I lay back on the floor. I’d become a non–grata person since talking to Frank Siekevitz in the Trianon’s security department last week. Had Lacey put me on her index, or had Alex Fisher done it for her? I sat up and redialed the hotel and asked for Siekevitz.

“Vicki!” He was embarrassed. “I’m sorry, but the lady doesn’t want to talk to you. She put it in writing.”

“She did, Frank? Or did the studio?”

“That I can’t tell you. But you don’t want to go bothering her if the studio wants you to stay away, do you?”

“Actually, I do. I need to talk to her about something pretty important.”

“Nothing’s that important, Vicki, believe me.”

“So it was the studio.”

He gave an uncomfortable laugh and hung up gracelessly. I wanted to limp to the Trianon as fast as my trembling hamstrings would carry me, but Mary Louise’s comments haunted me. What would running to the hotel do for me, anyway? Frank would stiff me harder in person, because the giants, as Mary Louise had called them, had left nothing to chance. They had threatened him or cajoled him.

The giants knew our strengths and weaknesses. I’d realized that Saturday night: they knew I would rise to the bait, that I’d be daring without exercising judgment. Joan of Arc, Lotty’d called me. What no one around me would believe was that I really didn’t want to lift the siege of Orleans. I wanted to keep on doing nice little investigations for Continental United until I made enough money to fund my Money Purchase Pension Plan and bought me a little house in Umbria, where I’d make Orvieto Classico and raise golden retrievers.

In frustration, I turned on the television, looking for news, fearing actually to hear news about Frenada. The Global channel had local coverage at four. It was the usual tabloid stew of sex and violence: an overturned truck on the tollway with flames and car wreckage, Mrs. Muffet and Mr. Tuffet exclaiming that they heard the explosion, they thought my God it’s World War III. Nothing on Frenada—or me, thank goodness.

When the ads started I turned off the sound, but after a truck climbed the Grand Canyon and a cleanser removed oily stains from a white blouse, a map flashed on the screen, showing a dotted line connecting Mexico and Chicago. Then Murray’s face loomed over it. I hastily switched on the sound but heard only, “Tuesday night at nine. Chicago’s hottest news, from the inside out, with Murray Ryerson.”