Flight

“Did you see the name of the boat?”

No. He looked away.

“Don’t worry, Seth. What you’ve told me tonight is very helpful. I think we can catch the man who did this.”

Seth looked at him uncertainly.

“Yes, I mean it,” he said. He was not just comforting the boy. Seth had already been more useful than many other crime victims would have been under far less traumatic circumstances.

He saw the boy was tiring, but ventured one more question. “Do you know how to use a computer?”

Yes, Seth answered, but held up his bandaged hands.

“The speech therapist and your mother want to get you one that will let you communicate without using your fingers to type — they can wire these computers now so that they will read movement from muscles in your arm, for example. We can deal with that later — for now, just concentrate on getting stronger, all right? We’ll talk again when you’ve had a little more rest.”

Seth looked toward the chair where Lefebvre had been sitting, then anxiously back at the detective.

“I’m not going anywhere, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Seth mouthed the word “thanks,” then closed his eyes.

When he was sure Seth was sleeping soundly, Lefebvre called Elena Rosario.

“Are they still watching Whitey Dane’s boat?”

“Yes. And Whitey, too.”

“Has he been anywhere near the Cygnet in the last few days?”

“No.”

“Do we know what time it came into the Downtown Marina that night?”

“No, but I could ask around. Maybe one of the live-aboards will remember. You working again?”

“Sort of. Listen — I think Dane just became our prime suspect in the Randolph case.”

“What?” she asked, startled.

“Seth woke up. I asked a few questions.”

“And you got a mute witness to talk to you.”

“Yes. Come by and I’ll tell you all about it.”

A search warrant was issued, and although the Cygnet didn’t look as lovely when they finished, the crime scene unit found crucial evidence there. Whitey Dane protested that he had not been aboard the boat for days, that he never took it to the Downtown Marina, that it must have been stolen from the Marina South. While the boat had been made to look as if it had been hot-wired, the police didn’t buy his story. The boat was not far from its home, and none of its expensive gear had been taken.

The decks had been washed, but luminol tests showed bloody footprints. And although the weapon was not found, a pair of bloodstained deck shoes were discovered hidden in a footlocker. An uncommon and expensive brand of deck shoes, of a style which exactly matched — as surveillance photos showed — those worn by Whitey Dane on several occasions. Careful collection of trace evidence in the locker and shoes yielded small amounts of hair and fiber evidence as well.

Whitey Dane was arrested for the murders of Trent and Amanda Randolph and the attempted murder of Seth Randolph. The D.A. wanted him held without bail, but the defense argued that he had no criminal record, that he had business interests in the community, and that there were indications that the boat had indeed been stolen. Judge Lewis Kerr, in a move some considered uncharacteristically harsh, set bail at two million dollars. Dane made bail in less than twenty-four hours.

5

Thursday, June 21, 2:00 P.M.

Las Piernas General Hospital

The room was too crowded, and the camera lights made it overly bright and warm. Lefebvre wanted the television news crews to leave. He wanted everyone to leave. But Tory Randolph was holding court, charming the press, the captain, the members of the police commission, and the others.

He was especially uncomfortable to see Polly Logan here. The platinum blond television news reporter always managed to get herself assigned to stories about his cases. He had thought it was coincidence until she had asked him out. He had politely refused, and although she had never asked again, when she showed up to cover stories now, he often found her glancing his way, directing a camera operator to shoot footage of him, and positioning herself as close as possible to him — to an extent that gave him the creeps. She often muttered catty remarks about Irene Kelly of the Express, perhaps jealous of Irene’s closeness to him. His friendship with Irene would never be understood by someone like Polly, he knew — like many of his coworkers, Ms. Logan suspected they were more than friends.

As if his thoughts had tapped her on the shoulder, Polly Logan turned to look at him. She smiled. He nodded, then looked away. He watched Irene, who seemed tired today. Her father was ill — cancer — and she was caring for him. She did not play the martyr about this, as some might have. He tried to picture Polly Logan or Tory Randolph bearing such a burden so quietly, and could not imagine it.

Most of the other members of the media were captivated by the Tory Show, as he had started to think of this press conference. When the reporters realized that Seth still couldn’t speak, they had focused on his surviving parent, camera operators dutifully recording her as she starred in the role of concerned mother — a beautiful, tragic figure, hovering over Seth, making statements about the credit due to her brave boy, who had helped police capture the man who had killed her daughter and her husband.

“Ex-husband, correct?” Irene asked. Lefebvre suppressed an urge to smile.

Tory said — with a little catch in her voice, and lifting a tissue to a dry eye — that divorce was just a legal