The Vanished Man (Lincoln Rhyme 5)

Rhyme felt a burst of unreasonable pride.

"How 'bout the others?"

"No, she was the only one he referred to." Rhyme was positive about this.

Sellitto said, "So he thinks of the vics as people doing a particular thing--that may or may not be their jobs."

"Right," Rhyme confirmed. "Playing music. Putting makeup on people. Riding horses."

"But whatta we do with that?" Sellitto asked.

And as Rhyme had said to her so often, when she posed this very same question about crime scene evidence, she replied, "We don't know yet, Detective. But it's a step closer to figuring him out." The policewoman then consulted the notes she'd been taking. "Okay, he did the razor-blade tricks, mentioned the Burning Mirror. He talked to his respected audience. He's obsessed with fire. He picked a makeup artist, a musician and a horseback rider to kill because of what they represent--whatever that is. Can you think of anything else?"

Eyes closed again. Trying hard.

But kept seeing the razor blades, the flames, smelling the smoke.

"Nope," he said, looking back at her. "I think that's it."

"Okay. Good, Rhyme."

And he recognized the tone in her voice.

He knew it because it was the tone he'd often use.

It meant she wasn't finished.

Sachs looked up from her notes and said slowly, "You know, you're always quoting Locard."

Rhyme nodded at the reference to the early French forensic detective and criminalist, who developed a principle that was later named for him. The rule held that at every crime scene there's always an exchange of evidence between the perpetrator and the victim or the locale itself, however minute.

"Well, I'm thinking there might be a psychological exchange too. Just like a physical one."

Rhyme laughed at the crazy idea. Locard was a scientist; he'd have balked at having his principle applied to something as slippery as the human psyche. "What're you getting at?"

She continued, "You weren't gagged the whole time, were you?"

"No, just at the end."

"So that means you communicated something too. You took part in an exchange."

"Me?"

"Didn't you? Didn't you say anything to him?"

"Sure. But so what? It's his words that're important."

"I'm thinking he might've said something in response to you."

Rhyme observed Sachs closely. A smudge of soot the shape of a quarter moon on her cheek, sweat just above her buoyant upper lip. She was sitting forward and, though her voice was calm, he could sense the tension of concentration in her pose. She wouldn't know it, of course, but she seemed to be feeling exactly the same emotions that he felt when he was guiding her through a crime scene miles away.

"Think about it, Rhyme," she said. "Imagine that you're alone with a perp. Not the Conjurer necessarily. Any perp. What would you say to him? What would you want to know?"

His reaction was to give a tired sigh that somehow managed to sound cynical. But, sure enough, her question jogged something in his mind. "I remember!" he said. "I asked him who he was."

"Good question. And he said?"

"He said he was a wizard. . . . No, not just a wizard but something specific." Rhyme squinted as he struggled to go back to that hard place. "It reminded me of The Wizard of Oz. . . . The Wicked Witch of the West." He frowned. Then he said, "Yeah, got it. He said he was the Wizard of the North. I'm sure that was it."