"All part of the service?"

"Just that it's on my way. What the hell."

This time I got a ride in an unmarked car. We made small talk about the Mets' new third baseman, a possible garbage strike, and a shakeup in the Queens District Attorney's office. Crooks and cops always have plenty of things to talk about once they can get past the basic adversary nature of their relationship. The two classes actually have more in common than either of us would like to admit. Phil and Dan, who couldn't have looked more like cops unless they'd been in uniform, had looked like robbers to me when they came into my store.

Ray dropped me right in front of Barnegat Books, told me to take care, gave me a slow wink, and drove off. I started to open up, looked to see if he was gone, then said to hell with it and refastened the locks I'd opened. I had to do a few things that were more important than selling books.

I hadn't been part of the gang of burglars who'd killed Wanda Colcannon. Her husband hadn't merely failed to identify me. He'd given them a firm negative identification. And if the rubber glove was all they had, their evidence was a joke.

But Richler still thought I was involved.

And something funny, something I'd realized at the very end of the ride back to the store. Ray Kirschmann thought so, too.

CHAPTER Seven

Carolyn and I usually have lunch together. Mondays and Wednesdays I pick up something and we eat at the Poodle Factory. Tuesdays and Thursdays she brings our lunch to the bookstore. Fridays we generally go someplace ethnic and inexpensive and toss a coin for the check. All of this, of course, is subject to change if anything comes up, and Carolyn must have gathered that something had. It was a Wednesday, so when I'd failed to turn up around noon she'd evidently gone somewhere herself. The Poodle Factory was closed, with a cardboard sign hanging on the back of the door. BACK AT, the sign said, and beneath it the movable clock hands pointed to one-thirty.

I looked in at the coffee shop on the corner of Broadway but didn't see her. There was a pay phone on the wall at the back but it looked a little too exposed. I walked north a block and checked the felafel place. She wasn't there, either, but their pay phone was a little more private. I ordered a cup of coffee and a hummus sandwich. I wasn't especially hungry but I hadn't had anything since my roll for breakfast and figured I probably ought to eat. I ate most of my sandwich, drank all of my coffee, and made sure I got some dimes in my change.

The first call I made was to Abel Crowe. The Post was on the street by now, and I didn't have to look at it to know that Wanda Colcannon would be spread all over page three. Her murder might even get the front page, unless something more urgent displaced it, like a projected invasion of killer bees from South America. (Once, during the Son of Sam foofaraw, they'd given the entire front page to a photo of David Berkowitz asleep in his cell. SAM SLEEPS! the headline shrieked.)

At any rate, the murder was general knowledge by now and one medium or another was sure to call it to Abel's attention. Any stolen object with a six-figure price tag is hot enough to blister the skin, but homicide always turns up the heat, and Abel would not be happy. Nor could I make him happy, but I could at least assure him that we were burglars, not murderers.

I let the phone ring an even dozen times. When my dime came back I stood there for a minute, then tried the number again. One sometimes misdials, and telephone-company equipment sometimes misbehaves.

No answer. I'd dialed his number from memory and there was no directory handy to confirm my recollection, so I let Information check it for me. I'd remembered correctly, but to be on the safe side I dialed it yet again, and when there was still no answer I gave up. Maybe he was already out selling the coin. Maybe he was at his favorite bakery on West Seventy-second Street, buying up everything in sight. Maybe he was napping with the phone's bell muffled, or soaking in the tub, or tempting muggers in Riverside Park.

I dialed 411 again and let them look up another number for me. Narrowback Gallery, on West Broadway in SoHo. The phone rang four times, just long enough for me to decide I wasn't destined to reach anybody this afternoon, and then Denise Raphaelson answered, her voice scratchy from the cigarettes she chain-smoked.

"Hi," I said. "Are we set for dinner tonight?"

"Bernie?"

"Uh-huh."

There was a pause. "I'm a little confused," she said finally. "I've been painting my brains out and I think the fumes are starting to get to me. Did we have a dinner date for tonight?"

"Well, yeah. It was sort of mentioned casually. Too casually, I guess, if it slipped your mind."

"I should write these things down," she said, "but I never do. I'm sorry, Bernie."

"You made other plans."

"I did? I don't think I did. Of course if I could forget a dinner date with you, I could forget other things at least as easily. For all I know I'm throwing a party tonight. Truman and Gore are coming, and Hilton wanted a quick look at my latest work before he does his piece for the Sunday Times, and Andy said he'd bring Marlene if she's in town. What do you suppose it's like being one of those people that people know who you are without hearing your last name? I bet if I was Jackie I'd still have to show ID to cash a check at D'Agostino's."

Telephonic whimsy is her specialty. We'd first met over the phone when I was trying to find an artist without knowing anything about him but his last name. She'd told me how to manage that, and one thing had led to another, as it so often does. We have since seen each other now and again, and if it's all remained very casual and on the surface, that's not the worst thing that can be said of what one has learned to call interpersonal relationships.

"What I should have done," she said now, "is fake it. When you asked if we were set for dinner tonight I should have said yes and let it go at that. It's a shame I don't take drugs. Then I could blame this mental sluggishness on the joint I'd just smoked. Would you believe paint fumes?"

"Sure."

"Because I am free for dinner, and just because I don't seem to recall our date shouldn't prevent me from keeping it. Did we make plans to meet someplace?"

"Not yet."

"Should we?"

"Why don't I drop by your place around seven-thirty?"

"Why don't you?"

"I think I will."

"I think you should. Shall I cook something?"

"We'll go out."

"This is sounding better and better. Maybe I'll have this painting finished and you can look at it. Maybe I won't and you can't. 'Bernie at 7:30.' I've written it down. I can't possibly forget now."

"I have faith in you, Denise."

"Shall I wear anything in particular?"

"Just a smock and a smile."

"Ta."

I tried Abel again, twelve rings and out. By then it was one-thirty. I hiked back to the Poodle Factory and caught Carolyn between appointments. "There you are," she said. "When you didn't show I went looking for you, and when I saw your store was closed I figured you'd just ducked out to pick up lunch, so I came back here and waited, and when you still didn't show I said the hell with it and went out and ate."

"Not at the coffee shop," I said, "and not at Mamoun's."

"I went and had some curry. I figured some really hot food would counteract the sugar from last night. God, what a morning!"

"Bad?"

"My head felt like the soccer ball from Pélé's last game. You have any idea what it's like to face a Giant Schnauzer on top of a sugar hangover?"

"No."

"Count your lucky stars. The coffee shop and Mamoun's-what did you do, go out looking for me?"