No Witnesses

Go for the gun, then turn on the light.

Her gun was in her purse, and her purse was on the table by the front door.

Indecision plagued her. She despised herself for just sitting there-a policewoman frozen in fear.

She crouched, held her breath, and switched on the lamp. She didn’t look toward the source of that noise first, she looked toward her purse.

She processed more information: A few steps to get there: A few added milliseconds to flick the safety off and load one into the chamber. From the moment she made her move, to having a functional weapon in hand, perhaps five seconds. An eternity if someone is inside this house.

A lifetime?

A good cop could not afford indecision. And if that was the only measure of a good cop, then she was not a good cop. Indecision had provided her with a four-inch scar across her throat. She hated that scar, not only for its appearance, but because she wore it like a flag. Indecision.

At this point, all she wanted was to prove herself wrong: That squeak had been nothing. She wanted a hot shower, a warmed-up dinner, and a glass of Pine Ridge on the deck. After that, a good book, with every door and window locked tight. Tomorrow, a security system, courtesy of Kenny Fowler. Her feet felt nailed to the pine planks.

The light, which had been on perhaps two seconds, went out. She grabbed for it and threw the switch. Nothing!

Silence! she thought. Not even the refrigerator was running. The power was out!

The board squeaked again.

She moved fast: two quick, bounding steps. She planted her forehead smack into the center post and went down hard and fast. Head swimming. Nauseated and dizzy. She imagined dinosaurs in a tar pit struggling to get out, sinking deeper. Black and gooey. She didn’t know how much time had passed, if any. She struggled to her feet and clawed her way over to the gun.

She announced in a slurred voice, “I’m armed. I have a weapon! Go away now!” Training. Arms sagging with the weight of the gun, her head swimming. “Go away now,” she mumbled. She fell to one knee and struggled back up to standing, feeling a thousand pounds heavier. Her head complained with the slightest movement. She inched her way forward, her right toe feeling in front of her. “Go away now,” she repeated in an unconvincing voice that sounded to her like someone else talking.

Her left hand searched out the flashlight that she kept in the kitchen drawer with the knives. She plunged her hand inside the drawer. “Shit!” she said as she caught a knife blade on the tip of her finger and yanked her hand out quickly, instinctively delivering the cut to her lips and sucking on it.

She switched on the flashlight, its beam a white tunnel splashing a large circle on the walls. But her vision was all wrong.

Sweating heavily, heart beating furiously, she staggered uncertainly out of the galley and pivoted left, bracing for a shot. No one.

Slowly, she lowered the intense beam of light until it illuminated the warped plank responsible for the bird chirps. She gasped as she saw beads of water catching the light like jewels. This was not her imagination. Someone was inside.

Assess the situation! She had a 50 percent chance. The intruder could be to her left, hiding in the head, or to her right, down the small hall, about to go out the back door. She hadn’t heard the back door open or close, and although it wasn’t a terribly noisy door-might have been opened and closed without her knowledge, the intruder gone-she didn’t believe this.

Think! But she could not.

“I’m armed,” she repeated, this time more strongly, her strength returning.

She leapt ahead, spun completely around, and slapped her back into the corner-the head now to her right, the back door nearly straight in front of her. No silhouette. She shined the flashlight there. No one.

Hiding in one of the closets? Or is he gone? Did he get out without me hearing?

She summoned her courage, maintaining a firm but awkward grip jointly on both the gun and flashlight. She spun to her right, first aiming into the head-nothing! — and then, in self-defense, spinning fully around and covering the closets. The quick motions drove her to the edge of vomiting.

The intruder made contact from behind-pushed her hard. She screamed loudly as she lost her balance.

Her furtive glance into the head had been too quick. He must have been standing in the tub, she realized, as she struck the opposing wall face-first. She heard two heavy steps, the back door come open, and then two more footsteps. In her mind’s eye she could see the intruder leaping to the next platform, the adjacent house, then, no doubt, the next after that, and the next. Too fast to be stopped. In the shadows, too dark to be seen.

She clambered back to her feet and surged forward and out the back door, handling the gun with great care. She knew she had lost him, but her training and her nerves required her to determine the area was clear. She made no attempt to try to follow or catch up. Her intention was self-defense. The area was clear: There was enough ambient light here to see. She reentered the house, shut and locked the back door, and hurried to the front door, which was still locked.

She found the flashlight, shook it several times, but it did not respond. Dark.

Trembling, her heart now running away from her-slipping into shock-she came around the corner, found a chair that offered her back against a solid wall, her eyes on the front door, the back door down the short hall to her right, and she dragged the phone toward her by its cord.

Twenty minutes later she unlocked the door for Boldt as she heard him running down the dock.

Shining a flashlight on her, he said, “Jesus!”

Daphne said, “The fuse box is inside the closet by the back door. I wasn’t about to go back there.”

A moment later Boldt called out, “Do you have enough coats?”

It made her laugh. Made her feel better. So did the light coming on.

The refrigerator growled back into operation. A digital clock on the microwave blinked CLOCK at her.

Boldt came around the corner wearing her faux leopard-skin hat. “Salvation Army time, if you ask me.” Daphne laughed. It hurt her head. He noticed her wince. “Gotta get you some pictures taken,” he said, meaning X rays.

“I’d rather have a glass of wine.”

He poured her one. He said, “I’m not going to harp on it, but I do think you should have that looked at.”

“Maybe later, okay?”

“It’s your call.”

“You must make a nice husband,” she said. She did not mean anything more than to give out a compliment, but the comment made Boldt uncomfortable anyway. It made him think of Liz and Miles at home, where he had left them with barely any explanation. It made him think of Owen Adler. Then he looked at her forehead again and said, “Did he get anything?”

“Haven’t looked,” she said. She locked eyes with him and stated, “It isn’t your standard breaking and entering.”

“Not when they pick a cop’s house, it isn’t.”

“I don’t mean like that.” She tried the wine. It tasted good. She drank some more.

“Then how do you mean it?”

“I’m being followed-stalked-I don’t know … Someone’s out there.” Another sip. “That someone was in here, I’m sure of it.”

He did not argue; he did not question. He went to work. For Boldt it was sometimes the only thing he knew.

Boldt conducted a thorough search of the house. Daphne was a compulsively neat person, so he assumed it would not be difficult to spot a burglar’s handiwork. The bedroom was tidy; the galley, he had already seen. He checked the bathroom-the head-and the back hall and closets. Daphne sat all the while, a bag of ice pressed