They were walking through a dim part of the street when Sachs felt something brush her thigh, twice, and she wondered for a moment if the retiree was coming on to her. Glancing down, though, she saw a folded piece of paper that he was subtly passing to her.

She took it and when they were under a streetlight, she looked it over.

The sheet was a photocopy of a page from a binder or book.

Snyder leaned close, whispered, “This’s a page from the file log. At the One Three One.”

She looked it over. In the middle was an entry:

File Number: 3453496, Sarkowski, Frank

Subject: Homicide

Sent to: 158 Precinct.

Requested by:

Date Sent: November 28.

Date Returned:

“The patrolman I’m working with,” Sachs said, “said there was no reference in the log to it’s being checked out.”

“He must’ve only looked in the computer. I looked there too. It probably was entered but then it got erased. This is the manual backup.”

“Why’d it go to the One Five Eight?”

“Don’t know. There’s no reason for it to’ve.”

“Where’d you get this?”

“A friend found it. Cop I worked with. Stand-up guy. Already forgot I asked.”

“Where would it’ve gone in the One Five Eight? The file room?”

Snyder shrugged. “No idea.”

“I’ll check it out.”

He clapped his hands together. “Fucking cold.” He looked behind them. Sachs did too. Was that a black car pausing at the intersection?

Snyder stopped walking. He nodded toward a run-down storefront. Flannagan’s Pool and Billiards. Est. 1954. “Where I’m going.”

“Thanks again,” she told him.

Snyder looked inside then glanced at his watch. He said to Sachs, “Not many of these old places left in Times Square. . . . I used to work the Deuce. You know—”

“Forty-second Street. I walked it too.” She looked back again toward Eighth Avenue. The black car was gone.

He was staring into the pool hall, speaking softly. “I remember the summers most. Some of those August days. Even the gangbangers and chain snatchers were home, it was so hot. I remember the restaurants and bars and movie theaters. Some of ’em had these signs up, I guess from the forties or fifties, saying they were air conditioned. Funny, a place that advertised they had air-conditioning to get people inside. Pretty different nowadays, huh? . . . Times sure change.” Snyder pulled open the door and stepped into the smoky room. “Times sure as hell change.”

Chapter 19

Their new car was a Buick LeSabre.

“Where’d you get it?” Vincent asked Duncan as he climbed into the passenger seat. The car sat idling at the curb in front of the church.

“The Lower East Side.” Duncan glanced at him.

“Nobody saw you?”

“The owner did. Briefly. But he’s not going to be saying anything.” He tapped his pocket, where the pistol rested. Duncan nodded toward the corner where he’d slashed the student to death earlier. “Any police around?”