Hodges rolls his eyes. Peeples grins. They have gone from potential antagonists to colleagues – almost, anyway – and why? Because Hodges happened to recognize the guy’s slightly off-center first name. You could call that luck, but there’s always something that will get you on the same side as the person you want to question, something, and part of Hodges’s success on the cops came from being able to recognize it, at least in most cases. It’s a talent Pete Huntley never had, and Hodges is delighted to find his remains in good working order.

‘I think she had a sister,’ he says. ‘Mrs Trelawney, I mean. Never met her, though, and can’t remember the name.’

‘Janelle Patterson,’ Peeples says promptly.

‘You have met her, I take it.’

‘Yes indeed. She’s good people. Bears a resemblance to Mrs Trelawney, but younger and better-looking.’ His hands describe an hourglass shape in the air. ‘More filled out. Do you happen to know if there’s been any progress on the Mercedes thing, Mr Hodges?’

This isn’t a question Hodges would ordinarily answer, but if you want to get information, you have to give information. And what he has is safe enough, because it isn’t information at all. He uses the phrase Pete Huntley used at lunch a few hours ago. ‘Dead in the water.’

Peeples nods as if this is no more than he expected. ‘Crime of impulse. No ties to any of the vics, no motive, just a goddam thrill-killing. Best chance of getting him is if he tries to do it again, don’t you think?’

Mr Mercedes says he won’t, Hodges thinks, but this is information he absolutely doesn’t want to give out, so he agrees. Collegial agreement is always good.

‘Mrs T. left a big estate,’ Hodges says, ‘and I’m not just talking about the house. I wonder if the sister inherited.’

‘Oh yeah,’ Peeples says. He pauses, then says something Hodges himself will say to someone else in the not too distant future. ‘Can I trust your discretion?’

‘Yes.’ When asked such a question, the simple answer is best. No qualifiers.

‘The Patterson woman was living in Los Angeles when her sister … you know. The pills.’

Hodges nods.

‘Married, but no children. Not a happy marriage. When she found out she had inherited megabucks and a Sugar Heights estate, she divorced the husband like a shot and came east.’ Peeples jerks a thumb at the gate, the wide drive, and the big house. ‘Lived there for a couple of months while the will was going through probate. Got close with Mrs Wilcox, down at 640. Mrs Wilcox likes to talk, and sees me as a friend.’

This might mean anything from coffee-buddies to afternoon sex.

‘Miz Patterson took over visiting the mother, who lived in a condo building downtown. You know about the mother?’

‘Elizabeth Wharton,’ Hodges says. ‘Wonder if she’s still alive.’

‘I’m pretty sure she is.’

‘Because she had terrible scoliosis.’ Hodges takes a little hunched-over walk to demonstrate. If you want to get, you have to give.

‘Is that so? Too bad. Anyway, Helen – Mrs Wilcox – says that Miz Patterson visited as regular as clockwork, just like Mrs Trelawney did. Until a month ago, that is. Then things must have got worse, because I believe the old lady’s now in a nursing home in Warsaw County. Miz Patterson moved into the condo herself. And that’s where she is now. I still see her every now and then, though. Last time was a week ago, when the real estate guy showed the house.’

Hodges decides he’s gotten everything he can reasonably expect from Radney Peeples. ‘Thanks for the update. I’m going to roll. Sorry we kind of got off on the wrong foot.’

‘Not at all,’ Peeples says, giving Hodges’s offered hand two brisk pumps. ‘You handled it like a pro. Just remember, I never said anything. Janelle Patterson may be living downtown, but she’s still part of the Association, and that makes her a client.’

‘You never said a word,’ Hodges says, getting back into his car. He hopes that Helen Wilcox’s husband won’t catch his wife and this beefcake in the sack together, if that is indeed going on; it would probably be the end of Vigilant Guard Service’s arrangement with the residents of Sugar Heights. Peeples himself would immediately be terminated for cause. About that there is no doubt at all.

Probably she just trots out to his car with fresh-baked cookies, Hodges thinks as he drives away. You’ve been watching too much Nazi couples therapy on afternoon TV.

Not that Radney Peeples’s love-life matters to him. What matters to Hodges as he heads back to his much humbler home on the West Side is that Janelle Patterson inherited her sister’s estate, Janelle Patterson is living right here in town (at least for the time being), and Janelle Patterson must have done something with the late Olivia Trelawney’s possessions. That would include her personal papers, and her personal papers might contain a letter – possibly more than one – from the freako who has reached out to Hodges. If such correspondence exists, he would like to see it.

Of course this is police business and K. William Hodges is no longer a policeman. By pursuing it he is skating well beyond the bounds of what is legal and he knows it – for one thing he is withholding evidence – but he has no intention of stopping just yet. The cocky arrogance of the freako’s letter has pissed him off. But, he admits, it’s pissed him off in a good way. It’s given him a sense of purpose, and after the last few months, that seems like a pretty terrific thing.

If I do happen to make a little progress, I’ll turn the whole thing over to Pete.

He’s not looking in the rearview mirror as this thought crosses his mind, but if he had been, he would have seen his eyes flick momentarily up and to the left.

4

Hodges parks his Toyota in the sheltering overhang to the left of his house that serves as his garage, and pauses to admire his freshly cut lawn before going to the door. There he finds a note sticking out of the mail slot. His first thought is Mr Mercedes, but such a thing would be bold even for that guy.

It’s from Jerome. His neat printing contrasts wildly with the bullshit jive of the message.

Dear Massa Hodges,

I has mowed yo grass and put de mower back in yo cah-pote. I hopes you didn’t run over it, suh! If you has any mo chos for dis heah black boy, hit me on mah honker. I be happy to talk to you if I is not on de job wit one of my hos. As you know dey needs a lot of work and sometimes some tunin up on em, as dey can be uppity, especially dem high yallers! I is always heah fo you, suh!

Jerome

Hodges shakes his head wearily but can’t help smiling. His hired kid gets straight As in advanced math, he can replace fallen gutters, he fixes Hodges’s email when it goes blooey (as it frequently does, mostly due to his own mismanagement), he can do basic plumbing, he can speak French pretty well, and if you ask what he’s reading, he’s apt to bore you for half an hour with the blood symbolism of D. H. Lawrence. He doesn’t want to be white, but being a gifted black male in an upper-middle-class family has presented him with what he calls ‘identity challenges.’ He says this in a joking way, but Hodges does not believe he’s joking. Not really.

Jerome’s college professor dad and CPA mom – both humor-challenged, in Hodges’s opinion – would no doubt be aghast at this communication. They might even feel their son in need of psychological counseling. But they won’t find out from Hodges.

‘Jerome, Jerome, Jerome,’ he says, letting himself in. Jerome and his chos fo hos. Jerome who can’t decide, at least not yet, on which Ivy League college he wants to attend; that any of the big boys will accept him is a foregone conclusion. He’s the only person in the neighborhood whom Hodges thinks of as a friend, and really, the only one he needs. Hodges believes friendship is overrated, and in this way, if in no other, he is like Brady Hartsfield.