The Night Is Watching

“Let me have the key, Mike. I want to take another look in there.”



“Here you go!” Mike handed him the key.



Sloan went to the Trey Hardy cell. Nothing looked any different than it had when he’d been in there a few days ago to search for the wallets that had “disappeared.”



He sat on the bed. Mike’s housekeeping staff was good; the cell was immaculate. He wasn’t sure what he thought he’d find in the cell but he began to go through the drawers. They were empty—except for a King James version of the Bible.



He sat back down on the bed, wondering what Jay Berman could have been up to that had gotten him executed out in the desert.



It was while he was sitting there that the door to the tiny bathroom suddenly flew open. “So, Hardy, there is something I’m missing, huh?” he asked.



He figured that one day the ghost would actually make an appearance. He never knew if he imagined the vague image he sometimes saw or if it was real. Longman always appeared as a solid entity to him. He’d never been sure if he was crazy or not; he’d decided he’d consider himself functional, if crazy, and learn to live with what he either did or didn’t see.



But now, it seemed that whether a ghost or his mind was suggesting it, he needed to investigate the small bathroom that had been built into the cell.



Shower, sink and toilet were almost on top of one another. The tile floor was clean and the wastebasket under the sink had been emptied. A mirror hung over the sink and a small cabinet, which had been nailed over the toilet, held the usual tiny containers of lotion, shampoo, conditioner and soap.



And a tissue box.



Sloan picked up the box. There were remnants of a piece of paper beneath it. Apparently, someone had set a note there to keep it from falling into the sink. Somehow, it had gotten damp and ripped, leaving behind the little corner of paper.



All that remained were a few blurred words. He frowned as he studied them.



DES DIA



It could only mean one place. Desert Diamonds. And it might not mean anything at all; Mike might have told Jay Berman that Desert Diamonds was where he could go to have pizza, coffee or buy souvenirs.



He looked into the mirror and froze. To his astonishment, he saw more than his own reflection there. For a moment, it was as if someone stood behind him, looking into the mirror, as well, meeting his eyes.



It was Trey Hardy, his plumed hat set jauntily on his head. He looked at Sloan grimly and nodded.



He didn’t speak.



He disappeared, fading away until he was nothing but a memory.



Or a sure sign of insanity.



* * *



It was late in the day when Jane finally returned Kanga to Sloan’s stable and took the patrol car back to the station. Betty was just about to leave.



“Jane!” she said, pausing to greet her before walking out. “How’s the work going?”



“The work—oh, it’s going very well.”



“I wish I knew more about what you do!” Betty said enthusiastically. “It’s science and it’s art!”



Jane smiled. “I’m lucky. I love my job. The form of the human skull shapes the face, but it’s the soft tissue that really creates the unique appearance of each human being.”



“How accurate can you be? When did people learn how to do this?” Betty asked.



“Pretty accurate. A lot is in the hands of the artist, especially where coloring comes into play, though nationality or ethnic background can often be determined by the skull. There was a French anatomist named Paul Broca who was the first to use scientific methods to create images of the living from the dead, showing the relationship between the bone and the soft parts. That was in the late 1800s,” Jane told Betty. “This is probably more than you wanted to know, so stop me if I’m boring you.”



“No, I’m fascinated. I didn’t know any of this.”



“Okay, you asked for it! Anyway, Broca defined the differences between different ethnic groups. Then there was a German anatomist, Hermann Welcker, who went on to measure the soft tissue in male cadavers and found nine ‘median points’ from which to work. All this was then enhanced by a Swiss anatomist, Wilhelm His, who worked with cadavers and used the nine median points and six lateral points to further the ability to re-create the appearance of life when nothing’s left but bone. As you can tell, I love it. And thanks to technology, what we can do grows all the time. Scientists and artists have worked together through the years to identify remains when all other hope of identification is gone.”



“That’s really important,” Betty said. She cocked her head to one side. “So, you’re an artist. Are you an agent, too?”



“Yes, I’m an agent. Anyone in a Krewe—part of the FBI’s behavioral sciences group—has to go through the academy.”



“Good!” Betty said. “I love to see other women in law enforcement. Can you shoot?”



“Fairly decently, yes,” Jane said.



That made Betty smile. “Well, you’re a wonderful asset to have here. I’m sorry. We’re usually a great place. And you got here for one of our very rare episodes of violence. Murder,” she added softly.



“Bad things can happen anywhere. But that doesn’t make the town bad.”



Betty smiled again, obviously pleased at the compliment. “Yeah, you’re right. Bad things—that’s just life, huh? I’m so glad that you’re enjoying your time here.” She gave an easy shrug. “Well, I’m off. The night crew is on.” She winked. “Not as good as the day crew, but they’re okay.”



Jane laughed, waving as Betty went to her car.



Jane put Sloan’s keys in his desk, got the keys to the little Kia that had been rented for her use and then spent a few hours working with the soft-tissue markers on the skull. After about two hours, however, she felt she’d have to pick up again the next day. She was just too tired to concentrate and she didn’t want to read a measurement wrong. True, the measurements were averages that had been determined through the years by many different anatomists and scientists. But every face was unique, something artists needed to remember as they worked, always letting the skull itself be the guide.



The problem now, of course, was that she was pretty sure she was looking at the earthly remains of Sage McCormick. Or part of them, at any rate. She’d seen the painting, and she’d seen her sketch. That was definitely going to influence her. But did that really matter? She’d done the two-dimensional drawing before she’d seen the painting above the bar and learned it was Sage McCormick.



She surveyed her work so far. Not much. The skull and markers by themselves did very little to form a human face.



Before leaving, she paused to look at the sketch she’d created the day before. The woman she’d depicted based on the skull had been beautiful. Of course, she’d given her the sparkle in her eyes and the look of friendly mischief that seemed to radiate from her smile.



Sage McCormick. It was the same expression she had in the painting. Maybe, Jane told herself, she’d been subconsciously aware of the painting when she’d checked in. But she didn’t think so; she hadn’t really seen it until she was sitting there today with Valerie and Henri.



Sloan Trent had seemed startled by the image—disturbed by it, even. But then, he’d seemed disturbed by Jane herself at the time, so she hadn’t gotten an explanation from him.



She covered her work with a muslin cloth. She was almost done with it and would start the buildup with clay to produce muscle structure the following day. She left the interrogation room and walked to the front. Now that the sheriff’s office had a murder to deal with, she doubted there’d be much interest in what she was doing.



Tired, Jane glanced at her watch and saw that it was past nine. When she reached the front office, she was pleasantly greeted by Scotty Carter, who was at the desk. He was the youngest of the crew here, she thought; he appeared to be about twenty-five, with a facial structure that suggested a Native American background.



“How are you doing, Agent Everett? If you need anything, you let us know, okay? We try not to interrupt you when we know you’re working,” he told her.



“I’ve been fine, thank you,” she said, equally polite. “Did you hear from the sheriff?” she asked.



The deputy nodded. “He’s in town now. Sloan won’t be taking any time off now that we’ve had a murder here. Things like that don’t happen in Lily very often. Well, I mean, it used to—the streets ran red with blood, as they say—but that was more than a century ago.”



“Have you learned anything about the dead man?” she asked.



Scotty hesitated, looking up at her with dark brown eyes. “It’s an ongoing murder investigation, you know. Although,” he added, frowning, “you are a federal agent....”



Jane smiled. “Don’t worry. You don’t need to tell me anything. I’ll just ask how things are going when I see the sheriff.”



“You got your car keys, right? You going to be okay getting around?”



“I’ll be fine,” she assured him.



Outside, the town seemed exceptionally quiet. The stars overhead had never looked brighter, but she realized that was partly because there was little air pollution. As she pulled onto the road to town, she thought that just as the stars had never looked brighter, the road had never seemed as dark. It wasn’t a long drive, and as she neared town, the darkness seemed to break in a pool of misty light—all the light shimmering from the theater and the saloon and the curio store, Desert Diamonds. She parked behind the theater in the paved lot.



As she walked around to the dirt road in front, she heard laughter and conversation. Murder in Lily or not, the show, as shows traditionally must, had gone on.



It had apparently concluded, since there were people spilling out onto the street, on their way to the saloon or to Desert Diamonds for pizza. That afternoon she’d learned that the saloon stayed open until 1:00 a.m., while Desert Diamonds closed at eleven, staying open to catch the late-night snackers and souvenir-shoppers who might be leaving the theater.