“Here’s a few more tricks of the trade from Uncle Frank, some things you can use to help spot a tail. Elevators are good, because they force the hand of the people tailing you. Somebody’s got to get on the damn elevator with you or they won’t know where you got off. Empty spaces like parking lots are good, because you can see who’s coming behind you. Escalators are good, because you can see the whole line of people, and your tail almost has to be one of them. And here’s one of Frank’s extra-special secrets, known only to a few discriminating members of the surveillance fraternity: when you’re moving, drop a piece of paper into an unlikely spot, and then watch to see if anybody picks it up. The tail will sometimes think you’re filling a drop, and he’ll stop to look. And you got him!

“Okay, son, that’s it.” He pushed me out the car door. “You’re due back here in two hours, at eleven-thirty on the dot. Don’t fuck up.”

I stood on the curb and watched Frank roar off. It was still fairly early in the morning, and the mall was relatively empty. I figured that worked to my advantage. Somewhere out there were five pairs of eyes, watching me intently. I walked into Nordstrom’s and headed for men’s clothes. I tried to be aware of everyone around me. I saw a full-figured blond woman in her fifties enter the store. She was dressed in white Capri pants that were a size too tight, and she was heading slowly in my direction. From the other direction a young man in jeans was ambling toward the men’s section, too. A dark-haired man in a neat business suit hovered nearby; I thought at first he was a salesclerk and walked over to ask him a question, but he turned and walked away. In the shoe department a neatly dressed black man was trying on a pair of wing tips.

How could I get the watchers to make themselves more obvious? I found some corduroy pants on a rack and went into one of the fitting rooms. I sat there, watching the entrance. Someone had to be waiting for me. After several minutes I popped out of the fitting room suddenly. Standing just outside was the woman in the Capri pants, looking at a selection of overcoats. Why was she looking at them in late May? She had to be one of the people following me. I took out my reporter’s notebook and wrote “Blonde in tight white pants.”