'You jiving?'

'You're a minority group member. There's agencies just waiting to lend you money.'

'What a notion,' he said.

In front of my hotel he said, 'That Colombian a.s.shole, I still can't remember his name.'

'Pedro Marquez.'

'That's him. When he registered at your hotel, is that the name he used?'

'No, it was on his ID.'

'That's what I thought. Like he was C. O. Jones and M. A. Ricone, and I wondered what dirty word he used for you.'

'He was Mr. Starudo,' I said. 'Thomas Edward Starudo.'

'T. E. Starudo? Testarudo? That a curse in Spanish?'

'Not a curse. But it's a word.'

'What's it mean?'

'Stubborn,' I said. 'Stubborn or pig-headed.'

'Well,' he said, laughing. 'Well, h.e.l.l, you can't blame him for that one, can you?'

THIRTY-FOUR.

In my room I put the two pounds of coffee on the dresser, then went and made sure n.o.body was in the bathroom. I felt silly, like an old maid looking under the bed, but I figured it would be a while before I got over it. And I wasn't carrying a gun anymore. The.32 had been impounded, of course, and the official story was that Durkin had issued it to me for my protection. He hadn't even asked how I'd really come by it. I don't suppose he cared.

I sat in my chair and looked at the place on the floor where Marquez had fallen. Some of his bloodstains remained in the rug, along with traces of the chalk marks they place around dead bodies.

I wondered if I'd be able to sleep in the room. I could always get them to change it, but I'd been here a few years now and I'd grown accustomed to it. Chance had said it suited me, and I suppose it did.

How did I feel about having killed him?

I thought it over and decided I felt fine. I didn't really know anything about the son of a b.i.t.c.h. To understand all is to forgive all, they say, and maybe if I knew his whole story I'd understand where the blood l.u.s.t came from. But I didn't have to forgive him. That was G.o.d's job not mine.

And I'd been able to squeeze the trigger. And there'd been no ricochets, no bad bounces, no bullets that went wide. Four shots, all in the chest. Good detective work, good decoy work, and good shooting at the end.

Not bad.

I went downstairs and around the corner. I walked to Armstrong's, glanced in the window, but went on walking to Fifty-eighth and around the corner and halfway down the block. I went into Joey Farrell's and stood at the bar.

Not much of a crowd. Music on the jukebox, some baritone crooner backed up with a lot of strings.

'Double Early Times,' I said. 'With water back.'

I stood there, not really thinking of anything, while the bearded barman poured the drink and drew the chaser and set them both before me. I had placed a ten dollar bill on the counter. He cracked it, brought my change.

I looked at the drink. Light danced in the rich amber fluid. I reached for it, and a soft inner voice murmured Welcome home.

I withdrew my hand. I left the drink on the bar and took a dime from my pile of change. I went to the phone and dropped the dime and dialed Jan's number.

No answer.

Fine, I thought. I'd kept my promise. Of course I might have misdialed, or the phone company might have f.u.c.ked up. Such things have been known to happen.

I put the dime back in the slot and dialed again. I let it ring a dozen times.

No answer.

Fair enough. I got my dime back and returned to the bar. My change was as I'd left it, and so were the two gla.s.ses in front of me, the bourbon and the water.

I thought, Why?

The case was finished, solved, wrapped up. The killer would never kill anyone again. I had done a whole lot of things right and felt very good about my role in the proceedings. I wasn't nervous, I wasn't anxious, I wasn't depressed. I was fine, for Christ's sake.

And there was a double shot of bourbon on the bar in front of me. I hadn't wanted a drink, I hadn't even thought of a drink, and here I was with a drink in front of me and I was going to swallow it.

Why? What the h.e.l.l was the matter with me?

If I drank the f.u.c.king drink I would end up dead or in the hospital. It might take a day or a week or a month but that was how it would play. I knew that. And I didn't want to be dead and I didn't want to go to the hospital, but here I was in a gin joint with a drink in front of me.

Because -

Because what?

Because -

I left the drink on the bar. I left my change on the bar. I got out of there.

At half past eight I walked down the flight of bas.e.m.e.nt stairs and into the meeting room at St. Paul's. I got a cup of coffee and some cookies and took a seat.

I thought, You almost drank. You're eleven days sober and you went into a bar you had no reason to be in and ordered a drink for no reason at all. You almost picked up the drink, you were that close to it, you almost blew eleven days after the way you sweated to get them. What the h.e.l.l is the matter with you?

The chairman read the preamble and introduced the speaker. I sat there and tried to listen to his story and I couldn't. My mind kept returning to the flat reality of that gla.s.s of bourbon. I hadn't wanted it, I hadn't even thought about it, and yet I'd been drawn to it like iron filings to a magnet.

I thought, My name is Matt and I think I'm going crazy.

The speaker finished what he was saying. I joined in the applause. I went to the bathroom during the break, less out of need than to avoid having to talk to anybody. I came back to the room and got yet another cup of coffee that I neither needed nor wanted. I thought about leaving the coffee and going back to my hotel. The h.e.l.l, I'd been up two days and a night without a break. Some sleep would do me more good than a meeting I couldn't pay attention to in the first place.

I kept my coffee cup and took it to my seat and sat down.

I sat there during the discussion. The words people spoke rolled over me like waves. I just sat there, unable to hear a thing.