"Sit," Roger ordered, searching for some way to get her mind off her nervousness. "I want you to look at something."

He pulled out the gun the mugger had given him as she reluctantly sat down again. "You and your dad used to go shooting together, right? Tell me if this feels too light to you."

Her eyebrows lifted as she took it. "Way too light," she said, frowning as she hefted it. "Is it a toy?"

"Don't ask me," he said. "Could it be some kind of high-tech plastic gun?"

"I don't know," Caroline said. "It looks like a standard 1911 Colt .45." She turned it over, and her searching eyes widened slightly as she saw the blood smear. "Is that—?"

"I doubt it's tomato juice," Roger said. "Anything else you can say about the gun itself? I really don't want to have to tell the cops I got mugged by an F.A.O. Schwartz Special."

"Well, the slide works," Caroline said, pulling the upper part of the gun back and then letting it go, the way Roger had seen them do in the movies. "Toy guns usually don't do that."

She fiddled with the bottom of the grip. "But the clip seems to be glued in place," she added.

"So that means no bullets?" Roger asked, trying to decide if that made him feel relieved or just more ridiculous.

"I don't know," Caroline said, pulling the slide back again and peering inside. "There's something in there that looks like a cartridge. But—"

She let the slide go, pulled it back again. "But if it was real, it should eject when I do this. Either the round is jammed, or else it's a fake."

"Any way to tell for sure?"

"You want me to try pulling the trigger?"

Roger snorted. "No, thanks. So what exactly have we got here?"

"I don't know," Caroline said again, handing the gun back. "The slide works, but the slide release doesn't. The safety catch works, but not the clip release. There seems to be a round chambered, only I can't get it to eject. It's like it was designed to look like a real gun, but only up to a point."