“You sonofabitch,” Juliana yelled, trying to pull herself up.

“Don’t move or I’ll snap another bone,” Bloch said.

Through her blinding pain, Catharina saw the young henchman strike her daughter across the side of the head, knocking her back to the cool tile floor. Catharina began praying in Dutch for strength and forgiveness. Her helplessness was the worst pain she had ever experienced.

“I should learn not to underestimate you Peperkamps,” Bloch said. He was breathing hard and bleeding significantly, and he coughed and snorted, catching his breath. “Goddamn women. Still, ain’t this convenient? We got us two little birdies with one stone, don’t we? Pick up the girl, Peters. We’ll go out the back.”

Juliana’s Burberry man had moved across the street to Central Park, where it was dark and getting very cold. Matthew trotted across the street and before the guy could do anything had him pinned against the tree, with a forearm pressed against his throat. “What’s your name?” Stark asked.

“Paul-”

“Hello, Paul. I’m Matthew Stark.”

“Jesus Christ.” The bland eyes widened. “Steelman? Weasel’s told me about you-shit. Look, I’m just following orders.”

“Bloch’s.”

It wasn’t a question. Paul tried to nod but couldn’t. “Hey, look, he’s okay. Just trying to get it together to go after some commies, that kind of thing, no big deal.”

“Then what’s he doing have piano players and old women followed around?”

“He’s just looking after his own interests. I got orders not to hurt nobody.”

“You haven’t got the talent to hurt anybody,” Stark said mildly. “Those women have been running circle around you. What about me? Got any orders?”

Paula licked his fleshy lips. “Truth is, I can do anything to you. I mean, Bloch don’t care what happens to you. But Weaze says you’re okay.”

“Tell me about Weasel.”

“I ain’t seen him in a while, I been up here.”

“Where’d you see him last?”

“I can’t…”

“Where?”

Stark didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t have to. Weaze had been telling stories about Steelman, some of them probably even true. “Florida. Ryder’s place on the Dead Lakes. Bloch knows I told you, I’m dead.”

“Is he there now?”

Paul didn’t say anything. Matthew repeated the question. Paul licked his lips some more; they were purple in the cold. He looked like the kind of guy who considered standing in the cold watching a ritzy apartment building on Central Park West hazardous duty. “No.” It came out as a whisper. “He ain’t there.”

Matthew waited.

“Man, I can’t-”

“You’d better. I can think of lots of things I could do with you if you don’t.”

“He’s here in New York, okay? I think he’s going after the women, first the baker, then these two, just to ask them some questions. They deal with him straight, he’ll let ’em go.”

“You dumb fuck,” Matthew said, but he didn’t waste any time or energy explaining to Paul that it didn’t matter if you dealt straight with Sergeant Phillip Bloch. If you were a loose end, he cut you off.

He ran out into the street, and a cab screeched to a stop in front of him. It was occupied. He didn’t care. He tore open the door and flashed his press badge. “It’s an emergency-please,” he said, climbing in.

The woman already occupying the cab decided she wouldn’t stay in for the ride and shot out. The driver, a fat, slow gentleman from Brooklyn, insisted on checking Stark’s press badge before he went anywhere.

“Okay, fella,” he said, “where to?”

It sounded ridiculous, but Matthew said it anyway, “Catharina’s Bake Shop on upper Madison.”

Phillip Bloch’s henchman Peters bent down to haul Juliana to her feet, but she was ready for him. Ignoring the shooting pain in her head and the muted cries of her mother, she kicked out viciously, one of her three-hundred-dollar black Italian shoes landing squarely in his face, knocking him backward. He grunted in surprise and blinding pain, and Juliana seized the opening, scooting backward as far out of reach as she could and scrambling agonizingly to her feet.

Bloch growled. “Fuck it, do I have to do everything?”

From the front room came a crashing sound and, absurdly, the tinkling of Catharina’s little doorbell. Matthew, Juliana thought wildly, hanging onto the doorframe, it’s got to be him!

A stout, fair-skinned older man jumped behind the counter, brushing her aside as he went into the kitchen.

“Hendrik-help Juliana!” Catharina was sobbing as Bloch twisted her good arm behind her back and pushed her toward the storeroom and rear exit. “Never mind me-for God’s sake, never mind me!”

“Don’t follow me, de Geer,” Bloch said. He had pulled out a monstrous gun and looked ready to call the whole thing a wash and kill everyone in sight. Blood poured over his hand. “I’ll kill her right now-and the girl. I’ll cut my losses. You know I will.”

The Dutchman took a short breath and halted, his cold eyes giving Juliana a quick, appraising glance. The young henchman was coughing, climbing slowly to his feet. Juliana could see his eyes focus on his gun and shot out one foot, kicking it farther away. De Geer folded his hands together and brought them down on the stumbling Peters, hitting him almost exactly where Juliana had gotten him with the wooden shoe. He fell unconscious.

Phillip Bloch had seized the opportunity and had disappeared through the storeroom with Catharina.

“Come, you must get out of here,” the Dutchman said in a low voice, “before he changes his mind and thinks he can handle us both after all.”

Juliana lunged blindly toward the storeroom. “Mother-”

“Bloch will kill her, and you, if we don’t leave now. He means what he says.”

“Dammit, I’m calling the police!”

Hendrik de Geer grabbed her by the shoulders and held her, not ungently, against the doorframe. “No. Understand me, Juliana: he will kill her.”

She nodded dully, hurting everywhere, gulping for air as she tried to still her pounding heart and concentrate…Mother. But she knew the Dutchman was right. “He wants the Minstrel,” she said.

“Of course he does. Now come. I will get you somewhere safe.”

She looked at him. She had never seen eyes so piercingly blue. “You’re Hendrik de Geer.”

“Yes,” he said, without pride. “I’m the man who betrayed your family and the Steins-my friends-to the Nazis. And, of course, you’re wondering whose side I’m on.” He gave her a thin, wretched smile. “But that’s very simple, Juliana. Everyone knows whose side I’m on: my own. Right now it suits me to help you. Now come.”

Betrayed…my friends…Juliana held back another wave of shock. She couldn’t think about the past and all she didn’t know right now. Stay within yourself. Shuji always said. “Wait-it’s all right. I can find my own way.”

“Your mother told me-”

“I know, but go after her. You can do it.” She had the feeling he had to. “I’ll be all right.”

The smile grew less thin, less wretched, and the cold eyes moistened and became almost warm. “You’re a fine woman, Juliana Fall,” he said.

He waited until she’d gotten safely out to the street, past the unconscious Peters, the fallen gun, the fallen knives, the pots, the baking pans…the smashed box of cream puffs. The glass door was smashed, but she seemed hardly to notice. She was a strong girl, Hendrik thought. He reminded her of Catharina-and Wilhelmina. He watched her stumble out into the street and flag a passing cab and waited until she’d climbed in, safe.

Then he went silently through the storeroom.

“Juliana.” Shuji opened the door to his Upper East Side townhouse. “You look like hell.”

She managed a weak smile. “Jazz’ll do that to you.”

“Bullshit.”

“I need help, Shuji.”

He sighed. “Get in here.”