I don’t know what I’d expected—that they wouldn’t bother to trace the call? That they’d let somebody get away with leaving a dead animal on the road?

“I just wanted to stop by and thank you on behalf of the Society for phoning in that report on the jackal. Can I come in?”

He smiled, an open, friendly, smug smile, as if he expected me to be stupid enough to say, “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” and slam the screen door on his hand.

“Just doing my duty,” I said, smiling back at him.

“Well, we really appreciate responsible citizens like you. It makes our job a whole lot easier.” He pulled a folded readout from his shirt pocket. “I just need to double-check a couple of things. You’re a reporter for Sun-co, is that right?”

“Photo-journalist,” I said.

“And the Hitori you were driving belongs to the paper?”

I nodded.

“It has a phone. Why didn’t you use it to make the call?

The uniform was bending over the Hitori.

“I didn’t realize it had a phone. The paper just bought the Hitoris. This is only the second time I’ve had one out.”

Since they knew the paper had had phones put in, they also knew what I’d just told them. I wondered where they’d gotten the info. Public phones were supposed to be tap-free, and if they’d read the license number off one of the cameras, they wouldn’t know who’d had the car unless they’d talked to Ramirez, and if they’d talked to her, she wouldn’t have been talking blithely about the last thing she needed being trouble with the Society.

“You didn’t know the car had a phone,” he said, “so you drove to—” He consulted the readout, somehow giving the impression he was taking notes. I’d have bet there was a taper in the pocket of that shirt. “—The 7-Eleven at McDowell and Fortieth Street, and made the call from there. Why didn’t you give the Society rep your name and address?”

“I was in a hurry,” I said. “I had two assignments to cover before noon, the second out in Scottsdale.”