“This is easy. I was telling John how I used to eat lunch in the school yard at Junior High School 125 in Queens, for twenty-three cents—fifteen cents for the sandwich, eight cents for the soda—how I could remember the taste of the sandwich and washing it down with a twelve-ounce Pepsi because Pepsi was the most for the money. This was before John was born. He wanted to try it. Because we’re different generations and like each other, we’ve made a point of trying to understand where we’re coming from. Anyway, it was a very cold day, too cold for that kind of food. Octavio was waiting at the checkout, which surprised me. He really should have been at home. Guys like him—junkies—always feel the cold worse than the rest of us. I had nothing to say to him, but he followed us back into the store. He wanted to bullshit. I asked him what he knew about the rapist who’s been working the neighborhood for the past year. He said that the guy was probably coming in from outside, meaning Octavio didn’t know squat.”

“That rapist is still running around, isn’t he?”

“Yeah. He’s not out of control, either. Figuring the rapes we don’t hear about, he hits about once every six weeks or so.”

Levine sighed. “Well, here’s the reason we called you down: Octavio Lopez shot and killed Jack Brennan in a room up in the Waldorf Towers at five o’clock this afternoon. He also shot and killed one Jane Milburn, twenty-seven years old, a researcher for Time magazine. The victims were in bed together. Brennan was due downstairs in the main ballroom at eight-thirty for a thousand-dollar-a-plate dinner. He was shaving it close, don’t you think?”

Devlin wanted a cigarette. There had been a minor news item about Jack Brennan on the radio tonight, but Devlin’s mind suddenly couldn’t get past the butt in his jacket pocket, and when he brought it to his lips, his hand was shaking. Levine’s eyes were on him. Take a good look, Devlin thought. He got the cigarette lit and took a long, deep drag. What he really wanted, he knew, was a drink—but that was normal for him, even at this late date. He’d settle for coffee. He was just as well off with nothing at all, he told himself. He continued to resist a flood of thoughts about the Brennans, about Maryellen, about her father in a wheelchair the past seven years, about Octavio Lopez—Octavio Lopez? Devlin said, “On the radio I heard that Jack missed the dinner because of a stomach upset.”