Julius nodded slowly.

"Just like him," he said.

"You had any interest in moving in on Tony Marcus's business while he's in jail?"

Julius shrugged.

"You think about it," he said.

"Tony's got some stiff named Tarone running his errands while he's in the place. Could knock him over easy."

"I met Tarone."

"I unnerstand Tony's problem," Julius said.

"You don't want no hotshot running things while you're away, 'cause when you come back it might be his."

"Tony's in no danger there," I said.

"Other hand, you don't want some candy ass running things, anyone can walk in and take it away from him."

"Not easy being a crime lord," I said.

Julius ignored me. He liked talking about business.

"Used to be when Broz was younger, you go see him, you talk, he sorta decides what's gonna happen, everybody gets along, everybody makes money. Now, it's like, you know, an open city. So, yeah, we been looking over his operation. Gino probably has too.

Fast Eddie Lee, I don't know. He ain't said. Fuckers never say much."

"Gotten to push and shove yet?"

"No, right now we're just appraising."

"Anthony have anything to do with the appraising?"

"Forget Anthony, I told you, there's a C-grand out on him. He don't matter anymore. He's already dead, he just don't know it yet."

"You think Shirley and Marty Anaheim might be connected to the appraising?"

"There ain't no Shirley and Marty Anaheim."

"I'm told there was."

"He's fucking lying," Julius said, his voice rumbling in his chest.

"Give me his name."

I shook my head again.

"I find out who's saying that," Julius rumbled, "I'll kill him.

Myself. Personally."

There didn't seem anywhere to go from there. I stood up.

"I'll go now," I said.

"I'm sorry about your daughter."

"Yeah," Julius said.

"And I hope your wife can find some consolation."

Julius nodded. His head was forward a little. He seemed to have sunk deeper into his chair.

"She ain't going to," he said.

CHAPTER 42

On Thursday nights Susan ran a walk-in clinic at The Spence Health Center in Cambridge, and didn't get out until 9:00. Then she always drove over to my place to have dinner with me and spend the night. And always before we went to bed we walked Pearl the Wonder Dog together up the Commonwealth Avenue Mall. Which was what we were doing on this Thursday night, at about 11:30. It was definitely fall now. The leaves had turned, and where the streetlights made them bright they seemed almost artificial against the darkness. There was little traffic, the eleven o'clock news was over, and many of the brownstone and brick townhouses were dark. Susan held Pearl's leash. Pearl leaned firmly into her choke collar and made an occasional huffing sound.

"Ever wonder why she's in such a hurry?" I said.

"She's not going anywhere."

"She likes to hurry," Susan said.

We crossed Dartmouth Street. Ahead of us at the Exeter Street crossing a car pulled up and two men got out and began to walk toward us. Behind us I heard a car slow and stop on Dartmouth Street. I glanced back; a man got out of the passenger side and began walking behind us.

I said to Susan, "Kiss me good night, and take Pearl and go right across the street here as if you were going home. When you're behind the parked cars crouch down and get the hell away from here."

"What is it?"

"Trouble, I think."

I turned her toward me and kissed her as if there were nothing else to do in the world. As I kissed her I took my gun out from under my coat.

I murmured against her mouth, "When I let you go, move. Don't hurry, but don't linger. Wave to me as you cross the street."

Susan didn't say another word. When we stopped kissing, she touched me on the face once, briefly, and headed across Commonwealth Avenue in the middle of the block; as she and Pearl squeezed between two parked cars she gave me a happy wave.

When she reached the sidewalk, she turned and started back toward Arlington Street. The guys in front of me paid her no mind.

I pretended to look after her. The guy behind me was walking casually, looking around like a late-night tourist. I palmed my gun, so that in the darkness no one could see that I was carrying it. It was the easy-to-carry little Smith & Wesson.38 chambered for five rounds. I always left the chamber empty under the hammer, so I had four. Usually that was enough, and would have to be again.

After all, I had one more bullet than attackers. Though I would have, had I known the agenda, brought the Browning 9mm which had thirteen in the magazine. To my right was a bench. I stopped and put my right foot up on it and pretended to tie my shoe. The two ahead of me were about thirty feet away. The guy behind me was a little closer. I saw one of the guys ahead of me move his hand and caught the flash of a stainless-steel handgun in the light that fused out from the streetlamps. A blued finish is better for being sneaky. I stepped suddenly up onto the bench and went over it and landed in a crouch behind it. There was a shot from in front and a bullet whanged off the cement leg of the bench. Across the street a car alarm began its siren call. I cocked my gun, took a breath, let it out, and drilled the guy with the stainless-steel handgun right in the middle of the chest. He made a huff, not unlike Pearl's huff, and fell over on his back. Another bullet plowed into the bench, hitting the wooden seat this time, and splintering it. I cocked the.38, breathed out again, aimed for the middle of the mass which was coming at me on the run, and shot the guy behind me. He pitched forward, his momentum overcoming the impact of the slug, and sprawled toward the bench on his face. I whirled toward the third guy, who should have been on top of me. He wasn't. He was running back down the mall toward Exeter Street.

The car that had been idling on Dartmouth pulled away and disappeared toward the river, running a red light in the process. I stood, and turned sideways and shot at the running gunman. But the range was too great for the two-inch barrel. He opened the back door, dove in, and the car screamed away from the curb as the door closed behind him.

Behind me the car alarm was whooping and whining. I took some bullets from my coat pocket and reloaded while I looked for Susan. I saw her come out from behind a car with Pearl at the corner of Dartmouth Street. Pearl, gun-shy to the end, was trying to climb into Susan's lap. I put my gun away and knelt beside the man who'd followed me. He was a large man with a beard and a significant belly. He had no pulse. I moved to the front guy, beardless and skinny. He was dead too. I couldn't think much anymore, but I could still shoot.

"You hit?" Susan said.

I put my arm around her.

"No," I said.

"What's with the car alarm."

"I banged into every car along the street," Susan said.

"One was bound to have a motion alarm."

"Smart," I said.

"I have a Ph.D. from Harvard."

"You didn't say stupid stuff when I told you to move," I said.

"You'd be worried about me and Pearl," Susan said.

"I'd have been in the way."

Pearl weaseled her way in between us, and jumped up with her paws on my chest. I patted her head.

"They're dead?" Susan said. She didn't look at them.