The Murray-Walters case was a spiritual lifeline. He was grateful for a death that had awakened something human in him. Something that Harvey suggested was making it impossible for him to continue with the investigation.

He felt lost. Was that the choice? Did feeling lead to failure? Did success have to be purchased with a loss of human qualities? Were his emotions blinding him to the truth?

Harvey had talked to him for a long time after they had let the Coolidges go. He had tried to convince him that he should forget them. That the truth lay elsewhere. Shindler did not buy that. Somewhere there was a key. He had never been this sure about a case. Those glasses. The personalities. The knife. The fight on the same evening. There were too many coincidences.

Shindler looked at his watch. He had been lying in the dark for an hour. Esther Freemont. He could see her large brown eyes. Doe’s eyes. Soft eyes. An animal at bay. She was not made of the same stuff as the Coolidges. She was soft. She would bend to his will. He could break her if she was lying. He closed his eyes and thought about it. He would see her in the morning.

Shindler had the plan worked out by the time he arrived at Esther’s house. The day was sunny and warm. There were no clouds in the sky. He told Esther’s mother that he wanted to ask her some more questions about the glasses and that he would bring her home shortly.

Esther went with him reluctantly. She never relaxed. Her eyes moved constantly. Her hands would not keep still. Shindler approved. He wanted her nervous and without reserves, so that there would be nothing there but truth when the moment came.

Shindler engaged Esther in small talk so that she would not notice that they were not headed toward the station house. He headed up Monroe Boulevard and he noticed her looking out the window uncertainly.

“This isn’t the way downtown.”

“I wanted to show you where we found the glasses.”

“Are we going to the park?”

Shindler nodded.

“To where Richie…?”

“To where we found the glasses.”

“I don’t want to go there,” she said suddenly. Shindler noticed that she was gripping the seat hard enough to make her knuckles turn white.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

“I really don’t want to go up there. Please, Mr. Shindler. It scares me.”

“It shouldn’t frighten you, Esther. The place doesn’t look the same anymore. I’ll take you to the meadow where we found Richie. You’ll see. You would never know that someone died there.”

She did not say anything more and Shindler continued until he reached the spot where the glasses had been found.

“Does this look familiar, Esther?”

She looked out of the car window. Shindler got out and walked over to the exact spot. Esther did not follow.

“Come on. Take a look.”

“I told you before, I wasn’t here. I don’t know why you brought me here.”

“Just to see the place, Esther. I thought that you might be curious to see where we found your glasses.”

She turned away and bit her lip. Shindler got back in the car and headed up the road to the meadow.

“I’m going to make one more stop. Then we’ll go down to the station.”

“Don’t take me there. Please,” she begged in a voice tinged with panic.

“I want to check something, Esther. You can wait in the car.”

He parked the car at the end of the dirt road and looked around. The meadow had not changed. It had been peaceful even on the day of the murder. The violence had been added and subtracted. Shindler got out of the car and walked to the spot where the car had been. There was no trace of it. He waited a while for Esther to see whatever phantoms remained. Then he got back in his car. Esther was quiet on the trip to the station.

Shindler parked in the police garage. The garage was in the basement of the police station. They took the elevator up to the third floor and he brought her to the same room where he had questioned Billy Coolidge. This morning, before he picked her up, he had put the photograph in the small drawer in the wooden desk.

The matron tried to get Esther to relax. She only made Esther more nervous with her attentions. Shindler could smell the fear in Esther. He had owned a pet rabbit when he was a boy. The rabbit had never adjusted to the cage. It would run round and round, darting into the mesh, trying to claw through. Esther’s eyes reminded him of the rabbit’s. They never looked at him. They darted everywhere, searching for an exit.

“You didn’t tell me the whole truth the last time we talked, Esther.”

“What do you mean?” she asked cautiously. She did not trust this soft-spoken thin man. There was too much of the deceiver below his surface.

“You didn’t tell me about what happened at Alice Fay’s house.”

“I didn’t do anything,” she answered quickly.

“No. But Billy and Bobby did. Tell me what they did.”

Esther stared away from Shindler at the floor.

“They fought,” she said in a low voice.

“I didn’t hear you,” Shindler said.

“They fought,” she said louder. “I told them to leave, honest. I didn’t want them fighting. I just wanted to see the house.”

“You didn’t tell me how they fought.”

Esther looked confused.

“What did Billy use, Esther?”

Esther’s eyes widened.

“What did Billy use?” Shindler repeated.

“A…a knife,” she said so quietly that her voice was like the tick of a clock in another room.

“That’s right. And you held that back, didn’t you?”

“No. Honest. I just…I didn’t know it would be important.”

“Not important, Esther? Did you know that Richie Walters was stabbed twenty times. Twenty different times. And you didn’t think it was important that Billy Coolidge had a knife?”

“Well, we didn’t go up there.”

“Up where?”

“To the park.”

“How do you know? You say you can’t remember what you did.”

“I just know.”

“You just know,” Shindler mimicked. Esther bit her lip.

“My mamma knows,” she said suddenly, and with relief, as if she had grasped a lifeline.

“Wrong, Esther. All your mother can say is that you came home late and drunk. Richie was killed between twelve and two.”

Esther looked down again. Shindler let her sit in silence for a moment. His eyes drifted toward the desk drawer. He could see the photograph through the wood and manila. It burned there, burning him with its fire. Any pity he might have had for Esther Freemont turned to ash. The picture dried him out and made him like cold stone.

“Tell me about the park, Esther.”

“I wasn’t in the park.”

“How do you know if you can’t remember?”

“That’s what I mean. I can’t remember. Please, can’t I go home?”

“Richie and Elaine can’t go home, Esther. You know that, don’t you?”

“Don’t talk like that, please, Mr. Shindler. It scares me.”

“You don’t like to think about Richie and Elaine, do you?”

She shook her head.

“Billy hated them, didn’t he?”

“I don’t know,” she said.

“You aren’t telling me the truth, Esther. Billy hates rich people. He envies them. I know. I’ve talked to enough people to know what goes on in Billy Coolidge’s head. Now answer me. Billy hated rich people, didn’t he?”

“Yes.”

“Good,” Shindler said, leaning back. “Now we are getting somewhere. Who did Billy hate, Esther?”

She wished he would stop saying her name. He made it sound dirty. Like it was scum in a gutter pool. She could feel tears coming.

“Who?” Shindler asked in a voice that cut to her nerve.

“Please, I don’t know. Just the rich kids. He didn’t like Tommy Cooper. I don’t know. He didn’t talk to me that much.”

“You were with him that night.”

“No. I was with Roger…Hessey. My boyfriend. But we had a fight at the party and he left me. That’s why I was with Billy.”

“And you can’t remember the park?”