"So now I got to find Speed who is thirty-seven and could be anyplace and be anybody so what do I do? I check out his pedigree and he's from this little town in Jersey called Collingswood across the river from Philly. I figure, what the hell, we got to start someplace. The biggest little town near there is Camden. I do the cemeteries. I write down every dead kid I come across who would be thirty-five to forty if he's still kickin'. I end up with thirty-two names outa maybe half a dozen cemeteries. So I pull some strings with some people I know in Trenton and I make a run on drivers' licenses. I'm lookin' for a match-up to one of the names from the cemetery, somebody in his late thirties who just applied for a driver's license. I draw bopkes.

"Then I start dealin' with Speed himself. He likes big city action. He likes ladies. He likes to play the numbers and the ponies. And . . . a big hit, he's got diabetes. He needs a fix every now and again."

"Insulin."

"That's the ticket. I figure, maybe he went across the river, maybe he's hangin' out in Philly. So I do the same thing with drivers' licenses in Pennsylvania and whadda ya know, I get lucky. I come up with three guys, three addresses, and one of the addresses is a phony. Now I figure Speed is a guy name of George Bernhart with diabetes livin' someplace in Philly. I do the hospitals. My story is, this guy Bernhart, I never met him before, he comes by my place with a friend and he leaves his fixins. I'm afraid he needs the stuff. There's twelve hospitals in the Philly area. I get to number nine, bingo again. Now I got a George Bernhart, age thirty-eight, a diabetes freak livin' at such-and-such in Philly. I stake the place, sure enough, here comes old Speedy down the street packin' groceries. I make a phone call. Ten days, the job's old news, I'm back in Manhattan spendin' the felt. See what I mean?"

"I get your point. Sometimes it's the little things that count."

"Yeah, right. Some oddball piece of information you pick up is what dumps them. If you ever get on to this bird, find out everything you can about him. Everything. Plus I got lucky."

"You make your own luck."

"I suppose there's somethin' to that."

"What happened to old Speedy?"

"I didn't ask. See, it's not my thing. I'm a tracker, I don't do hits. I don't even pack heat, that's what muscle's all about. Now I'm in industry. I done Lucky Lootch a favor once. Wasn't for him I'd be sittin' in the pen someplace. Or maybe dead."

"What kind of favor?" Keegan asked.

"I'm sittin' in the holding pen down at the Tombs waiting for my bondsman to show up. I'm maybe twenty at the time, a small-time booster, that's all. Anyways I'm sittin' there and a couple of city dicks walk by and I hear one of them mention the name of a gambling house uptown they're about to knock over. It's a place I know is one of Lucky's. So I make a little noise about my bondsman not being there and the desk man lets me out to make another call and I ring up a guy I know knows Lucky and I tell him what's about to happen and to get the word upstairs real fast. When the cops got there, the place was dark. Not a soul on the premises. Next thing I know my charges are dismissed and Mr. Lootch offers me a spot. I had this knack for sniffing out people didn't wanna be sniffed out and he kind of cut me loose on my own. I never missed yet."

"Mr. C was right."

"Bet'cher ass. I think I'll have that steak. Medium well, a potato maybe and a bottle a ketchup."

"My steaks are all prime beef, you don't need to douse them with ketchup."

"I put ketchup on everything. I put ketchup on my Wheaties."

"Tiny, a T-bone medium well and a potato for Mr. Tangier. Bring the ketchup bottle."

"Got it," Tiny answered.

"So where do I start?" asked Keegan.

"Me? I'd start with the screwup. See, you're lookin' for something federal around the middle of '34, right. Something that happened and maybe the feds are lookin' for somebody related to that thing, whatever that thing is."

"Like what?"

"Hell, I don't know. Maybe hot cars, that's federal. Kidnapping. Smuggling. Bank robbery. Maybe somebody movin' ladies around, state to state . . ."

"He wouldn't be involved in anything like that."

"Good thinkin', Frankie. Not if he's a sleeper like you say, waitin' for somethin' to happen, his angle would be to become a needle in the haystack. So, what I'm sayin', somethin' happened that maybe he wasn't directly involved in. Somethin' would make this John Doe turn rabbit. What could that be, a guy who's missin' but the feds wanna talk to him? An eyeball to something maybe? He knew somebody somethin' happened to maybe?"

"And he couldn't afford the scrutiny. What I mean, they'd maybe turn up his cover."

"Now you're cookin'. Look, how many cases that happened during those three, four months were the feds involved in? Already you narrowed things down a lot."

"Where would you go if you were this guy?"

"Get lost out in the sticks someplace. Out in the farmland, someplace out past Chicago. Just melt in."

"How about the South?"

"People're too nosy down there."

"Would he know all this?"

"You'd know that better than me. Anyways, that's the way you do it, pal, hit and miss. Play the logic. Put yourself in his place. What would he do next? See what I mean? I can't take a hand in this, y'unnerstand, with the feds in on it and all."

"Sure."

"You got my nose up, though. I hope you make this bird."

"I'm going to make him."

"Uh huh. I think I believe you there, Frankie Kee. Just outa curiosity, how bad you really want this guy?"

"I want to make a spot on the street out of the son of a bitch."

Tangier chuckled in his icy undertone. "Well, look, you run up a blind alley, you got my number, gimme a ring."

"Thanks, Eddie."

"Sure. Where the hell's my steak, they have to kill the cow?"

At three A.M. the phone jarred him out of a deep sleep. He groped for the instrument in the dark, finally got his hand on it and answered sleepily.

"Yeah?"

"It's Eddie again."

"What time is it?"

"Who cares. Listen, I been thinking about this problem of yours. A couple more things occur to me. First, if he come from across the pond, he had to have a passport from wherever he come from. Could be somethin' there. Two, he woulda gone for his new ID quick, he wouldn't wander around with a passport lookin' in cemeteries."

"I get your point," Keegan said sleepily.

"I figure he probably hit the East Coast because he would do this fast when he got here," Tangier continued. "If I was guessing, I'd say he got the name somewhere in north Jersey or eastern Pennsylvania, outa the Manhattan area but close enough by. Then he'd want to put some distance between him and wherever he picked up his ID so my guess, you look out in the middle of the country someplace, leastways for starters. So now you're lookin' for a case happened during those three, four months somewheres out West. See what I mean, I know it ain't much but it's better'n goose eggs."

"I appreciate your help, Eddie," Keegan said.

"You wanna give this thing up, I'd say you got good reason. But I just got the impression there, talkin' to ya, this was a big thing with you."

"It is a big thing with me."

"Then don't crap it up. You can find this guy. But I think you're gonna need some help from the G-boys, looking for what screwed this bucko up back in '34. If the guy disappeared it's gotta be on the books somewheres."

"Easier said than done."

"Think about this. What would be the perfect way to disappear? So they'd stop lookin' for ya?"

Keegan lay in bed staring at the shadowy ceiling for a few seconds then it struck him.

"Dead. Hell, he'd die."

"The perfect cop-out, pal. If he faked his death it would stop right there. He's out clean, comes back later and starts over. Pull all your strings, Frankie Kee. Nothin' comes easy."

"I hear you. Thanks, Eddie."

"Keep in touch."

Keegan lay in the dark for several minutes. Pull all your strings, Tangier said.

He only had one string left to pull.

But it was a good one.

THIRTY-EIGHT.

Keegan turned off the main highway just before he got to the city limits of Princeton and drove about four miles to the tiny village of Allamuchy. It was dark and the misting rain that had plagued him all the way from New York had turned to fog. He might have missed the railroad station completely had he not been stopped a hundred yards from it by four cars blocking the road.

A tall, gaunt-faced man with his hat pulled over his eyes emerged from the fog and shined his flashlight in the car.

"Excuse me, sir, can I help you?" he said in a flat, no-nonsense voice.

"My name's Keegan. To visit Car C."

"May I see some identification?"

Keegan handed him his wallet and his passport. The agent checked the license signature against the name in the passport. He flashed the light in Keegan's face again, then back down to the passport photo.

"Very good, sir. Mr. Laster will drive down with you if you don't mind."

"Not at all."

Laster was a handsome, pleasant man impeccably dressed, although soaking wet. He shook the rainwater off his hat before he got in.

"Sorry," he said. "I'm afraid I'm going to get your seat wet."

"That's the least of my troubles," said Keegan.

"Drive down to your right, past the station. You can cross the tracks there."

As they crossed over the railroad, Laster told him to take a sharp left. A hulking steam engine loomed through the fog. They drove past the black leviathan. Steam curled from around its enormous wheels and undercarriage as it hissed idly, waiting to be stoked up. The private train was seven cars long and was dark except for slender shafts of light streaming from under drawn shades. As they drove the length of the train, Keegan could see the vague forms of bodyguards moving about in the darkness. Then Laster suddenly ordered, "Stop here," as they neared the last car.

Keegan slammed on the brakes. A slender woman with a wide-brimmed hat came out of the last car, her collar turned up around her ears. A plainclothesman helped her down the steep metal steps, then they scurried through the mist around the back of the car. A moment later Keegan saw automobile headlights flash on the opposite side of the Pullman car. Then he heard an auto drive off.

"Okay, pull down to the end of the train," Laster said, and after hesitating a moment, added: "You might forget what you just saw."

"I didn't see a thing," Keegan said.

Laster smiled without looking at him. "This'll be fine," he said.

Keegan stopped the car and they got out.

"Just a minute, please," Laster said as he mounted the steps on the back of the Pullman. He disappeared inside. Keegan lit a cigarette and turned up the collar of his suit coat. The mist was so heavy it collected on the brim of his fedora and dripped off.

Keegan now understood why the president's private train from Hyde Park to Washington was sidetracked in this virtually nonexistent village. Through the years, Keegan had heard newsmen joke among themselves about FDR's "lady friend." It was a reporter's inside joke; no one ever hinted at it in print. But Beerbohm had confided to Keegan once that her name was Lucy Rutherfurd and she lived someplace in New Jersey and that Roosevelt had been in love with her since before the war; a twenty-five-year love affair which the press chose to ignore.

A minute or two passed and Laster appeared at the door to the Pullman car and motioned Keegan in. He climbed the steps and entered the private car.

It was laid out as an office, its walls lined with dark wood paneling, the floors covered with thick piled carpeting. A large oak desk dominated the middle section of the car. Behind it was a bar and to its left a large leather sofa with Tiffany floor lamps on either end. An antique chair sat in front of the desk. The lighting was subdued and the tasseled silk shades were fully drawn.

President Roosevelt sat behind the desk in his electrified wheelchair, dressed in a scarlet smoking jacket and a dark blue silk ascot, his pince-nez glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, a cigarette holder clamped between his teeth,, a glass of scotch at his elbow. His face broke into the familiar warm, broad grin as Keegan entered the car.

"Well, Francis, what a grand surprise after all these years," the president said, offering his hand.

"Mr. President," Keegan said as they shook.

"Pour yourself a drink and sit down there in front of me," Roosevelt said, nodding toward the chair. "Sorry about the rain. I trust the trip from the big city wasn't too uncomfortable."

"Not a bit," Keegan said. He poured himself a sour mash highball and sat down. "I appreciate your taking time to see me."

"I can hardly pass up a chance to say hello to an old friend," Roosevelt said, enunciating every syllable in his refined accent. "I can't thank you enough for your contributions to the party over the years, Francis. You've been a generous and loyal supporter."

"My pleasure, Mr. President," Keegan said. "Are you going to break precedent and go for a third term?"

"Still up in the air, old man," Roosevelt answered. "My advisers have mixed feelings about it."

"For what it's worth, I hope you do," Keegan said.

"Thanks. You look hardy, Francis. I trust things have gone well for you."

"No complaints, sir."

"Excellent, excellent. Before we chat I would like to request that you keep our meeting confidential," the president said. His eyes had an almost mischievous glow. "A policy of mine, permits me to let what little hair I have down."

"Absolutely, sir," Keegan answered.