The Narrows

then, something that didn't fit.
    "Rachel, why did he leave the note for you at the bar?"
    "What?" "The note. He left it at the bar. Why there? Why not here?"
    "I guess he wanted to make sure I got it."
    "If he hadn't left it there you would have still come up here. You would've still found it here."
    She shook her head.
    "What are you saying? I don't get-"
    "Don't try the door, Rachel. Let's wait."
    "What are you talking about?"
    "I don't like this."
    "Why don't you look around the back, see if there is another window you can see in or something."
    "Okay, I will. You just wait"
    She didn't answer me. I walked around the left side of the trailer, stepped over the hitch and headed toward the other side. But then I stopped and walked out to the trash barrel.
    The barrel was one-third full with the charred remains of burned refuse. There was a broom handle on the ground that was charred on one end. I picked it up and dug around in the ashes in the barrel, as I was sure Backus had done while the fire was burning. He had wanted to make sure everything got burned.
    It appeared to be mostly paperwork and books that had been burned. There was nothing recognizable until I came across a blackened and melted credit card. There was nothing I recognized on it but I guessed that the forensics experts might be able to connect it to one of the victims. I dug around further and saw pieces of melted black plastic. Then I noticed one book that was burned beyond recognition on the outside but still had some partially intact pages on the inside. With my fin- gers I lifted it out and gingerly opened it. It looked like it was poetry, though it was hard to be sure, since all the pages were partially burned away. Between two of these pages I found a half-burned receipt for the book. At the top it said "Book Car" but the rest was burned away.
    "Bosch? Where are you?"
    It was Rachel. I was out of her sight. I placed the book back into the barrel and stuck the broom handle in as well. I headed toward the back side of the trailer. I saw another open window.
    "Hold on a second."
    Rachel waited. She was growing impatient. She was listening for the distant sound of helicopters crossing the desert. She knew as soon as she heard them that her chance would be over. She would be pushed back, possibly even punished for how she had handled Bosch.
    She looked back down at the doorknob. She thought about Backus and whether this could be his last play. Was four years here in the desert enough? Did he kill Terry McCaleb and send her the GPS only to lead her eventually to this? She thought about the note he had left, his telling her he had taught her well. An anger welled up inside her, an anger that wanted her to throw open the door and-
    "We've got a body!"
    It was Bosch, calling from the other side of the trailer.
    "What? Where?"
    "Come around. I've got a view. There's a bed and I see one body. Two, three days old. I can't see the face." "Okay, anything else?"
    She waited. He didn't say anything. She put her hand on the knob. It turned.
    "The door's not locked."
    "Rachel, don't open it," Bosch called. "I think… I think there is gas. I smell something besides the body. Something besides the obvious. Something underneath."
    Rachel hesitated but then turned the knob fully and opened the door an inch.
    Nothing happened.
    She slowly pulled the door all the way open. Nothing happened. Flies saw the opening and buzzed by her and into the light. She waved them away from her eyes.
    "Bosch, I'm going in."
    She stepped up into the trailer. More flies. They were everywhere. The smell hit her fully then, invading her and tightening her stomach.
    Her eyes adjusted to the dimness after the brightness outside and she saw the photos. They were stacked on tables and taped to the walls and refrigerator. Photos of the victims, alive and dead, tearful, pleading, pitiful. The table in the trailer's kitchen had been turned into a workstation. There was a laptop connected to a printer on one side and three separate stacks of photos. She picked up the largest stack and started to flip through it, again recognizing some of the men in the photos as the missing men whose photos she had carried with them to Clear. But these weren't the sort of family photos she had carried. These were shots of a killer and his victims. Men whose eyes pleaded to the camera, asking forgiveness and mercy. Rachel noticed that all of the shots were at a downward angle, with the shooter-Backus-in the