He stepped in close and looked into her eyes. One was brown and one was green.

'What happened to your eyes, young lady?'

'I lost a contact, I guess.' She tried to curl her lip seductively. 'You got somethin' for me, Earl?'

'I got it. But not here. I'm takin' you out of this place.'

'Where we goin'?' she said.

'You're coming to live with me for a while. You're gonna have a shower and new clothes and clean sheets to sleep on every night.'

'What about the other thing?' she said, because that was all she cared about now.

'You're gonna have plenty of that, too.'

Sondra turned to the wall and untaped the magazine photo of the model. She folded it and picked up the paperweight off the toilet-paper dispenser and looked around for her other possessions. She picked up a wet, half-used book of matches from the tiles and realized that there was nothing else.

'Come on, baby doll. Ray's waiting on us out in the hall.'

'Can I get a little somethin' for my friend Tonio before we go?'

'Forget about him. We want to get out quiet and quick. I understand some of the other fellas in here might have fallen in love with you, and we wouldn't want them getting jealous.'

'Love?' said Sondra. She rubbed her nose and laughed.

They took her down the stairs and went through a large hole in the brick wall. From deep in the darkness of the side room, Tonio Morris watched Sondra leave with the old white man and his son. He wondered why Sondra would go without saying good-bye. He was sad for a moment, then felt a shudder of panic, realizing that maybe his source was gone for good.

In the street, the cop behind the wheel of the idling cruiser watched the Boones emerge from the Junkyard with the pretty junkie from the second floor. The three of them were headed for the garage where the others were holding their car. The cop snapped the cigar that he was holding between his fingers and tossed it to the floor.

20

'Sharmba Mitchell,' said Strange. 'That's a beautiful fighter right there.'

'Look at that left,' said Quinn.

'I had a left like that one, I'd never throw a right.'

Strange and Quinn sat in the bleachers of the Washington Convention Center, drinking a couple of four-dollar drafts. In the crowd of four thousand, Quinn was among a small number of whites, the others being the parents of a light heavyweight Texan, four frightened-looking fraternity boys, and several white women accompanied by black men. The convention center was a grim, outdated white elephant that had underserved the city from day one. But the sport almost lent itself to unattractive, spartan arenas; as boxing venues went, this wasn't a bad place to see a fight.

The white, light heavyweight Texan, who fought under the name of Joe Bill 'Rocky' Jakes, was walking along the edge of the stands, having changed into street clothes after his disastrous defeat. His face was marked and puffy, and one eye was swollen shut.

'Hey, Rocky!' shouted a guy from the stands.

'Yo, Adrian!' shouted another.

'You'll get 'em next time, Rock,' shouted a third, with a Burgess Meredith growl, to much laughter from the spectators in the surrounding seats.

'They're usin' the hell out of that guy,' said Quinn.

'You ever notice,' said Strange, 'how many white fighters call themselves Rocky?'

'I think there's been one or two.'

'There's that hook again,' said Strange, pointing to the ring.

Takoma Park's Sharmba Mitchell was defending his WBA super lightweight title against Pedro Saiz, out of Brooklyn. Saiz, a late replacement for a scratched William Joppy, had not been expected to show too much, but he was proving himself tonight. Mitchell wore trunks cut in strips of red, white, and blue. Saiz wore white.

The fourth round ended. As the fighters went to their corners, a blonde showing a whole lot of leg climbed into the ring and walked around the edge of the ropes, a round-card held up in her hands.

'You see the ladies?' said Strange.

'I liked Round Two, myself,' said Quinn.

'Shame about the face.'

'Hey, I bet she's got a big heart.'

'A big inverted heart, you mean.'

'Her ass was pretty big. But I thought you guys liked that.'

'You thought. Anyway, I'm not talkin' about the ring girls, Terry, I'm talkin' about our ladies. Our dates.'

'They went to get a couple of beers.'

'Fifteen minutes ago.'

'They're okay. Probably down there with their faces together, having a firefight. Talking about us.'

'I hope they are. It's when they stop talkin' about us, then we're in trouble.' Strange sipped his beer and looked at Quinn out of the corners of his eyes. 'You didn't tell me about Juana, man.'

'That she was fine?'

'That she was a sister.'

'She's half Puerto Rican.'

'Half nothin'. You got a drop of black in you, you are black.'

'Got a problem with it?' said Quinn.

'Uh-uh. I mean, I'm not gonna lie to you, it took me back at first, 'cause I didn't expect it.'

'It's the way we're programmed, is all it is.'

'Now you're gonna tell me what it is.'

'I was up in Wheaton Plaza a couple of weeks back, the mall? Half the young couples, some of 'em had babies in strollers, were interracial. Fifteen years ago, when I was hanging out up at the Plaza, you wouldn't have seen it. It's just natural for these kids now. And it made me think, the way my generation is, and especially the way your generation is, it's our hang-up, man. It's something we've got to get over, 'cause the world's changing whether we like it or not.'

'Case you didn't notice, you been getting a lot of looks here tonight. From people in all sorts of generations.'

'She's been drawing the looks, and I don't blame the guys who been lookin'.'

'You're gonna have to at least face this, Terry: there's a whole lot of people, black and white, they just don't believe in mixin', man. That doesn't make them racists or anything like that. It's just their opinion, straight up.'

'Long as they stay out of my business, they can have any kind of opinion they want.'

The fifth round began. A fight broke out by the men's room to their right, and security guards swarmed the guilty parties, carrying one man out as he kicked his legs and yelled obscenities over his shoulder. There had been a few fights in the crowd that night, and they had occurred with more frequency as more beer and liquor had been served.

'You been seem' Juana long?'

Quinn rolled his eyes. 'Shit, man, you still on that?'

'I got to admit, when we came up on the two of you, first thing I thought was, Terry got himself a one-time date with a black woman for my benefit. Trying to make an impression on old Strange, like, Here I am, Terry Quinn, lovin' all the people, can't you see I just want us all to get along?'

Quinn laughed. 'I'm through trying to impress you, Derek. You ought to know that by now. I've told you everything I know. I mean, can we just hang out and not deal with it for one night?'

'So how long you been seein' her?'

'Not too long, I guess. I'm crazy about her, too, you want to know the truth.'

'I got eyes.'

'How about you and Janine?'

'Shoot. We been seein' each other now, I don't know, about ten years. Not exclusive, nothin' like that.'

'She's in love with you.'

'Go ahead, man.'

'Look, I got eyes, too.'

'My mother always tells me that old parable about the guy, went all around the world lookin' for diamonds, when all the time he never did think to look in his own backyard.'

'Diamonds in your backyard. I've heard that one plenty of times.'

'Yeah, she didn't make it up. But when it's your mom tellin' you, you tend to listen. Anyhow, I guess me and Janine, we're good for each other in a lot of ways.'