"And you wouldn't take the bribe."

"Yeah."

"Well, that's d.a.m.ned white of you, Spenser, I must say. n.o.ble, sort of."

"You should probably try to avoid using the word 'white' as an accolade," I said.

"What? Oh h.e.l.l, Spenser, it's just a d.a.m.ned phrase. So is the Negro a body guard?"

"Not exactly," I said. "I thought it might be useful while I was with you to see if anybody was watching us. Apparently not."

"How can you tell."

"Because if there were someone, you wouldn't see Hawk."

"That's his name?"

"Uh huh. So give me an example of how you kidded these women."

"Boy, you don't give up, do you. Suzy Q got herself a good one."

"Suzy Q?"

Sterling shrugged and laughed and made his little dismissive hand motion.

"I'm glad she got a good one," he said. "She deserves it."

"You touch any of these woman?" I said.

"h.e.l.l no."

"They work for you?"

"Haven't we already gone over this ground?" Sterling said.

"I was hoping to find out something this time over," I said.

Sterling grinned at me and sipped his Chartreuse and tipped his head back in pleasure at the taste.

"They work for you?" I said.

"As I mentioned," Sterling said and took any sting out of it by grinning broadly, "these are volunteers. I directed them, in the sense that I was in charge of the whole bubble bath, but none of them was"-he made air quote marks with his fingertips-"working for me."

"So you didn't touch them. You made no s.e.xual innuendoes at them. You didn't use your position of power to create a s.e.xually hostile environment?" Sterling laughed happily.

"Whoa," he said. "A 's.e.xually hostile environment'? Holy moley."

"So why did four women suddenly get it into their heads to bring charges against you?" I said.

He got a leather cigar case out of his inside jacket pocket and opened it and offered me one. I shook my head. He took out a long dark cigar and put the case away. With a small pocket knife he trimmed the cigar, put it in his mouth, and lit it carefully, turning it slowly to get the ignition even. When it was going right, he took a big inhale, let the smoke out slowly.

"Maybe it was that time of month," Sterling said, "and they were cranky."

Again the big infectious grin to take any sting out of his words.

"Do you suppose they threatened you because they know they've got no case?"

"You figure it was the four women who sent the sluggers?" I said.

"Or her husband," Sterling said, looking at the end of his cigar, admiring the glow. "He used to be a criminal lawyer, I heard. He'd probably know somebody."

" 'Her,' meaning Jeanette Ronan," I said.

"Sure."

"Why her rather than, say, Olivia Hanson, or Marcia Albright, or Penny Putnam?"

"By golly, Miss Molly," Sterling said, "you are a detective, aren't you?"

I thought about getting up and going home. I could almost see myself standing and walking off down Newbury Street. I knew if I really could have seen myself walking away I would have looked happy. But I wasn't walking away. I was sitting here trying not to inhale the smoke that spiraled my way from his large cigar.

"How come you focused on Jeanette?" I said. "She's the one with the husband," Sterling said. "I mean, the other three are currently single, I believe."

He had described them originally, I thought, as the wives of rich husbands. I filed that for future consideration.

"These bad buys actually rough you up?" Sterling said.

"No."

"But they threatened to."

"Yes."

"And they didn't say who they were, ah, representing?"

"No."

"It's got to be Ronan."

"We'll see," I said. Sterling glanced over at Hawk across the street.

"Why doesn't he join us?" Sterling said.

"I thought you might be more at ease talking alone."

"You're a considerate pilgrim, aren't you."

"Yeah, you want to meet him?"

"Love to."

I gestured to Hawk to join us, and he walked across the street. Hawk always walked in a straight line from where he was to where he was going, and people always got out of his way. He pulled out a chair from another table, turned it around, and sat. He looked at me and shook his head once. No one was following Sterling. I introduced them.

"Good to see ya," Sterling said. "Didn't want you getting lonely over there by yourself."

Hawk looked at Sterling without expression, then looked at me.

"Lonely," he said.

"Want a libation?" Sterling said.

"Champagne be nice."

Sterling gestured at the waiter and ordered. The waiter brought Sterling another Chartreuse, me another beer, and Hawk a bottle of Perrier Jouet in an ice bucket. He poured Hawk a gla.s.s and left the bucket handy.

"Seen any bad guys sneaking around Newbury Street?"

I didn't smile, but I wanted to. Hawk was as close to conflicted as he could get. He liked Susan nearly as much as I did, and he knew we were doing this for her and he was determined to be pleasant.

"Just him," Hawk said, pointing at me with his chin.

"He a bad guy?"

"Depends," Hawk said, "if he on your side or not."

"But he's pretty dangerous?"

Hawk smiled. It was an expression of real pleasure. He did his upper cla.s.s WASP accent where he sounds a lot like James Mason.

"Brad, my man," Hawk said, "you simply have no idea."

"When I was playing football," Sterling said, and I watched Hawk's face go blank again as his attention closed down, "we had some pretty good battles..."

Hawk finished his champagne, pulled the bottle from the ice bucket, poured another gla.s.s, and drank most of it in a swallow.

chapter thirteen.

HAWK'S CURRENT GIRLFRIEND had a town house in the South End, off Clarendon Street close to the Ballet. Susan and Hawk and I were there with her, and maybe fifty of her closest friends, milling about in too little s.p.a.ce. The talk was mostly medical, because Andrea was a cardiologist and most of her friends were doctors.

"It's a natural fit," I said to Hawk. "They need patients, you supply them."

"She love me 'cause ah is sensitive," Hawk said.

"Of course she does," Susan said. "Plus your wonderful Amos and Andy accent."

"You'd prefer me to sound like an upward mobile WASP," Hawk said, sounding remarkably like an upward mobile WASP "I love you just the way you are," Susan said.

"Anyone would," Hawk said.

Andrea came over in a little red satin dress, carrying a gla.s.s of white wine.

"You wear that outfit to work," I said, "you may cause more heart attacks than you prevent."

"Is that a s.e.xist remark?" Andrea said.

"Probably," I said.

"And G.o.d bless it," she said. "Hawk, will you please come over here and meet my department head?"

"Impress him," I said to Hawk. "Go with the upward mobile WASP accent."

Andrea stuck her tongue out at me and took Hawk's arm as they walked into the next room.

Susan and I hunkered down in our corner of the party and watched.

"Speaking," Susan said, "of s.e.xism. You haven't told me how things are going with Brad."

"I didn't know that you wanted me to," I said.

"I'm interested, of course."

"Okay. It's kind of a hard one to get hold of. I mean, the charge has been made, apparently the lawsuit is moving forward, but I can't get anybody to tell me what happened, exactly."

"What did you think of Brad?"

"Well, you were right, I kind of like him, but he's either deliberately evasive, or so unfocused that he can't track an idea."

"Like how?"

"I can't get a real sense of whether he hara.s.sed these women or not. He's so out of touch with the current standards of male-female propriety that he could have sinned without realizing it."

"What does his lawyer say."

"He hasn't got one."

"Isn't that a mistake, to be faced with a lawsuit and have no lawyer?"

"Certainly. But he says he doesn't want to waste money on a lawyer for a case that isn't going anywhere."

"But how can he be sure?"

"I don't know. He seems entirely unfazed by the whole deal, which seems at odds with the way he presented his situation to you."