"Miriam, I swear to God – "

"All rye, Joe. Chew wait."

When Nina came on the line, she sounded wide awake. "This is very rude of you," she said crossly, "waking Miriam."

"What about you?"

"I was writing."

"Me, too," Joe Winder said. "You were working on your phone fantasies?"

"My stories, yes."

"That's the main reason for the call. I had an idea for you."

Nina said, "I've got some good news, Joe. I'm getting syndicated."

"Hey, that's great." Syndicated? What the hell was she talking about. Ann Landers was syndicated. Ellen Goodman was syndicated. Not women who write about bondage on Olympic diving boards.

"There's a company called Hot Talk," Nina said. "They own, like, two hundred of these adult phone services. They're going to buy my scripts and market them all over. Chicago, Denver, even Los Angeles."

"That's really something."

"Yeah, in a few months I'll be able to get off the phones and write full-time. It's like a dream come true."

She asked about Joe's idea for a fantasy and he described it. "Not bad," Nina admitted. "It just might work."

"Oh, it'll work," Winder said, but Nina didn't take the bait. She expressed no curiosity. "Remember," he added, "it has to be a fishnet suit with absolutely nothing underneath."

"Joe, please. I understand the principle."

He was hoping she would ask how he was doing, what he'd been up to, and so on. Instead she told him she'd better go because she didn't want to keep Miriam awake.

Winder fought for more time. "Basically, I called to see how you're doing. I admit it."

"Well, I'm doing fine."

"Things might get crazy in the next week or so. I didn't want you to worry."

"I'll try not to." Her tone was disconcertingly sincere. Winder waited for a follow-up question, but none came.

He blurted: "Are you seeing anybody?"

"Not exactly."

"Oh?"

"What I mean is, there's a man."

"Oh, ho!" A hot stab in the sternum.

"But we're not exactly seeing each other," Nina said. "He calls up and we talk."

"He calls on the 976 number? You mean he's a customer?"

"It's not like the others. We talk about deep things, personal things – I can't describe it, you wouldn't understand."

"And you've never actually met him?"

"Not face-to-face, no. But you can tell a lot from the way a person talks. I think he must be very special."

"What if he's a hunchback? What if he's got pubic lice?" Joe Winder was reeling. "Nina, don't you see how sick this is? You're falling in love with a stranger's voice!"

"He's very sensual, Joe. I can tell."

"For God's sake, the man's calling on the come line. What does that tell you?"

"I don't want to get into it," Nina said. "You asked if I was interested in anyone, and I told you. I should've known you'd react this way."

"Just tell me, is he paying for the telephone calls?"

"We've agreed to split the cost."

"Sweet Jesus."

"And we're meeting for dinner Tuesday up in the Gables."

"Wonderful," said Joe Winder. "What color trench coat did he say he'd be wearing?"

"I hate you," Nina remarked.

They hung up on each other at precisely the same instant.

Pedro Luz slithered beneath Carrie's mobile home. Lying on his back in the cool dirt, he listened to the shower running and laughed giddily. He placed both hands on a wooden floor beam and pushed with all his strength; he was certain that he felt the double-wide rise above him, if only a few millimeters. With a bullish snort, he tried again. To bench-press a mobile home! Pedro Luz grimaced in ecstasy.

He was proud of himself for tracing the car, even if the detective work entailed only the pushing of three lousy buttons on a computer. He was equally proud of himself for locating the address in the dark and remaining invisible to the occupants of the trailer. At dawn he had watched the woman drive off to work, leaving him alone with that crazy doomed bastard, Joe Winder.

Pedro Luz had spent a long time fueling himself for the task. He had strung the intravenous rigs in the storage room of the Security Department at the Amazing Kingdom of Thrills. There, stretched on a cot, he had dripped large quantities of horse steroids into both arms. Afterwards, Pedro Luz had guzzled nine Heinekens and studied himself naked in a full-length mirror.

The mirror examination had become a ritual to make sure that his penis and testicles were not shrinking, as Churrito had warned they would. Pedro Luz had become worried when his security-guard uniform had gotten baggy in the crotch, so every night he took a measuring tape and checked his equipment. Then he would leaf through some pornographic magazines to make sure he could still get a hard-on; on some evenings, when he was particularly anxious, he would even measure the angle of his erection.

On the night he went after Joe Winder, the angle was exactly zero degrees. Pedro Luz blamed it on the beer.

Inside the trailer, Winder finished typing another counterfeit press release, which said:

The widow of a young scientist killed at the Amazing Kingdom of Thrills has been offered a settlement of $2.8 million, officials of the popular amusement park have announced.

The payment would be made in a single installment to Deborah Koocher, age 31, of New York. Her husband, Dr. William Bennett Koocher, was a noted wildlife biologist who helped supervise the Endangered Species Program at the Amazing Kingdom. Dr. Koocher died two weeks ago in a tragic drowning at the park's outdoor whale tank. That incident is still under investigation.

Charles Chelsea, vice president of publicity, said the cash offer to Mrs. Koocher "demonstrates our sense of loss and sorrow over the untimely death of her husband."

Added Chelsea: "Will was instrumental in our rare-animal programs, and his heroic efforts to save the blue-tongued mango vole won international acclaim."

In a statement released Sunday morning, Francis X. Kingsbury, founder and chairman of the Amazing Kingdom, said that Dr. Koocher's death "was a tragedy for all of us at the park. We had come to love and admire Will, who was as much a part of our family as Robbie Raccoon or Petey Possum."

The $2.8 million settlement offer is "a gesture not only of compassion, but fairness," Mr. Kingsbury added. "If Dr. Koocher's family isn't satisfied, we would certainly consider increasing the payment."

Joe Winder reread the announcement, inserted the word "completely" before "satisfied," and fed the paper into the fax machine. He considered phoning Nina again, but decided it was no use; the woman was groping recklessly for male companionship. What else could explain her irrational attraction to a disembodied masculine voice?

Besides, Joe had Carrie now – or she had him. The dynamics of the relationship had yet to be calibrated.

Winder was in the mood for acoustic guitar, so he put on some Neil Young and fixed himself four eggs, scrambled, and two English muffins with tangerine marmalade. Glancing out the kitchen window, he noticed a tow truck parked crookedly on the shoulder of the dirt lane. He didn't see a driver.

The shower had been running for some time. Winder cracked the door and saw Skink curled in a fetal snooze, cold water slapping on the blaze weather suit. Winder decided not to wake him.

Suddenly he heard a pop like a car backfiring, and a hole the size of a nickel appeared in the tile six inches above Skink's face. Then came another bang, another hole.

Joe Winder yelled and dived out of the doorway.