The snow crunched under Denton's boots. The white picket gate stood open behind him, caught in the un-shoveled path. Looking up at the big Victorian house, Denton thought of Linda's painting, even though this was nothing like the Gutman House. There was no cupola, and instead of being red, it was painted white with dark green trim. But they shared in the town's history, as if they were each part of Bexhill's DNA.

He had gotten Agatha Radcliff's address from an old feature piece in the Shopper's Express. They hadn't actually printed her address, but there had been a picture of the house and a mention of the street, which was more than enough information to find it.

The interview had been a fluff piece and comprised mostly of her talking about the philosophy behind her art. There was also a small summary of the Radcliff's long history in the town. The artist's house had been in the family for generations.

On the Gazette's website, he had come across her obituary. The headline was: Community Mourns Local Legend. There were five paragraphs discussing her life and her career but not a word about the cause of death, only that she died on November 7th.

Denton went back and scanned articles from that period. He finally came across a short piece, dated the following day, titled: Bexhill Artist Found Dead. Other than mentioning her prominence in the community, the only facts were that her body was discovered out by Salem Creek Mill, and that the police set the time of death between midnight and 3:00 a.m. There were no other reports on Agatha Radcliff after that.

Why would there be so few articles about the death of such a famous local figure? He could only think of one reason. The same reason which had kept mention of Meyer's death from reaching the front page.

Looking at his desk calendar, he saw that the 7th was just over three weeks before his visit to Meyer's Grimshaw apartment. According to the police report, Alfred Reynolds had been killed on the 16th. Could Agatha Radcliff be the first victim?

Denton sat at the computer clenching his eyelids shut, trying to will the memory of that day in the police station back. What was the name on the second folder? It had sat there across from him the entire time. He could remember that it had been a light blue color. There had been a sticker along one edge with a three letter and three number code, with a bar code next to it. There was something written in blue ballpoint on the tab.

The more he thought of it, the more certain he was that it had been Agatha's name on the folder's tab. He also became equally certain that he had never looked at it and his mind was playing tricks on him.

There was a way to find out.

Grabbing his coat and his car keys, he told Linda he needed to go to the hardware store to get more windshield wiper fluid.

He hadn't completely lied. Two brand new jugs of the stuff sat in his trunk. The stop had taken only five minutes. He should have a good half hour before she expected him home.

After a long wait and two rings of the bell, the door was answered by a kid in a grubby sweatshirt. This had to be the surviving son, who was mentioned in the obituary.

Greasy brown hair that looked as if it hadn't been combed in days hung over his pale face. Dark circles under his eyes made him look gaunt, despite the chubby baby fat around his jaw. It was hard to guess his age, but he must have been old enough that he could be attending Milton. In fact, Denton had to look twice to make sure he wasn't one of his students. Feeling very old, he wondered when it was that he started to think of people of that age as kids.

"Edward Radcliff? I am very sorry for your loss. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?"

"Are you another cop?" the boy asked.

Denton said carefully, "I work with the police."

"Is this about the bodies they found last night?" Edward's eyes narrowed, and he looked intently at Denton as though hoping to read the answer in the lines and contours of his face.

Denton decided to try his luck. "Do you mind if I look around a bit?" "Why, you guys have already searched the place twice?"

"I'm sorry to bother you, but in light of last night's events, there have been new developments." He pieced his words together from bits of half remembered dialogue from crime shows.

The boy looked him up and down, searching for an answer in Denton's clothes. Perhaps the gray wool overcoat and black dress shoes had an authoritative air to them because Edward sighed and stepped out of the doorway to let Denton enter. "Sure, have a ball. Just don't make a mess, or I'll get my lawyer on the phone."

"You have a lawyer?" "Yeah, I have a lawyer. What, you think I'm some kid? My mom's stuff is in her bedroom, upstairs. First door on the left."

Denton stepped into the main hall of the house. The stairs were directly in front of him. On his right was a grand parlor. It had that delicate look of the type of formal living room he remembered from his childhood. The type that was always immaculate and never used. Opposite the doorway was a large marble fireplace. In front of it was a sitting area with a settee and a couple of Queen Anne Chairs. Above it was a large framed painting of a unicorn surrounded by swirling flowers. On their drive home from the gallery, Linda had called Agatha's art: "Hippy, New Age watercolors." He could see what she meant.

He entered the room feeling guilty about crossing the threshold, not because the son hadn't given him permission, but because of the unspoken taboo against using the room. It seemed to act like a spell, making his feet hesitate, an irrational remnant from his upbringing, as though his mother was going to jump out from some unseen corner and scold him.

Denton leaned in to examine the canvas. The flowers were done with imprecise strokes. They seemed to be more impressions of flowers than depictions of them. Perhaps it was to give a sense of motion. The unicorn on the other hand was very exact and each of the creature's muscles stood out with distinct form.

On the mantle were a collection of framed photographs. Several were of people he didn't recognize. One was of a young Agatha with a man of about the same age standing in front of the house on a summer day. There was a toddler in a green striped shirt between them. He didn't see any resemblance, but he imagined it had to be the boy that let him in. Four of the pictures were of horses. In one of them, Agatha sat astride a light gray mount, in full equestrian gear, looking as if she were about to go on a fox hunt. The horse bore an uncanny resemblance to the unicorn.

When he turned back around, he found Agatha's son standing in the doorway, watching him.

"Your mom liked horses." Denton spoke to break the silence. It wasn't a question or a statement.

"Don't remind me."

"I take it you don't like them?"

"They're okay," Edward said, as Denton stepped past him. "But now I have to sell the two at the stables. People don't want to buy horses in the winter."

Denton headed up the stairs. There were two more paintings and several photos on the wall above the railing. Both paintings were of that classic symbol of a sun and a moon merged as one. The first was in bright colors and each part had a broad smile; the sun's was head-on and the moon's was in profile. The other had no faces and instead mimicked the yin-yang symbol. It was mostly monochrome, but there were highlights of metallic gold and silver paint. There was a mystical look to it.

The photographs appeared to be of the family, dating from the invention of the camera to just a few years ago. He found it hard to concentrate on them, as a thought started brewing in his mind. It was a long shot, but he wondered whether the stables where Agatha kept her horses got deliveries from Baye's. When he reached the top landing, he was about to ask Edward the name of the place, but the boy hadn't followed him.

The door that he'd been directed to opened with a slow creak. Agatha's bedroom was stuffy, both the air and the décor. The room must have been closed up for a week or more. There was a strong smell of perfume, rich with roses and lilacs. But when he thought about it, there was also a hint of antiseptic.

All the furniture was dark, heavy wood. They were undoubtedly antiques. The bedspread and the drapes were made of dense fabric, colored blue and gold. All the lamps in the room were highly ornate with bases of semi-tarnished silver and dusty brocade shades. All in all, it looked like the bedroom of a woman twice Agatha's age. The only thing modern Denton could see were her paintings, spread out across the walls. They seemed to all be from the same series: all the subjects were horses.

Although rare in this day and age, he suspected that Agatha had taken the room over from her mother. It used to be common for one generation to take the place of the last in homes such as these. Maybe one day when his grieving was over, Edward would move in here too. But somehow Denton doubted that. He couldn't picture the young man in this old woman's room.

There was a small closet and a large oak wardrobe in the room. A perfunctory search of both found a collection of clothing ranging from jeans and peasant skirts to expensive designer gowns.

Denton left the room feeling as if he'd learned very little about Agatha. He wandered down the hall to the next door and found a bathroom. It was small with a claw foot tub. Everything was white except for the black and white honeycomb tiles that covered the floor and ran halfway up the walls. It was spotless. The smell of heavy duty cleaner was unmistakable.

There was nothing out of the ordinary in the medicine cabinet, except for an expired prescription of Naproxen. A quick search on his phone revealed that the drug was used to treat arthritis.

The next two doors opened up on tidy guest rooms that were even more devoid of personality than Agatha's was. The following door led to what could only have been the boy's room.

A quick glance revealed disorder. Dirty clothes covered the floor. A poster from The Two Towers movie was tacked to the wall next to a framed painting of a red dragon. The poster curled at the corners, and even from across the room, Denton could tell that the painting was dulled by a layer of dust. On the nightstand was an empty bottle of Jack Daniels.

Denton was tempted to enter and examine the bedroom. This was finally a personalized space that could yield a psychological profile. But Edward Radcliff wasn't his subject. He glanced nervously back to the stairs, expecting to see the boy standing there.

He shut the door and headed back. The last thing he needed was for the kid to sic his lawyer on him. Besides, he'd been there long enough, and there was still one more room he had to see before heading home.

Downstairs, he followed the sound of a TV, until he found the boy in a much more modern and well used living room, playing a videogame. The giant LCD showed a hand holding a machete that rose and fell, killing a horde of zombies. With each hack, animated blood splattered the screen and faded away in seconds. The furniture and the violent game seemed out of place with the room's wainscoting and ornate crown moldings.

Denton cleared his throat and interrupted him. "Your mother had a studio here, didn't she?"

"Yeah, over this way." The boy threw down the controller.

He led him to a huge room that must have been a conservatory at one time. Linda would have been envious. It positively dwarfed her studio. The outer walls formed a semicircle of tall windows. On one side of the door, stacks of paintings leaned against the wall. On the other side was a massive work table. In the center of the room, dozens of easels displayed her works. Some of the canvases had been finished, but most were in various states of progress. Denton walked through, trying to take in all the details, but it was an overload. There were all kinds of pictures of horses, suns, moons, dream catchers, trees, Celtic knots, mythical creatures, and on and on.

He reached the end of the room and looked out the window at the snow covered expanse of back lawn; half an acre of land must have been back there. The house cast a long shadow of muted blue over the snow. Bare branches and burlap wrapped bushes gave evidence to a network of gardens.

Turning back to the studio, he spotted two easels facing the window. The floor around them was speckled with dry paint. Between them sat a small table. On top of it was a box of paints with a palette resting on it. His long familiarity with Linda's studio helped him with the conclusion that this was Agatha's main work space. These were likely the last paintings she had worked on.

There were two canvases. Denton examined the one displayed on the stand to the right. It was not in Agatha Radcliff's usual style. There was none of the playfulness of the other works in the house. Instead of soft pastel colors, they were bright and bold. Instead of a vague, impressionistic background, it was stark and realistic.

But the subject matter hadn't changed much: it was of the cosmos. Top center was a sun, a yellow disk with a halo-like glow around its edge. Just below it was a moon. The three dimensional sphere seemed to be a swirling mass of various hues of gray. The background was dark blue and filled with stars, each one a precise pinhole of light.

The other painting sat on the floor leaning against the easel on the left.

It was almost identical to the first, but it was in her traditional style. The background was a cheerful indigo and the stars could have been straight out of a children's picture book. The pale yellow sun had sharply defined radiating points. The moon, a single shade of gray, with stylized black vortexes scattered across its surface. Circling them was an aura of blue and white waves. Perhaps it was meant to be some kind of celestial energy. The pattern it formed was unmistakable.

"What?" Edward asked.

Denton hadn't realized that he had spoken out loud. He tried to recover himself by repeating, "Eights." Then he added, "Your mom had a thing for them. Was that a theme she was working on?" As he spoke, he traced his finger in the air demonstrating the pattern on the two paintings in front of him.

"Huh, never noticed that before."

"Did she ever talk to you about her work?"

"Not really. Is there anything else?" An impatient tone built in Edward's voice with each word he spoke.

"No, I guess that's it."

As he retraced his steps back to the car, Denton's mind was racing, trying to sort out all of the things he had seen. What was important? What wasn't? The moment he was in the leather bucket seat, he pulled out his notebook and started scribbling down everything he could remember. He could sort it out later. It was getting dark; it was time to get home.

He stopped at the next intersection and waited for two cars to go by. He was about to turn, when he looked in his rearview mirror and saw a van pulling into the driveway of Agatha Radcliff's house.