"And I told you I was in Orlando with my wife and kids," I went on. "When you came into my room you didn't look around for anyone else. You didn't ask where my wife and kids were."

"I was...I didn't know what I was doing."

"You did know," I said. "You knew."

I turned to her husband.

"There was a little girl in that Laundromat," I told him. "She was standing a few feet away from me. Her name is Alaska Dreamer. She's got a toy monster with a big eye that lights up. She could have been killed."

Janice Severtson's eyes looked at her unfinished omelet.

"Wait, I don't get anything if Stark committed suicide," Kenneth Severtson said.

"No, but you do when your wife admits to killing him to protect your daughter from being molested. You set me up, Severtson. You both did. Stark didn't seduce your wife. She seduced him. He never touched your kids, did he?"

Neither of them answered this time.

"How long were you going to wait before Janice supposedly got conscience-stricken and called the Orlando police? Monday? Then they'd call me and you'd tell me to tell the truth. It wouldn't take much of a lawyer to get her to walk, but you can afford a good lawyer now."

"But why kill you?" he asked. "You're our witness."

"You found out I had checked on your business and Stark's insurance. It wasn't hard. You just called your office and they told you about my coming there. Once I knew about the insurance and your getting control of the business, you'd be better off without me testifying to anything. Maybe you even wondered how long it would take me to ask myself who your wife had called at three in the morning from Orlando and she'd remember that she hadn't asked about the family I supposedly had on vacation. In fact, you couldn't afford to have me tell the Orlando police what I know."

"This is crazy," he said.

"You already said that twice. You didn't miss me on purpose. You're just a lousy shot. The only other person who might have wanted me dead was a man named Stanley who wouldn't have missed."

"You haven't any proof," Janice said.

"I know. That's why I wrote a letter last night and mailed it to a cop in Orlando. If I get killed now, I don't think he's going to buy your story and I don't think you'll stand a chance in h.e.l.l or on earth of collecting your money. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe a good lawyer can make me look bad on the stand. Probably can. Maybe you can get away with it. Probably not. The insurance company won't give up. They'll take you to civil court and your business is going to go to h.e.l.l fast. Great headline: *Wife Seduces and Murders Husband's Partner in Insurance Plot.'"

"You broke the law," Janice reminded me. "You advised me to say it was suicide."

"And you made the mistake of going along with it," I said. "You thought fast. You'd go along with my suicide story and then break down and tell the police you had killed Stark to protect your children."

"It was self-defense," she said, her voice shaking. "He hit me, said he was going to kill me and the children. I believed him."

Ken Severtson was shaking his head yes. That was going to be their story.

"It's got big holes, especially me, but stick with that. It's probably the best you can do.

"I think my testimony will keep me from being charged for obstruction. I may be wrong. I've got a good law firm to represent me. You know Tycinker, Oliver, and Schwartz?"

They didn't answer.

The waitress brought the bill.

"I'll take it," I said.

"Don't do this to our children," Janice pleaded.

"With parents like you? I think I'm doing it for them."

"Look, Fonesca," Severtson said, leaning toward me. "We can-"

"No," I said. "We can't."

They got up and left without another word. I hoped Janice's sister was a decent human being. I hoped she'd take Kenny Jr. and Sydney. I hoped they wouldn't wind up on the desk of Sally Porovsky or someone in her office.

"Hey, Lew," someone said, as I played with a strip of bacon.

I looked up.

Dave from the Dairy Queen sat down across from me with a mug of coffee in his hand.

"Got the kids over there," he said, nodding toward a table across the room where his two children sat across from each other, drinking large gla.s.ses of chocolate milk.

He lifted his mug.

"Nice-looking couple you were having breakfast with," he said.

"Nice-looking," I agreed.

"So, tomorrow I take the kids to Disney World."

"I was there the other day," I said.

"You?"

"Yeah."

"Have fun?" Dave asked.

"I'll never forget it," I said.

Dave smiled, glanced at his children. His eyes went moist with a vision of happy kids and magical rides and singing dwarves. Or maybe I imagined it.

I went back to my room and erased the four messages on my machine without listening to them. Then I called Ann Horowitz's answering machine at work.

I hoped she wouldn't answer on a Sat.u.r.day. She didn't. Her machine said I could leave a short message and she would get back to me quickly or I could call her emergency number if I had an emergency. I didn't have an emergency. What I had to tell her would take a while.

There was a knock at the door. I didn't want a knock on the door unless it was a special delivery from a G.o.d I no longer believed in telling me that the last three years of my life had only been a dream.

"Come in," I said.

Digger came in. He was smiling sadly. He needed a shave.

"How was last night?" I asked.

"Perfect. You should have seen me. Tripping the light fantastic. What does that mean, *tripping the light fantastic'?"

"I don't know," I said.

"Well, I did it. I charmed old ladies, didn't eat too much from the buffet if you know what I mean, and got paid in cash and asked to come back on Monday to maybe talk about teaching dance lessons part-time."

"Congratulations," I said.

"I'll try it," he said, sitting in the chair across from my desk. "But I don't know if I can handle real life."

"I know what you mean," I said.

"How was your night?" he asked.

I could have said, Digger, I saw a man shot to death, got up this morning and had breakfast with two murderers, but I said, "Fine."

"You look tired."

"I am."

"I was going to offer to buy you breakfast at Gwen's."

"Another time, Digger."

He got up to leave.

"Wait," I said. "I've got something for you."

I dug into the brown paper bag on my desk, the one from Mickey's, and came up with a b.u.t.ton. I handed it to him.

On the b.u.t.ton was a photograph of d.i.c.k Van d.y.k.e on a rooftop in Mary Poppins. In quotes above Van d.y.k.e's head were the words "Steps in Time."

Digger grinned at the b.u.t.ton and carefully pinned it to the b.u.t.tonhole on his pocket so he wouldn't make a hole in his shirt.

"I'm a working man," Digger said with a deep sigh, and left the office, closing the door quietly as he left. I hadn't slept much the night before. I pulled down the shades, climbed into bed around two, and turned on a tape of The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. I watched Walter Huston do his dance on the mountain and call Curtain and Dobbs d.a.m.ned fools for not knowing they were standing on top of gold. I watched Emilio Fernandez say, "Badges, badges, we don't need no stinkin' badges." I said it along with him.

I made it to the end of the tape and immediately fell asleep.

I had closed the door between my room and the office but I was vaguely aware that the phone rang while I slept. The second time it rang something in the dim female voice got through to me. It rang more times. I slept. Then one of the rings got through to me in the middle of a dream I lost when I opened my eyes. I checked my watch. I had slept three hours.

I staggered to the phone and played the messages back. All of them were from Detective Etienne Viviase. All of them said I should call him as soon as I got in. He left his office and cell phone number.

I tried the office. He didn't answer. I tried the cell phone.

"Yeah," he said.

"Fonesca,"

"I talk, you listen," he said. "Understand?"

"I understand."

"Kevin Hoffmann shot Stanley LaPrince last night. He told the officers who were dispatched by 911 that Stanley had killed Roberta Trasker and was about to shoot him. He also told them that you and two other people saw it all and that you had left the house with Trasker. When I got there, Hoffmann was tossing an autographed baseball in the air and watching a Yankees game. He wouldn't talk to me. He wanted his lawyer. Questions. Were you there?"

"Yes."

"Did Stanley admit he killed Roberta Trasker?"

"Hoffmann said he did. Stanley didn't deny it."

"And Stanley was going to shoot Hoffmann?"

"Looked that way," I said.

"Who were the other two witnesses?" he asked.

I didn't answer.

"McKinney?"

I didn't answer.

"Who was the black guy?"

I didn't answer.

"You took Trasker," Viviase said.

"He went with me willingly," I said. "You can ask him."

"I heard about the commission vote," he said. "I will ask him. I want you to come in and sign a statement. Today. You understand?"

"Perfectly," I said, and hung up.

The phone rang before I could take my hand from it. I picked it up and listened to the voice on the other end. Then I hung up and called Sally.

Fifteen minutes later I had parked in the emergency-room lot at Sarasota Memorial Hospital and was taken to the little room where I now sat.

Sally walked in.

"How does it look, Lew?"

She took my right hand in both of hers.

"He's going," I said. "Doctor says it's a miracle he made it through last night. Obermeyer was probably right."

We looked at William Trasker, his eyes closed, mouth open, tube in his nose, tendons in his neck blue against white skin.

"What I don't understand," I said to Sally, looking down at the dying man, "is why he asked for me."