And that was what adhering to the commandments was all about, too. It was generational. It fostered the long view that human nature never changed. Only individual humans did. But not so often as you’d think.

Nat finished his prayer and hit his son on the thigh. OK, they could get up and go outside now.

On the steps of the synagogue, they both stopped, squinting into the bright sunlight. ‘I love the boy, Abraham, you know that. It’s nothing to do with that. It’s you.’

Abe drew in a deep breath. ‘What’s me? I didn’t plan this, you know, having to go downtown on Rita’s day off. They need me down there.’

Nat rolled his eyes, dismissing that excuse. ‘They always need you down there. Your son needs you out here. Suppose I just say no, I’ve got to go back to temple – then what?’

‘I don’t know. I guess I go get Orel and bring him down with me.’

‘Among the criminals? There’s a fine solution. Better I should take him back here.’

‘Except he’s got his soccer practice.’

‘Oh yes, right. Much more important than temple on the Sabbath.’

‘Well, he’s there, Dad, and I told him you’d be picking him up. If you’re not, fine, but I’ve got to know right now – all right?’

Suddenly, the serenity of the temple vanished, and a rare flash of anger took its place. Nat’s voice took on a hard edge. ‘Everything’s now with you, Abraham. You want to ask yourself why that is, maybe?’

Abe raised his own voice. ‘No. I don’t need to ask myself that, Dad. You want to know why? It’s because everything is a crisis. Everything has to be done five minutes ago, and so Saturday rolls around and all the stuff that needed to be done on Friday…’ Abe reined in his own escalating temper. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I don’t know. I don’t mean to yell at you.’

Nat reached up and put a hand on his son’s shoulder. Abe had his mother Emma’s height and, of course, her color. He towered over his Jewish old man, who now shrugged. ‘I been yelled at before, Abraham. It’s not the yelling I’m worried about. It’s your boy. It’s time passing and then it’s gone and you never saw it.’

Glitsky had told his father he’d be getting home in time for dinner with him and Orel.

Nevertheless, the discussion nagged at him as he drove down to the Hall of Justice. It was still on his mind when he walked through the doorway into the long hall that led to the DA’s office, airport for Flying Assholes Airways.

What did they really need him for now anyway? On Saturday afternoon?

The politicos thought they could just snap a finger and he’d have to come a-runnin‘. And he was proving that they were right, because here he was. He should have just said no, he had other plans, he couldn’t come down and discuss Ron Beaumont. But it was too late now.

Scott Randall was in Sharron Pratt’s office with her lordship, the DA’s investigator Peter Struler, Chief of Police Dan Rigby and Abe’s predecessor as head of homicide, Captain Frank Batiste, who was now an assistant chief. And my, weren’t things heating up? Four of the five of them – everyone but Batiste – were already in a friendly discussion about something that abruptly halted as Glitsky’s shadow crossed the room’s lintel.

‘Ah, Lieutenant Glitsky.’ Pratt was sitting on her desk and actually clapped her hands as though in delighted surprise that Abe had dropped in.

Batiste, Glitsky noticed, had found a convenient neutral corner and was memorizing the stains on the ceiling tiles. He was a good guy and his body language was telling Abe a lot. This wasn’t his party, which meant that he’d been called down by the chief to neutralize Abe and make sure that homicide accepted the message, whatever it was.

Rigby and Randall sat on either end of the low couch looking at some papers spread on the table in front of them.

‘Ah, Ms Pratt.’ Unable to stop himself, Glitsky silently brought his own hands together. Sometimes imitation wasn’t the sincerest form of flattery. Sometimes it meant that you saw through pretense and were telling the pretender that she was full of shit.

He stopped in the doorway and went into his best at ease. He nodded at the men, but no smile. ‘Hey, guys.’

There was an awkward moment during which some glances were exchanged, Rigby evidently waiting for a signal that it was time to begin. He cleared his throat. ‘About this Beaumont thing, Abe. And now the newspaper stories about this woman in jail.’

Glitsky nodded. ‘Frannie. Her name’s Frannie Hardy.’

‘Yes, of course it is. Frannie.’ The chief looked over at Pratt, got some secret message, cleared his throat, and spoke again. ‘We’ve just about decided to put out an all points on Ron, the husband, and we wanted to run it by you first, to get your input.’

‘We wanted to be sure we kept you in the loop, Abe,’ Pratt added.

Glitsky did a quick take at Batiste and the two conducted a millisecond’s worth of non-verbal communication of their own. Then the lieutenant folded his arms and leaned his bulk against the door jamb. ‘I really appreciate your concern, Sharron, thank you. And this all points bulletin? It would be in light of new evidence that Investigator Struler’s come up with – would that be it?’

Scott Randall spoke up. ‘We want him for questioning, that’s all. We want to talk to him.’

‘You don’t need me to talk to him.’ Glitsky couldn’t have been more laid back. ‘You don’t need me for an APB. But I’m curious about what you plan to do if you find him after this all points manhunt.’ He looked at Struler, then Randall. Across the room, Batiste brought a hand up to his mouth and pulled on it to keep the corners down.

‘What do you mean?’ Struler asked. ‘We bring him in and-’

‘You arrest him, you mean?’

Cornered, Struler looked to Randall, then Pratt. He nodded. ‘Sure.’

‘With no evidence? No chance to even get past a prelim and go to trial, much less win? You want a lawsuit for false arrest, or what?’

Chief Rigby cleared his throat again, getting into the middle of it. ‘Come on, Abe, it’s not like there’s no evidence.’

Glitsky turned to him. ‘It isn’t? I haven’t seen any if there is.’

‘The man’s disappeared,’ Randall said.

Glitsky shrugged. ‘So? What’s new?’

‘The murder was at his house,’ Pratt added. ‘There’s no sign of anyone else. She may have been having an affair and told him she was leaving. Process of elimination leaves Ron.’

Glitsky withered her with a look of disbelief and wondered, not for the first time, if the City and County’s top attorney had passed the bar or ever won a case in court. It didn’t seem possible. ‘You want to take that to a jury and get beyond reasonable doubt, Sharron, you’ve got my sympathy.’

Rigby, a political animal himself, tried to smooth the waters. ‘The point is, Abe, that in the real world we’ve got to move along on this.’

But Pratt couldn’t keep herself out of it. ‘I’ve had calls from a lot of citizens plus we’re getting some very bad response to this woman being in jail.’ Pratt had made something of a career out of ignoring the rules of law. Now she seemed to be having a hard time reconciling herself to the fact that her political problems weren’t going to go away even if she broke more of them. ‘I got a call from the mayor this morning, do you realize that?’

Again, Glitsky shrugged. ‘Talk to Judge Braun about that.’

‘The mayor has talked to her.’

‘And?’ Although they wouldn’t be here if Glitsky didn’t know the answer. Braun wasn’t budging.

Randall butted in with the crux of his theory. ‘If we get Beaumont in custody, Abe,’ he said, ‘we can shift public opinion away from Frannie and on to Ron. He’ll be the bad guy for putting her in this position.’

Now Glitsky had it all on the table. These people were really from Mars. ‘If memory serves,’ he said, ‘it was you who put her in this position, wasn’t it, Scott?’