Everett stayed quiet. They passed Bonney’s, which had a new enameled-metal front, covering four stories of aged gray stone. More and more of the stores were going for new fronts, but the ornate wooden eaves remained, the overhead wires, and the trolley tracks, to show the age of the town. The cab rocked again in the wind, and the suspended traffic lights swung. Leland blinked; he was still working the sleep out of his body.

Chapter Two

CHAPTER TWO

Past the Senapee Theater and then, down Clark Street, the Gem. At the six-way intersection of Senapee, Otis, and Broadway there were three hotels, a restaurant, two coffee shops, two more movie houses, a second-floor ballroom, a new caffè espresso, and three storefront strip clubs. Leland’s office was on the next block, over a furniture store, a loan office, and a law partnership.

“I hope you’re wrong about that little girl,” Everett said.

Leland didn’t answer. There was no question about what Everett was aiming for. Everett made the U-turn over the trolley tracks and braked the taxi smartly before the building entrance. Leland opened the door and handed a dollar over the top of the front seat. Everett didn’t take it right away. He looked troubled. Leland was going to wait him out.

“Listen, how does a fellow do it? I mean, how does he get in a little girl? They aren’t developed or anything.”

“Well, Everett, the one I saw was ripped open, back to front, skin, muscle, cartilage and bone, the same way a butcher dresses a turkey.” Leland pushed the dollar toward him.

Everett took the dollar and tucked it into the breast pocket of his jacket. He looked back at Leland unhappily. “Will I see you tomorrow?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know what I’ll be doing.”

“Listen, I’m sorry. Are you sore at me?”

Leland patted his arm. “No, no. Don’t be silly.” He got out; he couldn’t wait for a response. He hadn’t lied about his plans and he wasn’t angry. As he headed into the building he had to wonder how Everett abided the emotional scramble in which he hoped for Mary Shoftel and at the same time tried to wring a vicarious excitement out of the worst that could happen to her. The question had been phrased in the abstract, which was supposed to make it different, but he had been too nervous to pose as a man on the search for knowledge. Leland had told him that the girls were unconscious or dead and he had known that they were not developed. It did not take much to put them together and see it for the atrocity it was. Everett had not wanted to give up. Leland could not hold his hand like a child’s. If Everett was going to worry about the dollar a day as well, then it ceased to be Leland’s business.