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and headlines for their own careers that they forgot about the victims and their families. John was the son of a judge. He had grown up sitting in the back row of his father’s courtroom, watching townsfolk brought before the bench. So many secrets and sorrows went on behind the closed doors of Connecticut’s fine homes—John’s father had taught him to understand and even love his neighbors for their complicated, not always tidy lives, and he understood that justice and life were more complicated than people wanted to believe.
      “This is it,” he said to the cabdriver as they pulled up in front of his house. John looked through the window at the big white house, stone walls, and tall, old trees. The sugar maple—Theresa’s favorite—had turned brighter red during the cold night, approaching its peak. On the headland a quarter mile away, the lighthouse gleamed white in the cold sunshine. A patrol car cruised slowly by.
      We had it all covered, the four musketeers… he thought, taking it all in. Thinking of his high school friends, all of whom had remained local, he was unexpectedly flooded by emotion.
      John, the son of a judge, had become a lawyer. Billy Manning, son of a cop, had become a cop. And Barkley Jenkins, whose father had been the last lightkeeper, now ran an inn and had a contract to keep the automated lighthouse in working order.
      Theresa had been the fourth musketeer: From the day they had started dating in sophomore year, John had never wanted to be without her. Although Billy and Barkley would break away from their girlfriends some nights, deep down John had been afraid to let her out of his sight. The guys would razz him, but John was too in love to care. Had he known even then? That she was too beautiful to stay with him forever?
      Hurriedly, John pulled out his wallet and paid the driver.
      The broken window gaped in the sunlight, the jagged glass creating an open star. John would call to get it fixed before the kids got home.
      Walking up the steps, he looked through the front door and saw Maggie’s book bag lying on the hall floor. Had she forgotten to take it to school? John’s stomach tightened, thinking that the new baby-sitter was screwing up already. Hand on the doorknob, he instinctively turned around to glance at her blue car.
      The car wasn’t there.
      The door was unlocked.
      John’s heart beat fast in his throat, like a cluster of moths. He stepped into his own front hall. This was where he and Theresa had stood twice, bringing both kids home from the hospital—why had that memory come to him now? He shook it off, noticing Maggie’s lunch on the chair, the brown bag he’d packed himself last night. She’d stayed home from school, that’s all. That’s what happened.
      Maybe a stomachache. Maggie, especially since her mother’s death, had been prone to stomachaches. Or maybe it was her patented stubbornness—refusing to go to school till she saw with her own eyes that her dad was okay.
      “Maggie!” he called, dropping his briefcase.
      No answer. The hall clock ticked loudly. “I’m home, sweetheart. I’m fine.”
      That should bring her running, he thought. His good, caring, easily worried girl: She would want to know her father was safe and sound.
      But she didn’t come running. She didn’t even answer.
      “Hey, Maggie. Brainer—where’s Maggie?”
      Palms sweating, John walked through the first floor. Slowly, in control, he glanced through the living room, dining room, kitchen—faster now, starting to run—into the den, the sunporch. Where’s Brainer? The dog’s gone too , he thought.
      “Mags!”
      His guts thudded, hard and sudden. What was the baby-sitter’s name, the woman who had shown up at their door—and what kind of idiot , knowing what John knew about what human beings are capable of—would leave his kids with a stranger? Where was Mrs. Wilcox? Hadn’t she said she’d stay to help? John heard himself