“Certainly, no one I know would knowingly help such an organization,” Eduardo said smoothly.

“I didn’t think so.”

“Perhaps this is complicated,” Eduardo said.

“I’ve no doubt of that.”

“I do very little business these days, but I will ask a few questions and see what this man means to the people who are helping him.”

“I’m sure the answers would be interesting,” Stone said. “I think there is one thing of which you may be sure: that Trini Rodriguez is acting in his own interests, and not those of either the federal people or those who are helping him.”

Eduardo stood up. “Thank you for coming to see me, Stone. Perhaps you will come again soon, now that Dolce is not in the house. I know her presence made you uncomfortable.”

“I hope you will forgive me that, Eduardo. I would like very much to come again soon.”

“Someone will call you to arrange a meeting, when I have something to tell you,” Eduardo said. “It should not be long.”

The two men shook hands, and Stone followed Pete back through the house to the car.

30

STONE LEFT THE Bianchi house and drove back toward Manhattan, thinking about his conversation with Eduardo. The old man had seemed genuinely concerned about the situation with Trini Rodriguez, but that didn’t mean he was going to help. Over the years he had distanced himself from his past criminal associations, concentrating on the work of his foundation and his membership on the boards of the museum, the opera, and others of the city’s cultural institutions, and he seemed reluctant to revisit old acquaintances.

Dolce had helped him in these endeavors until she had begun to behave erratically, then violently. Eduardo was a lonely man now, Stone reflected, and he really should make an effort to see him at a time when he didn’t want something from the old man.

Stone had made his way across Brooklyn in fairly light traffic, making good time. He paid little attention to other cars along the route, but now a motorcycle cop caught his eye in his rearview mirror. Instinctively, he slowed down, and as he did the bike drew alongside him.

Stone was reaching for his badge when an alarm bell went off in his mind. There were two men on the motorcycle, and cops didn’t ride tandem. They were no more than three feet from his window. They wore black leather and white helmets with goggles, and one of them had something in his hand.

Simultaneously, there was a loud noise, and two splatters appeared in the window’s glass. Stone braked sharply, and the motorcycle shot past him, then slowed, as the man on the passenger seat twisted around for another shot. Two more splatters appeared, this time in the windshield, but the bullets did not penetrate the armored glass.

Stone, unarmed, fought back with the only weapon he had at his disposal: his car. He slammed the accelerator to the floor, and the tachometer needle shot up as he aimed at the rear of the motorcycle. The driver hadn’t been expecting that, and he failed to react quickly enough. Stone’s car struck the motorcycle hard, propelling the bike across the central divider of the bridge, directly into the path of an oncoming cement truck. The cycle and its two riders ricocheted off the grille of the truck, and Stone lost sight of them. Behind him he could hear the screech of brakes and the blowing of horns.

He braked to a halt and got out of the car, looking back. The driver of the car behind him had done the same thing, and traffic had come to a halt on the Brooklyn Bridge.

Stone watched the detective as he laboriously wrote the last of his notes. He had been in the police station for more than four hours.

“Anything else you can remember?” the man asked.

“No. Did somebody call Lieutenant Bacchetti?”

“Who knows? You think you need the help?”

“That depends on your attitude,” Stone said. His badge and ID card lay on the table between them.

“Not my call,” the detective said, standing up and stretching. “That’s my watch commander’s, but just between you and me, I think you did the world a favor by what you did. There’s a few greasy spots on the Brooklyn Bridge, but what the hell?”

The door opened, and Dino walked in. “First, Central Park, now Brooklyn,” he said. “Is there a precinct left where you aren’t up to your dick in homicides?”

“Dino, it was a hit. They tried to kill me. Twice.”

“Yeah, I saw your car outside. Nice to know that armored glass helps.”

The detective spoke up. “I forgot to ask: How come you drive an armored car?”

“It’s not an armored car,” Stone said. “It’s lightly armored. It will repel small-arms fire. I was car shopping, and it was in the showroom, and I thought, what the hell, why not?”

“Well,” the detective said, “it was a good idea, because if that had been regular glass between you and the shooter, it would be your brains spattered all over the Brooklyn Bridge instead of the two guys on the motorcycle.”

“You get an ID on them yet?” Dino asked.

“Nah. They weren’t carrying anything. Maybe their prints will ring the bell.”

“Don’t count on it,” Stone said to Dino. “The guy that Holly shot in the park still doesn’t have a name, does he?”

Dino shook his head. “He ain’t going to, either. C’mon, let’s get out of here.”

“I don’t have to talk to anybody else?”

“Nah, I had a chat with the watch commander. They’ll call you if there’s anything else they want to know.”

The two walked out of the precinct together, and Stone took another look at his car. “Follow me to the Mercedes garage?” he asked.

“Why not?” Dino replied. “It’s not like I have to work for a living.”

The car sat in the middle of the shop, surrounded by half a dozen Mercedes-Benz mechanics in blue coveralls.

“This is my first one of these,” the service manager said. “We’ve sold a few of these cars, but it’s the first time one of them ever came back with bullet holes in it.”

“How about the bumper?” Stone said.

“We’ll have one here tomorrow, but it’s got to be painted. The armored glass is going to take longer, maybe two or three weeks. It has to come from Germany, and there’s customs and all of that.”

“Put regular glass in it,” Stone said. “I’ll bring it back when the armored stuff comes in.”

“In that case, we’ll have it together by the end of the week,” the service manager said.

“Can we go now?” Dino asked.

Stone signed the service order and followed Dino back to his car.

“You thought about how you’re going to explain this to your insurance company?” Dino asked as they drove away.

“I don’t think I’ll mention it to them,” Stone said, “because I didn’t mention to them in the first place that the car was armored. I thought it might upset them.”

“Stone, maybe you ought to take Holly and get out of town for a while,” Dino said.

“That’s an attractive idea,” Stone replied, “and I’ll talk to Holly about it, but I don’t think she’s going to want to go. She’s mad now, and she’s going to get madder when I tell her what’s happened.”

“Better mad than dead,” Dino said. “Whoever’s doing this has wasted three men trying, and you may have pissed him off by now.”

“You think it’s Trini?” Stone asked.

“You got somebody else in mind?”

“Maybe,” Stone replied.