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“Yellow is a bad color for me. I’ll look green at breakfast.”

“Blue, then.”

“Blue is cold.”

“Well goddammit, paint it baby-shit tan for all I care. . . . No, look, I’ll probably be home before long and we’ll go to the paint store and get some chips and stuff, okay? And maybe some new handles and that.”

“Let’s do, let’s get some handles. I don’t know why I’m talking about this stuff. Look, I love you and I miss you and you’re doing the right thing. It’s costing you too, I know that. I’m here and I’ll be here whenever you come home, or I’ll meet you anywhere, anytime. That’s what.”

“Dear Molly. Dear Molly. Go to bed now.”

“All right.”

“Good night.”

Graham lay with his hands behind his head and conjured dinners with Molly. Stone crab and Sancerre, the salt breeze mixed with the wine.

But it was his curse to pick at conversations, and he began to do it now. He had snapped at her after a harmless remark about his “criminal mind.” Stupid.

Graham found Molly’s interest in him largely inexplicable.

He called police headquarters and left word for Springfield that he wanted to start helping with the leg-work in the morning. There was nothing else to do.

The gin helped him sleep.

6

Flimsy copies of the notes on all calls about the Leeds case were placed on Buddy Springfield’s desk. Tuesday morning at seven o’clock when Springfield arrived at his office, there were sixty-three of them. The top one was red-flagged.

It said Birmingham police had found a cat buried in a shoebox behind the Jacobis’ garage. The cat had a flower between its paws and was wrapped in a dish towel. The cat’s name was written on the lid in a childish hand. It wore no collar. A string tied in a granny knot held the lid on.

The Birmingham medical examiner said the cat was strangled. He had shaved it and found no puncture wound.

Springfield tapped the earpiece of his glasses against his teeth.

They had found soft ground and dug it up with a shovel. Didn’t need any damned methane probe. Still, Graham had been right.

The chief of detectives licked his thumb and started through the rest of the stack of flimsies. Most were reports of suspicious vehicles in the neighborhood during the past week, vague descriptions giving only vehicle type or color. Four anonymous telephone callers had told Atlanta residents: “I’m gonna do you like the Leedses.”

Hoyt Lewis’s report was in the middle of the pile.

Springfield called the overnight watch commander.

“What about the meter reader’s report on this Parsons? Number forty-eight.”

“We tried to check with the utilities last night, Chief, to see if they had anybody in that alley,” the watch commander said. “They’ll have to get back to us this morning.”

“You have somebody get back to them now,” Springfield said. “Check sanitation, the city engineer, check for construction permits along the alley and catch me in my car.”

He dialed Will Graham’s number. “Will? Meet me in front of your hotel in ten minutes and let’s take a little ride.”

At 7:45 A.M. Springfield parked near the end of the alley. He and Graham walked abreast in wheel tracks pressed in the gravel. Even this early the sun was hot.

“You need to get you a hat,” Springfield said. His own snappy straw was tilted down over his eyes.

The chain-link fence at the rear of the Leeds property was covered with vines. They paused by the light meter on the pole.

“If he came down this way, he could see the whole back end of the house,” Springfield said.