“So what are you into?” the kid asked.

“Conversation.”

“What?”

Myron was a big guy, six four, a former collegiate basketball star. He had weighed 215 in his playing days. He was up ten pounds since then. He positioned his body so that Dog Collar couldn’t just run off. Myron didn’t know if he would use force to stop him, but he didn’t want to make it easy either.

“You were there yesterday,” Myron said.

“Huh?”

“When that . . . that incident took place. You saw it.”

“What are you . . . Wait, are you a copper?”

“No.”

“So why would an American . . . ?” His voice faded away and his eyes widened. “Oh, look, I ain’t seen nothing.”

Myron wondered whether Win had spoken and if Dog Collar was putting it together like this: An American kills three people—and another American finds the witness.

“I don’t care about that,” Myron said. “I’m looking for the boy who was there. He ran off.”

Dog Collar looked skeptical.

“Look, I’m not here to harm you or anyone else.”

He tried to show Dog Collar his most trustworthy face, but unlike the throwback street hooker, this kid had probably never seen one. People were either abusers or marks in his world.

“Pull down your trousers,” Dog Collar said.

“What?”

“That’s what we’re here for, right?”

“No, listen, I’ll pay you. I’ll pay you a lot.”

That made him pause. “For?”

“Do you know the boy who ran off?”

“And if I do?”

“I’ll pay you five hundred pounds if you bring me to him.”

The eyes started darting again. “Five hundred?”

“Yes.”

“You have that much on you?”

Uh-oh. But in for a penny, in for a . . .

“Yeah, I do.”

“So you probably have more.”

As though on cue, two guys came around the bush. One was the man in camouflage pants Myron had noticed earlier. The other guy was a big brawler type with a tourniquet-tight black T-shirt, a Cro-Magnon forehead, and arms as big as ham hocks.

The brawler was chewing tobacco like a cow with a cud and playing to type; he was actually cracking his knuckles.

“You’re going to give us all your money,” Camouflage Pants said, “or Dex here is gonna give you a pounding—and then we’ll just take it.”

Myron looked at Dex. “Are you really cracking your knuckles?”

“What?”

“I mean, I get it. You’re a tough guy. But cracking your knuckles? It’s over the top.”

That confused Dex. He frowned. Myron knew the type. Bar fighter. Takes on smaller guys. Never did battle with anyone who had any kind of skill.

Dex moved into Myron’s space. “You some kind of smart-ass?”

“How many kinds are there?”

“Oh man, oh man, oh man.” Dex actually rubbed his hands together. “I’m going to so enjoy this.”

“Don’t kill him, Dex.”

Dex smiled with tiny pointy teeth like an ocean predator circling a guppy. There was no reason to wait. Myron made his fingers into a spear, cupped his hand slightly, and, leading with the fingers, he struck Dex straight in the throat. The blow landed like a dart.