"He's not going to stop until he's killed everybody who's attacked him in your blog. I'm going to ask you again, will you please give us the Internet addresses of the people who've posted?"
"No."
Goddammit. Dance shivered in rage.
"Because if I did, it would be a breach of trust. I can't betray my readers."
That again. She muttered, "Listen to me--"
"Please, Agent Dance, just hear me out. But what I will do . . . write this down. My hosting platform is Central California Internet Services. They're in San Jose." He gave her the address and phone number, as well as a personal contact. "I'll call them right now and tell them I won't object to their giving you the addresses of everybody who's posted. If they want a warrant, that's their business, but I won't fight it."
She paused. She wasn't sure of the technical implications but she thought he'd just agreed to what she'd asked for, while saving some journalistic face.
"Well . . . thank you."
They hung up and Dance called to Boling, "I think we can get the IP addresses."
"What?"
"Chilton's had a change of heart."
"Sweet," he said, smiling, and seemed like a boy who'd just been told his father'd gotten tickets to a play-off game.
Dance gave it a few minutes and called the hosting company. She was skeptical both that Chilton had called and the service itself would give up the information without a court battle. But to her surprise the representative she spoke with said, "Oh, Mr. Chilton just called. I've got the IP addresses of the posters. I've okayed forwarding them to a dot-gov location."
She smiled broadly, and gave the hosting employee her email address.
"They're on their way. I'll go back to the blog every few hours or so and get the addresses of the new posters."
"You're a lifesaver . . . literally."
The man said grimly, "This is about that boy who's getting even with people, right? The Satanist? Is it true they found biological weapons in his locker?"
Brother, Dance thought. The rumors were spreading faster than the Mission Hills fire a few years ago.
"We're not sure what's happening at this point." Always noncommittal.
They disconnected. And a few minutes later her computer dinged with incoming mail.
"Got it," Dance said to Boling. He rose and walked behind her, put his hand on her chair back, leaning forward. She smelled subtle aftershave. Pleasant.
"Okay. Good. Of course, you know those are the raw computer addresses. We've got to contact all the providers and find out names and physical addresses. I'll get right on it."
She printed out the list--it contained about thirty individuals' names--and handed it to him. He disappeared back into his corner of the lair and hunkered down in front of his computer.
"May have something, boss." TJ had been posting pictures of the mask on the Web and in blogs and asking if anybody knew its source. He ran his hand through his curly red hair. "Pat me on the back."
"What's the story?"
"The mask is of some character in a computer game." A glance at the mask. "Qetzal."
"What?"
"That's his name. Or its name. A demon who kills people with these beams from its eyes. And it can only moan because somebody laced up the lips."
Dance asked, "So it's getting even with people who have the ability to communicate."
"Didn't really run a Dr. Phil on him, boss," TJ said.