"What?" I asked her.

"He used to go to this day-care center. Out in Fresh Meadows. One day they took him someplace-he says out in the country-in the school-bus they use. There was a guy dressed in a clown suit and some other stuff. He can't tell me. He had to take his clothes off and do something-he won't tell me that either. And someone took pictures of him."

"Where was this place?" I asked her.

"I don't know!" she said, fighting not to start crying, biting her lower lip like a kid.

I patted her back in a careful rhythm, waiting until it matched her breathing. "What else did you find out?"

"A woman came there. An old woman, he said. She had two men with her. Big, scary men. One had a little bag-like a doctor's bag? With money in it. The old woman took the pictures and the clown got some of the money.

"And?" I prompted her.

"Scott couldn't tell me what the men looked like, but he saw the hands of the man who carried the little bag. There was a dark-blue mark on one of them. Scott drew it for me." She fumbled in her purse and pulled out a piece of paper. It was covered with all kinds of crosses and lines, drawn in crayon like a kid did it. Down in one corner was something in blue, with a red circle around it. I held the match closer. It was a swastika.

"This was on the man's hand?" I asked her.

"Yes."

"Back of his hand?"

"Yes."

"What did you do?" I asked her.

The redhead took a breath. "I showed the drawing to Julio. He took one look and said, 'Jailhouse tattoo.' I asked him if there were Nazis in prison. He said he really didn't know too much about it. I pressured him-I made him tell me. And that's when I got your name-he said you knew them."

41

IT WAS cold out there by the water, especially along my spine. We had a deal-I had listened to her story and now I could walk away. But I wanted to buy some insurance-make her understand that I wasn't the man for the job anyway.

"Julio's full of shit," I told her in a flat voice.

"I know," she said, quiet and soft.

"I mean about the Nazis. I don't know them-they were in prison with all of us-nobody knows them-they keep to themselves, you understand?"

The redhead twisted in my lap until she was facing me. She grabbed the lower half of my face like I had done to her. I could smell the perfume on her hand. She put her little face right up against me, grabbing my eyes with hers.

"You're lying to me," she whispered. "I know all about men-I know more about men than you'll ever know. I know when a man is lying to me."

I met her stare with no problem, even though the moon was dancing in her crazy eyes.

"I'm telling you the truth," I said.

She leaned against me, shoving her lips hard against mine. I could feel her teeth. Then her tongue. She stayed like that for a solid minute, her hands somewhere on my chest. "Please?" she whispered.

She pulled her face away. "No," I said. I started to get up but she was still sitting on my lap. She put her face against me again, opened her mouth, and bit into my lower lip with all her strength. The pain-jolt shot through me like electricity-I stiffened two fingers and a thumb and drove them into her ribs. She grunted and pulled away from me, blood on her mouth.

The redhead rolled off my lap and bent double at the waist. I thought she was going to throw up, but she got herself under control. Her head came up. She was chewing on something-a piece of my lip.

"Mmmmm," she said, "it's so good." I watched her swallow a part of me. Her smile had red in it, like smeared lipstick.

I got up from the bench and walked back to the Plymouth, leaving her where she was. She didn't move until she heard the engine kick over. Then she walked to the car, taking her time.

She got in the passenger side, opened her window, and looked out-away from me. She didn't say another word until we pulled up next to her BMW.

42

METROPOLITAN Avenue was quiet. The BMW was sitting there undisturbed. It was that kind of neighborhood.

The redhead turned to me. "Can I say one thing to you before you go?"

I just nodded, tensing my right arm in case she decided she was still hungry.

"One hundred thousand dollars. In cash. For you."

She had my attention, but I didn't say anything.

"One hundred thousand dollars," she said again, like she was promising me the most erotic thing in the world. Maybe she was.

"Where?" I asked her.

"I have it," she said. "And it's yours if you find me that picture."

"And if I don't? I mean, if I look and come up empty?"

"How long will you look?"

"If I look, I'll look four, five weeks. After that, there's no point. You could run some ads, shake some trees…but if it's around, still local, that's all the time there is."

"How do I know you'll really look?" she asked.

"You don't," I said, "and that's the fucking truth."

"Five thousand a week?"

"Plus expenses.

"For a hundred grand, you can pay your own expenses.

"If I find the picture," I said, "the hundred grand covers it all, okay? But if I don't, you pay five grand a week for a max of five weeks, plus expenses.

The redhead stroked her own face, soothing herself, thinking. Finally she said, "Ten grand up front and you start tonight."

"Twenty-five up front and I start tonight," I shot back.

"Fifteen," she offered.

"Take a walk, lady," I said. "I shouldn't have started this in the first place."

"You walk with me," the redhead said. "Back to my house. I'll give you the twenty-five."

"And a picture of the kid?"

"Yes. And all the other stuff I put together."

"And then you're out of it? I do my work and I let you know the result?"

"Yes."

"And then you forget you ever saw me?"

"Oh, I'll do that," she said, "but you'll never forget you saw me.

Even in the car I was still cold. "You have the money at your house? Your husband?"

"Don't worry about it. He won't be home tonight. Is it a deal?"

"No promises," I told her. "I'll take my best shot. I come up emptythat's all, right?"

"Yes," she said again. "Follow me."

She got out of the Plymouth and into her car. I let the engine idle while she started up. She pulled out and I followed her taillights into the night.

43

THE REDHEAD drove badly, taking the BMW too high in the lower gears, backing it off through the mufflers when she came to a corner, torturing the tires. The Plymouth was built for strength, not speed-I drove at my own pace, watching to see if she attracted attention with her driving.

The BMW ducked into the entrance for Forest Park. I lost sight of her around a curve, but I could hear tires howling ahead. I just motored along-there was no place for her to go.

She turned out of the park and into a section of mini-estates-not much land around the houses, but they were all big bastards, set far back from the street, mostly colonials. The redhead took a series of tight, twisting turns and stopped at a flagstone-front house with a wrought-iron fence. She got out and walked to the entrance, never looking back. Something from her purse unlocked the gate. She waved me around her car and I pulled into the drive. I heard the gate close again behind me and then the BMW's lights blinded me as she shot past me, following the curve of the driveway around to the back of the house-it opened as we approached-it must have had some kind of electronic eye. The light came on inside the garage. Only one stall was occupied-a Mercedes sedan.

I watched her slam the BMW into the middle space. I brought my car to a stop, and reversed so the Plymouth 's rear bumper was against the opening of the garage. She motioned for me to pull all the way inside. I shook my head, turned off the engine. She shrugged the way you do at an idiot who doesn't understand the program and pointed for me to follow her inside.