Keegan kneaded his temples. Hanging. A hangover. There was probably a quip to be made, but it was too much effort, and he wasn’t up to it. “Any business I need to worry about?”

“One new call,” Mrs. Dodd said. “It came in early. Almost missed it. I told him you were taking a few days off, but he was very—”

“He who?”

“Simon something,” she said. “Let me look.”

Keegan heard the creak of her office chair, the shuffle of papers. He pinched the bridge of his nose and tried to wish away the blunt ache gathering behind his eyebrows.

“Catling,” Mrs. Dodd said at last. “Simon Catling. Not sure if there’s two Ts or one. You know him?”

“Never heard of him. What does he want?”

“Wouldn’t say,” she said. “Real tight-lipped. Said he wanted you to track someone down. Wouldn’t tell me why.”

A skip trace. There was no easier paycheck, and he’d have to get back to work sometime, anyway. “Did he tell you who?”

“Wouldn’t tell me a thing,” she said. “No contact number or address. I was lucky to drag his name out of him.”

Keegan glanced at his watch. He was a good half-hour from the office, if he hit nothing but green lights. He’d need a shower and a change of clothes, so he’d have to swing by his apartment. And what about Nora? He rubbed the sweaty stubble on his cheeks again. “How am I supposed to get hold of the guy?” he said into the phone.

“You’re not,” she said. “He wants you to meet him this afternoon.”

“Where?”

“Grand Central Market,” she told him. “Said you should be on the farthest stool at the pizza place at three o’clock sharp.” Her tone dropped, as if she were about to say something confidential, though he knew she had to be sitting alone in his sixth-floor office. “He sounded foreign,” she informed him.

“Foreign how?”

“Just foreign,” she said, with a kind of verbal shrug. “Not from around here. How do I know?”

A shadow passed the kitchen window, and Nora set to barking outside.

Keegan stood, but from his angle he couldn’t see anything through the window over the sink except eucalyptus limbs and a patch of cumulus clouds beyond the mountains to the east. Outside the kitchen door, the dog kept up her insistent yapping while a deep, burbling voice tried to soothe her.

Keegan plugged one ear with a finger. “You think it’s on the level?” he said.

“I just sit here and answer the phones,” Mrs. Dodd told him. “You’re the big detective.”