The Last Precinct

"Zack! Don't you make me tell you again to get your butt inside the house!" Zack's mother shouts at him.

Cruelty. Leave, and the dog will be beaten. Maybe the child will. Bev Kiffin is an out-of-control, frustrated woman. Life has made her feel powerless, and beneath her skin she seethes with hurt and anger, the unfairness of it all. Or maybe she is just plain bad, and maybe poor Mr. Peanut is ru

Her face darkens and anger glints. I fix my stare dead center on her pupils.

"There are laws against cruelty to animals, Mrs. Kiffin," I say. "And beating Mr. Peanut is not a good example to set in front of your children." I hint that I spotted a second child she has failed to mention to us thus far.

She steps back from me, turns and walks off toward the house. Mr. Peanut sits, looking up at me. "You go home," I tell her as my heart breaks. "Go on, sweetie. You need to go home."

Zack comes down the steps and runs up to us. He takes the dog by the collar, squats and scratches between her ears, talking to her. "Be good, don't go making Mama mad, Mr. Peanut. Please," he says, looking up at me. "She just don't like it 'cause you're taking her baby buggy."

This jolts me, but I don't let it show. I get down to Zack's level and pet Mr. Peanut, trying to block out that her musky stench triggers memories of Chando

"When she has puppies, I take them on rides in it," Zack tells me.

"Why was it over there by the picnic table, Zack?" I ask. "I thought maybe some campers might have left it there."

He shakes his head, petting Mr. Peanut. "Uh uh. It's Mr. Peanut's buggy, isn't it, Mr. Peanut? I gotta go in." He gets up, glancing back furtively at the open front door.

"I tell you what." I get up, too. "We just need to look at Mr. Peanut's buggy, but when we're done I promise to bring it back."

"Okay." He tugs the dog after him, half ru

Chapter 23

WE HEAD EAST ON ROUTE 5 AND I AM MINDFUL of the time. Even if I could conjure up Lucy's helicopter, I would never make it back to A

"The whole thing out there, wow," he finally says, shaking his head. "Talk about a creepy feeling. Like there were all these eyes watching everything we were doing. Like that place has a whole life of its own nobody knows nothing about."

"She knows," I reply. "She knows something. That much is obvious, Marino. She made a point of telling us the baby carriage was left by the people who abandoned the campsite. She volunteered that without pause. Wanted us to think it. Why?"

"Those people don't exist, whoever was supposedly staying out in that tent. If the hairs turn out to be Chando

The vision of Chando

Marino gets out his cigarettes.

"Do you understand what I'm saying?" I go on. "In our arrogance, we decided what he's like. Based it on scientific evidence and came up with what, in truth, is an assumption. A caricature. He's not a werewolf. He's a human being, and no matter how evil he is, he has many facets, and now we're finding them. Hell, it was obvious on the videotape. Why are we so damn slow on the uptake? I don't want Vander going to that motel alone."

"Good point." Marino reaches for the phone. "I'll go to the motel with him and you can take my truck back to Richmond."

"There was someone in the doorway," I say. "Did you see him? He was big."

"Huh," he says. "I didn't see anyone. Just the little kid, what's his name? Zack. And the dog."

"I saw someone else," I insist.

"I'll check it out. You got Vander's number?"

I give it to him and he calls. Vander is already on his way and his wife gives Marino a cell phone number. I stare out the window at wooded residential developments with large Colonial homes set back far from the streets. Elegant Christmas decorations shine through trees.

"Yeah, there's some strange shit out there," Marino is telling Vander by cell phone. "So yours truly here's go

"How long have you known?" I finally ask Marino one more time, not at all satisfied with what he told me in A

"You hadn't even finished her damn autopsy yet." Marino lights a cigarette. "Bray was still on your table, to be exact. Righter gets me on the phone and says he don't want you doing her post, and I tell him, 'So what you want me to do? Walk in the morgue and order her to drop her scalpel and put her hands up in the air?' The dumb shit." Marino blows out smoke as my dismay folds into a scary shape inside my brain. "That's why he didn't ask your permission to come snoop around your house, either," Marino adds.

The snooping part, at least, I had already figured out.

"He wanted to see if the cops came across anything." He pauses to tap an ash. "Like a chipping hammer. Especially one with maybe Bray's blood on it."

"The one he tried to attack me with may very well have her blood on it," I reply reasonably, calmly as anxiety inches through me.

"Problem is, the hammer with her blood on it was found in your house," Marino reminds me of a fact.

"Of course it was. He brought it to my house so he could use it on me."

"And yeah, it does have her blood on it," Marino keeps talking. "They already did the DNA. Never seen the labs move so fast as they are these days, and you can guess why. The governor's got his eye on everything going on_in case his chief medical examiner turns out to be some whacko murderer." He sucks on the cigarette and glances over at me. "And another thing, Doc. Don't know if Berger might have mentioned this to you. But the chipping hammer you say you bought at the hardware store? It ain't been found."