"As it turns out, yes," he said. "But you sure weren't happy about it at the time."

"I wasn't upset," Caroline protested. "Really."

"You were awfully quiet."

She frowned. Was that what had put him in this mood? "I was listening," she said. "Trying to make out what they were saying."

It was Roger's turn to frown. "What are you talking about? They didn't say a single word the whole trip."

"Not out loud," Caroline agreed. "But it was like—" She paused, trying to find the right words to describe it. "You know how sometimes when you're by a stream that's running over a lot of rocks you can hear a kind of murmuring? When I was young I used to pretend the stream was talking to the woods. It was kind of like that."

"Really," Roger said, clearly intrigued. "Could you get any words, even ones you couldn't understand?"

She shook her head. "I could tell they were talking to each other, but that was it."

"What about with Nikolos? Could you tell if he ever talked to anyone?"

"Not really," she said. "Of course, he was farther away from me than the Greens in the cab."

"Which probably means your range is pretty short," Roger concluded. "Too bad."

"Sorry," Caroline said automatically.

To her surprise, he grinned at her, possibly the first genuine smile she'd gotten from him since this whole thing began. "Don't apologize, hon," he assured her. "It's not exactly your fault. I wonder why you could hear it and I couldn't."

"Maybe I was sensitized when Cyril tried to get me to bring Melantha to him," Caroline suggested.

"Maybe," Roger said. "It's as good an explanation as any." He nodded out the window at the subway tunnel wall flashing past. "Times Square coming up. We need to change trains."

Caroline braced herself. "Roger... what happens if we do find Melantha? Do we just hand her over to Nikolos?"

Roger shook his head. "I don't know," he said. "Let's worry about it then."

19

Jonah was plowing his way through his fourth sandwich when Fierenzo's cell phone finally rang.

Scooping it off the table, he popped it open. "Fierenzo."

"It's Jon," Powell's voice came back. "I've got good news, bad news, and weird news. Which do you want first?"

"I believe it's traditional to start at the bottom," Fierenzo said, getting up and crossing to the kitchen door. Preoccupied with his meal, Jonah didn't even look up as Fierenzo let the door swing shut behind him. "Let's hear the bad news."

"The Whittiers have learned not to take cabs to their actual destination," Powell said. "Smith and I canvassed the whole area around 14th and Fifth, and none of the shopkeepers remember seeing them."

"Not a huge surprise," Fierenzo said, walking to the far end of the living room where he could look out the windows. The city always seemed so clean and cheerful and crime-free from up here.

"I suppose not," Powell conceded. "The good news is that Smith then picked up a report of an incident that happened an hour ago down at Waverly Place and West 11th Street. On a hunch I showed the Whittiers' photos around the area, and we got lucky: a coffee shop manager at the corner of Greenwich and Bank Street remembered them walking around his corner between a pair of short, wide guys."

Fierenzo frowned. Short wide guys. Like the man sitting in his kitchen eating up all his bread and lunchmeat? "Turning the corner which direction?"

"From Greenwich onto Bank," Powell said. "Quiet neighborhood back that way, especially on a Saturday."

"He's sure it was them?"

"I'm sure it was them," Powell said. "Because a few minutes later an ambulance driver waiting at St.

Vincent Hospital saw them come tearing out again onto Greenwich, this time minus their escort."

"Really," Fierenzo said, frowning as he tried to visualize the street layout down there. "So they left Greenwich, went down Bank, turned again at either Waverly Place or West 4th, then came back up to Greenwich again?"

"It was Waverly," Powell told him. "According to the driver, they met up with two other guys and all got into a cab together."

"Not their original escort?"

"The driver described this pair as tall and thin," Powell said. "Unfortunately, he didn't get the medallion number."

"It's still a start," Fierenzo told him. "The cab companies are going to love us today."

"That's okay—I'm used to being loved," Powell assured him. "You ready for the weird news now?"

Fierenzo frowned. "I assumed that was the weird news."

"Not even close," Powell assured him. "The reason we came down here in the first place was that there was some kind of altercation on Waverly Place—which is how we know that's where the Whittiers turned—involving a man and a car that was apparently trying to run him down. A witness crossing the street a block away said he saw the man shooting at the car, and that the car was bouncing around as the bullets or whatever slammed into it."

" 'Or whatever'?"

"Patience, partner," Powell said. "Let me give it to you in order. Just before the car reached the pedestrian, he managed to jump out of the way. The car kept going; the intended vic then turned around and he commenced shooting at the back end of the car."

"What did the vic look like?"

"Shortish and built like a wrestler," Powell said with a note of satisfaction. "I'd bet money that he was one of the two men the coffee guy saw hustling the Whittiers around the corner. No idea what happened to the other one."

"How do we know he wasn't the driver?" Fierenzo asked.

There was a faint snort from the phone. "Because the driver was a kid."

"A kid?"

"Yep," Powell said. "Like I said, the car kept going down Waverly after it passed the intended vic.

Our witness saw it coming toward him and ducked around the nearest building so he wouldn't get creamed when it ran into the cross-traffic at Seventh. He heard the car brake to a halt, and a few seconds later a kid ten to fifteen years old went charging around the corner. He reached Greenwich Avenue, and that was the last the witness saw of him."

"I don't suppose he got a good look at the kid's face."

"Better than that," Powell said. "He saw both the kid's and the intended vic's faces. He's also an amateur photographer with an eye for features, and would be happy to describe both of them to a police artist. I've already sent him back to the precinct."

"We should have more citizens like this," Fierenzo said.

"Sign me up for a dozen," Powell agreed. "Anyway, after the kid disappeared our good citizen looked down Waverly again and saw the vic running back toward Bank Street. This weird enough for you yet?"

"Why?" Fierenzo asked suspiciously. "Is there more?"

"There is indeed," Powell said. "Because now we get to the 'whatever' part you asked about a minute ago. Like I said, the car had been battered pretty good; but it hadn't been shot, like the witness assumed. It was more like it had been worked over by a bunch of guys with sledgehammers. Lots of dents, not a single bullet hole."

Fierenzo frowned. "Like the hammer marks we saw on the Whittiers' balcony door?"

"That was the first thing I thought of, too," Powell agreed. "They seem to be the same kind of impact marks, only more so."

"Maybe you'd better tow it in and have CSU look at it."

"Already in the works," Powell said. "The owner's listed as a Halfdan Gray from Queens. That ring any bells?"

"The Whittiers mentioned someone named Halfdan," Fierenzo said, frowning. "Does he have a son with a penchant for joyriding?"

"I don't know—we haven't been able to contact him yet," Powell said. "Of course, it could also be that the kid was no relation and simply boosted a convenient car. One more thing. Our witness claimed he didn't hear any shots; but when I pressed him, he did remember hearing something like a bass guitar string being plucked. Does that one ring any bells?"