"Hardy," he said.

"What about Hardy? Where is he?"

"He's in Acapulco. Rusty Ingraham just tried to kill him."

As he threw things in a bag, he filled her in. She draped an afghan over her and sat straight up cross-legged.

"So what does he want you to do?"

"He wants me to come down there."

"And do what?"

Abe sat on the bed, started tying a shoe. "Pick Rusty up."

"Pick Rusty up," Flo repeated. "In Acapulco? How are you going to do that?" Then, as though remembering something, "Is Dismas all right?"

"He seemed fine." He turned to his wife. "You want to call the airport and see when the next plane leaves?"

He went into the bathroom to shave. Halfway through, Flo came to the doorway. "Mexican, seven-twenty."

"Well, I've got some time. How about a little breakfast?"

"You still haven't told me how you intend to pick Rusty up."

Abe had to be careful shaving around the scar that ran through his lips. He made funny faces into the mirror, scraping away.

"That's perceptive," he said finally. He threw some water in his face, reaching blindly for a towel. Flo picked it from the rack and put it into his hands. "And the reason is, I don't know. It will take some finesse, though."

He was back in the bedroom, taking a long-sleeved purple T-shirt from a dresser drawer. "Hardy knows me pretty well," he said. "Rusty's my collar."

"But you don't have jurisdiction down there. Why don't you just get a warrant, have him extradited?"

"On what?"

"How about murder?"

"Murder's good," Abe agreed, "except he's not wanted for murder. We could say we'd like to question him about a murder, but they wouldn't extradite for that, to say nothing of the fact that extradition takes a year on a good day. We have any chub? Cream cheese and chub on a bagel sounds good. I might even have some caffeinated tea."

"Abe."

He patted the bed next to him. When Flo sat down, he put an arm around her. "He's my collar. He's alive and tried to kill Diz-it points strongly to him killing Maxine Weir. You just said as much yourself... If he hadn't tried to kill Diz I'd say it wasn't definite. But since he did..." He shrugged. "At least, for my own peace of mind I've got to talk to him."

"Are you going to take your gun?"

"Hardy's already got one."

"In Mexico? How'd he... ?"

Abe patted her shoulder. "He's a resourceful guy, our Diz. And his having one saves me the trouble of hassling with the airlines, going through the locals for permissions, all that."

"Except that if you use it, how do you explain it?"

Abe stood up. "We're full of good questions today."

"Well?"

"Well, we'll have to think of something."

It was still dark, but Hardy heard a rooster crowing far off. He was trying to pull a sock onto his right foot and it was a tight squeeze over the bandage. The cut on the side of that foot, from ankle to little toe, was deeper, longer and uglier than anything on his arm. From the walk, the soles of both feet were raw.

He felt a little bad about his omission to Abe that he didn't have a real idea of where Rusty might be. At dinner, Rusty had bragged about his beachfront place five miles north of the city. So Hardy thought he'd drive on up the road looking for that telltale Volkswagen. Of course, he knew it could be in a carport, a garage, off the road, whatever. Well, then he would go back to the jai alai stadium. If Rusty thought he was dead, he'd probably just go back to his habits. If...

One sock on, he stopped.

He considered calling Abe back. Never mind. I'll go to the Mexican police and report my attempted murder. File charges. Let them look. Fuck it.

But, he realized, if he thought things had been personal before, Rusty had upped the ante by about a thousand. He wanted to take him, wanted to get him for what had started this whole thing, not just for the legalities. Abe deserved his chance, too, what with running around after Ray Weir and Johnny LaGuardia and Hector Medina and Louis Baker. Let's get the posse together, saddle up and kick some ass. He had told Abe to come to the El Sol when he got in. If he had left Abe with the impression that he'd have Rusty here, trussed up and ready to roast, he figured his friend would forgive him.

He was wearing dry jeans, a pair of suddenly too small tennis shoes, an Armani long-sleeved shirt Jane had given him, probably ruined forever now with the blood seeping through the bandage he'd wrapped around his arm. Well, too bad. He smiled at himself in the cracked brownish mirror-the Miami Vice look. Very nice. He grabbed a light tan windbreaker on the way out.

His Samurai was where he'd left it, around the corner from the El Sol's office, halfway up the hill. It was a long way up the silent, dark street. He felt under the driver's side fender. Still there.

He sat in the driver's seat, feeding the bullets he had taped under the bottom of the glove compartment into the chambers. He didn't think he was going to shoot Rusty on sight, but... Playing it as though the man was just screwed up, a once-nice guy gone a little bad had nearly cost him his life tonight and he wasn't about to let it happen again.

The sky behind him was starting to get light. He heard something drop onto the canvas roof of the car. A large dark shape appeared at the top of the windshield. Hardy knocked at it with his hand and the lizard skitted down and off the hood into the leaves on the side of the road. Hardy shivered. Get moving, he said, even if you don't know where you're going.

The ignition caught right away. Hardy slipped the Samurai into gear. Sitting still, even for a moment, sapped his energy. He thought he had probably lost a fair amount of blood, but not enough to weaken him. The fatigue must be from the hour-he'd been awake now for nearly a day, one filled with more than the usual ups and downs. But once a month or so at the Shamrock he'd pull an all-nighter talking to Moses, so he felt in shape that way.

He hoped.

At the corner he stopped, suddenly remembering that there was one other person in Acapulco who might know where Rusty lived. And he knew where to find her, though she might be a little tough to wake up.

Make that knocking go away.

There was dim light at the corners of the curtains. Dull gray light of very early morning. But he could see everything in the room. He didn't feel like he'd slept more than two hours. D.C., who definitely had been worth the stop, lay turned away from him on her side, naked and uncovered. Absently, he ran his hand along her flank. She made a sleepy, purring noise.

More knocking. He listened. Somebody was already up playing tennis-Rusty heard the rhythmic thok of the ball being hit. That must be it.

No, it was the door. Someone knocking on the door. Jesus, what time was it?

"Si?"

"Servicio, seor."

D.C. stirred. "What's that?" she asked.

"Room service."

She mumbled that they had the wrong room. Rusty tried to say 'wrong room' in Spanish but it didn't seem to take. The guy knocked again.

D.C. moaned and rolled out of the sack. "I'll just tell him." Rusty watched her walk across the room. He wondered how breasts so big could ride that high. He liked how she looked as she reached up for the chain, undoing it, opening the door a crack to tell the guy...

Stepping back away, her hands to her mouth. And before Rusty could react, Dismas Hardy was inside, the door closed behind him, pointing a gun at his head.

"Remember that thirty-eight Special I recommended you buy," he said. "I thought you'd like to see what one looked like."

Chapter Twenty-six.

*You can't shoot me."

"I can't?"

"Please God don't shoot us!" D.C. said.

Hardy grabbed the sheet that covered Rusty and threw it toward D.C. "Wrap yourself up and sit down," he said. He motioned to a chair with his head and leveled the gun at Rusty, now back up against the headboard, naked, covering himself. "I'm sorry, where were we?"

"You'll never explain the gun."

"This gun? The one you stole from me in San Francisco?"

"What's he saying?"

Both men ignored her. Hardy continued. "You mean the gun we fought over and it went off by accident? This gun?"

"They'd never believe that."

"I think they might if a San Francisco cop came down and said you were already a murderer."

"Rusty, what's he saying?"

Hardy glanced at the girl, shivering and huddled in the chair. "About four hours ago your friend Rusty here pushed me off a very high cliff."

She looked at Hardy as though he were a madman. "No. He was here all night. I remember, you both were driving in the car with me and-"

"Wrong," Hardy said. "You passed out. We went for a nightcap and Rusty tried to kill me."

She looked at Rusty. "What's he saying?"

Rusty shrugged. "Diz, give it up. What are you gonna do?"

Hardy drew it out one word at a time. "I am going to bust your ass." He cocked the gun. "I hate to be so melodramatic, but get some clothes on, Russ."

"You can't do this," D.C. said. "This is kidnapping or something. He was here. I know he was here."

Hardy kept the gun on Rusty. He moved closer and kicked the bunch of clothes that were next to the bed into the middle of the room. "You gonna need help, with your bad arm and all?"

Rusty flexed his bandaged arm, grimacing. "I'll need the sling."

"Pants first," Hardy said. He felt the pockets, checking for a weapon, then threw them onto the bed.

Ingraham was silent.

"Remember that woman-Maxine-I mentioned earlier? Last night. The friend of Rusty's, just a friend?"

She nodded.

"Rusty here killed her. He shot her three times. Close up. With a small-caliber gun. She crawled about twenty feet before she died. I bet that was a long twenty feet."

It was D.C.'s turn to be silent.

Hardy threw Rusty his shirt. "And that horrible gaff wound in his arm? You ever been on a real fishing boat, Rusty? There's no mate in the universe will use a gaff to help a human being pull up. Good basic idea, though, given short notice to come up with it. Creative." Hardy was back at D.C. "He needed something to explain the wound through his arm, since what he in fact did was shoot himself to make it look like someone had killed him. His blood all over the place. A trail of it leading to the edge of his barge, where it disappeared into the foaming brine."

"You've got it all figured, don't you?" Ingraham said.

"Yep." Hardy was curt. "Shoes," he said. He thought of his own aching feet. "Better yet, no shoes. Get up."

"Is this all true?" D.C. had pulled her feet up under her on the chair, tucking the sheet in all around.

"This is the gospel," Hardy said. "Let's go, Russ." He threw him the sling and Rusty draped it around his neck. Then he leaned over and reached for one of his shoes. Hardy took quick but careful aim and fired. In the room, the shot was a bomb blast. The pair of shoes exploded. There was a gash in the floor and plaster fell from the wall where the bullet had ricocheted up and through. Hardy smelled the cordite. D.C. screamed, then settled into a quiet sobbing.

"Jesus, Hardy. You're crazy."

"No, but I am a little pissed off. No shoes."

He went to the door, opening it, pointing the gun at Rusty. "We'd better move. I imagine that woke up some of the neighbors." He clucked, looking at D.C. "Horrible the way these Mexican kids will just go shooting off barrel bombs at all hours. Right? You understand?"

The girl, terrified, nodded. Hardy said he hoped so.

Rusty was at the door. Hardy looked back in at D.C. "This is really happening," he said. "And what I want you to do now is sit in that chair until you've counted very slow to three hundred. Don't open the door for anybody. Don't make any noise. Don't do anything. Do you understand?"

She nodded again and Hardy closed the door. Other doors around the complex were opening. Hardy kept the gun out of sight under his windbreaker. He was grinning.

"This is fun, isn't it? Now we're going to walk briskly to that car next to yours, looks like a Jeep, and get in and drive away into the sunrise. Is the plan clear? Because if it's not, a mistake could happen."