"Whatever you want, Matt, you've got. Just say."

"I appreciate it," Payne had said. "But I believe that right now what I have"-he motioned to Harris and to Corporal Kerry Rapier seated at his control panel-"is all Operation Clean Sweep needs. Running lean and mean to start will help keep us focused, and the confusion to a minimum. I can always add people as I go. But if I get too many people in here too fast, we'll spend more time and effort keeping the navel-gazers busy than actually hunting the doer."

"Understood. Your call. All I ask is for someone to keep me posted so I can keep Jerry in the loop." Mariana nodded once and went out the door.

Walker had then said, "Kerry, you heard him. Anything Sergeant Payne needs."

And he'd looked at Quaire and Washington and added, "If there's anything I can do, let me know." Then Walker had bolted.

Payne had seen the exchange of looks between Coughlin, Quaire, and Washington. While not one of them would have said it aloud, Payne knew what they were thinking: that Walker was headed to Forensics to chew out in his snooty manner whomever he deemed responsible for the delay in processing the Halloween Homicides fingerprints-and the resulting egg on his face before the mayor of Philadelphia.

Coughlin had simply said, "Let us know, Matty," and they were all gone.

Payne had walked to the door and swung it almost completely closed. Then he'd turned and looked between Tony Harris and Kerry Rapier and said, "Either of you buy that lean-and-mean bullshit?"

They had grinned.

"Me neither. I haven't a fucking idea of what to do first." He gestured at the banks of TV monitors that showed all the images of the pop-and-drop victims, the volumes of evidence, and live feeds that included a video of Shauna Mays being handcuffed. "Except, after interviewing this woman Hizzonor wants to make an example of, to run a fine-toothed comb back through everything." Payne took a sip from his china mug of black coffee, then said: "Kerry, would you please punch up"-he glanced at the second bank of nine sixty-inch, flat-screen TV monitors-"number seventeen, Reggie Jones's file, on the main bank?"

The monitor still displayed various images and data from the first eight pop-and-drops-the five from the previous month and the three from last night-now all collected on the monitors numbered ten to eighteen. And, within the last hour, Rapier had added that of Kendrik Mays, including the video of Payne's interview of Shauna Mays.

The third bank of nine monitors, numbers nineteen through twenty-seven, now showed the rotating feeds of video from the department's various cameras around the city, as well as feeds from two local TV news broadcasts.

"Yes, sir," Rapier said, and his fingers flew across the keyboard.

The image from TV monitor number seventeen was then duplicated-nine times larger-on the main bank of monitors. The image was from a digital video recording that had been shot at the crime scene the previous night, and showed the Old City sidewalk with the battered body of Reggie Jones lying inside the yellow police-line tape. The scene was brightly lit by a pair halogen floodbeams that were mounted high on the side of the Medical Examiner's Office panel van, which also held the video camera.

In the bottom right-hand corner of the image was an ID stamp: Richard Saunders Holdings/Lex Talionis Third amp; Arch 0105 hours, 01 Nov

Corporal Rapier then typed a few more keystrokes, and up popped another text box. It contained: Name: Reginald "Reggie" JONES Description: Black male, age 20, 5 ft. 11 in., 260 lbs. L.K.A.: 725 Daly St, Phila. Call Received: 01 Nov, 0012 hours Prior arrests: 4 total: Possession of cocaine (3) and distribution of cocaine (1). On probation for possession of crack cocaine. Cause of Death: BLUNT FORCE TRAUMA and/or STRANGULATION. Case No.: 2010-81-039613-POP-N-DROP Notes: Badly beaten by Suspect(s) Name Unknown. SNU 2010-56- 9326 SNU 2010-56-9327. Ligature strangulation caused by plastic zip ties (two (2) 24-inch-long zip ties put together to make a single 48-inch-long tie). Mildly mentally retarded. Body transported to Lex Talionis, Old City. Brother is Kenneth J. JONES, black male, age 22, a fugitive wanted on warrants for crack cocaine possession with intent to distribute.

Payne and Harris were looking at the image and reading the text.

"Still using 'Pop-n-Drop' as the code for the master files, Kerry?" Payne asked.

The youthful corporal grinned, then said, "Yes, sir. It just made sense to stick with the obvious."

"What about the fact that Jones wasn't shot?"

"Hey, getting beat up can be called getting 'popped,'" Rapier said reasonably. "Besides, I didn't want to have to recode all the others to fit. This way, it's consistent from the start." He looked at Payne, who was still studying the main screen, then felt he needed to explain better: "With the master files all linked by 'pop-n-drop,' the system can build on any of the previous composite reports, tables, graphs, maps, et cetera, that you created with the information from the earlier case files."

Payne turned to him and nodded. He said, "Okay, Kerry. I really have no problem with that. It was just an idle question."

"Yes, sir," Rapier said.

Rapier knew that Payne was well versed in how the system worked. That it went into the digital files and took key words-names, locations, weaponry, et cetera-and attempted to cross-match them first to the files coded "pop-n-drop," and then to all the other master case files in the system. If the system found a possible connection, it would generate a digital report citing those cases and the connections.

And, of course, it was able to then feed all that information to the FBI's National Crime Information Center and attempt to cross-match with NCIC's vast criminal database that was constantly updated by law enforcement across the country.

"So there's Commissioner Walker's handiwork in the Notes section," Tony Harris said casually, pointing with his ink pen in the direction of the text box on Reggie Jones's image.

"And it's not good news," Payne said, looking at it. "Forensics, it appears, has found more than one doer's prints on Jones."

"Well, then," Harris said with a smile, "on the positive side, that means we have twice the chance of getting lucky with IAFIS putting a name to those SNUs."

IAFIS was the FBI's Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System. SNU was the abbreviation for Suspect Name Unknown.

"Kerry," Payne said, "would you click on Reggie's SNUs?"

"Thought you'd never ask, Marshal," Rapier said.

Payne ignored the curious sudden reference to his nickname, Wyatt Earp of the Main Line, but saw out of the corner of his eye that Rapier was grinning.

Then, on the monitor, over the text box, a cursor appeared-and he immediately understood.

"It is different, Kerry," Payne said.

Harris snorted.

The digital pointer on-screen was not the usual black arrow. It was an actual image of a Colt.45 ACP Officer's Model pistol. Rapier knew it was Payne's favorite sidearm.

"I thought you'd like it, Marshal. Changing the cursor image was easy enough. This next part took a little work."

All the underlined words in the case file were hyperlinks that allowed a system user to access additional information on the case.

Corporal Rapier moved the Colt pistol over the underlined SNU 2010- 56-9326. When he clicked on it, three things happened in rapid succession. First, the sound of a pistol firing emanated from the speakers. Second, a puff of smoke appeared and disappeared from the muzzle of the pistol cursor. And, third, a box popped up that was headlined "Suspect Name Unknown #2010-56-9326." It held digitized images of fingerprints that had been lifted from Reggie Jones.

Now Harris laughed out loud. "That's great!"