"Yeah. Maybe." He was reluctant to commit himself. "Tell me this: We've got this guy who kills two women, completely destroys their eyes. Then he kills another guy, takes him out and buries him in Wisconsin, and he's spotted purely by chance-some neighbors see his car lights and think he might be a burglar. Turns out he probably buried the body the night before, and he came back for the sole purpose of hacking out the eyes…"

"… Doesn't want to be watched by the dead," Elle said crisply.

"I was wondering if it might be something like that," Lucas said. "But I was also wondering-would it necessarily have to be sincere? If there was some kind of manipulation going on, could he be doing it for some other reason?"

"Like what?"

"Publicity? Or a deliberate effort to tie the murders together?"

She shrugged. "I suppose he could, but then why go back and hack the eyes out of a man whose body you're trying to hide, and don't expect to be found?"

"Yeah, there's that," Lucas said, discouraged. He thrust his hands into his jacket pockets.

"So it's probably real, and it has implications," she said, looking up at him.

"Like what?"

"He hacked the eyes out of all three people he's killed-at least, all three that we know about. And he did it instantly: he killed the first one, Bekker, and did her eyes at the same time. How did he know that the first one would watch him after she was dead? It would suggest…"

"That he's killed before and was watched." Lucas slapped his forehead with the heel of his hand. "Damn it. I missed that."

"He's a very dangerous man, Lucas," Elle said. "In the psychological literature, we'd refer to him as a fruitcake."

Restless, Lucas drove to the Lost River. The door was locked, but he could see a woman inside, painting. He rapped on the glass door, and when she saw him, he held up his badge case.

"Cassie around?" he asked when she opened the door.

"There's a rehearsal going on," the woman said. "They're all out on the stage."

Lucas walked through the hall to the theater. The lights were up and people were walking or standing around the stage or the low pit in front of it. Two or three more were sitting in the seats, watching and talking. Half of the whites were in blackface, with wide white-greasepainted lips, while two blacks were in whiteface. Cassie saw him and raised a tentative hand, said something to the artistic director, and they both walked over.

"Just looking around, if that's okay," Lucas said. "Would it bother you if I watch?"

"Not much to see," the artistic director said, his greasepainted lips turning down. "You're welcome to stay, but it's mostly people talking."

"We'll be another hour or so…" Cassie said. Her green eyes were like lamps peering through the dark paint.

"How about some French food? I mean, later, if you're not doing anything."

"Sounds great." She stepped away and said, "About an hour."

Lucas walked halfway up the rising bank of seats and settled in to watch. Whiteface was a brutal but cheerful attack on latter-day segregation. A dozen set pieces were combined with rewritten nineteenth-century show tunes. There were frequent halts to argue, to change lines, to choreograph body positions. Twisting through the set pieces, the troupe kept up a running vaudeville: juggling, tap and rap dancing, joking, banjo-playing.

One manic set involved the two black actors as professional golfers, trying to sneak through a segregated southern country club. Cassie, in a play within a play, took the part of a white southern college belle in blackface, trying to sort out her relationship with a black radical in whiteface.

In a darker piece, a burly man in a wide snap-brimmed felt hat robbed white passersby in a park. Although he was obviously in blackface, none of the victims, when they were talking to the cops, could ever get beyond the blackness, even though they knew…

When that segment was over, there was a brief, sharp argument about whether it violated the pace and feel of the rest of the show. The two black actors, who were used as arbiters of taste, split on the question. One, who seemed more involved in the technical aspects of playmaking, thought it should go; the other, more interested in the social impact, insisted that it stay.

The artistic director turned and looked up into the seats.

"What do the police think?" he called.

"I think it's pretty strong," Lucas said. "It's not like the rest of the stuff, but it adds something."

"Good. Let's leave it, at least for now," the director said.

When they were done, Lucas sat with Cassie and a half-dozen other actors while they cleaned the paint off their faces. The man who played the mugger was not among them. On the way out, Lucas saw him on the stage, working on a dance he did late in the show.

"Carlo," Cassie said. "He works at it."

They ate and went to Lucas' house. Cassie flopped on the living room couch.

"You know what the worst part of being poor is? You have to work all the time. You're rich, you can take six weeks to veg out. That's what I need: about six weeks of daytime TV."

"Better'n watching the news, anyway," Lucas said. He lifted her legs, sat down on the couch and dropped them in his lap. "At least with the soaps, you know you're getting bullshit."

"Hmph. Well, we could get really philosophical about the media and have an intelligent conversation, or we could go fool around," Cassie said. "What'd you want to do?"

"Guess," Lucas said.

Later in the evening, Del called. "Sorry about the other day…"

" 'S okay," Lucas said. "What's happening?"

"I've been out with Cheryl twice and she's starting to talk," he said. "I keep telling her I don't want to hear it, and she keeps talking."

"Told you," Lucas said.

"Asshole," said Del. "I actually kind of like her… Anyway, she thinks Bekker might be on some kind of drug. Speed or coke or something. She said he'd sometimes act nuts, he'd be fuckin' her and he'd go a little crazy, start raving, spitting…"

"Sex freak?"

"Well, not exactly. The sex, I guess, was pretty conventional, it's just that he'd kind of lose control. He'd come after her with this really ferocious rush, and then afterwards, it was almost like she was a piece of furniture. Didn't want to hear her talk, didn't want to cuddle up. Usually he'd bring something to read, until he got it up again, and then he'd start freaking out all over."

"Hmph. That's not exactly the worst thing I've ever heard…"

"Well, I'm gonna see her again tomorrow."

"Is there any way we can let Bekker know you're seeing her?"

Del sounded surprised. "What for?"

"Maybe push him a little? We got the surveillance running, so there shouldn't be any problem for her."

"Well… yeah, I guess we could work something out. Maybe I could get her to call him, let it slip somehow…"

"Try," Lucas said.