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grabbed me, and he looked like he was about to cry. His second shot had gone under one of the evergreens, he said, and he’d kicked it out. He wanted to win so bad. But cheating, it wrecked him. He couldn’t handle it. That’s the kind of guy he is. He wouldn’t steal a dime, he wouldn’t steal a golf stroke. He’s absolutely straight, and incapable of being anything else.”
    The fireman with the chisel and mallet laid the tools on the floor, grabbed the front of the other fireman’s rubber coat, and ripped it open.
    “That’s got it,” said the second man. “I can take it from here.” He looked at Carr: “Fun in the great outdoors, huh?”

    The doctor was edging between the wall and the nose of the station wagon, followed by a tall man wrapped in a heavy arctic parka. The doctor had light hair spiked with strands of white, cut efficiently short. She was small, but athletic with wide shoulders, a nose that was a bit too big and a little crooked, bent to the left. She had high cheekbones and dark-blue eyes, a mouth that was wide and mobile. She had just a bit of the brawler about her, Lucas thought, with the vaguely Oriental cast that Slavs often carry. She was not pretty, but she was strikingly attractive. “Is this a secret conversation?” she asked. She was carrying a cup of coffee.
    “No, not really,” Carr said, glancing at Lucas. He gave a tiny backwards wag of his head that meant, Don’t say anything about the priest.
    The tall man said, “Shelly, I hit every place on the road. Nobody saw anything connected, but we’ve got three people missing yet. I’m trying to track them down now.”
    “Thanks, Gene,” Carr said, and the tall man headed toward the door. To Lucas, he said, “My lead investigator.”
    Lucas nodded, and looked at Weather. “I don’t suppose there was any reason to do body temps.”
    The doctor shook her head, took another sip of coffee. Lucas noticed that she wore no rings. “Not on the two women. The fire and the water and the ice and snow would mess everything up. Frank was pretty bundled up, though, and I did take a temp on him. Sixty-four degrees. He hadn’t been dead that long.”
    “Huh,” said Carr, glancing at Lucas.
    The doctor caught it and looked from Lucas to Carr and asked, “Is that critical?”
    “You might want to write it down somewhere,” Carr said.
    “There’s a question about how long they were dead before the fire started,” Lucas said.
    Weather was looking at him oddly. “Maddog, right?”
    “What?”
    “You were the guy who killed the Maddog after he sliced up all those women. And you were in that fight with those Indian guys.”
    Lucas nodded. “Yeah.” The Crows coming out of that house in the dark, .45s in their hands . . . . Why’d she have to bring that up?
    “I had a friend who did that New York cop, the woman who was shot in the chest? I can’t remember her name, but at the time she was pretty famous.”
    “Lily Rothenburg.” Damn. Sloan on the steps of Hennepin General, white-faced, saying, “Got your shit together? . . . Lily’s been shot.” Sweet Lily.
    “Oh, yes,” Weather said, nodding. “I knew it was a flower name. She’s back in New York?”
    “Yeah. She’s a captain now. Your friend was a redheaded surgeon? I remember.”
    “Yup. That’s her. And she was there when the big shoot-out happened. She says it was the most exciting night of her career. She was doing two ops at the same time, going back and forth between rooms.”
    “My God, and now it’s here,” Carr said, appalled. He looked at Lucas. “Listen, I spent five years on the patrol before I got elected up here, and that was twenty years ago. Most of my boys are off the patrol or local police forces. We really don’t know nothin’ about multiple murder. What I’m askin’ is, are you gonna help us out?”
    “What do you want me to do?” Lucas asked, shaking away the memories.
    “Run the investigation. I’ll give you everything I can.