I stuck the gun in the back of my jeans and went downstairs. Sure enough, Robbie Baladine was standing, by himself, on the other side of the door. His plump cheeks were dirt–stained, and he looked exhausted. I opened the front door at the same time that Mr. Contreras came into the hallway with Mitch and Peppy: he probably thought Morrell was paying another late–night call.

When the dogs bounded forward to greet him, Robbie stood stock still and turned white. Yelling at the dogs to stay, I caught the boy as he started to crumple. I caught him before he hit the floor. His deadweight hit my low back and hamstrings like a pile driver.

“Put the dogs inside, will you?” I panted to Mr. Contreras. “And let’s get this young man warm.”

Robbie hadn’t quite fainted. While my neighbor dragged the reluctant dogs back to his apartment, I helped Robbie to the bottom of the stairwell and made him sit with his head between his legs. He was shaking with suppressed sobs. His skin was clammy, his sweat acrid with the smell of fear.

“I’m such a weakling, aren’t I, fainting at the sight of a dog,” he gasped.

“Is that what happened? Mitch is a pretty big dog, and he took you by surprise. And you look done in. Don’t worry about it.”

Mr. Contreras returned with an old sweater and helped me wrap it around Robbie’s shoulders. “This a friend of yours, doll? He needs hot cocoa. You stay here with him; I’ll heat up some milk.”

The door opposite Mr. Contreras’s opened and the woman making the important presentation stormed out in sweat clothes. “Did you buy this stairwell to use as your living room?” she demanded. “If not, could you entertain upstairs so that people like me who work for a living can get some rest?”

Behind Mr. Contreras’s door, Mitch took exception to our neighbor’s hostility and let out a sharp bark.

“Think you can manage the stairs?” I said to Robbie. “If this woman gets any more excited she’ll have a stroke, and then we’ll be up all night carting her to the hospital and you’ll never be able to tell me why you came or how you got here.”

“I’m only asking you to show some consideration,” the woman said.

I didn’t think Robbie needed the added stress of me getting into a fight, so I bit back the various remarks that sprang to mind and concentrated on helping him up the stairs. When I turned my back on her, the woman gasped and ran back inside her apartment. It was only when we reached the second landing that I realized she must have seen my gun. I laughed a little to myself: that might be the last time she pissed to me about noise in the building.