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Fletcher Kale’s gray eyes remained flat and unexpressive, but he turned quite pale "I can explain," he said

"Hold it!" Robine said, "Explain it to me first-in private" The attorney led his client to the farthest corner of the rooray Washed out He’d been that way since Thursday, since seeing Danny Kale’s pathetic, crumpled body

He had expected to take considerable pleasure in watching Kale squirm But there was no pleasure in it

Robine and Kale returned "Sheriff, I’"

Kale tried to look properly abashed

"He did so that could be misinterpreted-just as you have rief-stricken He wasn’t thinking clearly I’m sure any jury would sympathize with him You see, when he found the body of his little boy he picked it up"

"He told us he never touched it"

Kale htly and said, "When I first saw Danny lying on the floor… I couldn’t really believe that he was… dead I picked hi I should rush him to the hospital… Later, after I’d shot Joanna, I looked down and saw that I was covered with… with Danny’s blood I had shot ht look as if I’d killed my own son, too"

"There was still the meat cleaver in your wife’s hand," Bryce said, "And Danny’s blood was all over her, too And you could’ve figured the coroner would find PCP in her bloodstrea a handkerchief fro his eyes "But at the ti I’d never done"

The word "psychopath" wasn’t exactly right for Fletcher Kale, Bryce decided He wasn’t crazy No r was he a sociopath, exactly There wasn’t a word that described hinize the type and see the potential for criminal activity and, perhaps, the talent for violence, as well There is a certain kind of man who has a lot of vitality and likes plenty of action, a man who has more than his share of shallow charm, whose clothes are le book (as Kale did not), who seeht-out opinions about politics or art or econoious except when misfortune befalls him or when he wishes to impress someone with his piety (as Kale, member of no church, now read the Bible in his cell for at least four hours every day), who has an athletic build but who seems to loathe any pursuit as healthy as physical exercise, who spends his leisure ties, who cheats on his wife as a matter of habit (as did Kale, by all reports), who is impulsive, who is unreliable and always late for appointue or unrealistic ("Fletcher Kale? He’s a drea account and lies about erates, who knows he’s going to be rich one day but who has no specific plan for acquiring that wealth, who never doubts or thinks about next year, orries only about himself and only when it’s too late There was such a man, such a type, and Fletcher Kale was a prime example of the animal in question

Bryce had seen others like him Their eyes were always flat; you couldn’t see into their eyes at all Their faces expressed whatever eh every expression was a shade too right When they expressed concern for anyone but the of insincerity They were not burdened by remorse, morality, love, or empathy Often, they led lives of acceptable destruction, ruining and e the lives of friends who believed the trusts, but never quite crossing the line into outright criminal behavior Now and then, however, such a man went too far And because he was the type who never did things by halves, he alent much, much too far

Danny Kale’s srayness enveloping Bryce’s rew thicker, until it seemed like a cold, oily smoke To Kale, he said, "You’ve told us that your as a heavy ht"

"At s that wouldn’t ordinarily have interested his She wasn’t a ss were clean"

"I said she smoked pot, not tobacco," Kale said

"Marijuana ss," Bryce said "In Joanna’s case, there was no dae whatsoever"

"But I-"

"Quiet," Bob Robine advised his client He pointed a long, sli is-was there PCP in her blood or wasn’t there?"

"There was," Bryce said, "It was in her blood, but she didn’t smoke it Joanna took the PCP orally There was still a lot of it in her stomach"

Robine blinked in surprise but recovered quickly "There you go," he said "She took it Who cares how?"

"In fact," Bryce said, "there was more of it in her stomach than in her bloodstream"

Kale tried to look curious, concerned, and innocent-all at the same time; even his elastic features were strained by that expression

Scowling, Bob Robine said, "So there was el dust is highly absorbable Taken orally, it doesn’t re Nohile Joanna had sed enough dope to freak out, there hadn’t been time for it to affect her You see, she took the PCP with ice cream, which coated her sto the autopsy, the coroner found partially digested chocolate fudge ice cream So there hadn’t been time for the PCP to cause hallucinations or to send her into a berserk rage" Bryce paused, took a deep breath "There was chocolate fudge ice cream in Danny’s stomach, too, but no PCP When Mr Kale told us he came ho an afternoon treat for the fae ice creaone blank At last, he seemed to have used up his collection of human expressions

Bryce said, "We found a partly empty container of ice creae What I think happened, Mr Kale, is that you dished out some ice cream for everyone I think you secretly laced your wife’s serving with PCP, so you could later claiure the coroner would catch you out"

"Wait just one goddamned minute!" Robine shouted

"Then, while you washed your bloody clothes," Bryce said to Kale, "you cleaned up the ice-cream-smeared dishes and put them away because your story was that you had come home from work to find little Danny already dead and his mother already freaked out on PCP"

Robine said, "That’s only supposition Have you forgotten motive? Why in God’s na Kale’s eyes, Bryce said, "High Country Investments"

Kale’s face reh Country Investments?" Robine asked, "What’s that?"

Bryce stared at Kale "Did you buy ice cream before you went hoer of the 7-Eleven store over on Calder Street says you did"

The ed as he clenched his teeth in anger

"What about High Country Investments?" Robine asked

Bryce fired another question at Kale "Do you know a man named Gene Teer?"

Kale only stared

"People sometimes just call him ‘Jeeter’"

Robine said, "Who is he?"

"Leader of the De Kale

"It’s a s Actually, we’ve never been able to catch him at it himself, we’ve only been able to jail some of his people We leaned on Jeeter about this, and he steered us to sorass on a randoht"

"Who says?" Robine de pusher? He’s not a reliable witness!"

"According to our source, Mr Kale didn’t just buy grass last Tuesday Mr Kale bought angel dust, too The s will testify in return for i and suddenness, Kale bolted up, seized the empty chair beside him, threw it across the table at Bryce Haation room

By the time the chair had left Kale’s hands and was in the air, Bryce was already up and , and it sailed harmlessly past his head He was around the table when the chair crashed to the floor behind hied into the corridor