"Why do you want to violate the sepulchre?" he asked in slow Southern cadences that belied a quick mind as he turned a page in a legal pad.

"After going over Dr. Jenrette's reports," I replied! "we agree some questions were not answered by the first examination of Emily Steiner's body."

"I know of Dr. Jenrette but don't believe I know you," Judge Begley said to me as he placed the legal pad on the desk.

"I'm Dr. Kay Scarpetta, the chief medical examiner of Virginia."

"I was told you had something to do with the FBI."

"Yes, sir. I am the consulting forensic pathologist for the Investigative Support Unit."

"Is that like the Behavioral Science Unit?"

"One and the same. The Bureau changed the name several years ago."

"You're talking about the folks who do the profiling of these serial killers and other aberrant criminals who until recently we didn't have to worry about in these parts." He watched me closely, lacing his fingers in his lap.

"That's what we do," I said.

"Your Honor," Dr. Jenrette said.

"The Black Mountain Police has requested the assistance of the FBI. There's some fear that the man who murdered the Steiner girl is the same man who killed a number of people in Virginia."

"I'm aware of that. Dr. Jenrette, since you were so kind as to explain some of this when you called earlier. However, the only item on the agenda right now is your wish for me to grant you the right to dig up this little girl.

"Before I let you do something as upsetting and disrespectful as that, you're going to have to give me a powerfully good reason. And I do wish the two of you would sit down and make yourselves comfortable. That's why I have chairs on that side of my desk."

"She has a mark on her skin," I said as I seated myself.

"What sort of mark?" He eyed me with interest as Dr. Jenrette slipped a photograph out of an envelope and set it on the judge's blotter.

"You can see it in the photograph," Jenrette said. The judge's eyes dropped to the photograph, his face unreadable.

"We don't know what the mark is," I explained.

"But it may tell us where the body lay. It may be some type of injury." He picked up the photograph, squinting as he examined it more closely.

"Aren't there studies of photographs you can do? Seems to me there's all sorts of scientific things they do these days."

"There are," I answered.

"But the problem is, by the time we finish conducting any studies, the body will be in such poor condition that we'll no longer be able to tell anything from it if we still need to exhume it. The longer the interval gets, the harder it is to distinguish between an injury or other significant mark on the body and artifacts due to decomposition."

"There are a lot of details about this case that make it very odd. Your Honor," Dr. Jenrette said.

"We just need all the help we can get."

"I understand the SBI agent working the case was found hanged yesterday. I saw that in the morning paper."

"Yes, sir," Dr. Jenrette said.

"Are there odd details about his death, too?"

"There are," I replied.

"I hope you're not going to come back here a week from now and want to dig him up."

"I can't imagine that," I said.

"This little girl has a mama. And just how do you think she's going to feel about what you've got in mind?" Neither Dr. Jenrette nor I replied. Leather creaked as the judge shifted in his chair. He glanced past us at a clock on the wall.

"See, that's my biggest problem with what you're asking," he went on.

"I'm thinking about this poor woman, about what all she's been through. I have no interest whatsoever in putting her through anything else."

"We wouldn't ask if we didn't think it was important to the investigation of her daughter's death," I said.

"And I know Mrs. Steiner must want justice. Your Honor. "

"You go get her mama and bring her to me," Judge Begley said as he got up from his chair.

"Excuse me?" Dr. Jenrette looked bewildered.

"I want her mama brought to me," the judge repeated.

"I should be freed up by two-thirty. I'll expect to see you back here."

"What if she won't come?" Dr. Jenrette asked, and both of us got up.

"Can't say I'd blame her a bit."

"You don't need her permission," I said with calm I did not feel.

"No, ma'am, I don't," said the judge as he opened the door.

Dr. Jenrette was kind enough to let me use his office while he disappeared into the hospital labs, and for the next several hours I was on the phone. The most important task, ironically, turned out to be the easiest. Marino had no trouble convincing Denesa Steiner to accompany him to the judge's chambers that afternoon. More difficult was figuring out how to get them there, since Marino still did not have a car.

"What's the holdup?" I asked.

"The friggin' scanner they put in don't work," he said irritably.

"Can't you do without that?"

"They don't seem to think so."

I glanced at my watch.

"Maybe I'd better come get you."

"Yeah, well, I'd rather get there myself. She's got a pretty decent ride. In fact, there are some who say an Infinin's better than a Benz."

"That's moot, since I'm driving a Chevrolet at the moment."

"She said her father-in-law used to have a Benz a lot like yours and you ought to think of switching to an Infiniti or Legend."

I was silent.

"Just food for thought."

"Just get here," I said shortly.

"Yeah, I will."

"Fine." We hung up without good-byes, and as I sat at Dr. Jenrette's cluttered desk I felt exhausted and betrayed. I had been through Marino's bad times with Doris. I had supported him as he had begun venturing forth into the fast, frightening world of dating. In return, he had always telegraphed judgments about my personal life without benefit of having been asked. He had been negative about my ex-husband, and very critical of my former lover. Mark. He rarely had anything nice to say about Lucy or the way I dealt with her, and he did not like my friends. Most of all, I felt his cold stare on my relationship with Wesley. I felt Marino's jealous rage. He was not at Begley's office when Dr. Jenrette and I returned at half past two. As minutes crept by inside the judge's chambers, my anger grew.

"Tell me where you were born. Dr. Scarpetta," the judge said to me from the other side of his immaculate desk.

"Miami," I replied.

"You certainly don't talk like a Southerner. I would have placed you up north somewhere."

"I was educated in the North."

"It might surprise you to know that I was, too," he said.

"Why did you settle here?" Dr. Jenrette asked him.

"I'm sure for some of the very same reasons that you did."

"But you're from here," I said.

"Going back three generations. My great-grandfather was born in a log cabin around here. He was a teacher. That was on my mother's side. On my father's side we had mostly moonshiners until about halfway into this century. Then we had preachers. I believe that might be them now." Marino opened the door, and his face peeked in before his feet did. Denesa Steiner was behind him, and though I would never accuse Marino of chivalry, he was unusually attentive and gentle with this rather peculiarly put together woman whose dead daughter was our reason for gathering. The judge rose, and out of habit so did I, as Mrs. Steiner regarded each of us with curious sadness.

"I'm Dr. Scarpetta." I offered my hand and found hers cool and soft.

"I'm terribly sorry about this, Mrs. Steiner."

"I'm Dr. Jenrette. We've talked on the phone."

"Won't you be seated," the judge said to her very kindly. Marino moved two chairs close together, directing her to one while he took the other. Mrs. Steiner was in her mid- to late thirties and dressed entirely in black. Her skirt was full and below her knees, a sweater buttoned to her chin. She wore no makeup, her only jewelry a plain gold wedding ring. She looked the part of a spinster missionary, yet the longer I studied her, the more I saw what her puritanical grooming could not hide. She was beautiful, with smooth pale skin and a generous mouth, and curly hair the color of honey. Her nose was patrician, her cheekbones high, and beneath the folds of her horrible clothes hid a voluptuously well formed body. Nor had her attributes successfully eluded anything male and breathing in the room. Marino, in particular, could not take his eyes off her.