the brick path, which was heavy with weeds, and up to the porch. Joe knocked loudly on the screen door. After several more minutes and two more knocking sessions, the front door finally opened. The man inside was thin, with a chaotic brown beard.

“Are you Mr. David Geisler?” Gil asked after introducing himself.

The man said nothing. He just stared at the floor.

“Sir, we’re here about some problems in the neighborhood,” Joe said.

“The child . . . child . . . they got to admit they can’t do that much,” Geisler said, covering his mouth as he giggled.

“Are you talking about Brianna Rodriguez?” Gil asked.

“An advanced being . . . a kind of . . . a certain . . . hands of motherness, that’s right . . .” he said and then giggled again.

“What do you know about her disappearance?” Gil asked.

“My sins never hope . . . that’s why they want me, I think,” he said. He looked up at the sky and grinned.

“Is he laughing about Brianna?” Joe asked.

“I don’t know,” Gil said to Joe. Then he asked Geisler, “Can we come in?”

The man said nothing; he just stared off with a slight smile on his face.

“I’m taking that as a yes,” Joe said, opening the door. Geisler made no move to stop them. Inside was the normal living room, but the couch had pillows and blankets on it. It appeared to be where Geisler slept. Two closed doors led out of the living room, but one was blocked by an ironing board and the other by a large chair.

“I was wondering, Mr. Geisler,” Gil said, realizing that the man’s mental illness was making him nervous enough that he kept using the formal title. “How do you feel about the Catholic Church?”

“What was said by the priests, they can hear my thoughts. It’s just . . . it’s just . . . the energy coming out of me . . . and I put it together . . . this means something,” he said, nodding.

“So the priests can hear what you are thinking,” Gil said. “That must be scary.”

Geisler put his hand over his mouth and giggled. “I am a superpower . . . anyone who puts together a creative understanding . . . it’s like 1984.”

“Did you know Brianna Rodriguez?” Joe asked as he looked around the room, which had beige carpet and paneled walls, making the room dark. It was made bleaker by the lack of pictures on the wall.

“They don’t . . . they don’t . . . God goes to penetrate the subconscious . . . and the prayer . . . it’s like rats,” he said. “That’s why they want me . . . and I put it together and let it go . . . and if I let it go . . . Jesus is bankrupt.”

Joe shot Gil a look. They weren’t going to get anywhere questioning him. They should go talk to the neighbors and maybe his family to see if he’d ever been violent. Gil was about to turn to leave when Joe pushed aside the ironing board blocking one of the doors and opened it.

The room was carpeted in the same beige color and had the same paneling. It had no furniture, but over in one corner some bedsheets were taped by their edges to the ceiling and hung down in a wall of white. Making a separate room inside the room. Gil’s daughters used to make forts like that when they would stay home from school on snow days. Gil pushed his way past the soft white fabric, holding the panel back for Joe. On the other side was a kitchen table lined with newspapers. In its center lay a silver samurai sword, its black handle embedded with silver triangles.

The curved tip of the sword reflected the dim light of the room. As Gil moved closer to the sword, he noticed that rust had started to form on the blade’s edge. It took him a moment to realize that the rust was more the color of dried blood.

Gladys Soliz Portilla stood at the bus stop and looked again at the time on her cell phone. She needed to pick her son up in fifteen minutes, and the bus was ten minutes late. She had called her babysitter, who had said she wouldn’t wait. Now she was trying to get in touch with one of the neighbors to see if they could go get him.

She missed her car.