I could feel my face getting red and I turned to look out the window.

“Hey, but it’s okay,” Lester said.

I turned and looked back at him and I read his face.

“What do you want, Sonny?”

“A piece, that’s all. We work it as a team. I go with you up to Sylmar and to court and I do all the photo work. You fill out a photo request, you put my name on it. Makes it a better package anyway. Especially for submissions.”

Meaning submissions to Pulitzer and other prize judges.

“Look,” I said, “I haven’t even told my editor about this yet. You are jumping way ahead. I don’t even know if they’ ll—”

“They’ll love it and you know it. They’re going to cut you loose to work it and they might as well cut me loose too. Who knows, maybe we both get a prize. They can’t lay you off if you bring home a Pulitzer.”

“You’re talking about the ultimate long shot, Sonny. You’re crazy. Besides that, I already got laid off. I’ve got twelve days and then I could give a shit about the Pulitzer Prize. I’m out of here.”

I saw his eyes register surprise at the news of my layoff. Then he nodded as he factored the new information into his ongoing scenario.

“Then this is the ultimate adios,” he said. “I get it. You leave ’em with a fuck-you—a story so good they gotta enter it in contests even though you’re long out the door.”

I didn’t respond. I hadn’t thought I was so easy to read. I turned back to the window. The freeway was elevated here and I could see block after block of houses crowded together. Many had blue tarps tied over their old, leaky roofs. The farther south you went in the city, the more of those tarps you saw.

“I still want in,” Lester said.

With complete access to Alonzo Winslow and his case now established, I was ready to discuss the story with my editor. By that I meant that I would officially say I was working it and my ace could put it on his futures budget. When I got back to the newsroom, I went directly over to the raft and found Prendergast at his desk. He was busily typing into his computer.

“Prendo, you got a minute?”

He didn’t even look up.

“Not right now, Jack. I got tagged with putting together the budget for the four o’clock. You got something for tomorrow besides Angela’s story?”

“No, I’m talking more long-range.”

He stopped typing and looked up at me and I realized he was confused. How long-range could a guy with twelve days left go?

“Not that long-range. We can talk later or tomorrow. Did Angela turn in the story?”

“Not yet. I think she was waiting for you to look it over. Can you go do that now and get it in? I want to get it out on the web as soon as we can.”

“I’m on it.”

“Okay, Jack.