The Burning Wire

hell many cables are there?”
    “About four.”
    “Well, the one Sachs and Pulaski found at the school in Chinatown. I want the trace between the insulation and the wire itself dug out and run through their SEM.”
    Then came the sound of plastic and paper. A moment later, footsteps. “I’ll be back in forty minutes, an hour.”
    “I don’t care when you get back. I care when you call me with the results.”
    Footsteps, thudding.
    The microphone was very sensitive.
    A door slammed. Silence. The tapping of computer keys, nothing else.
    Then Rhyme, shouting: “Goddamn it, Thom! . . . Thom!”
    “What, Lincoln? Are you—”
    “Is Mel gone?”
    “Hold on.”
    After a moment the voice called, “Yes, his car just left. You want me to call him?”
    “No, don’t bother. Look, I need a piece of wire. I want to see if I can duplicate something Randall did. . . . A long piece of wire. Do we have anything like that here?”
    “Extension cord?”
    “No, bigger. Twenty, thirty feet.”
    “Why would I have any wire that long here?”
    “I just thought maybe you would. Well, go find some. Now.”
    “Where am I supposed to find wire?”
    “A fucking wire store. I don’t know. A hardware store. There’s that one on Broadway, right? There used to be.”
    “It’s still there. So you need thirty feet?”
    “That should do it. . . . What?”
    “It’s just, you’re not looking well, Lincoln. I’m not sure I should leave you.”
    “Yes, you should. You should do what I’m asking. The sooner you leave, the sooner you’ll be back and you can mother-hen me to your heart’s content. But for now: Go!”
    There was no sound for a moment.
    “All right. But I’m checking your blood pressure first.”
    Another pause.
    “Go ahead.”
    Muffled sounds, a faint hiss, the rasp of Velcro. “It’s not bad. But I want to make sure it stays that way. . . . How are you feeling?”
    “I’m just tired.”
    “I’ll be back in a half hour.”
    Faint steps sounded on the floor. The door opened again then closed.
    He listened for a moment more and then rose. He pulled on a cable TV repairman’s uniform. He slipped the 1911 Colt into a gear bag, which he slung over his shoulder.
    He checked the front windows and mirrors of the van and, noting that the alley was empty, climbed out. He verified there were no security cameras andwalked to the back door of Lincoln Rhyme’s town house. In three minutes he’d made sure the alarm was off and had picked the lock, slipping into the basement.
    He found the electrical service panel and silently went to work, rigging another of his remote control switchgear units to the incoming service line, 400 amps, which was double that of most other residences in the area.
    This was interesting to note but not particularly significant, of course, since he knew that all he needed to cause virtually instant death was a tiny portion of that.
    One tenth of one amp . . .

Chapter 75
    RHYME WAS LOOKING over the evidence boards when the electricity went off in his town house.
    The computer screen turned black, machinery sighed to silence. The red, green and yellow eyes of the LEDs on the equipment surrounding him vanished.
    He swiveled his head from side to side.
    From the basement, the creak of a door. Then he heard footsteps. Not the footfalls themselves, but the faint protest of human weight on old, dry wood.
    “Hello?” he shouted. “Thom? Is that you? The power. There’s something wrong with the power.”
    The creaking grew closer. Then it vanished.Rhyme turned his chair in a circle. He scanned the room, eyes darting the way they used to dart at crime scenes upon first arrival, taking in all the relevant evidence, getting the impression of the scene. Looking for the dangers too: the places where the perp might still be hiding, maybe injured, maybe panicked, maybe coolly waiting for a chance to kill a police officer.
    Another creak.
    He spun the wheelchair around again, three-sixty, but saw nothing. Then he spotted, on one of the examination tables at the far end of the room, a cell phone. Although the power was off in the rest of the town house, of course, the mobile would be working.
    Batteries . . .
    Rhyme pushed the controller touch pad forward and the chair responded quickly. He sped to the table and stopped, his back to the doorway, and stared down at the phone. It was no more than eighteen inches from his face.
    Its LCD indicator glowed green. Plenty of juice, ready to