"What's your name?"

"Lacey Sherlock."

"No one's named that. That's stupid. That's out of some dumb detective story. What's your real name?"

"It's Sherlock, Marlin. Didn't I track you down? Didn't I bring you in? Wouldn't you say I've earned the name?"

"I don't like you, Marty."

"It's Lacey."

"I like you even less now than I did before."

"Do you mind if I turn on the tape recorder again, Marlin?"

"No, go ahead. Turn it on. I like to hear myself talk. I'm a real good talker. Mr. Caine, he's the guy who owns the Appletree Home Supplies and Mill Yard, he begged me to be his assistant manager. He knew I could sell anybody anything, and he knew that I was an expert on everything to do with building."

"Yeah, you're really great, Marlin. But a question. Tell me why you refused to say a word to the police. Why?"

"I just want to talk to you, Marty. I'm going to kill you one of these days, and I want to get to know you better."

"If it makes you feel good, you just keep holding on to that thought, Marlin. You want to talk? Tell me why you killed Hillary Ramsgate. She wasn't married. All the other women you've killed were married."

"I knew her boyfriend, well I didn't really know him, I just saw him a bunch of times. He told a group of guys that she was a ball buster and once he had her married, he was going to teach her a lesson."

"Where was this, Marlin?"

"At a bar, the Glad Rags, in Newton Center. He was there a whole lot. He'd sleep with her, let her tell him what a jerk he was, then come to the bar and let it an out. I told him he should punish her, that she deserved it."

"Did you go into the Glad Rags a lot?"

"Oh yeah. I wanted to see this Hillary woman. He brought her in one night. They had a big argument right there. She even threw a beer in his face. She cursed him up one side and down the other. She even called him a motherfucker. Most women, even bad ones like you, they don't say that word. That's a word for real bad guys. Well, all the other guys were laughing, but I wasn't. I knew she had to be punished and that he wasn't ever going to do it right. No, if anything, he'd just smack her around a little bit. You know that while she was tearing him down, that guy just laughed, he just took it. I would have sliced her up right there."

"Maybe her boyfriend liked exactly the way things were between them. Did you ever think of that?"

"No, that's impossible. She was bad. He was just weak and stupid."

"Did you go to lots of bars, Marlin?"

"Oh yes. I like bars. You can sit there in the dark and watch people. No one hassles you. I saw lots of women who needed to be punished."

"How many different bars?"

He shrugged, then winced, lightly touching his fingertips to his stomach. "About a half dozen, I guess. Lots more in San Francisco. You should have been sliced up too, Marty. But you don't cuss, do you? Not really. I'll bet you're not married either. You're just a cop. You just said all those bad words to trap me."

"I didn't trap you, Marlin. I just gave you a woman you could relate to. Nothing more, nothing less."

"I never should have believed you. You just fell into my lap. You're still wearing the sling. I like that."

"Yeah, but I'm not lying flat on my back with my gut burning through my back."

He tried to lurch up. The cop beside the bed was up in an instant, his hand on his gun. Lacey just smiled at him and shook her head. "Marlin doesn't have a knife now, Officer Rambling. He's like an old man without his teeth."

1 sure would like to kill you," Marlin said and tell back against the pillow, breathing hard.

"Not in this lifetime, Marlin. Now, you're so good at talking, you like to do it so much, why don't you tell me about the women you killed in San Francisco? I know each of them was married. Did you hear them all bad-mouthing their husbands?"

"Why should I tell you anything? You don't like me. You shot me in the belly. It still hurts real bad. I just might want a lawyer now."

"Fine. Do you have any money or shall I call the public defender?"

"I can get the best and you know it. Those guys don't care if I have a dime or not, they just want their faces in the news. Yeah, get me a phone book and let me pick out the highest-priced one of the lot."

"I could connect you to the ocean bottom, if you like."