“They’re after me,” he said urgently. “You need to help me.”

And that is the second greatest line a journalist might hear. “Who’s after you?”

“Everybody.” There was an urgency in his voice. “They all looking for me.”

“Everybody is a lot of people.” He was beginning to sound like another one of the crazies.

Then he explained, “They killed my friends. You know, in that house. In Detroit, that house there.”

I pressed the mute button, then ordered, “Cher, record.” I took a deep breath and pressed the mute button a second time. “Go slow,” I said. My heart was playing a rumba. I knew who this guy was; two men had driven from Detroit to New York to complete a drug deal. The remains of one of them had been scraped up in the tunnel. It had been assumed that the second man had died in the tunnel with him; the fact that his remains hadn’t been identified wasn’t surprising. Not after the explosions and fires.

“Look, you got to help me, man. I’m not no terrorist. It was just drugs that we was doing. That’s all. That terrorist shit, that’s fucked up.”

I had learned how to handle panic on some very distant streets. Without having to think about it, I switched into calm mode. “How can I help you?”

In a tone somewhere between desperation and frustration, the man pleaded, “I don’t know. You the reporter. Get me out of this shit.”

Elijah Amram, I remembered, that was the name. “Does anyone know where you are? Are you sure people are looking for you?”

“Fuck yeah, mon. They been crawling over my peeps. They all scared. Nobody wants a help me.”

“I know who you are,” I said, with a coolness that even surprised me. “Do you know exactly who is searching for you?”

“I tole you man, everybody. They all fucking looking for me. I gots to keep moving.”

It wasn’t much of an answer. “Okay. All right. Listen to me. I want to help you, but I need to know more. Do you know where I am?”

“Shit, yeah, you in Washington.”

“Can you get here?”

He laughed at that question, the lilting laugh of an immigrant. “I already here, mon.”

“Okay, here’s what I want you to do.” In most situations the best protection for someone with knowledge of a dangerous secret is to go as public as possible. Then it is no longer a secret. This is my advice to you: If you are privy to a potentially blockbusting secret, call a reporter immediately. In fact, call me. I still can be reached. I thought about asking Amram to come to my office, but instead I suggested we meet close by. We were still receiving the occasional threat and I didn’t want to invite someone I didn’t know into the office. After I had confirmed he was legit, I could bring him inside.

I picked that location because it was easily accessible and it fulfilled my journalistic fantasy: In homage to Woodstein and Deep Throat, we would meet in a parking garage. There was a public garage a block away from the Pro; I parked Van there when I drove to work. I told Amram to meet me on the fourth level in an hour. Among the many lessons the military had drilled into me was that before meeting someone you didn’t know, stake out the territory.