Bart seemed to mull something over. He pulled out a small leather-bound notebook and pen and scrawled something onto a clean page. "This ain't much..."

He tore the page from the book and handed it to me. A name and phone number. "Like I said, it ain't much. An MP."

I groaned. "You know how many missing persons in this city are never found?"

"This broad has been driving us crazy. Missing husband, and we're nowhere. This lady won't take 'we don't know' for an answer."

"I'm not licensed."

"She won't care. She wants someone good. And she's got dough." He paused, looking torn. For a moment I thought he was going to tell me to forget it. Something was eating him. Why would he be conflicted over throwing me this meager bone?

"She's big league, Paul," he said. "Handle her right, and you could be set until..."

"Until I'm too young to drive," I said, folding the paper away. "Thanks."

"You ever want that P.I. license, I got friends in Albany."

"Let's see how this one goes first."

"You need a couple simoleons?"

I smiled a no and stood. Nothing more to say.

"Take care, Bart," I said.

I started for the door.

"Donner."

I turned.

"You meant what you said, right?" asked Bart. "About not coming around here again?"

It's amazing. There's always a new level of pain.

9.

DONNER.

The next morning, I rolled my neck, trying to work out the pounding in my head.

After my oh-so touching reunion with Bart, I'd spent the night drinking. And looking at the slip of paper he'd given me. I couldn't figure out if he'd thrown me a lifeline or a quick brush off.

I called for Maggie, but there was no response. I sat up and the world did a dipsy-doodle. I rushed for the john and almost made it. Afterward, I stared at the dead cigarettes, the empty bottles, the phone number I couldn't work up enough courage or enthusiasm to call.

A boozer cop. Jesus, what a cliche.

The Venetian blinds sliced the sunlight into neat lines on the hardwood floor. Outside, antique horns ah-oo-gahed and people laughed and life... Life went on.

The question was, could I? I hated this new existence. I was a blind man who'd been escorted into a strange room and left to grope for himself. I couldn't get my head around what was in store for me-growing younger, a young man, a teen, eventually being too young to care for myself, living in some reborn child care center with a child's body but an adult's mind, finally devolving into infancy. I'd feel my wits and memory fade as the neural pathways melted away to nothingness. It brought a thunder cloud down on me, blotting out light and air.

Lots of reborn suicides, Maggie had said. I could find a gun. The tried-and-true office-in-blue method. What point was there to sticking around?

Only one.

Still one thing I wanted. It was ugly, but I couldn't shake it.

My blue rose. Whoever had killed her might still be out there, walking those streets. If he'd been young, or had used the juvie centers, he could still be alive. He'd be an old man, but he could still be alive. I still had a chance to...

To make him pay. To make him hurt. To make him beg for his life.

Then to make him beg for his death.

Then to grant him his wish.

That was it, then. The rest I could put on hold. When I'd sent this scumbag to the hell I hoped existed, only then it would be time to decide whether to follow him or not.

I took a walk through Prospect Park and tried to plan my moves. Got nowhere. I was the only reeb in sight. A young couple who'd been making out on a bench saw me, shuddered and fled. Fifteen steps later a stone hit my shoulder, thrown from teens who'd interrupted their pick-up game of hoops to hate me. They gave me the dead eye treatment. I sent it back half-heartedly. I had no stomach for anything more.

The cold air cleared my head a little, at least.

When I returned to the apartment, a stranger was waiting for me in my living room.

She sat in a corner in a cloud of blue cigarette smoke.

"Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Donner."

I shut the door, glancing at the lock. No scratches. Unjimmied. I looked around.

"How'd you get in here?"

"Your VP let me in. I told her you were expecting me."

"I was?"

"Mr. Hennessy referred my case to you, I believe?"

The missing persons gig. Shit. The last thing I felt like doing was babysitting some trophy wife whose hubby had run off with the maid. I'd make quick work of her.

"She shouldn't have let you in."

"Don't worry, I didn't steal anything." She gave the room a look of distaste. The destroyed furniture, the smashed pictures. Somehow, she'd managed to find an intact chair. "Termite problem?"

I shrugged my overcoat off. "You'll have to make an appointment, Miss... ?"

She came to her feet with a supple and dangerous grace, like a panther. As she moved into the light, I saw that her face was obscured by a hat and a veil. She wore a charcoal dirndl with a tight bodice and low neck, tailored to accentuate her waistline and curving hips, and to broaden her shoulders to well, pretty much perfection.

She offered me a gloved hand. "Nicole Struldbrug."

"What's with the veil, Ms. Struldbrug? In mourning?"

She raised the wisp of black lace. She was gorgeous, of course. Chiseled features, dark skin, pouty mouth. Mickey Spillane's wet dream.

"Better?" The hint of a smile played across her lips.

I shook my head. "Beautiful women make me nervous."

"Now why don't I believe that?"

She settled back into her seat, and the way she did it set off my alarms again-wiggling her tush slightly, as though trying to get comfortable. This woman had been wrapping men around her finger since puberty.

"Maggie let you in?" I repeated. I looked around.

She nodded. "Is she your girlfriend?"

"What?"

"Are you two keeping company?"

"Is that a joke?"

"Some people go for that kind of thing."

"She's... my assistant."

"Quite a rude one." She took a drag on her smoke.

"I'm surprised she didn't call the cops when you lit that cigarette," I said.

"What times we live in." A sigh. "The next thing you know, sex will be illegal, too."

"That would be a shame."

"Wouldn't it, though?"

I leaned against the wall. "How can I help you, Ms. Struldbrug?"

"I want you to find my husband."

"So much for the sex."

"My, you're easily stalled."

"An old-fashioned model, I guess."

"Maybe you just need a lube job."

"Whoa, hit the brakes."

"Poo." She drew on her cigarette, amused.

I went to the bar, grateful to end the double entendre marathon. "Drink?" I dropped ice into a glass.

"Bruichladdich, neat, if you have it."

Another alarm. The only bottle I had left was a fifth of Bruichladdich I'd been saving.

I prepared the drinks. "A fan of single malt, are you?"

"It's the Hebridean spring water," she replied.

She'd tossed the place while I was gone. It was either to avoid embarrassing me by asking for something I didn't have, or to sell herself as a kindred spirit because we liked the same Scottish whiskey. Either way, it was way too calculating. "This husband. Dead, alive, or reborn?"

"Alive, I pray. But missing."

I returned with the glasses.

"His last name is Crandall. I kept my own."

Nicole seemed to remember something then, because she began rummaging through a small purse. I sipped my drink. The scotch brought instant relief. I heard Elise's voice, saying, not a good sign.

Nicole, meanwhile, was pulling various items from her handbag and dropping them in her lap. A compact, a leather wallet, a .25 caliber handgun- I didn't react outwardly. Whatever game she was playing, shooting me wasn't part of it. She could have done that when I walked through the door. She withdrew a data pebble and a black plastic tube and handed them out to me.

I nodded at the pistol. "Mind checking the safety on that thing?"

"Please. It's almost a toy. A 'dame's gun,' as you cops would say."

"I'm not a cop. And I never said 'dame' in my life. And for your information, that 'toy' is real enough to kill." I thought about the holes that used to be in my chest.

She wiggled her hand impatiently. I took the items.

"A few of Morris's hairs are in the tube, for DNA tracing. The pebble has background data, plus your fee. $20,000."

I managed to keep my eyebrows from blasting off my face.

"Don't pretend you don't need it, shamus," she said coolly. "I know how hard things can be for someone re-entering society."

"The money's welcome," I said. "But a smart person would've headed straight for one of those fancy, established outfits. The kind with three names on the letterhead."