They were not much older than I was. He shot the boy first, and then the girl. He used his off-duty revolver, a.38 Colt with a two-inch barrel, because he was not in uniform at the time. The boy was hit in the face, the girl in the chest. When he was sure that they were dead, my father, as though in a trance, drove back to the city, and showered and changed in the locker room of the Ninth, watt the Nihere they came for him. Less than twenty-four hours later, he shot himself.

For my entire adult life, I have wondered why he acted as he did, but it seemed to me that there were no answers to be found to that question, or perhaps that was the lie I was happier to tell myself.

Until now.

It is time to call this what it is.

This is an investigation into the circumstances of my father’s death.

I

I hate and I love. Perhaps you ask why I do so. I do not know, but I feel it happen and I am tormented.

– CATULLUS, CARMINA, 85

CHAPTER ONE

THE FARADAY BOY HAD been missing for three days.

On the first day, nothing was done.