“I suppose so.”

“Roger, I wonder. You’re a psychologist. Do you have any theories about what might have happened to Dr. Strachey?”

“I’m an evolutionary psychologist. I’m not a diagnostician.”

“So you refuse to even hazard a guess as to the underlying cause?”

Carbon expelled a put-upon sigh. “Very well. To put it in the most technical of terms: Willard went barmy.”

Logan frowned. “In the most technical of terms.”

“It happens, you know. Perhaps more frequently to brilliant scientists than to others. Even brilliant scientists who are — shall we say — past their prime.”

“Speaking of that, Perry Maynard told me it was you who advocated for Dr. Strachey to be put in charge of the West Wing renovation.”

Carbon did not reply to this. He merely rubbed his Freud-like beard.

“You seem to enjoy meddling in the affairs of Lux residents,” Logan said.

“If you’re referring to my efforts to get you ousted, that was nothing personal. Your work was pseudoscience, smoke and mirrors, below Lux’s standards. In the case of Willard, I saw a piece of slowly vegetating human matériel that could be put to better use.”

“Why the West Wing?”

“Why not? It was a job that needed doing. Although, had I known he was about to crack, I wouldn’t have suggested it.” He shook his head. “All that nattering about ‘voices in the dark.’ ”

Logan glanced up. “When was this?”

“When he went past me, of course.”

“I thought you told me he didn’t say anything.”

“He didn’t say anything to me. He was just raving.”

Logan looked at him speculatively.

“You don’t think I’m responsible, somehow? What — you think Willard blamed me for putting him in charge of the West Wing…a resentment that eventually pushed him over the edge? Ludicrous.”

“I didn’t say that,” Logan replied.

“If you’re looking for a scalp to collect, go chat up that Grecian assistant of his. She’s had her eye on his chair from her first bloody day in the place.”

“I already have.” Logan stood up. “Good day, Roger.”

“Close the door on your way out,” Carbon said, rising as well, turning his back, and heading for his desk. “And don’t slip on any ectoplasm.”

As Logan was leaving, a woman appeared in the other doorway of the suite. “Dr. Logan? Do you have a minute?”

“Of course.” Logan stepped into a lab on whose large desk sat no less than three computers and four flat-panel monitors. A nearby rack contained at least half a dozen blade servers. “Good lord. Do you work with them, or repair them?”

The woman smiled. Then she closed the door and gestured Logan to a seat. “I work with them. I’m an electrical engineer, with a specialty in quantum computing.”

Logan nodded. The woman — whom he had seen once or twice at dinner — was young, very thin, with arresting raven hair and deep-set eyes. Her movements were sharp and abrupt, like a bird’s. Although she was still smiling pleasantly, she seemed to be cloaked in an invisible veil of melancholy.

She sat down in a nearby chair. “I’m sorry. My name is Laura Benedict. I asked you in because I couldn’t help overhearing your conversation with Roger. I wanted to apologize for his behavior.”

“Thanks, but that really wasn’t necessary.”

“Roger is an exceptional scientist, but he’s also like the schoolyard bully who never grew up. He still likes to pull the wings off flies.

“It sounds like he didn’t get along with Willard Strachey.”

“They certainly weren’t the best of friends. But then, Roger rubs a lot of people the wrong way.” She looked at him with her penetrating eyes. “Nobody’s actually made an announcement, but I can guess why you’re here. You’re looking into Will’s death, right?”

“Yes.” Logan paused. “Did you say your name was Laura Benedict?”

The woman nodded.

“As it happens, you and Dr. Carbon were the last on my list of people to interview.”

Laura Benedict looked at him inquiringly.

“Forgive me, but I have to ask. On the afternoon following Willard Strachey’s death, you were seen on a bench overlooking the ocean, hugging yourself, rocking back and forth. The person who logged the incident said that at one point you stood up and walked toward the cliffs at the edge of the ocean. You seemed so…well, so distraught that they were about to call security. But then you returned to the bench, and…”

As Logan spoke, the woman’s eyes filled with tears. She began sobbing, quietly at first, and then more loudly. It didn’t take a sensitive such as Logan to see that the woman was grief stricken. Uncomfortable at the reaction he’d precipitated, Logan fell silent.

After a minute or two, the woman collected herself. “I’m sorry,” she said, wiping her eyes with a tissue. “I thought I was over the worst of it.”

“It’s my fault,” Logan said. “Had I known, I wouldn’t have—”

“No,” the woman said, sniffling. “No, I have to learn to deal with it.” She got a fresh tissue, blew her nose with shaking hands. “There’s no mystery. I was beside myself with grief. Will was…he took me under his wing when I first came to Lux. It can be a pretty intimidating place, you know; the brainpower here is almost incandescent.” She smiled through her tears. “Will was so patient, so helpful. He was my mentor. No, more than that. He was like a father to me.” Her hands began trembling again and she reached for another tissue.

“I didn’t know him well myself, during my own brief tenure here a decade ago, but he always struck me as a kind and gentle person.” Logan paused. “Do you have any idea what could have caused such a change in him?”

Laura Benedict shook her head, wiped her eyes again. “I hadn’t seen much of him these past few weeks. I’ve been preparing a paper I’m presenting at the next meeting of the Society of Quantum Engineering, and it’s been consuming all my time. But he always had time for me — I should have found time for him. I keep thinking that if only I’d spoken with him, heard him out, that maybe…maybe…”

“That’s survivor guilt talking. You mustn’t think like that.” Logan did not want to intrude on this woman’s grief any longer. It was clearly still too raw. “One last question — and, again, I hope you’ll forgive my asking. When you were seen walking toward the cliffs, were you…?” Finding himself unable to frame the words, he fell silent again.

“Was I going to fling myself in? No. That’s not me. Besides, I have a paper to present — remember?” Another smile, but it was a wan smile, as before.

“Thank you for being honest at a difficult time, Dr. Benedict.” And Logan rose. “And thanks also for the words about Carbon.”

Laura Benedict rose as well. Her eyes looked a little bruised and red, but at least they were now dry. “If he gives you any more trouble, let me know. For some reason, he’s a pussycat around me.”

Back in his rooms, Logan entered some notes on these two interviews into an encrypted file on his computer — a paragraph on Laura Benedict, several on Roger Carbon. Now that he had spoken to everybody on his initial list, he read over their brief dossiers one more time. Then he created a spreadsheet, also encrypted, and entered each name and a small comment on why they had been chosen for questioning. Then he sorted the names into various groups. One group, including people like Ian Albright and Kim Mykolos, comprised those who had worked with Strachey. Another group, which included Roger Carbon, consisted of people who had witnessed Strachey’s strange behavior in the days leading up to his suicide. And then there was the final group: those, such as Terence McCarty, the linguist, whom Carbon had labeled “the others.” There were five names in this last group. One was Laura Benedict, and Logan put an asterisk beside her name — her behavior had stemmed from simple grief.

The remaining four were interesting. Three were scientists in residence; one was an administrator. None had been eager to talk about their experiences, some less so than others. Two had reported seeing or smelling things that turned out either to be not there at all, or to be grossly different from reality. Three of the four said that they had briefly felt compelled to do unusual or uncharacteristic things. All four had heard music or voices, or a combination of the two.