“What? The van?” I noticed the morgue car-with its OCME markings on the side panel-coasting to a stop behind our Crown Vic.

Mike shook his head. “Someone was crouching behind the marker opposite the Hassett plot. Somebody waiting for us who wasn’t invited to this unpleasant little disinterment.” He started to trot down the incline.

“Where’s he going?” Silbey asked, his voice rising almost an octave.

I saw a figure in a dark coat dart out from behind the obelisk and cross the road to go down toward the tranquil pond. Mike called out for the person to stop as he began to give chase.

“Mike,” I said, in almost a whisper. It seemed so inappropriate to be shattering the quiet of this sanctuary.

He ignored me but had reached the roadway just as the truck carrying four gravediggers pulled up to the intersection.

The person picked up speed as he ran downhill, and Mike lost seconds waiting for the truck to make the turn. Whoever it was did not want to stop to see why Mike was after him.

The branches of the weeping beech hung over the landscape, like hundreds of arms reaching almost to the ground. I lost sight of the black-coated figure when he headed directly for the great tree and slipped under its limbs, disappearing behind it. A garish mausoleum with a green copper roof sat beside the beech and provided cover for him as well.

Ten seconds later, Mike was swallowed up by the foliage, too. Anxiety had overtaken me again. I didn’t need any more excitement after yesterday’s trauma. I was too late to try to chase Mike and uncertain about what had set him off after the elusive figure.

I cut through the grass between several markers to get to the curb. I pleaded with Mr. Silbey to send the gravediggers to back Mike up. All four of them-and Silbey himself-looked at me as though I had lost my mind.

“What do you need, Miss Cooper?” one of the morgue drivers asked.

“Mike Chapman-he’s gone off after someone. Would you check down there”-I pointed-“and see if he needs any help?”

“Sure. Who was it?”

“I don’t know.”

“But,” the driver said tentatively, “what if it’s trouble?”

“It’s probably paparazzi,” I said. “Mike was worried that someone at the squad might have leaked this to a reporter. We wanted to get the exhumation done without any press around. Please hurry.”

We had talked about that possibility on the ride to the cemetery. I hadn’t seen a camera in the runner’s hand, but now I was actually hoping that the interloper was no more dangerous than a press photographer.

Reluctantly, the driver started walking toward the pond.

Another car pulled up behind our growing caravan. A husky, thick-necked man in a T-shirt, jeans, and clean work boots-a baseball cap barely fitting the circumference of his wide head-got out and came slowly toward Evan Silbey and me with his head down.

“I thought you weren’t expecting anyone else,” Silbey said. “Get Chapman back here. Who is this?”

“I don’t have any idea,” I said.

Then the well-muscled figure lifted his head and kept walking toward the stone that bore Rebecca Hassett’s name. All his features were exaggerated-a bulbous nose, strong chin, piercing blue eyes, and sulking expression. It was her brother Bobby.

He wagged a finger in my direction. “Don’t think you’ll be touching my sister, Miss District Attorney. Not you, not that wiseass cop who’s sticking his nose in our personal business every place I go. Let her rest in peace, for God’s sake, or I’ll be sure you live to regret it.” Hassett stepped closer to me and backed me against another headstone. “You leave the poor girl alone.”

“Look, Mr. Hassett, we’ve got a court order to do this,” I said, trying to glance over my shoulder for any sign of Mike. “I-I know this is an awful thing to have to think about, but it’s quite possible that techniques we have now that weren’t available when your sister was killed might help us identify-”

Bobby Hassett’s face was just inches from mine. His nostrils flared and his bloodshot eyes narrowed as I spoke. His breath had the faint odor of beer as he interrupted my lame explanation. “Don’t give me none of that. What difference is it to know who the mutt is who killed the kid? He’s lived way too long to make any kind of justice worthwhile.”

“A judge has already made a ruling about this,” I said, inching backward again.

“I know that. I got a call from the DA’s Office last night-”

“My office?”

“The Bronx. Those fools thought they were going to get my permission to do this.”

“Well, that would have been necessary if the judge hadn’t granted the order,” I said, aware that the prosecutor’s phone call was what had alerted Bobby to this morning’s exhumation.

“An order? Let me see your papers.”

Evan Silbey had retreated from this encounter. “Mr. Silbey,” I said, “you’ve got to send your men to find Detective Chapman.”

Bobby Hassett grabbed my wrist and pulled me forward. “Get your damn foot off my mother’s grave.”

I looked down to see the writing on a small flat stone similar to Rebecca’s, though not worn by age and exposure to the elements. The woman had been dead less than six months, according to the date. The grass around her little plot was newer than that around the family graves surrounding it.

“The documents are in the car. The detective picked them up early this morning. I’ll get them for you.”

I was glad to step away from Hassett and even more relieved to see Mike Chapman, leaning on the arm of the morgue driver, limping up the slope that led from the pond.

I didn’t stop to get the court order, but jogged directly down to meet the two men.

“What happened?”

“I fell on my rear end, that’s all. Glad you weren’t there to see it. Twisted my ankle and slid down. Just missed that frigging tree trunk. Could have planted me in old Mr. Woolworth’s mausoleum.”

“Is it-”

“Nah. I stepped into a pile of goose droppings and my foot went out from underneath. It’s just sore. Maybe a sprain.”

“You didn’t catch up to the guy, did you?”

“Not even close. Not even a good look. Like a gazelle, he was.”

I put my arm around Mike’s back and let him walk the rest of the way up leaning on me. “A photographer?”

“Not likely. No equipment dangling and no reason to run.”

“Well, we’ve got another spectator,” I said. “Bobby Hassett.”

“That’s a gruesome thought. He wants to watch?”

“He wants to stop us. Someone from Jefferson’s office called him last night, trying to get his consent in case the judge didn’t go for their application. Tipped him off that something might happen this morning, whether the Hassetts agreed to it or not, and now he’s here to try to prevent us from-from doing this.”

As soon as Mike heard Hassett’s name, he untangled himself from me and straightened up, walking gingerly across the road to get to the family plot.

Mr. Silbey scurried toward Mike. “Please, Detective Chapman. We can’t have a scene here.”

“I forgot-all your peeps are asleep, aren’t they?”

“This man has rights, too, doesn’t he?”

Mike kept moving while he looked around us. Birds were chirping in the surrounding trees, the wind occasionally gusted and rustled the leaves, no one else was in sight but those of us who had come to disturb Rebecca Hassett’s grave-and her irate brother. There was nothing in this pastoral setting to tell us that we were still in New York City.

“Bobby,” Mike said, reaching a hand out to Hassett. “Mike Chapman. Homicide.”

“Yeah. I know that.” His hands were dug as far as they could go into his jeans’ pockets.

“Could we step away from here? Would you let me tell you-”

“Not a chance.”

I walked to the morgue van and spoke to the patient attendants, waiting for their cargo.