I got shot here. It's really a bitch sometimes."

"Do you want something for it?"

"No, I just get these twinges. Makes me sweat like a pig. Keep going." A smile. "Please."

He could say that only because he was dead. The Terrors fangs had shredded his heart. He was gone. He was as polite as a corpse at the wake.

She continued for a few minutes then offered some conclusion. Something cheerful, something snappy. He nodded and had no idea what she had said. She said she was sorry she had to leave. They'd talk again soon. He thanked her. Looked her right in the eye and said, "This's been real, you know, reassuring. I appreciate it." They shook hands. Buffett told her to have a nice weekend.

When she was gone he picked up the phone and called Bob Gianno at the Maddox police station. They talked about nothing for a while and when Buffett could wait no longer he asked the detective for a phone number. There was silence for a moment and then Buffett heard the numbers. He memorized them. He asked Gianno, "This is one of those cellular phones, right?"

"Yeah, it's in his Winnebago."

"And I just call it like a regular number?"

'That's all you have to do."

TWELVE

Through his closed eyes, Donnie Buffett was aware of a shadow over him. He hoped it was not Penny.

He particularly hoped it wasn't her parents.

The nurse changing the urine bag would have been okay.

The nurse changing the Foley's wouldn't have been.

He was pleased to see that it was John Pellam.

BufFett said, "Hey, chief, it's you."

Pellam nodded and walked into the room.

"You got more flowers. Looks like a nursery."

"Yeah. I don't like flowers so much, you know. She said she didn't want them, that girl of yours. But you ought to take some to her. What's her name? Tell her you bought 'em."

"I'm glad you called. I was going to stop by."

Buffett waved to the chair. "Why? You in the mood for more abuse?"

Pellam laughed.

"I was feeling bad, you know. I was a real shit."

"No problem," Pellam said.

"I kind of go crazy. I didn't-"

"I understand. You doing okay?"

Buffett nodded, and laughed. "I'm fine. I was, I think the doctor called it, 'resisting.' I was resisting what happened to me.

If you go with it you feel better."

"Good."

"A little therapy. I'll get a wheelchair. There're a lot of laws. Wheelchair access. Go to the Cardinals games, they gotta have ramps. You can get practically anywhere."

"I saw they have sports for… you know." Pellam was hesitating, maybe not sure whether to say "paraplegics" or "handicapped." What he said was, "Wheelchair sports. I saw it on the ESPN."

"Yeah, basketball. Wheelchair basketball. And some guys do the marathon. I guess you can coast downhill. Man," he said, smiling, "that's me-doing a marathon sitting on my ass. Hey, you want something to eat?"

"Thanks a ton. Hospital food?'

"Naw, I got some good stuff here. Ruffles, dip. Cookies."

Pellam shook his head. Buffett ate half a cookie and stared into the cellophane bag for a moment. He rolled the top of the bag tight. Set it on a tray.

Pellam did a tour of the greenhouse by the window. He said, "So how long you been on the force?"

"Close to seven years."

"You say that? Force?"

"Sure, you can say that."

"And you walked a beat, like in the old days?"

"Some neighborhoods aren't so good anymore. Mad-dox's really gone to the dogs. So you make movies?"

"Not me. I just find locations."

"How'd you get into that?"

"Fell into it, I guess. I like to travel."

"You meet any Hollywood honeys? You must, huh?"

"I stay clear of the Coast. Not my scene, really."

"Then why're you in movies?"

"Why're you a cop?"

Buffett shrugged.

"Oh, I forgot." Pellam lifted the stained bag he carried. "It's beer. Can you drink it?"

"Hell, yes, I can drink it."

Pellam sat down on the sturdy gray chair. They opened two cans and drank them down. "You know," Buffett said, "all these guys I work with? Mean sons of bitches some of them, it's like they turn into pussies when they come to see me. They bring me flowers. They bring me magazines. Nobody's brought me any beer. A lot of guys don't come. I think they're nervous or something about seeing me, about what they're going to say."

Pellam stood up and slipped two fresh cans in the water pitcher next to the bed. He filled it with cold water. The lid did not close completely. "If you got a spacey nurse, maybe you can get away with it."

'"Predate it, chief."

Pellam sipped his beer. He waited a moment, then said, "I guess I wanted to say this last time, but, well, you looked pretty upset and I held off."

"Say what?"

"I'm really getting hassled. Your buddies-and the FBI now-they're really on my case. They've been on the set and it's messing up the film. I'm worried about my job. I can't afford that right now."

Buffett shrugged. "If you didn't see anything, you didn't see anything."

"Yeah, but they don't feel that way and they're all over the place. The FBI's talking about looking into the company's tax returns and corporate documents." Pellam made a helpless gesture with his hands.

"Oh, the feds're pricks from the git-go," Buffett said as if explaining something as basic as gravity. Then he nodded. "Ron Peterson-he's the U.S. Attorney-he's a maniac." He explained about Gaudia and Crimmins and the 60 Minutes program. "Peterson's going to get Crimmins and nothing in this world is going to stop him."

Pellam continued, "I want to help. I don't want to be a GFY but-"

This brought a spark to Buffett's eyes. He started to laugh.

"What's so funny?" Pellam was irritated.

"Somebody called you a GFY?"

'Your friends. The detectives."

"Gianno and Hagedorn." Buffett laughed again. "Nobody told you what that means?"

"They told me it meant a reluctant witness."

"Pellam, believe half of what cops tell you. It means, go fuck yourself."

"Very funny. Very goddamn funny."

Buffett continued to laugh.

After a moment, Pellam's mouth curled upward and he laughed loud. "GFY. That's good, I gotta admit."

"Listen, Pellam, I got a deal for you. I want you to do me a favor. You do it and I'll tell the department to lay off. I can't do anything with the Bureau but they'll listen to me at Maddox Police."

"You'd do that?"

"You got my word."

"What's this favor?"

"No big deal. There's something in my house I want you to get for me."

"Me?"

"If you wouldn't mind."

"No, I guess not." Buffett saw Pellam's eyes flick to Buffett's wedding ring. He asked, "Why not have your wife bring it when she comes to visit?"

'The thing is," Buffert said, as his determined and cheerful eyes moved from Pellam's face to the fuzzy TV screen, "it'd upset her."

It was a small neighborhood of bungalows set on postage-stamp-size lawns five minutes from downtown Maddox. Both the dark brick houses and the grass were well tended and trim. Pleasant. Pellam believed he had cruised along this street on his quest for the perfect Tony Sloan bungalow. The traffic from a nearby expressway was an irritating sticky rush that filled the air and yellow haze from a half dozen brick smokestacks hung thick over the yards.

Pellam climbed off the Yamaha. He paused in front of the house and checked the address. There was a white Nissan in the driveway and behind it a brown Mercury station wagon with Illinois plates.

The small garden in front held the corpses of flowering plants. Stalks mostly. Bleak. Pellam knew nothing about gardening but if this had been his lawn, he would have added some evergreens. He walked up the winding brick path to the small porch.