Nick grunted. “Investigation apprentice or the other kind?”

Fitz put on a sober face. “I’m not at liberty to say.”

“Hngh,” Nick said, nodding. “Heard he’d picked up an apprentice. You’re holding back to keep me distanced from the situation.”

“Yes.”

“And you just want the information? You don’t want me to work the field on it?”

“That’s right.”

“A wwww,” Nick said. He scratched at his ear and said, “Yeah. I guess. What else can you tell me about this guy?”

I fed Fitz his lines. “He was crazy.”

Nick snorted. “Whole hell of a lot of gangers are crazy, kid. Or the next best thing.”

“Less money-drugs-sex-violence crazy,” Fitz said. “More creepy-cult crazy.”

“Hngh,” Nick said. Lines appeared on his brow. “There’s one, where they all wear the hoodies with the hoods up all the time. Got rolling maybe three or four years back. They don’t call themselves anything, but the gangs call them the Big Hoods. No one knows much about them.”

“Perfect,” I said to Fitz. “Sounds like the assholes we’re looking for. Ask him where they’re set up.”

“A tunnel under the Eisenhower Expressway, on the south end of the Meatpacking District. The other gangs think they’re crazy to be where the cops move so freely, but the Big Hoods never seem to attract any police attention.” He scrunched up his eyes. “Don’t think they even claim any territory. That’s all I got.”

“Because they aren’t a gang, per se,” I said. “Excellent, Fitz. Let’s move.”

“Thank you,” Fitz said to Nick.

“Thank Dresden. Wouldn’t have said that much to anyone else.”

“I’ll do that.” Fitz stared intently at Nick for a moment and then said, “What do you do here?”

“As a private cop?” Nick asked. “Take some cruddy work to keep the lights on—divorces and so on. But mostly I look for lost kids.”

“Doing it a while?” Fitz asked.

“Thirty years.”

“Find any?”

“Plenty.”

“Find any in one piece?”

Nick stared hard at Fitz for a long time. Then he pointed a finger up and behind him, to the row of portraits on the wall.

“Seven?” Fitz asked.

“Seven,” Nick said.

“In thirty years? You live like this and… Seven? That’s it? That’s all?”

Nick leaned back in his chair and gave Fitz a small smile. “That’s enough.”

Outside, Fitz said, to me, “He’s crazy.”

“Yeah,” I said. “And he helps people.”

Fitz frowned and moved hurriedly back out of the Vice Lords’ domain. He was silent for several blocks, seemingly content to walk beside me and think. Eventually, he looked up and asked, “You still there?”

“Yeah.”

“All right. I helped you. Pay up.”

“Okay,” I said. “Take a right at the next corner.”

“Why?”

“So I can introduce you to someone who will help.”

Fitz made a rude sound. “You really love not telling people things, don’t you?”

“I don’t love it, so much as I’m just really good at it.”

Fitz snorted. “Does this guy drink, too?”

“Nah. Sober as a priest.”