Strega

'Oh,' Wolfe said. She'd seen enough birth certificates to know I'd never have to worry about buying a present on Mother's Day. I shrugged again, showing her it didn't mean anything to me. Now.

Wolfe took another piece of paper off her desk-this one wasn't yellow.

'The FBI has a sheet on you too,' she said.

'I never took a federal fall.'

'I see that. But you are listed as a suspect in several deals involving military weapons. And a CIA cross-reference shows you were out of the country for almost a year.

'I like to travel,' I told her.

'You don't have a passport,' she said.

'I didn't come here to ask you for a date,' I said. 'I'm not applying for a job either. I admire what you do-I respect your work. I thought I could help you-that you could help me too.'

'And if we can't work this out?'

'I'm going into that house,' I told her, looking her full in her lovely face like the crazy bastard this case had turned me into.

Wolfe picked up the phone, punched a number. 'Nothing's wrong,' she said. 'Come in here.' She hung up. 'I want to be sure you're not wearing a wire, okay? Then we'll talk.'

'Whatever you say,' I told her.

The bouncer came back in, the.38 almost lost in his meaty hand.

'I told you nothing was wrong,' Wolfe said.

'That was a few seconds ago,' he snapped. The Rottweiler growled at him. 'Good boy,' he said.

'Would you please take this gentleman with you and see if he has anything on him he shouldn't have,' Wolfe told him.

The big guy put his hand on my shoulder-it felt like an anvil.

'There's no problem,' Wolfe said to him, a warning note in her voice.

We went past a couple of offices-the tall black woman was reading something and making notes, the little lady with the piled-up hair was talking a mile a minute on the phone, a handsome black man was studying a hand-drawn chart on the wall. I heard a teletype machine clatter-bad news for somebody.

'Doesn't anybody go home around here?' I asked the big guy.

'Yeah, pal-some people go home. Some people should stay home.'

I didn't try any more conversation-starters. He took me into a bare office and did the whole search number, working at it like a prison guard you forgot to bribe. He took me back to Wolfe.

'Nothing,' he said, disappointed. He left us alone.

The Rottweiler was sitting next to Wolfe, watching the door as she patted his head. She pointed to his corner again and he went back, as reluctant as the big guy was.

'Mr. Burke, this is the situation. The woman you intend to visit is Bonnie Browne, with an 'e.' She sometimes uses the name Young as well-it's her maiden name. The man she lives with is her husband. George Browne. He has two arrests for child molesting-one dismissal, one plea to an endangering count. Served ninety days in California. She's never been arrested.'

I put my hand in my pocket, reaching for a smoke.

'Don't write any of this down,' Wolfe said.

'I'm not,' I told her, lighting the smoke.

'We believe this woman to be the principal in a great number of corporations- holding companies, really. But she doesn't operate the way most of the kiddie-porn merchants do. You understand what I mean?'

'Yeah,' I told her. 'You want the pictures-videotapes, whatever-you send a money order to a drop-box in Brussels. When the money clears, you get a shipment in the mail from Denmark, or England, or any other place they're established. Then the money orders get mailed to an offshore bank-maybe the Cayman Islands -and the bank makes a loan to some phony corporation set up in the States.'

Wolfe looked at me thoughtfully. 'You've been at this quite a while.'

'I do a lot of work-you get bits and pieces here and there-you put it together.'

'Okay. But this woman doesn't work like that. Her product is special. She guarantees all her stuff is so-called collector's items. No reproduction-every picture is one of a kind.'

'What's to stop some freak from copying the pictures?'

'She puts some kind of mark on every picture she takes-like this.' Wolfe showed me a tiny drawing of a standing man, his hand on the shoulder of a little boy. It looked like it was hand-drawn with one of those needlepoint pens architects use. Only it was in a soft blue color. 'The mark won't survive a copy-she uses something called chroma-blue ink. She puts every mark on herself-by hand.'

'What's the point?'

'There's two points, Mr. Burke. The first is that she gets a minimum of five thousand dollars a picture, so she can achieve huge profits without a lot of volume.'

I took a drag on my cigarette, waiting.

'The other point is more significant. She produces pictures to order.'

'You mean some freak calls her and says he wants to see a certain thing go down?'

'Yes. If you want a blond boy wearing a snowsuit, you got it.'

'You going to drop her?' I asked.

'We are going to drop her-but not soon. We're just beginning to trace pictures back to her. We don't have a prayer of getting a search warrant now.'

'And if you ask for one, it might get back to her?'

Wolfe raised her eyebrows. 'You are a cynical man, Mr. Burke.'

'Those black robes the judges wear,' I told her, 'they don't change you inside.'

Wolfe didn't say anything for a minute, fingering her pearls. 'Do you know anything about search warrants?' she finally asked.

Now I knew why she wanted to make sure I wasn't wired. 'I know if a citizen breaks in a house and finds dope or whatever, the evidence won't be suppressed unless the citizen is an agent of law enforcement.'

'Um…' Wolfe said, encouraging me. I hadn't told her what she wanted. Yet.

'I also know that if the police are called to a location…say because there's a burglary in progress and they find something bad, they can take it.'

'And use it in court.'

'And use it in court,' I agreed.

Wolfe's face was flat and hard. 'This woman wouldn't report a burglary,' she said.

I lit a last cigarette. 'You have her house under surveillance?'

'We might-starting tomorrow.'

'Round the clock?'

'Yes.'

I took a drag of my smoke.

'Any citizen has an obligation to rescue people when there's a fire,' I said.

Wolfe held her hand across the desk. I brought it quickly to my lips before she could do anything and walked out of her office.