A piece of paper hangs limply from his hand.

“Is that the new one?” Mrs. Mayhew asks, taking it from him.

She inspects the page, then passes it to Cavallo. The familiar photo of Hannah, a toll-free tip number, a reward offer for information leading to her return. I wave away my opportunity for a closer look, so Cavallo hands the flyer back to the man. Before he can go, Mrs. Mayhew stops him again.

“Where are my manners? Detective Cavallo, this is our youth pastor, Carter Robb. He and Hannah are really close. Carter, this is the detective leading the investigation.” She turns to me. “And I’m sorry but I’ve already forgotten your name.”

“Roland March.”

I stand, moving around the coffee table to shake the guy’s hand. As strong as he looks, he has a weak handshake. I can feel him trembling. He won’t make eye contact, either. The moment I let go of his hand, he backs out the door saying he has more copies to make.

I give Cavallo a quizzical look. “He seemed a little on edge.”

Mrs. Mayhew smiles wanly. “We all are, Detective. This is especially hard on Carter because of their friendship. Hannah has been a real ally of his in the youth group since he first came here.” The words are sympathetic, but there’s something stiff about the delivery, running through the lines, not putting much feeling behind them. “It’s hard on everyone, of course.” She leans Cavallo’s way. “Have you heard? They’re trying to get me to go on TV.”

“You should,” I say. “It can’t hurt.”

Cavallo gives me a vigorous sandpapering with her glare, but I ignore her. Whether she wants to be in the public eye or not, what mother faced with the prospect of never seeing her daughter again raises scruples like this? She should be desperate to cooperate. Anything that helps the cause, no matter how peripherally, is worth a shot. I’m not about to say all this, but hopefully the way I’m looming over them, hands on hips, gets the gist across.

“Do you have children, Detective?” she asks.

I glance down. “No.”

“My daughter, she grew up without her father. He died when she was still just a baby, so she only knows him through videotapes and other people’s stories.” Her eyes shine in the lamplight. “There was this thing she used to do. She’d come to me and say, ‘Mama, I remembered something about Daddy.’ And she’d tell some elaborate story about how she and her dad went to the park together, or ate their favorite ice cream, things like that. She’d remember the time he brought home a puppy. The most fanciful things – she has such an imagination – and then she’d say, ‘You remember that, don’t you, Mama?’ or ‘That really happened, didn’t it?’ Always wanting me to confirm the stories she made up, so they’d feel real.”

“And did you?”

“Sometimes. The thing is, I was always afraid of what she might hear. When her daddy died, people told all kinds of stories. He was kind of famous in certain circles; he’d touched a lot of lives. Since his body was never found, there were people who said he wasn’t really dead. Either he’d faked it to get out of some kind of financial trouble, or he’d gone undercover as part of his ministry.”

“Undercover.”

“Silly, I know. But there was a missionary to Bolivia, a really sweet man, a friend of Peter’s from way back, and he came home on furlough and told me people down there had reported seeing Peter. He would turn up at evangelistic rallies, they said, and lay hands on people, healing them.”

“Did you believe that?” I ask.

“My husband died. All the stories never changed that. But I lived in fear that Hannah would get hold of them somehow, and convince herself they were true.”

“And this is why you don’t want to do a press conference?”

“Not only this,” she says. “But yes. I’ll do anything to bring her back safely, Detective, but I won’t turn her life into entertainment for strangers. Hannah has a right to privacy, don’t you think? I don’t want to give them more things to talk about on the news. I just want her back.”

A woman after my own heart, I have to confess. Keep the media vultures on a starvation diet. But there’s always a chance the added publicity will make a difference. Someone will remember seeing something. A witness will come forward. It happens all the time. In the same circumstances, I’d have to hold my nose and cooperate with the news cycle. Give it what it wants in hope that what I want will follow. Not that the world works that way.

As she listens, Cavallo’s expression turns beatific with sympathy, only hardening when she accidently looks my way. There’s more than just a feminine bond at work, but I can’t quite put my finger on what’s going on.

“Donna,” she begins softly, “I have a favor to ask.”

“What is it?”

“I’d like to get a dna swab from you,” Cavallo explains in her most soothing bedside manner. “It’s not entirely routine” – a glance my way – “but in this case, it could help us with a particular line of inquiry.”

Mrs. Mayhew stares down at her open Bible. “This line of inquiry. Is it something I don’t want to know about?”

“I’ll tell you if you do.”

“But is it…?”

“A very remote possibility,” Cavallo says. “Just something we’d like to check off the list.”

Donna Mayhew reaches forward, easing the book shut. “What do you need me to do?”

While Cavallo explains the process, producing the buccal swab kit from her bag, I wander back into the corridor to allow them some privacy. This woman still dreams of her daughter returning home safely, while I’m trying to establish the girl’s a homicide victim. I’d rather not witness what I’m putting her through.

Across the hall, another door stands open. Glancing inside, I find Carter Robb sorting through boxed reams of paper, shifting the stacks on his desk, his back to the door. Unlike Mrs. Mayhew, he occupies a tiny, spartan office, almost entirely devoid of decoration apart from the cheap particleboard bookcases lining the walls, the shelves bowing from the weight of ragged, stringy hardcovers and creased paperbacks. The books seem at odds with his carefully ungroomed appearance. I wouldn’t have figured him for a reader.

“Tell me something,” I say, hoping he’ll jump. He turns, holding his hands slightly out, like I’ve caught him in the act. “What exactly is a youth pastor?”

A slight smile. “Most days? A glorified baby-sitter.”

He seems to expect me to laugh, but I make a point of keeping a straight face. “You want to elaborate on that a little?”

“Well, what I do is, I oversee the youth group. The teens, I mean. We have a service for them on Sunday nights, and some activities during the week, mostly after school.”

“And Hannah’s part of that?”

“Yeah,” he says. “I mean, yes.”

To his credit, he looks me straight in the eye. Set deep in that uncomplicated face, its perfect symmetry exuding all-American innocence, his gaze seems incongruous, darkened by an unearned seriousness, the sort brought on by books and too many grave conversations. This man, who has never killed and probably never even had to fight, whose only suffering up to now has been the failure to live up fully to all his grandiose teenage ambitions, somehow manages to project an old man’s world-weariness, an acquaintance with pain that contradicts his unlined skin. The stress could do that, agonizing over the fate of his missing charge, but I get the feeling it’s a preexisting condition.

“You two are pretty close, her mother says. Is that right? I was wondering if she ever said anything to you about gangs.”

“About what?”

“ La Tercera Crips,” I say, flashing my best approximation of the appropriate sign. “A dude named Octavio Morales maybe?”

His mouth gapes open, but he doesn’t answer. I might as well be speaking Greek. Or Sanskrit in his case, assuming they still teach Greek in seminary.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says finally. “Hannah never mentioned anything like that, not to me.”