Point of Origin

The fire was located on a seedy strip on the western fringes of the University of Pennsylvania. Darkness had fallen, and flashing emergency lights were visible miles away. Police cars had closed off two blocks of the street. There were at least eight fire engines and four ladder trucks, and more than seventy feet in the air, firefighters in buckets blasted the smoking roof with deluge guns. The night rumbled with diesel engines, and the blasting of high pressure water drummed over wood and shattered more glass. Tumescent hoses snaked across the street, and water was up to the hubcaps of parked cars that would be going nowhere anytime soon.

Photographers and news crews prowled sidewalks and were suddenly on alert when McGovern and I got out of her car.

'Is ATF involved in this case?' asked a TV reporter.

'We're just here taking a look,' McGovern answered as we walked without pause.

'Then it's a suspected arson, like the other grocery stores?'

The microphone followed as our boots splashed.

'It's under investigation,' McGovern said. 'And you need to stay back, ma'am.'

The reporter was left at the hood of a fire engine while McGovern and I drew closer to the store. Flames had jumped to the barbershop next door, where firefighters with axes and pike poles chopped square holes in the roof. Agents in ATF flak jackets were interviewing potential witnesses, and investigators in turn-outs and helmets moved in and out of a basement. I overheard something about toggle switches and the meter and stealing service. Black smoke billowed, and there seemed to be only one area in the plenum that stubbornly smoldered and spurted flame.

'She might be inside,' McGovern said in my ear.

I followed her in closer. The plate-glass storefront was wide open, and part of the inventory flowed out on a cold river of water. Cans of tuna fish, blackened bananas, sanitary napkins, bags of potato chips, and bottles of salad dressing flowed by, and a firefighter rescued a can of coffee and shrugged as he tossed it inside his truck. The strong beams of flashlights probed the smoky, black interior of the devastated store, illuminating girders twisted like taffy and exposed wires hanging in tangles from I-beams.

'Is Lucy Farinelli in there?' McGovern called inside.

'Last I saw her she was out back talking to the owner,' a male voice called back.

'Be careful in there,' McGovern said loudly.

'Yeah, well, we're having a real problem getting the power to shut down. Must be an underground feed. Maybe if you could look into that?'

'Will do.'

'So this is what my niece does,' I said as McGovern and I waded back out to the street and more ruined produce and canned goods floated past.

'On her good days. I think her unit number's 718. Let me see if I can raise her.'

McGovern held the portable radio to her lips and searched for Lucy on the air.

'What'cha got?' my niece's voice came back.

'You in the middle of something?'

'Finishing up.'

'Can you meet us in front?'

'On my way.'

My relief was apparent, and McGovern smiled at me as lights strobed and water arched. Firefighters were black with soot and sweating. I watched them moving slowly in their boots, dragging hoses over their shoulders and drinking cups of a green thirst quencher that they mixed in plastic jugs. Bright lights had been set up in a truck, and the glare was harsh and confusing as the scene became surreal. Fire buffs, or whackers, as ATF agents called them, had crawled out of the dark and were taking photographs with disposable cameras, while entrepreneurial venders hawked incense and counterfeit watches.

By the time Lucy got to us, the smoke had thinned and was white, indicating a lot of steam. Water was getting to the source.

'Good,' McGovern commented, observing the same thing. 'I think we're almost there.'

'Rats chewing wires,' Lucy said first thing. 'That's the owner's theory.'

She looked at me oddly.

'What brings you out?' she asked.

'It's looking like Carrie is involved in the Lehigh arson-homicide,' McGovern answered for me. 'And it's possible she's still in the area, maybe even here in Philadelphia.'

'What?' Lucy looked stunned. 'How? What about Warrenton?'

'I know,' I replied. 'It seems inexplicable. But there are definite parallels.'

'So maybe this one's a copycat,' my niece then said. 'She read about it and is jerking us around.'

I thought of the metal shaving again, and of the point of origin. There had been nothing in the news about details like that. Nor had it ever been released that Claire Rawley had been killed with a sharp cutting instrument, such as a knife, and I could not get away from one other similarity. Both Rawley and Shephard were beautiful.

'We've got a lot of agents on the street,' McGovern said to Lucy. 'The point is for you to be aware and alert, all right? And Kay.' She looked at me. 'This may not be the best place for you to be.'

I did not answer her, but instead said to Lucy, 'Have you heard from Benton?'

'No.'

'I just don't understand,' I muttered. 'I wonder where he could be.'

'When did you have contact with him last?' Lucy asked.

'At the morgue. He left saying he was going to the scene. And he what? Stayed there maybe an hour?' I said to McGovern.

'If that. You don't think he would have gone back to New York, or maybe Richmond?' she asked me.

'I'm sure he would have told me. I'll keep paging him. Maybe when Marino gets here, he'll know something,' I added as fire hoses blasted and a fine mist settled over us.

It was almost midnight when Marino came to my hotel room, and he knew nothing.

'I don't think you should be here by yourself,' he said right off, and he was keyed up and disheveled.

'You want to tell me where I might be safer? I don't know what's happening. Benton's left no messages. He isn't answering his pager.'

'You two didn't get in a fight or something, did you?'

'For God's sake,' I said in exasperation.

'Look, you asked me, and I'm just trying to help.'

'I know.'

I took a deep breath and tried to settle down.

'What about Lucy?'

He sat on the edge of my bed.

'There was a pretty big fire near the university. She's probably still there,' I answered.

'Arson?'

'I'm not sure they know yet.'

We were quiet for a moment, and my tension grew.

'Look,' I said. 'We can stay here and wait for God knows what. Or we can go out. I can't sleep.'

I began to pace.

'I'm not sitting here all night worrying that Carrie might be lying in wait, damn it.'

Tears filled my eyes.

'Benton's out there somewhere. Maybe at the fire scene with Lucy. I don't know.'

I turned my back to him and stared out at the harbor. My breath trembled in my breast, and my hands were so cold the fingernails had turned blue.

Marino got up, and I knew he was watching me.

'Come on,' he said. 'Let's check it out.'

When we reached the fire scene on Walnut Street, the activity had diminished considerably. Most of the fire trucks had left, and those few firefighters still on the job were exhausted and coiling hoses. Steamy smoke drifted up from the plenum area of the store, but I could see no flames, and from within voices and footsteps sounded as the strong beam of flashlights cut the darkness and were caught in shards of broken glass. I sloshed through water as more groceries and debris floated past, and when I reached the entrance, I heard McGovern's voice. She was saying something about a medical examiner.

'Get him here now,' she barked. 'And watch it over there, okay? No telling where it's all scattered, and I don't want us stepping on anything.'

'Someone got a camera?'

'Okay, I got a watch, stainless steel, men's. Crystal's shattered. And we got one pair of handcuffs?'