Mustafa placed a hand on the case folder. “The police report of your fiancée’s murder is in here,” he said. “There’s a picture. Would you like to see it?” Costello blinked and his head jerked back. “No, I don’t suppose you would . . . But there’s another photo I would like you to take a look at.” As Costello eyed him warily, Mustafa got out his wallet and removed a worn snapshot that had been laminated in plastic. He placed it on the table and slid it forward, watching the doctor as he did so and seeing, in his mind’s eye, the mother from the Ghost Music store.

“I don’t know this woman,” Costello said.

“No, you wouldn’t,” said Mustafa. “Her name was Fadwa bint Harith. She was my wife. On the morning the towers fell, we had an argument. I was at fault, and knew it, and so naturally I was very angry. When I had to leave for work and my car wouldn’t start, I took hers. She had an appointment downtown as well that morning, not far from where I was going, but rather than drive her I left her to take the subway. She would have been riding on the number two line, one of the trains that passed beneath the Tigris and Euphrates Plaza.

“You can guess how the story ends, Dr. Costello. And perhaps you wouldn’t think it presumptuous if I said that I thought I understood something of how you felt, losing your Jessica. But really, that’s too simple. We have this thing in common, you and I, but there are also differences.

“One difference,” Mustafa said, placing his hand on the folder again, “is that there is no photo of my wife’s body for me to be afraid of. Fadwa is one of the 11/9 missing. I know she is dead—indeed, I would say I knew it even before it happened—but there is no actual proof of that.

“Now, I don’t know how much you know about Islamic legal tradition, Dr. Costello. In the matter of missing persons, the authorities vary widely in how long you must wait before declaring them dead. The strictest standard, from the Hanafi school of jurisprudence, holds that in the absence of positive proof you must assume the person is alive until such time as they would die of old age. In the case of a young person vanishing, that can mean a wait of as much as sixty or seventy years. It’s a very strict standard, especially for women, who can only have one husband at a time.

“Here in the state of Iraq, we follow the much more liberal standard of the Maliki school, which specifies a waiting period of only four years. But there’s a catch: The four-year clock doesn’t start until you go before a judge to report the person missing.

“In Fadwa’s case, I resisted going to the judge. I knew she was dead, I didn’t doubt it, but still, out of some selfish impulse, I delayed. Fadwa’s father was very angry with me when he found out—he accused me of being cowardly. Eventually, my own father convinced me to do the right thing. But because I delayed so long, it’s only very recently that the official declaration of death came through. That was hard; I was surprised by how hard it was, after so much time. My behavior since then has been . . . erratic. My boss, he’s actually worried about my sanity.

“What about you, Dr. Costello? Did having your fiancée’s body make it easier or harder for you, do you think? I can’t imagine it was much easier. Did you go mad? I think perhaps you did. And I am tempted, again, to say that I understand.

“But that brings us to the other difference between us.”

Mustafa flipped open the folder and pulled out not just one death-scene photograph, but several. He began dealing these onto the table, and Costello, who had been listening attentively, now recoiled in his seat as if Mustafa were chucking hot coals at him.

“Take a good look, doctor,” Mustafa said. Costello tried not to, but before he could avert his eyes one of the images caught at him, and he looked; and then his expression changed, as he realized that the people in these pictures, though unquestionably murder victims, were not, any of them, his fiancée. They were Arabs, Iraqis: two men, dead in the front seat of a bullet-riddled car; another man, tied to a post with his hands behind his back and shot in the head; a woman, garroted in her bedroom; and saddest of all, three small children, lying like dolls in the wreckage of a blown-up storefront.

“Yes, take a good look,” Mustafa repeated. “This is what you signed on for, when you joined the Hoffmans.” This wasn’t, strictly speaking, true. Mustafa had taken these photos from an open case file forwarded to AHS from Halal Enforcement. Although the use of explosives automatically made it a terrorism case under post-11/9 rules, these were almost certainly organized crime slayings. The killers would be Arabs as well, their boss—Mustafa could guess who he was—a Muslim. Still, the goal of these murders was the same as those planned by the Hoffmans: to spread terror. Morally, there was no difference.

“Let me tell you something about myself, Dr. Costello,” Mustafa said. “I’m no pacifist. I’m not above thoughts of vengeance. If the men who flew the planes on 11/9 were brought alive before me, I’d show them no mercy. Likewise, with the men who sent them on their way. But this”—he waved a hand at the pictures—“this slaughter of innocents, it’s beyond me. Not even in my darkest dreams am I tempted to such savagery. I look at this woman, here, and all I can think of is Fadwa in her last moments. God willing she didn’t suffer long, but to imagine even an instant of her pain and fear, and then to imagine choosing to inflict that same pain and fear on some other blameless woman . . . No. No, that is beyond me. And these children, little children who can have done nothing, nothing to deserve this . . . I don’t understand it. Can you explain it to me, Dr. Costello?

“Is this Christianity? I’m no expert on your New Testament, but I have read parts of it. The prophet Jesus, peace be unto him, said that there were two great commandments: to love God with all your heart and soul, and to love your neighbor as yourself. True words, Dr. Costello, words that any Muslim would be bound to agree with, for we believe the same thing. But even a very poor Muslim such as I am would have a hard time seeing how you get from those words, to this. Can you explain it to me? Think of your Jessica, in her last moments. If she were here now, and knew what sort of acts you’d been contemplating, what would she say?”

Costello’s lips moved in a soft murmur.

“What was that, Dr. Costello? I didn’t quite hear you.”

“I said, I’m sorry.”

“I would like to believe that,” Mustafa said. “It would help me to believe that, if you’d talk to me about your dealings with the Hoffmans: What you were planning. Who else was involved. Anything you can tell me that might prevent the deaths of more innocents.”

But Costello shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”

“To the contrary, Dr. Costello, it matters very much. Certainly it matters to those who may die. It matters to their families. It matters to me. And as a human being and a child of God, it should matter to you. I won’t lie to you: Even if you choose to cooperate fully, you’re facing a long stretch in prison. For security reasons you’ll be kept in solitary confinement, which means years in a small room with only your own conscience for company. You may not think it now, but over time, over long time, guilt and regret can eat you alive. And if that doesn’t happen? You still have to answer to God on Judgment Day. So I would urge you, for your own sake, to care. Care now, while you can still do some good.”

Not a bad speech, Mustafa thought, but even before he finished, he could tell that it was wasted. Whatever brief connection he’d established with Costello had already evaporated. The doctor had mentally withdrawn, or maybe sidestepped was a better word—when he spoke again, it was from a different, and very strange, place.