"Hi, Kaesha. Remember me? I was here earlier about the Asian John Doe?"

    She gave him a hard look, then her features softened. "You're the one who thought you might know him."

    "Right. Have the hospital attorneys cleared me for a look at him?"

    "I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but the patient died a few hours ago."

    Crap.

    "But," she added, "it would be a great service to him and to the hospital if you could identify him. And the police want to talk to you as well."

    Jack stiffened inside. "The police?"

    "Well, I suppose it's okay to tell you, since he's dead. But he also had a gunshot wound. The police are looking for any information available."

    Double crap.

    "Sure. I'll help any way I can."

    Uh-huh.

    "We appreciate it. I'll see about arranging a viewing and let the police know you're here."

    "While you're doing that," Jack said, forcing a tremor into his voice, "I think I'll step outside for a breath of air. We were very close. Had a lot of laughs together. He was a real cutup."

    She gave him a sympathetic smile. "I understand."

    As soon as Jack was out the door, he made a beeline through the banished smokers and began quick-walking up Amsterdam Avenue. He pulled off his sling and shoved it inside his shirt, then ducked into the Lincoln Center parking garage and cut through to Columbus Avenue.

    As he mingled with the crowd there he called Naka Slater and told him to print up those flyers and Martin Luther them all over town, because his only info source was dead. The body count had moved up to four.

    Hank found the perfect spot on Long Island's North Fork.

    Somewhere in the tectonic past, Long Island's eastern third split into a pair of peninsulas. While the longer, wider southern division grew crowded and famous for its wealthy Hamptons and remote Montauk, its smaller sister to the north remained fairly rural, becoming the heart of Long Island's wine industry.

    Halfway out the fork—shouldn't it be called a tine? he wondered—and a little ways off Middle Road, he came upon a farm with a dozen or so brown-and-white Golden Guernsey cows munching grass in a field adjacent to the road.

    He watched them for a moment, then turned and looked at the slim, oblong, blanket-wrapped bundle on the backseat and felt his excitement grow.

    This was gonna be good.

    He found a spot on the side of the road where his Jeep would be shielded from the farmhouse by an intervening stand of trees.

    Perfect.

    Except for the wait. Though the sun was well into its slide toward the horizon, the sky was still too bright for what he planned.

    So he took a leisurely drive out to Orient Point on the far eastern tip of the fork and parked near the ferry dock. As he stared across the choppy channel to Plum Island, he thought about the strange turns his life had taken since he'd written Kick. From manual laborer to backdoor celebrity.

    Life had been simpler and maybe even happier back in his slaughterhouse days. He hadn't had to make decisions for other people, not even for himself. He'd been happy to do what he was told. Some days he'd be a "knocker," using a compressed air gun to shoot a steel bolt into the cow's head to knock it out. Other days he'd be assigned as a "sticker," which he tended to prefer. Once the knocker was through with them, the unconscious cows would be hung upside down by a leg from the overhead rail, and then Hank would come along and slit their throats.

    Bloody, bloody work, and hot too because of the rubber jacket and pants. But looking back, Hank realized he'd never felt so at peace with himself, not before, not since.

    Peace… He shook his head. Would he ever know peace? Then he heard himself laugh. Did he even want peace again?

    Sure as hell not till he'd found the guy who'd stolen the Compendium of Srem—right out of his hands, the son of a bitch. The same guy who'd called himself John Tyleski and pretended to be a reporter. He could still see his nothing-special face, with its brown eyes, and his brown hair as he grilled him. Hank would have the Kickers out looking for him but how do you describe a guy who looked like everybody and nobody?

    Hank glanced in his rearview and saw the sun nudging the horizon. Time to go.

    He drove at the speed limit, trying to time his arrival at the farm with dusk. He needed some light for his plan, but didn't want too much. The closer he got, the more he felt his excitement build, tingling down his back and around to his belly to settle lower, like a horny kid heading out to meet the easiest girl in town, knowing she'd give it up with the barest minimum of persuasion.

    As he turned off Middle Road he spotted a puddle. He stopped and rubbed mud on his license plates, then continued to the farm.

    The light was perfect when he reached it. He parked in the blind spot and removed the katana from the blanket on the backseat. He held up the blade and saw the dying light reflect dully along its pitted, riddled surface. He found it strangely beautiful, almost… mesmerizing…

    With effort, he pulled his gaze away and hopped the fence. A Guernsey stood about thirty yards away. She looked up at his casual, unhurried approach. Not afraid. Why should she be? The worst any human had done to her was milk her teats. She lowered her head to the grass and resumed grazing.

    Hank positioned himself beside her, feet spread, facing her thick neck. As he raised the katana above his head he felt a stirring in his groin.

    He needed this… really needed this. And he wanted to see what this katana could do… wanted to cut all the way through with a single swing.

    But he wanted the cow looking at him when this happened.

    "Hey!" he called in a soft voice. "Hey, you."

    When the cow looked up he saw his reflection in her large dark eye, a man-shaped blotch silhouetted against the fading twilight.

    Now… do it now.

    To add extra force behind the blow, Hank envisioned the fake John Tyleski's bland features against the skin of the neck. With a low cry he raised the blade even higher and swung with all he had.

    "Here's an odd story," Abe said, staring down at a newspaper through the reading glasses perched on his nose.

    Jack glanced up and saw it was the Long Island paper, Newsday. Abe hadn't ventured into the wilds of Long Island since he'd had a full head of hair, but that didn't keep him from Newsday.

    "Odd how? Like congress-has-impeached-itself-for-high-crimes-and-misdemeanors odd, or two-headed-cow odd?"

    "A cow he mentions. You're psychic maybe?"

    "Call me Criswell. Another moon-jumping incident?"

    "Not quite. Someone killed a cow on a farm out Peconic way."

    "That's not odd, that's the first step toward a Big Mac. Hard to get ground beef with the cow still alive."

    "This one wasn't killed by its owner."

    "Those pesky aliens again? Mutilated?"

    "Beheaded."

    That brought Jack up short. He looked up at Abe and saw he wasn't kidding. The thought of someone hacking away at some poor dumb animal's neck until the head fell off made him queasy.

    "Jeez."

    "There's more. It seems to have been done with a single blow."

    "To a cow? Behead a cow with a single cut? What'd he use—a chainsaw?"

    "They think it was a sword."

    Ah… so this was why he'd brought it up. Jack had told Abe about the Gaijin Masamune, and how it had sliced through his shoulder like a hot Ginsu through butter—no, make that soft margarine.