"There has been… a certain failure of communication, an oversight."

"Oversight!" I exploded, jumping to my feet and stamping the length of the room and back. "Oversight! Fire and blood and an explosion, a woman in the hospital and my wife vanished—and you call that oversight!"

"There is no need to lose your temper—"

"Yes there is!"

"—we are proceeding with the investigation and have already made some progress." He ignored my sneer. "The blood found in the temple has been subjected to analysis down to the molecular and subatomic levels. These results have been compared to those of everyone on this planet. We keep complete health and hospital records as you might imagine. Computers are accessing this immense data base at the present moment. When I called you earlier the search had been narrowed to less than twenty possibilities. As we talked I have been following the progress on this readout." He tapped the screen on the desk. "The exacting comparison has now been reduced to five. Nofour. Wait—there are only three now, And two of them are women! And that remaining man is…"

As he tore the slip from his printout we turned as one and raced for the door.

"Who?" I shouted as we ran. He read without breaking his stride.

"Professor Justin Slakey."

"Where?"

"Under sixty seconds' flight from here."

At least he was right about that. The copter was airborne even as we fell through its door. The military must have had the news the instant that the police did because a cover of military jets roared by above us. Even before we began our descent we could see that copcopters were already hitting the ground and unloading troops to surround the house. Rotors roaring we dropped down onto the stone—flagged patio. Cohn had produced a large gun and was a fraction of a second ahead of me as we kicked open the doors.

The house was empty, the bird flown.