Rules of Prey

more analytical spread in the St. Paul paper. On Monday, the coverage died. There was almost nothing, which puzzled him. Burnt out already?
    That afternoon, he went to the county recorder’s office and politely introduced himself as a lawyer doing real-estate-tax research. He showed them his card and they instructed himin the use of computerized tax files. McGowan? The names ran up the computer monitor: McGowan, Adam, Aileen, Alexis, Annie. There she was. A sole owner. Nice neighborhood.
    The computer gave him square footages, prices. He would need more research. He went from the computer files to the plat books and looked at the neighborhood maps.
    “If you need aerial photos, you’ll find them in those cases over there,” said the clerk, smiling pleasantly. “They’re filed the same way.”
    Aerial photos? Fine. He looked them over, picking out McGowan’s house, noting its relationship to the neighboring houses, the garden sheds, the detached garage. He traced the alley behind the house with a fingertip. If he walked in from the north side, he could approach from the alley and go straight to the back door, pop it, and go in. If he came in early enough, when he knew McGowan was on the air, he would have a chance to explore it. What if there was another occupant? Easy enough to find out; that was what the telephone was for. He would call night and day, while she was working, looking for a different voice; he knew hers so well now. Maybe she had a roommate. He thought about that, closed his eyes. He could do a double. Two at the same time.
    But that didn’t feel right. A taking was personal, one-to-one. It was to be shared, not multiplied. Three’s a crowd.
    The maddog left the recorder’s office and walked through another glorious fall day to the library, to the crime section, and began pulling out confessional books by burglars. They were intended, their authors said, to help homeowners protect their property.
    From a different perspective, they were also a short course in burglary. He had studied a couple of them before he went into Carla Ruiz’ studio. They helped. The maddog believed in libraries.
    He thumbed through the books, picked the four best that he hadn’t read. As he walked out of the stacks, past rows of books on crime and criminals, the name “Sam” caught hiseye. Son of Sam. He had read about Sam, but not this particular book. He took it.
    Outside in the sunshine, the maddog took a deep breath and watched the people scurrying by. Ants, he thought. But it was hard to take the thought too seriously. The day was too good for that. Like early spring in Texas. The maddog was not unaffected.
     
    The burglary books gave him material for contemplation; the Sam book, even more.
    Sam should not have been caught, not when he was.
    On his last mission, as the maddog thought of it, he had shot a young couple, killing one, wounding and blinding the other. He had parked some distance away, near a fire hydrant. His car had been ticketed.
    A woman out walking her dog had seen both the ticketing and, later, a man running to the car and driving away. When the latest Sam murders hit the press, she called the police. There had been only a few tickets given in the area at that time of night, and only one for parking at a hydrant. The police were able to read the car’s license number off the carbon of the ticket. Sam was caught.
    The maddog was reading in bed. He dropped the book on his chest and stared at the ceiling. He had known this story, but had forgotten it. He thought about his last note, the one dropped on Wheatcroft. Isolate yourself from random discovery, it said. He thought about his car. All it would take was a ticket. Now that he thought about it, it was a certainty that police were checking tickets issued near the killings.
    He tossed the book on the bed and padded out to the kitchen, heated water in a teakettle, and made a cup of instant cocoa. Cocoa was one of his favorites. As soon as the hot bittersweet chocolate hit his tongue, he was back at the ranch, standing in the kitchen with . . . Whom? He shook it off and went back to the bedroom.
    He had done it right with Wheatcroft. He had driven so that he wouldn’t be seen leaving his house on foot. He hadparked and walked in to the killing so that his car wouldn’t be spotted at the crime scene.
    Walk in to the killing. Keep the car out of the way. Make sure, make doubly sure, that the car was legally parked. And get it close enough to