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beautiful baby. A beautiful child.”
    Frank nodded.
    â€œA beautiful woman,” Karen said. She looked at Frank. “There’s nothing more powerful than that.”
    Frank closed the black plastic bag over Angelica’s face. “I have to ask you. It’s a technical thing. Is this your sister?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œWe can go now,” Frank said. He pushed the carriage back into the wall and closed the door.
    Karen did not move. She continued to look at the closed door, as if studying her own marred reflection.
    â€œMiss Devereaux,” Frank repeated. “We can go now.”
    She shook her head. “Not yet,” she whispered. Her eyes remained on the stainless steel door, but it was as if they were passing through it, were still in the dark cold vault gazing at Angelica’s face. “Sparks flew from her,” she said. “My father used to pick her up in his arms and laugh. ‘Sparks fly from you,’ he’d say.” Her eyes remained on the closed door, but Frank could tell that her mind was somewhere else, and that everything in her life was passing through the dark funnel of this moment. Her body grew even more rigid, and slowly her hand lifted toward the latch.
    Frank took it quickly. “No,” he said, then released it. It fell limply to her side.
    â€œWhy not?” she asked.
    â€œBecause it won’t help anything.”
    â€œHow do you know?”
    â€œI’ve been here before.”
    â€œAll right,” Karen said. She turned slowly and walked straight down the corridor.
    â€œJust go on out to the car,” Frank told her, once they were back at the entrance. “I want to talk to Jesse for a minute.”
    She was standing beside the car smoking a cigarette when he joined her a few minutes later.
    â€œI’m sorry to keep you waiting,” he told her.
    â€œWhat did you talk to him about?” she asked.
    â€œA few things. Technical.”
    â€œWhat? I want to know, exactly.”
    Frank took out his notebook and flipped to his last entries. “Well, the body came down about a half-hour ago. The lab report should be on my desk by now.” He turned the page. “No outside inquiries about her.”
    â€œDo you keep everything in that book?” Karen asked.
    â€œIt helps my memory,” Frank said. He closed the book. “You took it well, Miss Devereaux.”
    A slender black eyebrow crawled upward. “Did I?”
    â€œBetter than most.”
    â€œWith less feeling, you mean?”
    â€œWith less show of feeling.”
    â€œIs there a difference?”
    â€œI think so,” Frank said. He opened the car door. “Come, I’ll take you home.”
    It was late afternoon, and the traffic had begun to build steadily toward its rush-hour snarl. Frank knew that it would be a long tangled line from downtown to West Paces Ferry, and given what Karen had just been through, it seemed unnecessarily brutal to add at least an hour of stop-and-go traffic to the day’s ordeal.
    â€œWe could stop somewhere if you like,” he said.
    She looked at him curiously. “Stop somewhere?”
    â€œAnd let the traffic die down a little,” Frank explained.
    â€œAll right.”
    A few minutes later, Frank pulled into a small tavern on Peachtree Street. He felt the need for a drink, but he felt even more that he needed a dark, quiet room, a place away from the heat and traffic.
    â€œWe can talk about anything you want,” he said, after they’d ordered their drinks. “I mean, you don’t have to …”
    â€œWas she murdered?” Karen asked immediately.
    â€œProbably. We don’t know.”
    â€œBut wouldn’t it be easy to tell?”
    â€œIf she were shot or strangled, yes, it would be easier to tell. As it is, any number of things could have happened to her—some sort of accident maybe, hell, even a heart attack, I don’t know. If