"There's one more," Leland said.

The pain was increasing, but he had fallen into an easy, slow cadence that allowed his arms and shoulders to take his weight on the banisters. He was finished — he was going to get out. He needed medical attention. At the rate they were going, the police wouldn't get to him for hours, even if they came down from the roof. If they tried to lift him to a helicopter, they might just drop him down to the street. Accidents happened. All concerned would be better off if this thing remained a mystery.

He marveled at himself: he was still afraid of falling, even after Steffie had already done it. It made him sick to his stomach. He had one shot left with Karl on the loose and the police afraid to come up into the building. It was as if people wanted him to die. Certainly the president of Klaxon Oil. After this night, the list was longer than ever.

On the way down he tried to figure out everything that had happened and where all the bodies were, but he was too tired, so tired he wasn't sure he was going to be able to remember even after he'd had the rest he needed. He would let other people worry about it. He was going to get to sleep. He wasn't going to think. He would answer questions later. The first person he would talk to was his lawyer.

At the thirty-second floor, he thought of looking again at Steffie's office. If he wanted to live, he would have to forget things like that. After the medical attention, he needed a bath, one given to him, a meal, and a night's rest, in that order. He wanted to see his grandchildren. He wanted to talk to Kathi Logan. The kids had a father, but Leland wasn't sure they wanted to be with him. They weren't that young and Leland wasn't that old. It was a thought and a reason to live.

At the twenty-eighth floor he had to stop to rest. He sat down heavily, stretching his left leg stiffly across the stairs. Both legs ached, his back, his chest, and his arms. Coming down, when he tried to ease the strain from one part of his body, another would begin to give way to pain, and then spasms. He knew he could make it. He would be all right once people could see him, once cameras could pick him up. That was what he wanted. He wanted to get better. He wanted to get healthy, eat a steak and baked potato. He wanted a meal that started with a shrimp cocktail, about eight fresh jumbos.

He got up.

He had to stop again at the twenty-second floor and this time he threw himself back on the stairs to ease the cramps in the muscles all around his rib cage. Terra incognita:he kept thinking of the offices and labyrinths outside the staircases, the self-important little bastions of clerical territoriality — what if he opened the doors and found more computers, more value, more magic beyond his grasp? He kept going, thinking that an old man believes in himself in spite of the changing evidence, in spite of everything.

On the nineteenth floor they started to hail him on the radio again, and he turned them off until he passed what he thought could be a danger zone. He was thinking of where his chair-bomb had hit the elevator. The wreckage he had seen on television opened the possibility that one, more, or all of the staircases were unsafe, exposed, or both. If hostages were hiding in the middle part of the building, he had not seen them. He did not want to see them. He had one bullet left, and he did not want to scramble the wrong person's brains by accident.

The staircase was intact. The blast must have gone straight out the windows. Maybe the building wasn't that badly damaged. He gave up as an unnecessary risk the opportunity to look out on the two floors. Karl had not established that he had an imagination, but how much imagination did it take to stake out the floors about which Leland would be most curious?

At fifteen he rested again. This time he went out onto the floor. Some ceiling panels were down, windows broken, but otherwise it looked like every other office waiting for Monday morning. He sat on a desk, pushed his weight back so that his thighs were supported, then lay back. He had to wipe the grime off the face of his watch in order to read it. Almost noon, if it was accurate.

He thought of staying where he was.

He had to get down to the ground floor. His daughter was dead. Her children were alone. He couldn't stop. You don't stop, ever, no matter what.

He was barely able to get up. His muscles shook so much he felt as if he were being raised by a bumper jack. The sun was so high now that the light pouring through the windows was pearl-colored. Who was going to clean out his daughter's room? He had taken care of both his parents, and perhaps God had spared him Karen, but he did not want to do it for Stephanie. He did not want to intrude on her privacy. Karen would not have wanted it. He was on his feet, moving.

"Bill? Can you let me talk to Kathi?"

"Sure, man. Anything you want."

"Joe? Are you all right?"

"Do you know what happened?"

"Yes. I'm sorry. If I can help you in any way, please let me."

"I got all of them but one. There's one still running around in here."

"The television picked that up. The police say they have no way of being sure, one way or the other. Can you stay where you are? Can you tell the police your location and wait for them to come for you?"

"This fellow's listening to every word we say. He's in here somewhere."

"Joe, he's not your responsibility..."

"She's telling you the truth, Joe," Al Powell said, "Look, I believe you. I don't want anything to happen to you!"

"I'm not looking for him! I'm trying to get out of here!"

"Please, Joe..."

It was like living your life for nothing. What was left? Everything he and Karen had worked for, everything they had planned, and all that had survived the disaster they had made together, was gone. It was just history and the passage of time. He pressed the "Talk" button. "What else is happening? What are they showing on television?"

"The streets of Los Angeles are jammed with cars," Kathi said. "People are trying to follow the money, which is blowing east. The building is between Beverly Hills and the direction the money is taking, and people in their Rolls-Royces can't get around the jam. If you caused all that after what you've been through, if you were the one throwing the money out the window, I'll love you forever."

"I don't know anything about any money. I never saw any money."

"Do you want me to come up there?"

"I'm going to get into the right hospital. Try to get some rest. I want everything to slow down."

"I'll be watching for you," she said.

He had forgotten that television would be downstairs, too. Something made him feel a start of fear — he didn't know what it was. Now Al Powell broke in.

"Joe, let me have a word with you. We have people coming down in twos and threes, reporting that there are people up there too exhausted or frightened to move. We have about forty down here now, but no sign of your grandchildren. On the basis of what you've been saying, Captain Robinson had devised a plan. We're sending teams of officers up all the staircases. These men are heavily armed. As they get to each floor, they're going to say so — radio that information to me. I'll relay it to you. You don't have to give us your location. When the officers are near you, sit down on the stairs and put your hands on your head. We'll get you down, I promise. I promise you, partner."

It took another forty minutes; they were being very cautious. He was on the sixth floor when he heard their voices and the scraping of their shoes. He sat down, put his hands on his head, and announced his presence.

It was as if he had been away — out of contact with people — for years. After they disarmed him and Al told them on the radio they had the right man, two of the officers picked him up and carried him down the stairs. There were six of them altogether, all trying to talk at once. Just as well, for he had nothing to say. He dreaded the talking he was going to have to do. He had lost weight; he could feel it in the ease with which they carried him, then passed him to their fellows.