The Vanished Man

“I’m like him.” A nod toward Rhyme. “Sort of a consultant.”
    Bell said, “Nice to meetcha.” And blinked to see her absently rolling three coins back and forth over her knuckles simultaneously.
    As Sachs went to work on the evidence with Cooper, Rhyme asked, “Who was he, the vic?”
    “Name was Anthony Calvert. Thirty-two. Unmarried. Well, no partner, in his case.”
    “Any connection with the student at the music school?”
    “Doesn’t seem to be,” Sellitto answered. “Bedding and Saul’ve checked it out.”
    “What was his job?” Cooper asked.
    “Makeup stylist on Broadway.”
    And the first one was a musician and music student, Rhyme reflected. One straight female, one gay male victim. Lived and worked in different neighborhoods. What could link the killings? He asked, “Any feel-good stuff?”
    But since the first crime hadn’t been sexual in nature Rhyme wasn’t surprised when Sachs said, “Nope. Not unless he takes his memories home to bed with him. . . . And he gets off on this.” She stepped to the whiteboard and taped up the digital photos of the body.
    Rhyme wheeled closer and studied the gruesome images.
    “Sick fuck.” Sellitto offered this lethargic observation.
    “And the weapon was?” Roland Bell asked.
    “Looks like a crosscut saw,” Cooper said, examining some close-ups of the wounds.
    Bell, who’d seen his share of carnage as a cop bothin North Carolina and New York, shook his head. “Well, now that’s a tough shell.”
    As Rhyme continued to study the pictures he was suddenly aware of an odd noise, an erratic hissing from nearby. He turned to see Kara behind him. The sound was her frantic breath. She was looking at the pictures of Calvert’s body. She ran her hand compulsively over her short hair as she stared, transfixed, at the photos, tear-filled eyes wide in shock. Her jaw trembled. She turned away from the board.
    “Are you—?” Sachs began.
    Kara held up a hand, closed her eyes, breathing hard.
    Rhyme knew then, seeing the pain in her face, that this was it for her. She’d reached the end. His life—crime scene work—entailed this type of horror; her world didn’t. The risks and dangers in her profession were, of course, illusory and it was too much to expect civilians to confront this revulsion voluntarily. This was a true shame because they needed her help desperately. But, seeing the horror in her face, he knew they couldn’t subject her to any more of this violence. He wondered if she was going to be sick.
    Sachs started toward her but stopped when Rhyme shook his head—his message: he knew they were losing the girl and they had to let her go.
    Except that he was wrong.
    Kara took another deep breath—like a high diver about to plunge off the board—and turned back to the pictures, a determined look in her eyes. She’d just been steeling herself to confront the photos again.
    She studied them closely and finally nodded. “P. T. Selbit,” she said, wiping her blue eyes.
    “That’s a person?” From Sachs.
    Kara nodded. “Mr. Balzac used to do some of his routines. He was an illusionist who lived a hundred years ago. He did that routine. It’s called Sawing a Woman in Half. This’s the same, tied down, spread-eagle. The saw. The only difference is he picked a man for the performance.” She blinked at the benign word. “I mean, the murder. ”
    Again Rhyme asked, “Would only a limited number of people know it?”
    “Nope. It was a famous trick, even more famous than the Vanished Man. Anybody with the slightest knowledge of magic history’d be aware of it.”
    He had expected this discouraging answer but said, “Put it on the profile anyway, Thom.” Then to Sachs: “Okay, tell us what happened at Calvert’s.”
    “Looks like the vic left through his building’s back entrance on his way to work—like he always did, the neighbors said. He walked past an alley and saw that.” She pointed to the black toy cat in a plastic bag. “A toy cat.”
    Kara looked it over. “It’s an automaton. Like a robot. We’d call it a feke.”
    “A—?”
    “F-E-K-E. A prop that the audience is supposed to think is real. Like a fake knife with a disappearing blade or a coffee cup with a hidden reservoir in it.”
    She pushed a switch and suddenly it started to move, giving off a realistic-sounding meow. “The vic must’ve seen the cat and walked over to it, maybe thought it was hurt,” Sachs continued. “That’s how the Conjurer