Over the next couple of days, I managed to piece together what had happened from talking to Michael and, on the second day, to Sanya.

The big Russian had come out of things all right. Marcone, after getting me and Michael out of the water, had called Murphy and told her where to find us. She had already been on the way, and got there in only a couple of minutes.

The crew of the train, it turned out, had been killed. The three goons that had been trussed up on the train had bitten down on suicide pills and were dead when the cops found them. Murphy had taken us all to Butters instead of to the emergency room, since once my gunshot wound was reported, Rudolph and company could have made my life hell.

"I must be out of my mind," Murphy told me when she visited. "I swear, Dresden, if this comes back to bite me in the ass, I'm taking it out on your hide."

"We're fighting the good fight, Murph," I said.

She rolled her eyes at me, but said, "I saw the body at the airport concourse, Harry. Did you know him?"

I looked out the window, at Michael's three youngest playing in the yard, watched over by a tolerant Molly. "He was a friend. It could have been me instead."

Murphy shivered. "I'm sorry, Harry. The people who did it. Did they get away from you?"

I looked at her and said, "I got away from them. I don't think I did much more than annoy them."

"What happens when they come back?"

"I don't know," I said.

"Wrong," Murphy said. "The answer to that question is that you don't know exactly but that you will certainly call Murphy from the get-go. You get less busted up when I'm around."

"That's true." I covered her hand with mine and said, "Thanks, Murph."

"You're gonna make me puke, Dresden," she said. "Oh, so you know. Rudolph is out of SI. The assistant DA he was working for liked his toadying style."

"Rudolph the Brownnosed Reindeer," I said.

Murphy grinned. "At least he's not my problem anymore. Internal Affairs has to worry now."

"Rudolph in Internal Affairs. That can't be good."

"One monster at a time."

On the fourth day, Charity inspected my wound and told Michael that I could leave. She never actually spoke to me, which I considered an improvement over most visits. That afternoon, Michael and Sanya came in. Michael was carrying Shiro's battered old cane.

"We got the swords back," Michael said. "This is for you,"

"You'll have a better idea what to do with that than me," I told him.

"Shiro wanted you to have it," Michael said. "Oh, and you got some mail."

"I what?"

Michael offered me an envelope and the cane as a unit. I took them both, and frowned at the envelope. The lettering was in black calligraphy, and flowed beautifully across the envelope.