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  "Of course. I would have told him myself, but ..." My voice trails off.

  "That's my job," she finishes, saving me from speaking the truth: Now that I have forgiven Caleb, I do not know if he will forgive me.

  I busy myself with the dishes--rinsing our mugs, squeezing dry the tea bags and putting them into the trash. I have specifically tried to focus on Nathaniel since leaving Dr. Robichaud's office--not only because it is the right thing to do, but because I am a terrible coward at heart. What will Caleb say, do?

  Monica's hand touches my forearm. "You were protecting Nathaniel."

  I look directly at her. No wonder there is a need for social workers; the relationships between people knot so easily, there needs to be a person skilled at working free the threads. Sometimes, though, the only way to extricate a tangle is to cut it out and start fresh.

  She reads my mind. "Nina. In your shoes, he would have reached the same conclusions."

  A knock on the door captures our attention. Patrick lets himself in, nods to Monica. "I'm just on my way out," she explains. "If you want to reach me later, I'll be in my office."

  This is directed to both Patrick and me. Patrick will need her, presumably, to be kept abreast of the case. I will need her, presumably, for moral support. As soon as the door closes behind Monica, Patrick steps forward. "Nathaniel?"

  "He's in his room. He's okay." A sob hops the length of my throat. "Oh, my God, Patrick. I should have known. What did I do? What did I do?"

  "You did what you had to," he says simply.

  I nod, trying to believe him. But Patrick knows it isn't working. "Hey." He leads me to one of the stools in the kitchen, sits me down. "Remember when we were kids, and we used to play Clue?"

  I wipe my nose with my sleeve. "No."

  "That's because I always trounced you. You'd pick Mr. Mustard every time, no matter what the evidence said."

  "I must have let you win."

  "Good. Because if you've done it before, Nina, it's not going to be that hard to do it again." He puts his hands on my shoulders. "Give over. I know this game, Nina, and I'm good at it. If you let me do what I have to, without messing yourself up in the process, we can't lose." Suddenly he takes a step away from me, stuffs his hands into his pockets. "And you've got other things to work on, now."

  "Other things?"

  Patrick turns, meets my eye. "Caleb?"

  It's like that old contest: Who will blink first? This time, I can't bear it; I am the one to look away. "Then go lock him up, Patrick. It's Father Szyszynski. I know it, and you know it. How many priests have been convicted of doing just this--shit!" I wince, my own mistake hammering back. "I talked to Father Szyszynski about Nathaniel during confession."

  "You what? What were you thinking?"

  "That he was my priest." Then I glance up. "Wait. He thinks it's Caleb. That's what I thought, then. That's good, right? He doesn't know that he's the suspect."

  "What's important is whether Nathaniel knows it."

  "Isn't that crystal clear?"

  "Unfortunately, it's not. Apparently, there's more than one way to interpret the word father. And by the same logic, there's a whole country full of priests out there." He looks at me soberly. "You're the prosecutor. You know this case can't afford another mistake."

  "God, Patrick, he's only five. He signed priest. Szyszynski is the only priest he even knows, the only priest who has any contact with him on a regular basis. Go ahead and ask Nathaniel if that's who he meant."

  "That's not going to stand up in court, Nina."

  Suddenly I realize that Patrick has not come only for Nathaniel; he has also come for me. To remind me that while I'm being a mother, I still have to think like a prosecutor now. We cannot name the accuser for Nathaniel; he has to do it himself. Otherwise, there is no chance of a conviction.

  My mouth is dry. "He isn't ready to talk yet."

  Patrick holds out his hand to me. "Then let's just see what he can tell us today."

  Nathaniel is on the top bunk, sorting his daddy's old collection of baseball cards into piles. He likes the feel of their frayed edges, and the way they smell gray. His dad says to be careful, that one day these could pay for college, but Nathaniel couldn't care less. Right now he likes touching them, staring at all the funny faces, and thinking that his dad used to do the same thing.

  There's a knock, and his mom comes in with Patrick. Without hesitation, Patrick climbs up the ladder--all six-feet-two inches of him squashing into the small space between ceiling and mattress. It makes Nathaniel smile a little. "Hey, Weed." Patrick thumps the bed with a fist. "This is comfy. Gotta get me one of these." He sits up, pretends to crack his head on the ceiling. "What do you think? Should I ask your mom to buy me a bed like this too?"

  Nathaniel shakes his head and hands Patrick a card. "Is this for me?" Patrick asks, then reads the name and smiles broadly. "Mike Schmidt, rookie. I'm sure your dad will be thrilled you've been so generous." He tucks it into his pocket and takes out a pad and pen at the same time. "Nathaniel, you think it would be all right if I asked you some questions?"

  Well. He is tired of questions. He is tired, period. But Patrick climbed all the way up here. Nathaniel jerks his head, yes.

  Patrick touches the boy's knee, slowly, so slowly that it doesn't even make Nathaniel jump, although these days everything does. "Will you tell me the truth, Weed?" he asks softly.

  Slower this time, Nathaniel nods.

  "Did your daddy hurt you?"

  Nathaniel looks at Patrick, then at his mother, and emphatically shakes his head. He feels something open up in his chest, making it easier to breathe.

  "Did somebody else hurt you?"

  Yes.

  "Do you know who it was?"

  Yes.

  Patrick's gaze is locked with Nathaniel's. He won't let him turn away, no matter how badly Nathaniel wants to. "Was it a boy or a girl?"

  Nathaniel is trying to remember--how is it said again? He looks at his mother, but Patrick shakes his head, and he knows that, now, it is all up to him. Tentatively, his hand comes up to his head. He touches his brow, as if there is a baseball cap there. "Boy," he hears his mother translate.

  "Was it a grown-up, or a kid?"

  Nathaniel blinks at him. He cannot sign those words.

  "Well, was he big like me, or little like you?"

  Nathaniel's hand hovers between his own body, and Patrick's. Then falls, deliberately, in the middle.

  That makes Patrick grin. "Okay, it was a medium guy, and it was someone you know?"

  Yes.

  "Can you tell me who?"

  Nathaniel feels his whole face tighten, muscles bunching. He squeezes his eyes shut. Please please please, he thinks. Let me. "Patrick," his mother says, and she takes a step forward, but Patrick holds out a hand and she stops.

  "Nathaniel, if I brought you a bunch of pictures"--he points to the baseball cards--"like these ... do you think you could show me who this person was?"

  Nathaniel's hands flutter over the piles, bumblebees choosing a place to light. He looks from one card to the other. He cannot read, he cannot speak, but he knows that Rollie Fingers had a handlebar moustache, Al Hrabosky looked like a grizzly bear. Once something sticks in his head, it stays there; it's just a matter of getting it back out again.

  Nathaniel looks up at Patrick; and he nods. This, this he can do.

  Monica has been in accommodations far worse than the efficiency suite where she finds Caleb Frost, but this is almost more jarring, and she thinks it is because she has seen the sort of home where he is supposed to be. The minute Caleb recognizes her face through the keyhole of the door, he throws it open. "What's the matter with Nathaniel?" he asks, true fear washing over his features.

  "Nothing. Nothing at all. He's made another disclosure. A new ID."

  "I don't understand."

  "It means you're no longer a suspect, Mr. Frost," Monica says quietly.

  Questions rise in him like a bonfire. "Who," Caleb m