The Night Window. Dean Koontz

that Charlie most appreciates in citizens with whom he must interact in situations like this. Although Mendoza is humble, he is not meek. Humility is good; Charlie Weatherwax expects any subject of an interrogation to be no less than humble, but humility is not enough. In urgent cases like this, he never trusts an interrogee until he has reduced him all the way to meek submission.

      He puts away his smartphone and looms over Jesus Mendoza, who is even two inches shorter than Mustafa al-Yamani. He makes a point of exaggerating the Spanish pronunciation of the man’s name, calling him Hey-Seuss, emphasis loud on the first syllable, as if he is calling out to the author who wrote How the Grinch Stole Christmas. “Hey-Seuss, is it? Listen to me, Hey-Seuss, and listen good. If you’re covering for Vikram Rangnekar, Hey-Seuss, I’ll bust your skinny ass and put you away in some shithole of a federal prison for ten years. We’re going to search this place from top to bottom, Hey-Seuss, and you will assist us without delay.”

      Mendoza smiles and shrugs. “Of course. We know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully.”

      As sheet lightning fluoroscopes the body of the impending storm and shadows like revealed malignancies briefly caper around Charlie, he senses that he has been rebuked. “Exactly what’s that supposed to mean?”

      Instead of answering the question, Mendoza says, “Because of recent mudslides, the city has condemned the property. Mr. and Mrs. Stein are contesting the condemnation in court. Deep caissons can be installed, retaining walls built, the home saved. If the law will allow. Meanwhile, no one is permitted to live in the house.”

      “So what are you doing here?” Charlie asks.

      “Sir, you see, I can no longer garden or make repairs. I work the night to keep out vandals who might damage the house before it can be saved.”

      “Do you think we will vandalize the place, Hey-Seuss?”

      “No, sir. Of course not. You are the law. Come with me. I will show you there is no Rangnekar and never was.”