He swung his feet down and swiveled toward me.

"Whooaa! Let me get a bead on that."

He must have seen something in my face.

"Don't take me wrong. That is one real haircut." He leveled two index fingers at me. "Makes you look younger."

"Let's go," I said, retrieving a sweater from the hal tree. I'd had more than enough comments on my hair.

Over brasserie subs and fries my nephew described his Sunday with Lyle Crease, the highlight of which had been the purchase of the fedora. No Madonna or fishing lures. After returning to Montreal, they'd dined on smoked meat at Ben's, then Crease took him to the newsroom.

"What do you two talk about?"

"The dude's real y heads-up." Muffled through cold cuts and cheese. "It's awesome how much he knows about broadcasting. And he's pretty tight on cycles, too."

"Does he ask you a lot of questions?"

I wondered how much Crease was using Kit to get information about my cases. The biker war was hot news just now

"Some."

Kit yanked a paper napkin from a metal box at the end of the table and wiped grease from his chin.

"About what?"

He bunched up the napkin and reached for another.

"Al kinds of stuff. Lyle's amazing. He's interested in everything."

Something in his voice told me my nephew had begun to worship Lyle Crease. O.K., I thought. I can live with that. Oily as the guy is, he beats the Preacher sight unseen.

After lunch Kit insisted on returning with me to the lab. Though anxious to get back to my skeletal autopsy, I obliged him with a short tour. I could be heads-up, too.

During our rounds Kit made only two comments. I would recal them later, and chastise myself for taking no notice.

"Who's the freak show?" he asked, after passing Jocelyn at the Xerox machine.

"She works in records."

"Bet that's a head ful of slash and burn."

"She has al ergy problems."

"Right. Nasal spray."

The other remark was made in the bal istics section. He cal ed their col ection of firearms "sweet."

When Kit had gone I went back to the stowaway. By four-thirty I'd finished my preliminary examination, concluding that the remains were those of a male in his late twenties. I'd dissected out the bones and sent them upstairs for boiling. Then I'd washed up, changed, and returned to my office.

I was reaching for my sweater when I noticed a color print centered squarely on my blotter Oh, great, I thought. Here's something new. I haven't scoped a photo in at least two hours.

I reached for the picture, thinking that perhaps it belonged to Claudel.

It didn't.