He had determined that the girl had died five days earlier. He could almost pinpoint the hour. The maggots were sometimes better at that than the medical examiner, especially if you knew what you were looking for. Danny knew.

Danny had put on a mask and climbed into the Dumpster, going through every item, including rotting, ant-covered takeout food and a single skinny dead rat with its mouth open, showing its teeth.

Teresa's mother's boyfriend had lied about when he had last seen Teresa. The maggots had told Danny. There was no mistake. The boyfriend, twenty-two-year-old Cole Thane, when confronted with the evidence, which included a single fingerprint on the outside of the Dumpster, had talked. He had planned to rape the girl and then kill her, but when the time came, he couldn't do it- a rapist-murderer of children with a conscience. So he had only killed and mutilated the child instead.

Cole Thane had searched Dannys eyes for sympathy.

A pill and a few hours' sleep and Danny would be ready to go back to work. The crime scenes didn't stop. They piled up. Bodies: fresh, decayed, surprised, at peace. More every day.

Was the search for the killers motivated by justice, revenge, morbid curiosity or professional pride?

Maggots. Cole Thane looking for sympathy. Danny's arm, the arm he had thrown out in his tryout for the majors, began to ache. Nothing new.

The air-conditioning in the subway car was running at about half power. Danny's wrinkled white shirt clung to him. He could feel the drops of sweat dripping down his chest and stomach.

A shower. A pill. Some sleep.

To Danny's right, the door between cars opened. He slowly sat up, languidly put his right hand on top of his backpack.

The two who had come in were Hispanic, no more than twenty, one lean, one muscled up. They wore identical black T-shirts with a single letter "T" in white over the heart.