He had told the others to order what they liked; the Department was picking up the tab. But they followed his lead. Jason T. Jason was sitting across the booth table from Delaney and Boone. The black cop was big enough to fill half the booth.

"You look like you could handle two burgers," Sergeant Boone told him. "Or three."

"Or four," Jason grinned. "But I'm trying to cut down. You see the latest memo on overweight cops? My sergeant gives me a month to drop twenty pounds. I'm trying, but it ain't easy."

He was almost six-four, Delaney figured, and was pushing 250 at least. His skin was a deep cordovan with a soft, powdery finish. A precisely trimmed mustache ran squarely across his face, cheek to cheek. Dark, dancing eyes. Full lips that turned outward. Hands like smoked hams, and the feet, the Chief noted, had to be bigger than his own size thirteens.

The bulk of the man was awesome. Revolver, walkie-talkie, and equipment dangled from him like tiny baubles on a Christmas tree. If he's got the will to go with the weight, Boone mused, the best thing a bad guy braced by that man-mountain could do would be to throw up his hands and scream, "I surrender! I surrender!"

"Football?" Delaney asked.

"Nah," Jason T. Jason said. "I was big enough but not fast enough. I tried out, but the coach said, 'Jase, you run too long in the same place.' Chief, is my ass in a sling on the Maitland thing?"

"Just the opposite," Delaney assured him. "You did exactly right to tell the homicide dick. If anyone screwed up, he did-for not following up on it. But you can't really blame him either; he probably had a hundred other leads to follow, and figured it was nothing."

"It may still be nothing, Jason," Boone put in. "We just don't know. But we'd like to prove it out one way or another."

"Here's our food," Delaney said. "Want to wait until we finish?"

"I better eat and talk," Jason said. "I get itchy when I'm not on the street."

"I know the feeling," Delaney nodded. "Listen, if you want the rest of your tour off, I can square it with your lieutenant."

"No, no," Jason said. "This won't take long. There's not that much to tell. All right, let's see now ... That Monday morning they pulled me off patrol and put me to guarding the door to Maitland's studio. Eight to four."

"The sawhorses were down around the house?" Boone asked.

"Right," Jason Two said. "Down and gone. I was posted on the top landing, right outside the door. The lab guys were inside taking up the drains, vacuuming dust samples, and stuff like that. Man it was something! They were even taking scrapings from inside the toilet. Anyway, a little before eleven I was out on the landing."

"Sure of the time?" Delaney said.

"Absolutely. Had just looked at my watch to see how close noon was. Two guys in a squad had promised to bring me sandwiches and a coffee at noon. So at about eleven, these two women came up the stairs. They got halfway up to the landing, where the stairs turn, when they see me standing on top, and they stop."

"Surprised to see you there?" the Chief asked.

"Yeah, surprised."

"Frightened?"

Jason T. Jason took an enormous bite of his cheeseburger and chewed a moment, thinking about it.

"Frightened, yeah," he said. "But I don't think that counts. I'm a big black guy, Chief, wearing a cop's suit and swinging a stick. I scare a lot of people. It helps," he smiled.

"I'll bet it does," Boone said. "What were they? White? Black? Spanish?"

"Spanish," Jason Two said promptly. "Take it to the bank. But whether they were Puerto Rican, Cuban, Dominican Republic, or whatever, I couldn't say. But definitely Spanish. Bright clothes-red and pink and orange. Like that."

Only he was eating now; both Delaney and Boone were taking notes. Jason T. Jason seemed to enjoy his importance.

"Descriptions?" the Chief asked.

"The older woman, say about fifty, fifty-five, she's a butterball. Maybe a hundred-forty. Short. Say five-two or three. I'm looking down at them, you know, it's hard to figure from above. Also, this was like two months ago."

"You're doing fine," Delaney assured him.

"She does the talking, and then I'm positive she's Spanish. Also, she has like a whorey look. But she's so old and fat, maybe she hustles the Bowery. Stringy hair dyed a bright red. The other one is a kid. I figure her from twelve to fifteen. In that range. Maybe five-seven or five-eight. One-twenty. Good body from what I could see. Long black hair hanging loose down her back."

"Pretty?" Boone asked.

"Yeah, pretty," the cop said. "Get her cleaned up, the hair fixed, some decent clothes and makeup, and she'd be fucking beautiful. Sorry, Chief."

"I've heard the word before," Delaney said, writing busily. "How did the talk go?"

"You want me to hold a minute so you can eat?" Jason Two asked.

"No, no," Delaney said. "Don't worry about us. You just keep rolling. What did you say and what did they say?"

"Only the older woman talked. The kid didn't open her mouth. I asked them what the hell they were doing there. The woman said they were going through the house, all the houses in the neighborhood, knocking on doors, looking for cleaning work to do."

"Did she say that immediately after you asked her what she was doing?"

The question came from Chief Delaney. Jason T. Jason stopped eating, frowned, trying to remember.

"I can't rightly recall," he said.

"Guess," Boone said.

"I'd guess maybe she hesitated for a beat or two before she answered."

"You didn't figure she was scamming you?"

"Not then I didn't. Later, when I got to thinking about it, I figured she might have been lying. You know, I been a cop for three years now, and I'm just beginning to realize that everyone lies to cops. I mean everyone! Even when they don't have to, when there's no point in it. It's automatic. Is it like that in plainclothes, too?"

"If they know you're a cop, it's exactly like that," Delaney nodded. "So they said they were looking for cleaning work. What did you say then?"

"I said there was no work for them on the top floor and to get their ass out of there. The woman said she was told a guy lived on the top floor, and she wanted to ask him. I told her he was fucking dead, and unless she wanted to mop up a puddle of old blood, she better disappear. Maybe I shouldn't have told her that, but I didn't want to stand there arguing with her. Anyway, it worked. She didn't say another word. The two of them turned around and went back downstairs."

"Ever see them again?" Boone asked.

"No," Jason Two said. "Never."

"Anything else you can tell us about them?" Delaney asked. "Their appearance? Any little thing?"

"Let's see ..." Jason T. Jason said, finishing his cole slaw. "The old woman had a gold tooth. In front. That any help?"

"Could be," Delaney said. "Anything else?"

"The young girl," the cop said. "Something about her. Something funny ..."

"Funny?" Boone said.

"Not funny ha-ha," Jason said, "but funny-strange. She had like a vacant expression. Kept staring up into the air like she was spaced out."

"Drugs?" Boone asked.

"I don't think so. More like she was maybe retarded or a little flaky. Like something wasn't right there. I mean, she didn't say word one so it was hard to tell. But I got the feeling she was out of it. Off somewhere."

"Recognize them if you see them again?" Delaney asked.

"Is the pope Catholic?" Jason T. Jason said.

"Good," the Chief said. He tore a blank page from his notebook, scribbled down his telephone number and Boone's. "Here are our phone numbers. Keep and eye out on the street. If you make them, call one of us. Or leave a message."

"You want me to hold them?"

"No, no, don't do that. But tail them until they hole up in a restaurant or store or movie or their home. Whatever. Then call us. Don't worry if it takes you off your beat. I'll square it at the precinct."

"Will do," the cop nodded. He took the page, folded it into his wallet. "I better hit the pavement. Nice talking to you gents. I hope something comes of it."

"So do we," Boone said. He and Delaney half rose to shake hands with Jason Two. "Many thanks. You've been a big help."

"Anything else I can do, give me a shout."

They watched him move away. He had to go through the outer door sideways.

"Good cop," Delaney said. "Observant. And he remembers."

"How would you like to be a mugger or purse-snatcher?" Boone said. "You make your hit, you've got the loot, you're running hell-for-leather, you come scrambling around a corner, and there's Jason T. Jason."

"I wouldn't like that," Chief Delaney said. "My God, they're growing them big these days! Well, let's eat. Want a hot coffee?"

They ordered fresh coffees, but ate their cold cheeseburgers and home fries without protest.

"Think the young girl was the model in those Maitland sketches?" Boone asked.

"It fits," Delaney nodded. "How's this: Our first scenario was correct; Maitland picks up a young, fresh twist on Friday. But she's not alone. The woman sounds too old to be her mother, but maybe she's a relative or friend."

"Or madam," the sergeant offered. "Jason said she looked like a hooker. Maybe she's peddling the young kid's ass."

"Could be," the Chief said. "So they go up to the studio on Friday. The girl strips down, and Maitland makes his drawings."

"While the older woman has a drink and leaves her partials on the glass and bottle."

"Right. Maitland likes what he draws, and makes a date to use the girl at eleven on Monday morning. That listens, doesn't it?"

"Does to me," Boone said. "The older woman wouldn't have shivved him on Friday, would she? Because he tried to screw the girl?"

"No way," Delaney said, shaking his head. "They'd never have come back on Monday if that had happened. No, I think when the two of them left the studio on Friday, Maitland was breathing. They were probably the last ones to see him alive."

"Except for the killer," Boone said.

"Except for the killer," Delaney nodded. "I'd like to find those two women. Maybe they saw something. Maybe the guy we're looking for was coming up the stairs on that Friday while they were going down."

"Not much chance of finding them, Chief," Boone sighed. "Unless Jason T. Jason hits it lucky and spots them on the street."

"Stranger things have happened," Chief Delaney said. "You finished? Let's get uptown. We'll brace Alma Maitland first."

Once again they were ushered into that cheerless family room, which, today, smelled faintly of oiled machinery. They hadn't yet seated themselves when Alma Maitland came sweeping in, hatted, tugging on white gloves.

"Really, Chief Delaney," she said angrily. "I was just going out. This is very inconvenient."

He stared at her coldly.

"Inconvenient, ma'am?"

She caught the implication; her face whitened, lips pressed.

"Of course I want to help," she said. "As much as I can. But you might have called."

Both the cops looked at her without expression. A proved technique: say nothing and let them yammer on and on. Sometimes they dug themselves deep simply because they could not endure the silence.

"Besides, I told you everything I know," she said, lifting her chin.

"Did you?" Delaney said, and was silent again.

Finally, with a pinching of features, a small sound of exasperation, she asked them to be seated. They took the couch, sitting almost shoulder to shoulder, a bulwark. She sat in an armchair, in her ladylike position: spine frozen, ankles crossed, knees turned, gloved hands folded demurely in her lap.

"You don't get along with your mother-in-law and sister-in-law, do you?" Delaney said suddenly. It came out more flat statement than question.

"Did they say that?" she demanded.

"I'm asking you," Delaney said.

"We're not close," she admitted. A tinselly laugh. "We both prefer it that way."

"And your late husband? How close was he to his mother and sister?"

"Very close," she said stiffly.

"Oh?" the Chief said. "He only saw them once or twice a year."

"Nonsense," she said sharply. "He saw them at least once a month. Sometimes once a week. They were always coming down to have lunch or dinner with him."

Neither Delaney nor Boone showed surprise.

"And you didn't attend these lunches and dinners, Mrs. Maitland?" the sergeant asked.

"I did not."