The snow shifted beneath the red and blue lights. The police car was like a meteor beneath the moon, leaving a long trail across the snow before slowly coming to a stop beside a black car. Two officers got out and approached it. The window rolled down, and Schiller turned to look at them.
"Commissioner Gordon said your car broke down and sent us to pick you up."
Schiller pushed open the door and got out. He climbed into the police car and said, "Take me to Morson Street."
"What?"
Twenty minutes later, police lights illuminated the dark neighborhood. The man in the black suit stepped out of the car, opened an umbrella, and walked into the cordoned-off crime scene. The surveillance camera on the street corner lit up for an instant, then went dark.
The traces of Jerryta the corpse collector's death still lingered in the house like a ghost unwilling to leave. The bloodstains on the sofa, the footprints by the door, the fingerprints on the glass. He really had come to help him, Schiller thought. He had found the key.
His phone suddenly received a message from someone named "Moriarty." Brainiac had not made a move yet, Schiller said. "No need to track it. It was sent by someone under his control."
"I'll be waiting for you on the cliff." There was only that brief sentence.
Schiller left the house, got back into the police car, and said, "Take me to the Cliff Restaurant."
Less than half an hour later, the sea, even murkier in the darkness, appeared beyond the railing of the pedestrian walkway rushing past. There was no one on the beach. The canopy, lounge chairs, and bar counter were all reduced to vague outlines.
Schiller got out and entered through the east entrance of