“Yes, that’s a possibility, but like you I’m going with the percentages. The kind of sick fuck you are talking about-which, incidentally, in psychobabble we call a sociopath-is much rarer than the one who keys on specific targets, specific women.”

Bosch shook his head dismissively and looked out the window.

“What is it?”

“It’s just frustrating, that’s all. There wasn’t much in the murder book about them taking a hard look at anybody in her circle, any of the neighbors, nothing like that. To do it now is impossible. It makes me feel like it’s hopeless.”

He thought of Meredith Roman. He could go to her to ask about his mother’s acquaintances and customers, but he didn’t know if he had the right to reawaken that part of her life.

“You have to remember,” Hinojos said, “in 1961 a case like this would probably have seemed impossible to solve. They wouldn’t even have known how to start. It just didn’t happen as often as today.”

“They’re almost impossible to solve today, too.”

They sat in silence for a few moments. Bosch thought about the possibility that the killer was some hit-and-run nut. A serial killer who was long gone into the darkness of time. If that was the case, then his private investigation was over. It was a failure.

“Do you have anything else on the photos?”

“That’s really all I had-no, wait. There was one thing. And you may already have this.”

She picked the envelope up and opened it. She reached in and began sliding out a photo.

“I don’t want to look at that,” Bosch said quickly.

“It’s not a photo of her. Actually, it’s her clothing, laid out on a table. Is that okay to look at?”

She paused, her hand holding the photo half in and half out of the envelope. Bosch waved his hand, telling her to go ahead.

“I’ve already seen the clothes.”

“Then you’ve probably already considered this.”

She slid the photo to the edge of the desk and Bosch leaned forward to study it. It was a color photo that had yellowed with age, even inside the envelope. The same items of clothing he had found in the evidence box were spread out on a table in a formation that outlined a body, in the way a woman might put them out on a bed before dressing. It reminded Bosch of cutouts for paper dolls. Even the belt with the sea shell buckle was there, but it was between the blouse and the black skirt, not at the imaginary neck.

“Okay,” she said. “What I found odd here was the belt.”

“The murder weapon.”

“Yes. Look, it has the large silver shell as the buckle and there are smaller silver shells as ornamentation. It’s rather showy.”

“Right.”

“But the buttons on the blouse are gold. Also, the photos of the body, they show she was wearing gold teardrop earrings and a gold neck chain. Also a bracelet.”

“Right, I know that. They were in the evidence box, too.”

Bosch didn’t understand what she was getting at.

“Harry, this is not a universal rule or anything, that’s why I hesitate to bring it up. But usually people-women-don’t mix and match gold and silver. And it appears to me your mother was well dressed on this evening. That she had jewelry on that matched the buttons of her blouse. She was coordinated and she had style. What I am saying is that I don’t think she would have worn this belt with those other items. It was silver and it was showy.”

Bosch said nothing. Something was poking its way into his mind and its point was sharp.

“And lastly, this skirt buttons on the hip. It’s a style that is still around and I even have something similar to it myself. What’s so functional about it is that because of the wide waistband it can be worn with or without a belt. There are no loops.”

Bosch stared at the photo.

“No loops.”

“Right.”

“So what you’re saying is…”

“This might not have been her belt. It might have-”

“But it was. I remember it. The sea shell belt. I gave it to her for her birthday. I identified it for the cops, for McKittrick the day he came to tell me.”

“Well…then that shoots down everything I was going to say. I guess maybe when she came into the apartment the killer was already waiting with it.”

“No, it didn’t happen in her apartment. They never found the crime scene. Listen, never mind whether it was her belt or not, what were you going to say?”

“Oh, I don’t know, just a theory about it possibly being the property of another woman who may have been the motivating factor behind the killer’s action. It’s called aggression transference. It doesn’t make sense now with this evidence but there are examples of what I was going to suggest. A man takes his ex-girlfriend’s stockings and strangles another woman with them. In his mind, he’s strangling the girlfriend. Something like that. I was going to suggest it could have happened in this case with the belt.”

But Bosch was no longer listening. He turned and looked out the window but wasn’t seeing anything either. In his mind, he was seeing the pieces falling together. The silver and gold, the belt with two of the punch holes worn, two friends as close as sisters. One for both and both for one.

But then one was leaving the life. She’d found a white knight.

And one was staying behind.

“Harry, are you okay?”

He looked over at Hinojos.

“You just did it. I think.”

“Did what?”

He reached for his briefcase and from it withdrew the photo taken at the St. Patrick’s Day dance more than three decades before. He knew it was a long shot but he needed to check. This time he didn’t look at his mother. He looked at Meredith Roman, standing behind the sitting Johnny Fox. And for the first time he saw that she wore the belt with the silver sea shell buckle. She had borrowed it.

It dawned on him then. She had helped Harry pick the belt out for his mother. She had coached him and she chose it not because his mother would like it but because she liked it and knew she would get to use it. Two friends who shared everything.

Bosch shoved the photo back into the briefcase and shut it. He stood up.

“I gotta go.”

Chapter Forty-eight

BOSCH USED THE same ruse he had earlier to get back into Parker Center. Coming out of the elevator on the fourth floor, he practically ran into Hirsch, who was waiting to go down. He grabbed hold of the young print tech’s arm and held him in the hallway as the elevator doors closed.

“You going home?”

“I was trying to.”

“I need one more favor. I’ll buy you lunch, I’ll buy you dinner, I’ll buy you whatever you want if you do it for me. It’s important and it won’t take long.”

Hirsch looked at him. Bosch could see he was beginning to wish he’d never gotten involved.

“What’s that saying, Hirsch? ‘In for a penny, in for a pound.’ Whaddaya say?”

“I’ve never heard it.”

“Well, I have.”

“I’m having dinner with my girlfriend tonight and I-”

“That’s great. This won’t take that long. You’ll make it to your dinner.”

“All right. What is it you need?”

“Hirsch, you’re my goddamn hero, you know that?”

Bosch doubted he even had a girlfriend. They went back to the lab. It was deserted, since it was almost five on a slow day. Bosch put his briefcase on one of the abandoned desks and opened it. He found the Christmas card and took it out by holding a corner between two fingernails. He held it up for Hirsch to see.

“This came in the mail five years ago. You think you can pull a print off it? A print from the sender? My prints are going to be on there, too, I’m sure.”

Hirsch furrowed his brow and studied the card. His lower lip jutted outward as he contemplated the challenge.

“All I can do is try. Prints on paper are usually pretty stable. The oils last long and sometimes leave ridge patterns in the paper even when they evaporate. Has it been in its envelope?”