Reuben came awake at five o'clock. Eyes wide, he oriented himself: spread-eagled on a short single bed in a small, shabby hotel room. His nighttime thrashings had pulled the upper sheet and blankets loose and he was only half covered.

Sitting on the side of the bed, he put on his ballpackers (that's what his father always called jockey briefs) and a T-shirt and his pants. Then he pulled the curtains on the narrow window and stood in front of it, looking out at the predawn light coming up over the city. Gray buildings, old brick and stone darkened by last night's sleet and snow; orange streetlights casting lonely spots on wet pavement; a single ancient Toyota truck driving through slush below the window and slowly cornering past an abandoned and boarded-up storefront.

Reuben showered, put on his new suit, and was out of the hotel by five-thirty. He had paid his room tab the night before. He stood shivering for a moment by the abandoned storefront, listening to the network, getting his final directions. The old Toyota came down the street again and pulled to the curb in front of him. A man just a few years older than Reuben, dressed in overalls and a baseball cap, sat behind the wheel. "Need a lift?" he asked, reaching over to open the opposite door. Heat poured from the cab. "You're heading down to the Toland Brothers Excursion Terminal. You're the second I've picked up this morning."

Reuben slid into the passenger side and smiled at the. driver. "Awful early to be out driving," he said. "I appreciate this."

"Hey, it's in a good cause," the man said. His gaze lingered on Reuben's face. He did not appear happy that his passenger was black. "That's what I'm being told, anyway."

They took East Ninth Street to the Municipal Pier. The driver let Reuben out and drove away without saying another word.

Dawn was something more than a promise as he walked along the pier and approached the heavy iron bars and gate beneath the giant painted TOLAND BROS. sign. A plump, grizzled man of something less than seventy years and more than sixty stood behind the gate with a flashlight in hand, waggling a cigar between his teeth. He saw Reuben but did not move until the young man was less than two yards away. Then he pushed off from the bars next to the closed gate and shined his flashlight on Reuben's face.

"What can I do for you?" he asked sharply. The cigar was soggy and unlighted.

"I'm here for the morning excursion," Reuben said.

"Excursion? To where?"

Reuben stretched out an arm and pointed vaguely at. Lake Erie. The man scrutinized him for several long moments in the flashlight beam, then lowered the lens and called out, "Donovan!"

Donovan, a short, clean-cut fellow in a cream-colored suit, about as old as the plump man but far better preserved, came out of a shed near the office.