“Larry,” the assistant prosecutor said to the sheriff’s patrolman, “keep that but give me some light. Walter, I want to read you Luis Camacho’s statement.”

The overhead fluorescent light washed the sharpness and detail from the figures on the screen, but the action remained clear. Mr. Majestyk, the justice of the peace from Geneva Beach, blinked twice as the light came to full brightness but kept his eyes on Jack Ryan.

“He gives his name,” the assistant prosecutor began, “and when it happened, July twenty-sixth, about seven P.M., and then Officer J. R. Coleman says: ‘Tell us in your own words what happened.’ Walter, you listening?”

“Sure, go on.”

“Camacho: ‘After supper I went out to the bus and waited, as Ryan had promised to do some repair work on it for me. When he did not appear, I looked for him and found him in the field where some of the men and kids were playing baseball. The men had some beer and most of them were playing baseball. Ryan was with them, though he wasn’t playing. There were some girls there Ryan was talking to. I asked him why he was not fixing the bus and he said something back that is unprintable. I reminded him that servicing the bus was part of his job, but he told me again to do the unprintable thing. One reason-”

“Excuse me,” Mr. Majestyk said. “Larry, are those the words the guy used?”

The sheriff’s officer hesitated. “They’re, you know, writing words, the way you write it in a report.”

“What’d Ryan tell him?”

“To go bag his ass.”