Johanna Apollo was bending over her patient, shining a light into Riker's eyes and finding no one at home in there. "Profound shock."

Heedless of this, Mallory stood over the weapon on the floor and pulled on a pair of plastic gloves. "That's not Riker's gun." She picked up the weapon, opened its cylinder and emptied two unspent bullets into the palm of her hand.

Charles lacked his cleaning woman's television expertise in weaponry, but he was quite sure that these were not normal bullets. They would be more accurately described as the bottom halves of bullets sealed with wax.

"Blanks," said Mallory, somewhat incredulous. "Someone broke in here and shot him with blanks."

Mrs. Ortega and Charles sighed in unison. So ended their only line of speculation, the theory of a suicide gone wrong.

"So it was a robbery." The cleaning woman was almost cheerful, much preferring this less personal crime. "Blanks. Go figure." She returned to the couch and leaned down to pick up the cast-off blanket. "These criminal types get dumber every year. That's what Riker always says." She rearranged the blanket over the man's body, saying to the doctor, "You have to keep him warm."

"You're right. Thank you." Johanna Apollo moved aside to allow the cleaning woman more room, then patiently waited out the manic tucking and smoothing of the blanket, as if Mrs. Ortega's ministrations were more important. Charles was deeply grateful for this small act of grace. Johanna had rightly intuited that this little stranger with a Brooklyn accent was in a bit of trouble herself. Mrs. Ortega was tightly reining in emotions that would only humiliate her should they spill out.

And now he studied Mallory, the only unaffected person in the room. She was utterly focused on the weapon in her gloved hand. "This has to be the revolver he took away from that idiot juror. Riker said the man emptied this gun in the parking garage. So the perp who broke in here took the ammo from MacPherson's speedloader." In Mallory's other hand, she hefted the remaining truncated bullets, as if they might have real weight. "The shooter was already inside. He was standing here in the middle of the room. When Riker opened the door, the lights were off. He was facing the dark and backlit from the hall." Her gun hand was rising, the muzzle pointing toward the door. "And the shooter fired exactly four blanks."

Charles closed his eyes for a moment. Her picture of events was all too clear. Turning to the prone figure on the couch, a man twice proved to be unsafe in his own home, Charles hunkered down beside the doctor, who was sorting through bottles in her medical bag. "Johanna, you should know his history. A psychotic teenager shot him four times. All the wounds were to the torso, all life threatening. It happened in his old apartment back in Brooklyn."

"He nearly died," said Mrs. Ortega.

"He did die," said Charles. "He was clinically dead for three minutes before the paramedics revived him." And, in a sense, the man had died again, for the gunshots had obviously seemed quite real to him.

"Four bullet wounds," said the doctor. "And now four blanks. He must have thought the boy had come back to – "

"No," said Mallory. "The shooter's dead."

"Extremely dead," said Charles.

"Yeah," said Mrs. Ortega, "you wouldn't believe how dead that kid is." The cleaning woman turned to Mallory. "So let me get this straight. When Riker fell down, the freak left him for dead 'cause he didn't see any holes in the body. And that's how you know the lights were out. Yeah, that's it. Poor guy. Didn't even have time to reach for the wall switch."

It was Mallory's mildest form of contempt, something bordering on courtesy, to simply ignore the cleaning woman's observations, though Charles thought the logic was rather good. However, now he had time to notice that the wall switch was in the on position, but the lights were off. Perhaps crime detection was something the layperson should not try at home.

"If the freak cased this apartment," said Mallory, "he'd know the only other tenant on this floor was out of town. No risk."

"And thick walls," said Charles. "No one would hear the gunfire and come running."

Mallory shook her head. "I don't think he planned to make a lot of noise. He came here with something else in mind. Finding MacPherson's gun in the apartment – that was a bonus."

"So Riker surprised a thief," said Charles, having learned nothing from Mrs. Ortega's last foray. "Well, that fits. I expect it would've taken an experienced burglar to get past the locks on Riker's door."

"You never felt that draft?" The young detective nodded toward the bathroom she had checked upon her arrival.

The door was slightly ajar. Charles opened it a bit wider, and now he was staring at the broken window overlooking the fire escape. "Not a pro," said Mallory. "Only amateurs do that." "But breaking that window should've set off the alarm. I had a security service install it before he moved in. They assured me the police would be notified the instant – "

"No," said Mallory. "That would only work if Riker bothered to pay the monthly service fee." She was facing the open door to the kitchen, wherein lay a mountain of unopened mail. Mallory had recommended bars for the bathroom window and even offered to pay for them. But Riker had declined the bars, arguing that he had nothing to steal.

Charles looked around the room of wall-to-wall debris. Yes, jewel thieves and the like so seldom broke into places like this. His gaze settled on Johanna Apollo as she tied a rubber tourniquet around Riker's upper arm to plump up a vein. She was unaware of the younger woman stealing up behind her.

Mallory bent low to Johanna's ear, saying softly, "The Reaper likes to play with people, doesn't he, Doctor?"

Johanna froze, as if Mallory had screamed instead of whispered. The doctor quickly recovered her poise and, with a steady hand, filled a syringe from a thin bottle. "Yes, he does." She shot a trial spurt of fluid into the air, then filled Riker's vein with the rest of her chemicals. "I'm going to need a few more things from the pharmacy."

When Mrs. Ortega had quit the apartment with a handful of prescriptions to fill, Charles was given the task of putting Riker to bed, and Johanna was left alone with the young detective, whom she had come to regard as her jailor. At least there was no doubt about who was in charge.

"How long will this take?" Mallory might as well have been asking when her dry cleaning would be done.

"He's in shock," said Johanna. "I can bring him around in a few hours."

The younger woman advanced on her with a slow shake of the head to say, No, Doctor, that's not what I mean, and you know it. "How long will it take to fix him."

"The state he's in now – that's only a symptom of his core problem." Johanna sank down on the couch, taking her cues from animals in the wild, not wanting to give the appearance of challenging Mallory's authority in this room. She did not regard this young woman as less than human, but somewhat more dangerous. "A cure could take years. Long-term therapy."

Judging by Mallory's sudden anger, Johanna knew the detective had no clue to the extent of Riker's infirmity. He would not have shared the entire experience in the underground parking garage. He would never have mentioned the paralysis brought on by gunfire, not to the police, and certainly not to this one.

"You know what happened to him," said Mallory. "It's a simple – "

"The problem goes beyond hearing those shots and thinking he'd been ambushed again." That effect would have been temporary. Twice now, she had seen it pass off very quickly. "I interned at a city hospital. I've seen my share of trauma victims. There's more to this than a single event." Johanna found herself preaching to the walls.