“Marquez is dead, and Calderón disappeared, and Ruby’s in San Francisco. And the question is where’s Chance, and the answer is I don’t know. Where I think I am is out of business.”

“The girls are all right.”

“So you said.”

“Mary Lou isn’t going to be turning tricks anymore. She’s glad she did it, she learned a lot from it, but she’s ready for a new stage in her life.”

“Yeah, well, I called that one. Didn’t I tell you after the funeral?”

I nodded. “And Donna thinks she can get a foundation grant, and she can earn money through readings and workshops. She says she’s reached a point where selling herself is starting to undermine her poetry.”

“She’s pretty talented, Donna. Be good if she could make it on her poetry. You say she’s getting a grant?”

“She thinks she’s got a shot at it.”

He grinned. “Aren’t you gonna tell me the rest of it? Little Fran just got a Hollywood contract and she’s gonna be the next Goldie Hawn.”

“Maybe tomorrow,” I said. “For now she just wants to live in the Village and stay stoned and entertain nice men from Wall Street.”

“So I still got Fran.”

“That’s right.”

He’d been pacing the floor. Now he dropped onto the hassock again. “Be a cinch to get five, six more of them,” he said. “You don’t know how easy it is. Easiest thing in the world.”

“You told me that once before.”

“It’s the truth, man. So many women just waiting to be told what to do with their damn lives. I could walk out of here and have me a full string in no more than a week’s time.” He shook his head ruefully. “Except for one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“I don’t think I can do that anymore.” He stood up again. “Damn, I been a good pimp! And I liked it. I tailored a life for myself and it fit me like my own skin. And you know what I went and did?”

“What?”

“I outgrew it.”

“It happens.”

“Some spic goes crazy with a blade and I’m out of business. You know something? It would have happened anyway, wouldn’t it?”

“Sooner or later.” Just as I’d have left the police force even if a bullet of mine hadn’t killed Estrellita Rivera. “Lives change,” I said. “It doesn’t seem to do much good to fight it.”

“What am I gonna do?”

“Whatever you want.”

“Like what?”

“You could go back to school.”

He laughed. “And study art history? Shit, I don’t want to do that. Sit in classrooms again? It was bullshit then, I went into the fuckin’ army to get away from it. You know what I thought about the other night?”

“What?”