“The first is easy, the second is harder,” Martin said.

“Yeah, well, if you don’t keep it shut, you could hurt the town even worse than it already has been.”

Martin agreed to keep his mouth shut, retrieved an empty shell from his workbench, and said, “Listen, Virgil, I think I know what you’re planning to do and I don’t like it.”

“About keeping your mouth shut,” Virgil said, “I wouldn’t mind if you told your friends I came over and fingerprinted you and cleared you when I compared your print to a picture that I had on my cell phone . . . that I got off this shell . . . You gotta lie sincerely.”

“I can do that . . . But, jeez, Virgil, you gotta be careful.”

* * *

—

When Virgil got back to Van Den Berg’s house, Sawyer and Baldwin were examining the streak of blood in the back of the Jeep.

“That nails down the Jeep transporting the body,” Sawyer said.

“Good work,” Virgil said, not mentioning that he’d already seen the blood and knew that the Jeep had been used to transport the body, and that none of that helped. He showed the .223 cartridge to Sawyer—she wouldn’t have let him use the actual cartridge found in the garage—and rolled his thumb across it. “I need you to fume this and pull the print.”

“I don’t like this,” she said. “You’re going to get hurt.”

“Nah, I’m gonna live forever.”

“I’ll only do it under protest,” she said. “Then when I visit you in the hospital, or at the funeral home, I can tell you that I told you so.”

“I’ll take it any way you want to do it.”

* * *

—

The fuming wand looked like a black, industrial-strength dildo but was actually a butane torch with a brass tip filled with Super Glue. The idea was to heat up the glue and then fume the .223 cartridge; the glue’s fumes would stick to the fatty acids in Virgil’s print and would then harden. When it was hardened, Sawyer dusted the print with a black powder, making it more visible. The process took only a few minutes, and, when it was done, Virgil took a photo of the print with his cell phone.

“And I need one of your tiny evidence bags. Plus, one of those fingerprint ink pads,” Virgil said.

The pad looked like a woman’s compact, except it was made of plastic and half as large. The pad inside was filled with purple ink that would make a nice, readable fingerprint on ordinary paper. The .223 cartridge went in a transparent four-inch ziplock bag.

“You think the shooter will believe you’re walking around with evidence in your pocket?” Baldwin asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe it’d be more believable if I let out the word that you’re walking around with evidence in your pocket,” Virgil said.

“Never mind,” Baldwin said.

* * *

—

Virgil left them to process the house and drove down the street to Skinner & Holland. On the way, Shrake called to say that they’d located Andorra’s son, heir to the farm, and he had good alibis for two of the shootings: he worked at a truck dispatching company and had signed out on time-stamped loads. “He’s out,” Shrake said.

“Okay. Look, I need you guys back here. Change cars—find some old crack-and-dent sedans that you can get comfortable in. We’re talking surveillance mode.”

“You got a suspect?”

“Not yet, but I hope to get one.”

* * *

—

At Skinner & Holland, Skinner was behind the cash register, and Holland was in the back room, counting the daily take. When he saw Virgil, Skinner said, “Jennie’s back. She’s down at her house, and she’s okay. Except she hurts.”

“Good. I need to talk to you and Wardell.”

“I can’t leave the register.”

“Then one at a time . . . But let me get a potpie.”

Virgil carried the frozen potpie to the back—nasty, but he was starving, having had no real breakfast—and put it in the microwave. He told Holland what he was going to do and what Holland should say about it. “I need to explain it to Skinner as well, but I want to do the actual printing out in public.”

“I dunno, man. Frankly, this sounds a little stupid . . .”

“Send Skinner back here.”

When he’d told Skinner what he was planning, Virgil sent him back out front, then sat and ate the potpie. When he was finished, he went out the back door, around to his truck, got the fingerprint pad and a piece of white paper, and carried them into the store. He printed both Holland and Skinner, as three locals watched, then compared their prints to the print on his cell phone.

“I guess you guys are in the clear,” he said. “Neither of you have that big of a whorl.”

“You got it off a cartridge?” Holland asked. “Can I see it?”

“Not much to see,” Virgil said. He took the evidence bag out of his jacket pocket and dangled it in front of Holland’s nose. “The print’s clear enough. Now, I just have to find a match.”

He put the bag back in his pocket, turned to the locals—a fourth had joined the first three, and none were leaving—and asked, “Anybody else want to get cleared?”

* * *

—

Virgil’s last stop was back at his room, where he knocked on the connecting door between his room and the main part of the house. Danielle popped it open, and asked, “What’s up?”

“About the town blog . . . ?”

“Yes?”

“Could you put a news story up for me without saying where it came from?” Virgil asked.

“Depends on what it is.”

Virgil explained about the cartridge shell and the fingerprint. “I’d like to get the word out that I’m going around printing suspects, without it coming from me.”

“Hey, that’s a good story. I’ll put it at the top of my ‘Heard Around Town’ column.”

When she’d gone to post the news, Virgil locked the door, went out to his truck, got his armored vest and his iPad, and started reading all the news he’d neglected over the past few days. He checked a few wildlife forums and “The Online Photographer.”

He had nothing to do until news of the fingerprinting had percolated through the town and until Jenkins and Shrake got back.