had been drawn through it and next to it in bold and neat block letters was written, “REFUGEE!” I shoved the Aviacion printout back in and flipped the page. The next page showed a man with an opened body cavity stuffed with what appeared to be cigars and rum bottles.