“That’s not possible.”

“It is. It was. Billy bound his chest, saying he needed the support because he’d broken his ribs in a car accident. I won’t go into the details of how he did what he did-I’m afraid you’ll pass out from that level of technical detail-but if you get curious, there’s a very good book about his life. The point is, it’s doable. It’s been done.”

A thought was nagging Tess, buzzing around her like a gnat. She waited for it to settle, to sit still long enough so she might snatch it up and examine it. But it faded away as quickly as it arrived.

“Can they make a woman into a man?” Carl asked, and it was as if a child had asked a single penetrating question, cutting through to what is profound and essential in the world. Tess sat, a spoonful of kreplach halfway to her mouth. Can they make a woman into a man?

“I’m not sure. Certainly, the task is more formidable than making a man into a woman. But-”

She let the idea sit there, not quite yet exposed, even on a Saturday, waiting to see if it would wither as it was exposed to air and light. No, it was still there.

“If Becca Harrison became a man, one way or another, she wouldn’t exist anymore. It’s natural that she would take the name of Eric Shivers, the boy whose death she witnessed-”

“Maybe caused,” Carl put in.

“Still, there’s no connection to Alan Palmer. Not that we know of. We could throw her name at the state police, but then we’d have to explain how we came to have it.”

They sat in silence, chewing. Carl was the first to get to the end of a long mouthful.

“You know, if you’re a woman passing as a man, there’s one thing you can’t fake.”

“What?”

“You know.” He made a baffling hand gesture.

“An erection? Honestly, Carl, have you ever heard of dildos? Or even the concept of a rolled-up sock filled with birdseed?”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“What then?”

He made another indecipherable gesture.

“I’m sorry, I guess I don’t speak ”Toll Facilities cop,“ because that doesn’t mean a thing to me.”

“Semen!” Carl sputtered, earning the undivided attention of every blue-haired diner in Suburban House. “Sperm! You can’t make a baby without those things, so what’s the point of keeping all these careful records if you’re not?”

“I don’t know,” Tess admitted. She still felt the presence of that damn gnat, hovering close to her ear, still determined not to tell her what it knew. “Maybe none of this matters at all. Do you think we should go to Frederick?”

Carl knew she meant visiting the Gunts family. “That’s specifically against the rules.”

“Right. So you’d rather sit in the office all day, even on a Saturday, waiting for phone calls that never come, rereading case files we’ve practically memorized, in the hopes that the state police might at least tell us when they’ve arrested our guy, let us come to the press conference and stand on the dais?”

Carl thought for a moment. “Let’s go.”

“The Wild Bunch,” Tess said. “William Holden, Ernest Borgnine.”

“You finally watched?”

“Last night. It’s no Once Upon a Time in the West, but it’s pretty good.”

“You know that movie too?”

“Yeah, but I prefer Once Upon a Time in America.” Tess fell back in her chair, faked a dying croak. “Noodles, I… slipped.”

Carl smiled as if she had just presented him with a wonderful gift.

CHAPTER 23

Things had changed in Frederick-things that couldn’t be explained by the passage of less than three weeks. Had it really been so long ago? Had it really been so recently? Tess was beginning to feel like the old crone on Notting Island. One thing was clear: The Gunts family no longer considered her an ally, a friend. Of course, they had been stiff and taciturn the first time, but she detected a new coolness to their closed-in ways. Or maybe it was simply that they had been caught without their usual spokesman, the brother, who was on the road. His chatty wife, Kat, was at work as well. It was just the mother and father today, and neither seemed eager to speak.

“The state police have already been here,” the father said.

“Yes,” Tess said. “I thought you’d be pleased.”

“Pleased you think that sweet boy did this?” This was Mrs. Gunts, but the father grunted something that sounded like assent.

Carl tried, deploying his small-town charm. “There’s a strong chain of circumstantial evidence linking him to the murder I investigated on the upper shore-”

“We know all about that-that… nasty thing. But Tiffani was shot in her kitchen by a burglar. Not some crazy who took off her head and kept her body and-” The mother shook her head. Clearly, she considered Tiffani’s death more dignified than Lucy Fancher’s.

“I can understand how distressing all this is,” Tess said. “You’ve been so sure, for so long, that she was killed by an intruder. It’s hard to readjust your thinking. But I just have a few questions.”

“I don’t think,” the father said, “that we have any answers. We made that clear to the state police.”

The front door opened, and a burst of noise, cheerful and high-pitched, swept into the gloomy house. The grandchildren had arrived home from school. Now that Tess had met Troy Plunkett, she could see the striking resemblance in the one girl’s face. There was no denying this child, as they said on the streets of West Baltimore, although Plunkett had tried. It was too bad that Tiffani’s sweet but indefinite features had been vanquished by Plunkett’s tougher genes. If the girl didn’t catch a break in adolescence, she was going to end up with her father’s all-over feral look.

The children paid no heed to the four grown-ups gathered in the family room, just ran past to the kitchen, opening cabinets, grabbing things from the refrigerator.

“One each,” Mrs. Gunts called out. “You can have any treat you want, but just one each.”

“Does a soda count as one?”

“Yes. But milk and juice don’t.”

There was some grumbling about this, but the children accepted the edict and began the difficult selection process.

“May I-” Tess gestured toward Tiffani’s daughter.

“No.” Mr. Gunts’s raised voice lashed like a whip. Tess flinched, wondering what it was like to grow up with the threat of that sound. But she wasn’t his daughter. He had no say over her.

“One question. A simple one, not about the crime but about something her mother may have told her in the weeks before she died.”

“She was barely four then. She wouldn’t remember anything.”

“I imagine if your mother dies when you’re small,” Tess said, “the memories that might be lost in a different life only become stronger.”

“You’re going to ask something about Eric,” Mrs. Gunts fretted. “Something nasty.”

“No, I’m not even going to mention his name. Or Tiffani’s death. But please, let me speak to her for five minutes.”

They were clearly torn. Why were they so reluctant to know the truth about what had happened to their daughter?

“Please,” she said. “Five minutes, and we’re gone.”

The little girl-Darby, Tess had forgotten the name-seemed unfazed by the idea that some strange woman wanted to talk to her.

“One minute,” she said. “I’m going to have a Ho-Ho.” With great concentration and delicacy, she unwrapped the cake and then slipped her free hand into Tess’s and led her to the backyard. Tiffani had probably offered her hand with the same ease.

“Do you remember your mother?” she asked, when they were seated on the back steps.

“Oh, yes. She was pretty. Maw-maw says I look just like her.”

“You do,” Tess lied.

“She… told me stories. At night. She said I could have a puppy one day. But we needed a yard.” The girl looked around. “Now I have a yard, but I still don’t have a puppy. People are allergic.”

“Did she ever say you might have a brother or a sister?”