‘Like in “pithed off,” ’ Gino said deadpan. ‘Say, how come Tinker and Peterson aren’t here? You’re doing a tandem, right?’

‘Nah. We’re catching media bullets on this one, and the chief hasn’t let Peterson near a camera since he told that arrogant prick from Channel Three he was an arrogant prick.’

Gino sighed happily. ‘That was a beautiful moment.’

‘That it was,’ McLaren agreed. ‘Anyway, Tinker was signed out for vacation starting tomorrow morning anyway, so it worked out. Now I get all the glory as soon as Langer solves this thing.’

Langer smiled as he keyed in the command to print, then stood up and stretched. This was good. Being in the office after hours, working an active case, listening to the guys banter… for the first time in what seemed like years, he was beginning to feel as if everything might be all right again.

He was halfway through his fifth barbequed chicken wing, trying to remember if he still had that bottle of Maalox in his bottom drawer, when Magozzi asked a question that reminded him that there might not be enough Maalox in the world.

‘You were pretty close to Marty Pullman, right, Langer?’

He held up one finger and continued chewing, buying time. No one expected Aaron Langer to talk with his mouth full. When he finally swallowed, it felt like a small, hairy dog going down his throat. ‘Barely knew him until I ran the case on his wife.’

‘Sure dogged us on that one, though,’ McLaren put in. ‘Not that you can blame the poor guy. Man, those were some bad days.’

‘I don’t doubt it,’ Magozzi said. ‘He was at our scene today, you know.’

‘Figured he would be,’ Langer said. ‘He really loved that old man.’

‘Well, the thing is, Marty looked pretty bad…’

‘Walking dead,’ Gino agreed.

‘… which is why I brought it up. Gino and I talked about it. We both got some bad feelings from him, think he might be in one of those holes you can’t get yourself out of, and we thought if you’d been close…’

‘We weren’t,’ Langer interrupted, glancing at McLaren for confirmation. ‘Neither one of us.’

‘Nah, he was totally shut down,’ McLaren said. ‘Truth is, he’s been walking dead since his wife got killed. He still putting it away?’

Gino nodded glumly. ‘Said he woke up this morning on his kitchen floor next to a Jim Beam empty and has no clue where he was last night. And I says, “Gee, Marty, you been drinking like that since you left the force?” And he thought about it for a second, then said, “Well, that would explain the blackouts.” ’

McLaren winced and pushed away the remains of whatever animal he’d been eating. ‘I kind of figured he was headed down that road. Can’t remember seeing him sober once during the whole investigation. Seemed like Morey was the only thing holding him together.’

Magozzi’s brows shot up. ‘Morey? You knew him well enough to call him by his first name?’

McLaren gave an uneasy shrug. ‘You met him once, you knew him that well. He was that kind of a guy, you know? Really bummed us out when we heard the news this morning. As if that family hadn’t been through enough. And I’ll tell you another thing. Your killer was a stranger, because nobody who ever met that man would want him dead.’

Magozzi crumpled his napkin and pushed away from the table. ‘Yeah, that’s what everyone says, but we’re having a little trouble with that. Morey Gilbert caught it once in the head, real close. It doesn’t look like an accident or some kind of impulse shooting. What it looks like, and what it feels like, is an execution.’

Langer shook his head. ‘Impossible. Morey couldn’t have made an enemy if he tried. You can’t imagine how much good that man did in his life.’

‘Oh, we’re getting an idea,’ Gino said. ‘You saw the crowd outside the nursery today?’

‘Yeah. We got stuck in the jam on the way back from our scene.’

‘Well, we worked it a little, talked to some people, got an earful of good deeds.’ Gino licked some barbeque sauce off his thumb and started paging through his pocket notebook. ‘I got a list here of down-and-outs he gave money to, homeless people he dragged off the street and took home to dinner, if you can believe that, some guy with a gang tattoo and a Perry Ellis suit who claimed Morey Gilbert got him out of the life just by talking to him…’

That made Langer smile. ‘Talking is what he did best.’

‘And most.’ McLaren grinned. ‘Man, he could talk your ear off. But it wasn’t small talk, you know? I mean, this guy thought about the weirdest things in ways you never thought of.’

‘Like what?’ Magozzi asked.

‘Oh, jeez, a million things. Like the day Langer and I went over after the case was all wrapped up, and Morey found out I was Catholic – remember that, Langer?’

‘Oh, yeah.’

‘Anyway, he sits us down at the kitchen table, gives us a beer, and then starts asking me all these questions, like I was a priest or a scholar or something…’ McLaren shook his head a little, smiling, remembering.

So, Detective McLaren. They have saints, the Catholics. You know about these?

Sure, Morey.

Well, it just seems funny to me, the ones they picked. You know, Joan of Arc, she stabbed people with swords, and then there was St Francis who talked to birds… what is the connection there? There’s no consistency. And these are the people who are supposed to be putting in a good word with God when you can’t reach him directly, am I right?

Well, yes…

So my question is this: Now Moses, he had this one-on-one relationship with the big guy, you know? He talked to him personally, just like I’m talking to you. So if anybody should be interceding for anybody, you’d think it would be Moses. But they didn’t make Moses a saint. Now why do you think that is?

Uh, I think you have to be a Christian to be a saint.

Ah! You see what I’m saying? There’s no sense to the way you pick these people.

Hey, I don’t pick them…

Maybe you could talk to the people who do that sort of thing, eh? Because the thing is, they based their whole religion on Jesus and even he couldn’t be a saint because he was Jewish, not Christian. You see? No sense. I need your help understanding this.

Gino was smiling a little. ‘So he was a pretty religious guy, huh?’

McLaren thought about that for a minute. ‘Not religious, exactly. He just thought about that stuff a lot, like he was trying to figure it out, but I suppose that goes with the territory. He was in Auschwitz, did you know that?’

Gino nodded. ‘We knew he was in one of the camps. One of the assistant MEs showed me the tattoo at the scene.’

‘Gotta tell you, it just about blew my mind when I found that out. I mean, I never knew anybody who was in the camps before. Seems like that stuff happened a million years ago, you know? So here’s this guy who lives through God knows what kind of hell, and he comes out the other side loving his fellow man. I’m telling you guys, he was something. You would have liked him a lot.’

‘Aw, don’t say that.’ Gino got up and started shoving empty containers into a bag. ‘I don’t want to like dead people. There’s no percentage in it. Langer, are you just going to leave those chicken wings?’

‘You bet I am.’

Gino grabbed one and ripped off a bite. ‘So tell me. When you were getting all cozy with the Gilberts, what kind of vibes did you get off the son?’

‘Jack?’ Langer shrugged. ‘He was never around. Kind of the black sheep, I guess. Marty said he’d had some kind of falling-out with his folks.’

Gino tossed a decimated chicken wing into the bag. ‘Must have been a pretty major falling-out. The old lady still isn’t talking to him.’

‘Must have been,’ Langer agreed. ‘Jack didn’t even stand with the family during his sister’s funeral.’

‘Oh, Christ.’ McLaren winced. ‘That was tough to watch. I’d almost forgotten. Here’s this middle-aged guy bawling his head off, literally falling apart, and he stumbles over to Morey with his arms out, and Morey just looks at him, then turns and walks away. Left Jack standing there alone, crying, arms stretched out to nobody… man, I’ll tell you, it was pathetic.’