“I’ve always wanted to see you excited,” she said.

I had nothing really good to say to that so I didn’t say anything.

“I guess we’ve got Mary Smith out of the deep water,” I said.

“She did try to conceal a murder,” Rita said.

“Well, did she,” I said. “She set out to conceal a suicide.”

“By pretending it was a murder.” Rita smiled. “Which in fact it was,” she said. “I think we can reason with Owen Brooks about that.”

She swung her foot some more, watching as it moved in a small arc. She smiled at me again.

“You know,” she said, “Owen’s single again.”

“A single DA,” I said. “What could be better?”

“You think Mary knew anything about the bank-fraud enterprise?” Rita said. Sex and business were two sides of the same thing to Rita.

“I haven’t come across any sign of it,” I said.

“The murder was the only overlap.”

“Far as I can see, except for Graff…!”

“What?” Rita said.

“Graff. Graff is the only person left standing that could connect Shawcross to the bank fraud and the murders.”

“What about Conroy?”

“Shawcross thinks Conroy is waiting for him in Wamego, Kansas,” I said. “Under another name. In another bank.”

“And Graff is connected to them?”

“The bank lent him money, interest-free,” I said. “He used his original name, Joey Bucci.”

“A gift.”

“Yep.”

“He did something for Shawcross,” Rita said.

“You’d think so.”

“And with Conroy, Shawcross assumes, still his partner and already laying groundwork for a new fraud…”

“Leaves Graff the only loose end I know about.”

Again Rita and I looked at each other.

“I think I better go visit Larson,” I said.

“Six people have been killed so far,” Rita said.

“Let’s see if we can hold it at six,” I said.

“Be a little careful,” Rita said. “I haven’t slept with you yet.”

CHAPTER SIXTY

Larson Graff denied that he knew Felton Shawcross, denied that he had introduced Mary Toricelli to Nathan Smith, denied that he had anything to fear, and insisted therefore that he was not afraid. I didn’t believe any of it.

“Do me one favor,” I said. “If a man named Felton Shawcross, whom you don’t know, shows up, or calls and wants to see you, lock your doors and call me.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Graff said.

His face was pale and tight and his mouth moved stiffly when he spoke. I gave him my card.

“Of course it is,” I said. “So am I. But if Shawcross or anyone else that you don’t know wants to see you, call me.”

Graff was silent, sitting in his state-of-the-art swivel chair, behind his big maple desk with the red leather top. His Adam’s apple bounced as he swallowed. I stood and walked toward the door. I had my hand on the knob before he spoke.

“He called,” Graff said.

I took my hand off the knob and turned, and walked back to Graff’s desk and sat back down in the client chair.

“Shawcross?” I said.

“That was the name he said.”

“Where does he want to meet you,” I said.

A quick flicker of surprise pushed through Graff’s look of cold panic for a moment.

“The parking lot at the Blue Hill Trailside Museum.”

“In Milton,” I said.

“Yes.”

“What time?”

“Nine,” Graff said. “At night.”

“The museum closes about five,” I said.

“I guess so.”

“So the parking lot will be empty and it’ll be dark,” I said. “Nothing to worry about there.”

“Would you go with me?” Graff said.

The valve had opened, and his resolve was running out.

“Why go at all?” I said.

“I… I feel I should.”

“A guy you don’t even know?”

“Can you go?” Graff said.

“I’ll go instead,” I said.

“Instead of me?”

“Yes. You lend me your car. He thinks it’s you. I jump out and say ah ha!”

“Maybe it won’t be him,” Graff said.

“It’ll be him. As I explained so carefully but a few moments ago, you are the only one left, as far as he knows, who can tie him to any of this mess. He isn’t going to send somebody to do it, then that person becomes a threat. He’s going to do it himself.”

“Do it?”

“Kill you,” I said.

Graff leaned suddenly forward in his chair as if he had a stomach cramp.

“Oh God,” he said.

“Not to worry,” I said. Soothing. “I can fix it. All you have to do is tell me what you know, and then I’ll handle Shawcross.”

“You can’t handle him,” Graff said. His voice had become squeaky. “Nobody can handle him.”

“Tell me what you know,” I said.

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

The next morning I went to a place on lower Washington Street that sold what it called “novelties,” and bought one. In the middle of the afternoon, I took my novelty and followed Larson Graff while he drove his black BMW sedan down to Milton and parked in the museum lot at the foot of the Blue Hill. The lot was maybe two-thirds full and Graff parked at the far end of it, away from the museum, between a Chevy Blazer and a Ford minivan, near the foot of one of the trails leading up into the hill. I parked behind him. He got out. I got out with my novelty and put it on the driver’s seat, then Graff and I got in my car and drove in silence back to Boston. Graff had told me everything he knew yesterday morning in his office with fear singing at the edge of everything he said. Neither of us had much more to say today.

In the late afternoon I joined the south-bound commuter traffic and drove back to Milton. I parked on a shoulder on Route 138 about a half mile from the Trailside Museum, took my raincoat from the backseat and carried it with me as I walked on down to the parking lot. I was wearing a replica Boston Braves baseball cap, New Balance running shoes, jeans, a T-shirt, and a Browning 9mm semiautomatic pistol on my belt, with the T-shirt hanging out to be less conspicuous. I had two extra magazines in my hip pocket. There were only three or four cars in the parking lot when I got there. Graff’s BMW sat alone at the far end. I paid it no attention and started up one of the paths near the museum. It was hot and gray and the air was dense with the unculminated promise of heavy rain.

I went up the narrow trail for maybe 100 yards, turned left out of sight of the parking lot, and worked my way through the humid woods to a point above where Graff’s car was parked. I sat at the base of a large tree, put my back against it, and waited.

The last stragglers from the museum wandered into the parking lot and got in their cars and departed. Finally, Graff’s BMW was the only one left. As it grew dark, it grew no cooler. It seemed impossible that the atmosphere could still contain the rain that thickened it. In the woods there was the rustle and movement and sound that woods always seem to have. A few pretentious raindrops plopped onto the leaves in the treetops above me. There would be more. I stood and put on my raincoat. I took the Browning out of its holster and put it into the side pocket of the raincoat before I zipped the coat up. A few more raindrops pattered. The scatter was decreasing. Then they were steady. Then, as if the energy that held them had released, they cascaded joyously. I sat as stolidly as I could. Hunching my shoulders didn’t help.

It was hard to see my watch in the wet darkness, but I think it was ten minutes to nine when a car, maybe a Buick, with its headlights on, swung into the parking lot and drove in a circle around the lot before it parked near Graff’s BMW. The wipers stopped. The headlights went out.

I waited.

Nothing else happened. The car sat there three spaces away from the BMW. I stood and began to move through the woods, down the slope, fighting the tendency to slide on the wet hillside. I was almost to the edge of the parking lot when the door of the Buick opened and a piggish man got out. He had a trench coat belted tight and a soft wide-brimmed hat pulled down. He closed the car door and thrust his hands in his pockets and walked to Graff’s car. I was in the parking lot now, on the other side of the Buick away from the man and the BMW. I had the Browning out, and held it pointed down by my leg as I walked. I didn’t want the barrel to fill with rainwater. Whatever front had brought the rain with it was colliding with the front that had made it hot. Lightning appeared and thunder followed. The rain was hard and steady. Soon, there’d probably be a plague of locusts.