Serial by John Lutz

means.”
    “Sick jerks like him always have a regular routine,” Lido said. “Compulsive bastards. You know that better’n anyone.”
    “Maybe I do, Jerry.” Quinn watched Lido down the rest of his drink. It wouldn’t be easy to get a cab this time of night—morning. “How you gonna get home, Jerry? You should be in bed, if you’re gonna be worth anything tomorrow.”
    “If you don’t mind,” Lido said, “you’re sitting on my bed.”
    Quinn stood up and yawned. “I’ll get you a blanket from the closet.”
    “Hot night,” Lido said. “I don’t need a blanket. I’ll just take off my shoes and catch some Z’s.”
    Quinn hadn’t heard that in a long time, catch some Z’s.
    “Okay, Jerry, the couch is all yours. I’ll see you in the morning.”
    “So how ’bout a nightcap?”
    Quinn thought about it. “Why not?”
    He knew Joe Nethers would disapprove.
    Pearl would disapprove.
    Quinn should disapprove.
     
    In the morning Quinn got up earlier than he should have. He showered, got dressed, then had toast and coffee standing up in the kitchen. He left Lido snoring on the sofa and walked the few blocks to the office to help clear his head.
    Pearl was the only one there. Sal and Harold were out searching for Simon Luttrells with Fedderman. Quinn had decided to let them carry out the task for the sake of thoroughness. Renz would insist that every base be touched. And for all anyone knew, they might find the guilty, live Simon Luttrell, or at least a Simon Luttrell who might have some idea of why his name was used by the killer.
    “Coffee’s made,” Pearl said. She was sitting at her desk, booting up her computer.
    Quinn walked over and poured himself a mug of coffee, then added cream. He came back and perched on the edge of Pearl’s desk, looking down at her.
    “Don’t put that down and leave a ring on something,” she said, nodding toward the steaming mug in his hand.
    “Jerry Lido paid me a visit during the night,” he said, and described what had happened, what Jerry had learned.
    When he was finished, Pearl leaned back in her chair, thinking.
    “So our killer continues to establish a Socrates’s Cavern theme,” Quinn said, “maybe for no reason other than to throw us off the scent.”
    “Has he succeeded?”
    “Sure. We have to interview, or at least check into, any Simon Luttrells in the New York area. And that’s while we’re still looking for Philip Wharkin.”
    “He’s forcing us to waste our time,” Pearl said.
    “Maybe.”
    “You think it’s a double game—making it look too obvious so we abandon that avenue of investigation?”
    Quinn shrugged his bulky shoulders. “Been done before.”
    “Yeah, but not often. And serial killers are creatures of compulsion. They don’t like straying from their ritual, even in order to lay down false clues.”
    “That’s what Helen says.”
    “What any profiler would say.”
    “But what if we’re not dealing with a serial killer? Not a creature of compulsion at all.”
    “Somebody with a logical motive?” Pearl swiveled her chair so she was looking up at Quinn directly.
    “Or a different rationalized sick motive not linked to compulsion.”
    “It would have to be a strong motive,” Pearl said, “considering the way those women were tortured before he released them to death.”
    “Maybe that’s what he wants us to think.”
    “A terrible thing to do to human beings, simply to mislead the police. Not many ordinary men would have the stomach, no matter how devoted they were to their cause.”
    “The evil that men do…” Quinn said.
    Pearl gave Quinn an alarmed look. “You going religious on me now, Quinn?”
    “That’s Shakespeare, I believe.” Quinn the avid theatergoer.
    “Shakespeare was big on men doing evil.”
    Quinn smiled. “What I’m saying is that we can’t rule anything out or in at this point.”
    Pearl swiveled back to face her desk and got busy again on her computer. “Where’s Jerry Lido