“No,” Eggers said, pulling a thick envelope from an inside pocket and handing it to Stone. “It’s a job for an attorney. This is the form of consent to the sale; I wrote it myself. His great-great-grandfather’s will requires that it be explained to him by an attorney and that he be given an opportunity to engage a lawyer of his own to review it. If he chooses not to have it reviewed, there’s a second document to be signed, waiving that right.”

“If you can get this done for me, Stone,” Keating said, “I’m prepared to be generous.”

“What sort of time frame are we talking about?” Stone asked.

“A week, give or take,” Eggers said.

“And that postcard is the only reason to think he’s in Key West?”

Stone asked.

Keating shrugged. “He could be anywhere.”

“I’ll leave tomorrow morning,” Stone said, glancing through the restaurant’s front window. “Weather permitting.”

2

2

EGGERS AND KEATING had just left when Dino Bacchetti, Stone’s former partner in his days on the NYPD, walked into Elaine’s, shucking off and shaking his overcoat. Dino was still on the force, a lieutenant now running the detective squad at the 19th, the Upper East Side precinct.

“It’s coming down out there,” Dino said, hanging up his coat and taking a seat, while making drinking motions at a waiter, who was already in gear. He stopped and looked at Stone. “You look like you’ve just been dumped again.”

“Again? What’s that supposed to mean?” Stone asked.

“Well, you’re always getting dumped,” Dino said.

“I have to go to Key West tomorrow; you want to come along?”

“What about this weather?” Dino asked.

“The snowstorm is supposed to pass off the coast early in the morning, followed by clear weather.”

“Yeah,” Dino said, “I’d like to take a trip to Key West in the dead of winter, and I’ve got some time off coming.”

“You’re on,” Stone said, sipping his drink and reaching for a menu.

Elaine got up from a nearby table, walked over and sat down.

“So,” she said, “Tati dumped you?”

“I knew it,” Dino chimed in.

“We had a conversation,” Stone said.

“It looked to me like she was doing all the talking,” Elaine pointed out.

“All right, all right; she’s taking her husband back.”

“That ass?” Dino said, incredulous. “He’s a drunk, and he beat her.”

“She says he’s been sober for ninety-one days, and he’s a changed man.”

Elaine spoke up. “When they have to count the days, they haven’t changed yet. Sounds like he’s in AA, though, and that can’t be a bad thing.”

“Forgive me if I view anything that would get him back into her house as a bad thing,” Stone said.

“Don’t worry,” Dino said. “You haven’t heard the last of her.”