Her eyes weren’t bandaged now, but she wore dark glasses. She was too thin, and unhealthily pale, as if she never went outside. However, they saw her smile up at her ex-husband, who stood at her side, his hand resting lightly on her shoulder. According to the papers, Jon Bender was a successful real estate developer who had traded her in for a younger model, namely his personal assistant, two years before, but didn’t marry her. And he was here now, a big man, stocky, tough jawed, his blind ex-wife again living in his house.

Savich introduced himself and Sherlock. He said without preamble, “The old man and the young girl who bragged to me about taking you—their names are Moses Grace and Claudia. We don’t know her last name yet, or her relationship to the old man. They’re the same ones who buried my friend Pinky Womack in a grave in Arlington National Cemetery.”

Mr. Bender looked from Savich to Sherlock, obviously wondering if he should be alarmed. He nodded slowly. “We heard about that. We had no idea until you called this morning—Well, now there are actual names attached to their faces. I assume you’ve spoken with the local police?”

“Yes, we did. We’re here because we need your help, Mrs. Bender. You’re the only one who can provide us with a description.”

Mr. Bender answered for her. “Elsa still can’t remember what happened, so she can’t help you.”

Savich sat on the hassock at Elsa Bender’s feet. He took her left hand between his two large ones, felt the chill of her flesh. She’d turned inward, he thought, and that was the wrong direction. He said, “I appreciate your agreeing to speak to us on such short notice. Do you mind if I call you Elsa?” At her faint nod, he continued. “We know how badly these people hurt you, Elsa. We don’t need to focus on that. I know you want these monsters caught and punished for what they did to you. They’ve done terrible things to other people, too. You’re one of the lucky ones; you survived. We need your help so that other people can survive, too.”

“I wouldn’t call this surviving,” Elsa said, and Savich continued to hold her hand as the bitterness flowed through her.

He said, “I would. There’s something else, Elsa. These people who hurt you, they’re calling me, they want to kill me. They’ve also threatened my wife, and my little boy. I desperately need your help to protect them.”

Her hand fluttered a moment, then settled again. “It’s been a horribly painful time for me, Agent Savich. I don’t know if I can ever think about what happened. I don’t want to face those monsters again.”

“Elsa doesn’t need to be tortured with this again, Agent Savich,” Mr. Bender looked ready to muscle Savich out the door. He said, “Listen, she’s gone through enough. We’re sorry about the threats to you and your family, but Elsa can’t help you. We’d like you to leave now.”

Savich didn’t look away from Elsa. “I imagine the doctors told you that when you begin to remember what happened, it’s important not to block it out again. Remembering it, talking about it, will only lessen the pain. Tell us about it, Elsa, tell us and you can send it into the past, where it belongs. You survived. Never forget that you survived.”

To Savich’s surprise, Elsa said, “Jon was in the past. And yet he’s here now. Isn’t that strange?”

Savich saw Mr. Bender flinch, heard him say, “I’m not going anywhere,” but Savich had no idea if she understood his words.

“We have children ourselves, Agent Savich, Jon and I. But I can’t talk about what they did to me, I simply can’t.”

“I don’t need you to, Elsa, although I’m convinced it would help you.”

Elsa said, “The fact is, I’ve remembered almost all of it.” She heard her husband’s quick indrawn breath, but didn’t pause. “The girl Claudia called him her sweet pickle. He was a filthy old man with a hacking cough. She tied my hands behind my back in that dirty old van, told me that he wanted to see her with a woman and that he picked me because she’d told him I looked like her, like I could be her mama and wasn’t that the coolest thing? Then he told her to pretend she was diddling her own mama. The old man blindfolded me and then the girl started.” She began to cry quietly. She swallowed hard and whispered, “The oddest thing is that I didn’t feel the pain in my eyes until later, in the emergency room.”

“You were in shock, a good thing.”

“I suppose it was.” She lifted her glasses only enough to lightly daub the edge of a monogrammed white handkerchief to her eyes. She straightened her glasses again and said, “It doesn’t hurt so much anymore when I cry.”

Jon Bender said, “Tell them about the farmer, Elsa.”

“The farmer who found me. He visited me in the hospital every single day, brought me roses. He’d sit by my bed and tell me about how he grows barley and oats. Jon came late that night, and three days later, he brought me back here, to our old home, only I can’t see what they’ve done to it since I left.”

“Ask him, Elsa. Simply ask him.”

Jon Bender looked like he wanted to burst into tears. He said, “I didn’t do anything, Elsa.”

“Good.” For the first time she smiled a little. “I hate fussy things. I’m glad you left it clean.” She let Savich ask her questions for several minutes and gave the best description she could of Moses and Claudia. She agreed to talk to a sketch artist later in the day. She told Savich about how Claudia did indeed look like her daughter. She smiled toward her ex-husband. “Jon, give them that photo of Annie throwing the beach ball. Remember, I sent you a duplicate? The resemblance is really quite striking.”

While Mr. Bender was gone, she said, “Tell me more about your boy, Mr. Savich.” Her hand still rested comfortably between his.

“His name is Sean, and he’s a pistol.” He watched her face as he told her about Sean’s birthday party, where Savich’s sister Lily chased around twenty small children, her feet in gigantic clown shoes. He told her how Sean loved to barrel at him the moment he walked through the front door every evening. Hearing this, she was smiling, breathing easily.

Jon Bender broke in when he returned. “I’ve been trying to talk Elsa into giving me another chance, Agent Savich.”

The hand in Savich’s stiffened a bit, then relaxed. She wasn’t ready to let go of him yet, and that was fine.

“I’ve promised her over and over I won’t ever be an ass-hole again.”

And glory of glories, Elsa Bender laughed. She looked up in the direction of her ex-husband’s voice. “Perhaps you won’t,” she said. “The kids seem to think you won’t. Perhaps.”

Sherlock looked closely at Jon Bender’s face, studied his eyes as he looked at Elsa. “You know what, Elsa? I think this guy of yours has learned what’s important to him.”

Ten minutes later, Savich clasped Elsa’s hands in both of his and pulled her slowly to her feet, letting the afghan pool at her feet. She wasn’t quite steady.

He said, “You’re going to be fine, Elsa. Jon is going to bundle you up and take you for a nice walk, maybe make some hot chocolate when you get back. It’ll put color back in your cheeks.”

“Hello, Special Agent Savich. Hello, Special Agent Sherlock. Did you shoot anyone today?”

“Oh yes,” Sherlock said immediately. “It was all blood and gore. Took me forever to wash it all off.”

“Dude! Really, tell us everything you did. Not just the boring stuff like Dad does, but the cool stuff?”

Savich smiled for the first time since leaving Washington hours before. He hugged both boys quickly, breathing in their excitement, their teenage love of anything gruesome. In ten years or so would Sean be asking the same things?

Rob said, “We waited dinner for you until Dad said he was going to gnaw on his elbows if he didn’t eat. We had bouillabaisse, Ms. McCutcheon brought it over because she knows Dad likes it. It was okay if you like fish.”

“Dillon, come on in the living room,” Ruth called out, before appearing in the doorway, Dix at her shoulder. “We’ve got some delicious tea, some scones that Millie of Millie’s Deli made herself, just for the Feds, and Dix and I had something really interesting happen today, but never mind that just now. Boys, bring in the Federal agents and let’s eat.”

“So how was your day?” Dix asked as he handed out scones.

Sherlock smiled as she took a cup of tea from Ruth. “Actually, our afternoon was great. We took Sean out to build a snowman, poured hot chocolate down his gullet, and listened to him talk nonstop about his grandmother’s new puppy.” She rolled her eyes. “I have a feeling there’ll be barking in our house very soon now.”

“Dogs are good,” Dix said as he gave Brewster a pat. “This little guy keeps my neck warm at night.”

Rob and Rafe finally went off to bed after nearly an hour and four more scones, Savich and Sherlock having filled their ears with horrifying, thoroughly fictional tales of mayhem in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Dix waited another couple of minutes until he was sure it was quiet upstairs, then nodded. “Okay, they’re down for the count. Tell us what really happened in Philadelphia. Could that poor woman tell you anything about Moses Grace and Claudia?”

Savich said, “Yeah, she did. Her name’s Elsa Bender. She’s going to be all right. I mean, I think the future looks pretty good for her.” Savich looked over at Dix and Ruth, who were sitting on the sofa opposite him and Sherlock, Brewster sleeping between them. He pulled a photo out of his shirt pocket. “This is the Bender daughter, Annie. She’s seventeen in the photo—tall, slender, nearly white-blond hair, big blue eyes. Elsa Bender says she looks like Claudia.”

Ruth studied the photo. “She looks like a cheerleader whose biggest problem is deciding who to go out with after the football game on Saturday night. You’ve already got this photo out all around the Beltway, haven’t you, Dillon?”

“Oh yeah.”

Sherlock said, “Elsa said Moses Grace is as old as he sounds, at least seventy. His face is all leathery from too much sun, which suggests he could have spent a good deal of his life on a farm, an oil rig, a chain gang—take your pick. Elsa said he’s lean and wiry, but he didn’t look fit, he looked sort of gray. She said Claudia’s voice was sweet one minute, shrill the next, with a midwestern accent. As for Moses, we’ve heard his deep drawl, the excessive bad grammar that simply doesn’t feel right. Elsa also said he had a hacking cough, and was always spitting up. That was two months ago. He sounds much worse now.”

Dix sat forward, cuddling Brewster in his arms. “You had a productive day—”

Ruth cut in, the enthusiasm bubbling out of her. “But maybe not as exciting as ours. You’re going to love this. I’ll start you off with Ginger Stanford, and then move on to lunch with Chappy and the little rascals.”

“Then,” Dix said, “our pièce de résistance—Helen Rafferty.”