The Cold Moon (Lincoln Rhyme 7)

"He left the clock in the bathroom. The fire escape is off the master bedroom so he was in there too." She paused. Then came on a moment later. "They've been canvassing for witnesses but nobody saw him or his car. Maybe he and his partner are on foot since we've got his SUV." A half dozen different subway lines serve Greenwich Village and they could easily have escaped via any of them.

"I don't think so." Rhyme explained that he felt the Watchmaker and his assistant would prefer wheels. The choice of using vehicles or not when committing a crime is a consistent pattern in a criminal's M.O. It rarely changes.

Sachs searched the bedroom, the fire escape, the bathroom and the routes he would've taken to get to those places. She checked the roof too. It had not been recently tarred, she reported.

"Nothing, Rhyme. It's like he's wearing a Tyvek suit of his own. He's just not leaving anything behind."

Edmond Locard, the famed French criminalist, developed what he called the exchange principle, which stated that whenever a physical crime occurs, there is some transfer of evidence between the criminal and the location. He leaves something of himself at the scene and he takes some of the scene with him when he departs. The principle is deceptively optimistic, though, because sometimes the trace is so minuscule it's missed and sometimes it's easily located but provides no helpful leads for investigators. Still Locard's principle holds that there would be some transfer of materials.

Rhyme often wondered, though, if there existed the rare criminal who was as smart as, or smarter than, Rhyme himself and if such a person could learn enough about forensic science to commit a crime and yet flaunt Locard's principle--leave behind no evidence and pick up none himself. Was the Watchmaker such a person?

"Think, Sachs. . . . There's got to be more. Something we're missing. What does the vic say?"

"She's pretty shaken up. Not really concentrating."

After a pause Rhyme said, "I'm sending down our secret weapon."

Kathryn Dance sat across from Lucy Richter in the living room of her apartment.

The soldier was beneath a Jimi Hendrix poster and a wedding photo of Lucy and her husband, a round-faced, cheerful man in a dress military uniform.

Dance noted the woman was pretty calm, considering the circumstances, though, as Amelia Sachs had said, something was clearly troubling her. Dance had the impression that it was partly something other than the attack. She didn't exhibit the post-traumatic stress reactions of a near miss; she was troubled in a more fundamental way.

"If you don't mind, could you go through the details again?"

"If it'll help catch that son of a bitch, anything." Lucy explained that she'd gone to the gym to work out that morning. When she returned she found the clock.

"I was upset. The ticking . . ." Her face now revealed a subtle fear reaction. Fight-or-flight. At Dance's prompting she explained about the bombs overseas. "I guessed it was a present or something but it kind of freaked me out. Then I felt a breeze and went to look. I found the bedroom window open. That's when the police showed up."

"Nothing else unusual?"

"No. Not that I can remember."

Danced asked her a number of other questions. Lucy Richter didn't know Theodore Adams or Joanne Harper. She couldn't think of anyone who'd want to hurt her. She'd been trying to recall something else that could help the police but was drawing a blank.

The woman was outwardly brave ("that son of a bitch") but Dance believed that something in Lucy's mind was preventing her, subconsciously, from focusing on what had just happened. The classic defensive crossing of her arms and legs was a sign, indicating not deception but a barrier against whatever was threatening her.

The agent needed a different approach. She put her notebook down.

"What are you doing in town?" she asked conversationally.

Lucy explained that she was here on leave from her duty in the Middle East. Normally she'd have met her husband, Bob, in Germany, where they had friends, but she was getting a commendation on Thursday.

"Oh, part of that parade, supporting the troops?"

"Right afterward."

"Congratulations."

Her smile fluttered. Dance noticed the minuscule reaction.

And she noted one in herself, as well; Kathryn Dance's husband had been recognized for bravery under fire by the Bureau four days before he'd died. But that was a crackle of static that Dance immediately tuned out.

Shaking her head, the agent continued. "You come back to the States and look what happens--you run into this guy. That's pretty shitty. Especially after being overseas."

"It's not that bad over there. Sounds worse on the news."

"Still . . . But it looks like you're coping pretty well."