3

Rob Cohen raised a brow at Garreth. "That's the third time you've yawned in the last five minutes. You single guys sure lead a fast life."

Harry regarded Garreth sharply, however. "You worked all night after all?"

Garreth shrugged. "I couldn't sleep." He gave Harry a recap of the North Beach canvas. "It was a waste of good shoe leather, though; I didn't find her."

"Maybe you're lucky. Your hexagram this morning was number forty-four, Coming to Meet. 'The maiden is powerful. One should not marry such a maiden.'"

A sudden chill raised the hair down Garreth's spine. He wondered at it. I Ching's prophecies usually neither disturbed nor encouraged him. He thought of Grandma Doyle's Feelings. However, he made himself slap Harry's shoulder. "Don't worry, Taka-san. I have no intention of marrying any maiden in the near future."

Too late he realized that the flip response had been wrong. Harry's almond eyes went grave. "You know the text isn't to be taken literally. What's the matter?"

The chill bit deep into Garreth's gut. "Nothing." A lie? He could not be sure. His chest felt so tight he had trouble breathing. "Guess I'm just superstitious enough not to like having that caution turn up when I'm hunting a woman." He hurriedly changed the subject. "Here's the flier on Mossman's watch, ring, and pendant that's going out to the pawnshops."

Harry read it over. "Good."

The tightness and chill eased in Garreth. "What do you want to do this morning?"

"I think one of us ought to get started checking out cults and the other take China Basin. Shall we flip for it? Loser takes the cults."

Garreth chose tails. The quarter came up heads. Harry grinned as he left for China Basin.

Garreth sat down with the Adair file and read through the reports to see which groups Faye and Centrello had investigated. On the half dozen he found reports on, only one had a formal name, Holy Church of Asmodeus. The others were listed by leaders' names. The groups varied in size, organization, and object of worship. Some seemed to be satanists or devil worshipers. Others appeared to be variations of witchcraft and voodoo. One group claimed to be neo-druids. All, however, had been rumored to use blood in their ceremonies. A few admitted it, but insisted it was either animal blood or small amounts from members, voluntarily given. Analysis of blood samples on altars and instruments confirmed that most was animal blood. One of the few human samples proved to be A positive like Adair's, but investigation of the group failed to establish opportunity for any of the members and, further, more detailed analysis of the blood sample found enough differences in minor factors to rule out the possibility of the blood being Adair's.

Nevertheless, Garreth turned all the names in to R and I for a check of current activities, then called Sergeant Dennis Kovar in Fraud.

"Denny, what complaints have you had in the past year about oddball church and cult groups?"

Kovar laughed. "How much time do you have to listen? I don't need to lift weights after picking up the current file a few times a day. Parents and neighbors are all out for the blood of these groups."

"What about the groups? Do you have any word that any of them are using blood?"

Silence came over the line for a moment before Kovar answered. "What are you looking for?" He listened silently to Garreth's reply, then said, "I don't have many complaints about those groups. They aren't asking for monetary donations. They keep a low profile so they won't be noticed. But you might talk to Angelo Chiarelli. He's undercover full-time and officially attached to Narco, but he's fed information to me on some of these fraudulent church groups and contacted a few kids in the cults for Missing Persons. Maybe he can help you."

A call to Narcotics produced a promise to pass on Garreth's request. "You understand we can't just go calling on him every day, and he's too busy doing his own job to run errands for other sections."

Garreth sighed. "He doesn't have to work on my case. I just want any possible information on blood-using cults that he may know about."

"We'll get back to you."

He even called the Humane Society about complaints of people killing and mutilating animals and went out to buy underground papers. When Harry came back to the office around two, they exchanged notes over coffee and doughnuts.

Harry's interviews in China Basin produced nothing for them. The underground classifieds had some cult ads, but no direct route of contacting the groups.

"We'll have to get some scrawny kid straight out of the Academy, who can get past their security," Garreth said. "The ASPCA has some complaints of animal mutilation we might follow up on, too."

"What about Chiarelli?"

"Still no word back from Narco yet. Here's everything R and I has currently on the cults Faye and Centrello investigated."

And what, Garreth wondered, leaning back in his chair with a sigh, did it mean until they knew where Mossman had been? Until they knew, they had no way of establishing opportunity for the cults. Checking movements was treadmill work.

Still, it needed to be done, and over the next four days they visited the cult groups Faye and Centrello listed, then those with ads that their rookie contacted for them. They visited people who had reported animal mutilations to the Humane Society. Garreth did not like most of the cultists he met—some he detested on sight—but he found them very educational: women who simultaneously attracted and chilled him, people who he would have taken for dull businessmen on the street, and some, too, who looked like escapees from Hollywood horror movies. No group, though, had a very tall red-haired female member.

None of Mossman's jewelry appeared in the pawnshops.

At the same time, they hunted up the four girls who had joined Mossman's group on that Monday night—and cleared all four of any Tuesday night involvement with Mossman—and kept prodding their contacts for Wink O'Hare's hiding place. Garreth spent his evenings in North Beach on a systematic search for the singer. On Tuesday, September 6, one week after Gerald Mossman died, Garreth found her.