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“Kids have a way of doing that.”

Harry knew that Melissa had two children of her own, two girls, and that her husband, Albert, also worked for the FBI.

“You take care, Harry, and if there’s anything else you want to bounce off me, let me know.”

Was there a hint, Harry wondered, of condescension in her voice? Like she was the big federal agent, counseling the small-town chief who stayed behind because he didn’t think he could make it in the big leagues? Or did he hear that tone because that was exactly how he felt? He was in over his head and knew he couldn’t handle this on his own?

“Thanks, Melissa,” he said. “Best to the girls and Albert.”

He hung up the phone and took a sip of his cold coffee.

Commonalities.

Darryl Pidgeon died when his barbecue blew up in his face. Not a murder. An accident.

Nadine Comstock died of an electrical shock in her bathtub. Not a murder. A suicide.

Delbert Dorfman smoked himself to death on the roof of his house.

Betty Wilford shot her dog dead when it went crazy and attacked her.

Four unrelated tragedies.

But at least three of them had something in common.

“This is nuts,” Harry said under this breath. “Totally nuts.”

When Darryl Pidgeon died, there was a train.

When Nadine Comstock died, there was a train.

When Betty Wilford shot her dog, there was a train.

And in each case, he was willing to bet, they had come from a shop run by Mr. Edwin Nabler. But none of these events had anything to do with what had happened to Angus Tanner.

Hang on.

Harry thought back to the night Angus Tanner’s body had been found. He’d knocked on the door of one Darrell Crohn and asked him whether he had seen or heard anything in the night. Maybe a car stopping by the side of the road, someone getting out and dumping a body.

Crohn hadn’t heard or seen anything. At least, nothing like that.

But there was the sound of that train in the night that brought him out of a deep sleep. Harry had dismissed it. Even Crohn had to admit he might have imagined it. He’d had quite a bit to drink before nodding off.

After all, it simply wasn’t possible. There wasn’t a rail line anywhere near there.

Thirty-Eight

A few days passed.

Harry sat in his office, leaning back in his chair and throwing darts at a board hanging on the wall, ruminating.

He had been thinking about a famous serial killer whose day job was as an installer of home security systems. This allowed him to gain access to private residences, install locks and alarms, and in the process gain the trust of the individuals who had engaged his services. The killer would select his victims from those he had met in his job, and when it came time to break in and snuff the life out of one of them, he had the technical know-how to bypass whatever security measures he’d installed.

So what if, Harry thought, this Mr. Nabler had personally delivered the toy train sets to the homes where these tragedies had occurred? Assembled the track, carefully taken the trains from their packaging, did all the wiring that connected the power pack to the rails and an electrical outlet, gave everything a test run to make sure it was working. Then Nabler would have gained a familiarity with the workings of the household. Know that they had a barbecue, a liking for baths, a normally friendly dog.

And?

Suppose hehadbeen in those homes. Did he sabotage the barbecue? Put that poor woman in the tub and drop in a live transformer?Drive a dog mad? How the fuck was he supposed to have donethosethings?