captors chose to contact him.
If the visitor had nothing to do with her abduction, Mitch was nevertheless obliged to answer the door in order to maintain an air of normalcy.
His truck in the driveway proved that he was home. A neighbor, getting no response to the bell, might circle to the back of the house to knock at the kitchen door.
The six-pane window in that door would provide a clear view of the kitchen floor strewn with broken dishes, the bloody hand prints on the cabinets and the refrigerator.
He should have drawn shut the blinds.
He left the bedroom, followed the hall, and crossed the living room before the visitor had time to ring the bell twice.
The front door had no windows. He opened it and found Detective Taggart on the porch.
Chapter 9
The praying-mantis stare of mirrored lenses skewered Mitch and pinned his voice in his throat.
'I love these old neighborhoods,' Taggart said, surveying the front porch. 'This was how southern California looked in its great years, before they cut down all the orange groves and built a wasteland of stucco tract houses.'
Mitch found a voice that sounded almost like his own, though thinner: 'You live around here, Lieutenant?'
'No. I live in one of the wastelands. It's more convenient. But I happened to be in your neighborhood.'
Taggart was not a man who just happened to be anywhere. If he ever went sleepwalking, even then he would have a purpose, a plan, and a destination.
'Something's come up, Mr. Rafferty. And since I was nearby, it seemed as easy to stop in as to call. Can you spare a few minutes?'
If Taggart was not one of the kidnappers, if his conversation with Mitch had been taped without his knowledge, allowing him across the threshold would be reckless. In this small house,
the living room, a picture of tranquility, and the kitchen, smeared with incriminating evidence, were only a few steps apart.
'Sure,' Mitch said. 'But my wife came home with a migraine. She's lying down.'
If the detective was one of them, if he knew that Holly was being held elsewhere, he did not betray his knowledge by any change in his expression.
'Why don't we sit here on the porch,' Mitch said.
'You've got it fixed up real nice.'
Mitch pulled the door shut behind him, and they settled into the white wicker chairs.
Taggart had brought a nine-by-twelve white envelope. He put it on his lap, unopened.
'We had a porch like this when I was a kid,' he said. 'We used to watch traffic go by, just watch traffic.'
He removed his sunglasses and tucked them in his shirt pocket. His gaze was as direct as a power drill. 'Does Mrs. Rafferty use ergotamine?'
'Use what?'
'Ergotamine. For the migraines.'
Mitch had no idea whether ergotamine was an actual medication or a word the detective had invented on the spot. 'No. She toughs it out with aspirin.'
'How often does she get one?'
'Two or three times a year,' Mitch lied. Holly had never had a migraine. She rarely suffered headaches of any kind. A gray-and-black moth was settled on the porch post to the right of the front steps, a night-flyer sleeping in the shade until sunset.
'I have ocular migraines,' Taggart said. 'They're entirely visual. I get the glimmering light and the temporary blind spot for like twenty minutes, but there's no pain.'
'If you've got to have a migraine, that sounds like the kind to have.'
'A doctor probably wouldn't prescribe ergotamine until she was having a migraine a month.'
'It's just twice a year. Three times,' Mitch said.
He wished that he had resorted to a different lie. Taggart having personal knowledge of migraines was rotten luck.
This small talk unnerved Mitch. To his own ear, he sounded wary, tense.
Of course, Taggart had no doubt long ago grown accustomed to people being wary and tense with him, even innocent people, even his mother.
Mitch had been avoiding the detective's stare. With an effort, he made eye contact again.
'We did find an AVID on the dog,' Taggart said.
'A what?'
'An American Veterinary Identification Device. That microchip ID I mentioned earlier.'
'Oh. Right.'
Before Mitch realized that his sense of guilt had sabotaged him again, his gaze had drifted away from Taggart to follow a passing car in the street.
'They inject it into the muscle between the dog's shoulders,'
said Taggart. 'It's very tiny. The animal doesn't feel it. We scanned the retriever, got her AVID number. She's from a house one block east, two blocks north of the shooting. Owner's name is Okadan.'
'Bobby Okadan? I do his gardening.'
'Yes, I know'
'The guy who was killed — that wasn't Mr. Okadan.'
'No.'
'Who was he? A family member, a friend?'
Avoiding the question, Taggart said, 'I'm surprised you didn't recognize the dog.'
'One golden looks like another.'
'Not really. They're distinct individuals.'
'Mishiki,' Mitch remembered.
'That's the dog's name,' Taggart confirmed.
'We do that property on Tuesdays, and the housekeeper makes sure Mishiki stays inside while we're there, out of our way. Mostly I've seen the dog through a patio door.'
'Evidently, Mishiki was stolen from the Okadans' backyard this morning, probably around eleven-thirty. The leash and collar on her don't belong to the Okadans.'
'You mean…the dog was stolen by the guy who was shot?'
'So it appears.'
This revelation reversed Mitch's problem with eye contact. Now he couldn't look away from the detective.
Taggart hadn't come here just to share a puzzling bit of case news. Apparently this development triggered, in the detective's mind, a question about something Mitch had said earlier — or had failed to say.
From inside the house came the muffled ringing of the telephone.
The kidnappers weren't supposed to call until six o'clock. But if they called earlier and couldn't reach him, they might be angry.
As Mitch started to rise from his chair, Taggart said, 'I'd rather you didn't answer that. It's probably Mr. Barnes.'
'He and I spoke half an hour ago. I asked him not to call here until I had a chance to speak with you. He's probably been wrestling with his conscience ever since, and finally his conscience won. Or lost, depending on your point of view.'
Remaining in his chair, Mitch said, 'What's this about?'
Ignoring the question, returning to his subject, Taggart said, 'How often do you think dogs are stolen, Mr.
