“For what I said about your nephew, Isaac.” I pulled the ropes away and wrestled my back clear of the stove. “I’m right, aren’t I? You are Isaac’s uncle Joey?”

He nodded and helped me to stand. “The back of your coat’s scorched through,” he said. “I can’t see what your back looks like, but it can’t be too bad. Otherwise we could probably smell it.”

“There’s a comforting thought. By the way, thanks. For helping me.” I put my arm around his huge shoulder and straightened painfully.

“He’s had that coming for a long time,” said Joey.

“I’m afraid all of what I said was true. But I’m sorry you had to hear about it like that.”

Joey Deutsch shook his head. “I suspected as much,” he said. “Goerz told me different, of course, but in my guts I suppose I knew different. I wanted to believe him, for Isaac’s sake. I guess I had to hear it from someone else for it sink in.”

Erich Goerz rolled slowly onto his stomach and groaned.

“That’s quite an uppercut you’ve got on you, Joey,” I said.

“Come on. I’ll get you home.” He hesitated. “Can you stand by yourself?”

“Yes.”

Joey bent down over the unconscious driver and retrieved a set of car keys from the man’s waistcoat pocket. “We’ll take Erich’s car,” he said. “Just in case these two bastards come after us.”

Goerz groaned again and contracted, slowly, into a fetal position. For a brief second I thought he might be having some sort of convulsion until I remembered what Blask, the site foreman, had told me about the gun strapped to Goerz’s ankle. Only it wasn’t strapped to his ankle anymore. It was in his hand.

“Look out!” I yelled, and kicked Goerz in the head. I’d meant to kick his hand, but as I raised my foot I lost control and fell onto the floor again.

The pistol fired harmlessly, breaking a windowpane.

I crawled over to Goerz to look at him. I hardly wanted another man’s death on my conscience. He was unconscious, but fortunately for me, and more especially him, Erich Goerz was still breathing. I retrieved my ID card from the floor, where he had tossed it angrily a few minutes earlier, and picked up the pistol. It was a Bayard semiautomatic 6.35-millimeter.

“French cigarettes, French gun,” I said. “Makes sense, I suppose.” I made the gun safe and pointed it at the door. “Anyone else out there, do you think?” I asked Joey.

“You mean, like him? No, it was just these two, the three truck drivers, and, I’m sorry to say, me. After Isaac got killed, they took me on the payroll. As extra muscle, they said, but I guess it was just as much about ensuring that I kept my mouth shut.”