The governor nodded: “So. Lucas. Talk to your people. We don't want any bleed-back, we don't want anybody pointing fingers at us, saying there's a political thing going on. We want this straightforward, absolutely professional.

We regret this kind of thing as much as anybody. It's a tragedy for everybody involved, including Burt Kline.”

“And especially the child. We have to protect the children from predators,” Mitford said. “Any contacts with the press, we always hit that point.”

“Of course, absolutely,” the governor said. “The children always come first. Especially when the predators are Republicans.”

Nobody asked about the Bucher case, which was slipping off the front pages.

When they were finished, Lucas walked down the hall with Rose Marie, heading for the parking garage. “Wonder why with Republicans, it's usually fucking somebody that gets them in trouble. And with the Democrats, it's usually stealing?”

“Republicans have money. Most of them don't need more,” she suggested. “But they come from uptight, sexually repressed backgrounds, and sometimes, they just go off.

Democrats are looser about sex, but half the time, they used to be teachers or government workers, and they're desperate for cash. They see all that money up close, around the government, the lobbyists and the corporate guys, they can smell it, they can taste it, they see the rich guys flying to Paris for the weekend, and eating in all the good restaurants, and buying three-thousand-dollar suits. They just want to reach out and take some.”

“I see money in this, for my old company,” Lucas said. He'd once started a software company that developed real-time emergency simulations for 911 centers. “We could make simulation software that would teach Republicans how to fuck and Democrats how to steal.”

“Jeez, I don't know,” Rose Marie said. “Can we trust Republicans with that kind of information?”

Back at his office, Carol told him that the intern, Sandy, had been up half the night preparing a report on Hewlett-Packard printers and on murders in the Upper Midwest.

He also had a call from one of Jim Cole's assistant county attorneys.

Lucas called the attorney, and they agreed that Lucas and Flowers would testify before the grand jury the following day. The assistant wanted to talk to Flowers before the grand-jury presentation, but said it would not be necessary to review testimony with Lucas himself.

“You'll do the basic bureaucratic outline, confirm the arrival of the initial information, the assignment of Agent Flowers to the case, and Flowers's delivery of the technical evidence to the crime lab. We'll need the usual piece of paper that says the evidence was properly logged in. That's about it.”

“Excellent,” Lucas said. “I'll call Agent Flowers now and have him get back to you.”

Lucas called Flowers: “You're gonna have to carry the load, Virgil, so you best memorize every stick of information you put in the files. I wouldn't be surprised if somebody from Kline's circle has been talking to somebody from Cole's circle, if you catch my drift.”

“After that newspaper story, I don't see how Cole could bail out,” Flowers said.

“I don't see it, either. But depending on what may have been said behind the chicken house, we gotta be ready,” Lucas said. “Tell them what you got, don't get mousetrapped into trying out any theories.”

“Gotcha,” Flowers said. “Gonna get my mind tightly wrapped around this one, boss.

Tightly.”

Lucas, exasperated, said, “That means you're going fishing, right?”

“I'll talk to the lab people and make sure the paperwork is right, that we got the semen sample and the pubic hair results, the photos of Kline's nuts. Copies for everyone. And so on, et cetera. I'll polish my boots tonight.”

“You're not going fishing, Virgil,” Luca said. “This is too fuckin' touchy.”

“How's the little woman?” Flowers asked.

“Goddamnit, Virgil…”

Lucas got his share of the paperwork done, reviewed it, then gave it to Carol, who had a nose for correct form. “Look it over, see if there are any holes. Same deal as the Carson case. I'll be back in five.”

“Sandy's been sitting down in her cubicle all day, waiting for you…”

“Yeah, just a few more minutes.”

While Carol was looking over the paperwork, he walked down to the lab and checked the evidence package, making sure everything was there. Whatever else happened, Lucas didn't want Kline to walk because of a bureaucratic snafu. Back at his office, he sat at his desk, kicked back, tried to think of anything else he might need. But the prosecutor had said it: Lucas was essentially the bureaucrat-in-charge, and would be testifying on chain-of-evidence, rather than the evidence itself.

Carol came in and said, “I don't see any holes. How many copies do you want? And you want me to call Sandy?”

“Just give me a minute. I gotta call John Smith.”

Smith was leaving a conference on the stabbing of a man at Regions Hospital a few weeks earlier. The stabbed man had died, just the day before, of an infection, that might or might not have been the result of the stabbing. The screwdriver-wielding drunk might be guilty of a minor assault, or murder, depending.

“Depending,” Smith said, “on what eight different doctors say, and they're all trying to tap-dance around a malpractice suit.”

“Good luck,” Lucas said. “Anything new on Bucher?”

“Thanks for asking,” Smith said.

“Look, I'm going to interview this Amity Anderson. I told you about her, she was the secretary to the Wisconsin woman.”

“Yeah, yeah… Hope something comes out of it.”

Amity Anderson worked at the Old Northwest Foundation in Minneapolis. Lucas tracked her through a friend at Minnesota Revenue, who took a look at her tax returns. Her voice on the phone was a nasal soprano, with a touch of Manhattan. “I have clients all afternoon. I could talk to you after four o'clock, if it's really urgent,” she said.

“I live about a half mile from you,” Lucas said. “Maybe I could drop by when you get home? If you're not going out?”

“I'm going out, but if it won't take too long, you could come at five-fifteen,” she said. “I'd have to leave by six.”

“See you at five-fifteen.”

He hung up and saw a blond girl standing by Carol's desk, peeking at him past the edge of his open door. He recognized her from a meet-and-greet with the summer people.

Sandy.

“Sandy,” he called. “Come in.”

She was tall. Worse, she thought she was too tall, and so rolled her shoulders to make herself look shorter. She had a thin nose, delicate cheekbones, foggy blue eyes, and glasses that were too big for her face. She wore a white blouse and a blue skirt, and black shoes that were wrong for the skirt. She was, Lucas thought, somebody who hadn't yet pulled herself together.

She was maybe twenty years old.

She hurried in and stood, until he said, “Sit down, how y'doing?”

“I'm fine.” She was nervous and plucked at the hem of her skirt. She was wearing nylons, he realized, which had to be hot. “I looked up that information you wanted.

They let me stay late yesterday.”

“You didn't have to…”

“No, it was really interesting,” she said, a spot of pink appearing in her cheeks.

“What, uh…”

“Okay.” She put one set of papers on the floor by her feet, and fumbled through a second set. “On the Hewlett-Packard printers. The answer is, probably. Probably everybody saw a Hewlett-Packard printer, but nobody knows for sure. The thing is, there are all kinds of printers that get thrown away. Nobody wants an old printer, and there are supposed to be restrictions on how you get rid of them, so people put them in garbage sacks and hide them in their garbage cans, or throw them in somebody else's dumpster. There are dozens of them every week.”

“Shit…” He thought about the word, noticed that she flushed. “Excuse me.”