Stone reached into a desk drawer, extracted his Colt Government .380, and handed it to Fred. “You can borrow this, until yours comes back.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“You handled yourself well, as always, shooting to wound.”

“Things would have got a lot messier if I’d killed the bloke. Have the coppers ID’d him yet?”

“One Irving Schwartz, ex-con. They missed him by ten minutes at the Lenox Hill ER.”

“Did they get the bullet?”

“Good question. I’ll ask.”

“I take it you’re not leaving for Santa Fe today.”

“Right, but we’d like to drive away at eight tomorrow morning.”

“I’ll have the car ready. Any other passengers, besides Ms. Barker?”

“No, the Bacchettis are coming, but the City of New York is providing them with transport.”

“Righto. See you tomorrow, unless you need me tonight.”

“I think we’ll dine in.”

“I rehung the pictures in the living room,” he said.

“Thank you.”

Fred excused himself and left.

54

CURLY WAS WATCHING an old movie on TV when the house phone rang, and he picked it up.

“Yeah?”

“Curly, it’s Chico.” Chico was the building superintendent.

“Yeah, Chico.”

“You gave me a hundred to tell you if the cops visited.”

“Yeah.”

“They’re on the way up, two detectives.”

Curly’s entire system went into flight mode. He grabbed a backpack containing his passport, some money, and a couple of extra false IDs, stuffed his laptop into it, opened a window, and stepped out onto the fire escape, being careful to close the window behind him. As he started up the stairs, he heard banging on his door and shouting. He ran faster. It was only two flights to the roof, and he was already there when he heard the window in his apartment open. A man shouted, “Nothing out here.”

“Head for the roof,” another voice yelled, and Curly got a running start and made the eight-foot leap to the next building. He had already measured the distance during his planning for escape. He ducked behind the stairwell entrance to the next roof and pressed his body against the door. There was too much unobstructed distance to the next building to run for it without being seen.

“Go on,” one of them shouted to the other, “go for it!”

“Are you out of your fucking mind? I’m not going to get myself killed just to bag some burglar. You do it.”

“Aw, come on, we’ll go next door and take the elevator.”

Curly waited for a slow count of ten, then sprinted across the roof and jumped the parapet to the next building. He was three buildings down the street before he saw the two cops emerge onto the roof next to his own.