She went to the Strand, a musty used-book store with scuffed wooden floors and shelves and crates packed with books. She found used editions of Miriam and Dangling in rough condition—hardcover without slipcovers.

She asked a clerk for The Rudies.

“Can’t keep it in hardcover,” he said. His nose was pierced in five places. “We don’t get many and when we do they don’t last. Try paperback.”

She squeezed past the crowd milling around the art books table and went to the paperbacks.

“Rudies? We had one today but I think it might be gone. See that trough of books over there? Dig somewhere in there.”

She found the book after a difficult search. It was a thick volume, with a porkpie hat and a .38 Special on the cover. She began to read it on the train platform. The gangland epic engrossed her so much that she was almost home before she realized that she was headed in the wrong direction. There was simply no point in returning to her office.

She called in sick and continued reading and taking notes until three A.M., by which time she was sure she wanted to do it. There was an honesty to the writing and an eye for detail that she found compelling. She began to find the author fascinating. What did he look like? All she knew of him was his blurb. So he was Jamaican and had won a Somerset Maugham and a David Higham, two outstanding awards.

Fuck, she would have to lie to get the time off.

She called Diego.

“Hello?”

She didn’t answer.

“Hello?… Hello? Hello?”

She tried to say something.

“Who the fuck is it? Okay I’m jacking off too, maricón. I’m wearing lace lingerie and I have an ass that’s big like Brooklyn—”

“Hi, Diego, how are you? It’s me.” She sighed heavily.

“Heavy breathing. I knew it had to be some pervert calling me this early in the morning. Lemme go on … I got an ass that’s big like Brooklyn but I wish it was as big as Sylvia Lucas’s ego, because it took her so fucking long, after all the shit we been through, to call me, not to say sorry, but just to say, ‘Motherfucker, how you doing?’ ”

“I’m sorry, Diego,” she whispered. She didn’t want her voice to crack.

“I love you, mi hija.”

“I love you too, Diego. I miss you. I’m sorry about everything.”

“It’s okay. We’re all allowed three stupid things in life. That was one. Getting engaged to Lou-Lou was the second—don’t ask how I know. And if you’re calling to tell me you’re not gonna take the assignment, that’ll be the third. I worked hard to hook you up. I even licked Jane Smith’s lily and I’m allergic to flowers. Come on, fuck it. What’re you worried about? Umbra? Fuckem. What’ve they done for you lately, Janet Jackson? Tell them a relative died in Jamaica. They’ll give you the time. Whose gonna question a death in the family?”