�But this one is different,� the big man reminded him. �This one is very different. The boss said only you could handle it.�

For a long time he had felt that this thing might happen, but in spite of the prevailing symptoms, he never considered what he would do when this bitter moment came. With his thumb and index finger clamped over his mouth, Judge leaned against the window, staring wistfully at the scattering snow. His eye would pick out a thick descending flake and would follow it down, until it became lost among the thousands of flakes that settled on the ground.

Behind him the big man shifted his weight and coughed. �Well?� the man asked, coughing again.

Judge squeezed his lips together thoughtfully. Then he turned to face the man. �What more is there? You�ve brought me the word � there�s nothing more. What else do you want?�

Small, probing eyes, that never seemed to blink, reflected the virulence in the giant�s heart. His lead-colored lips munched on a cigarette. �I got ta get an o.k.,� he said. �Are you going to hit him?�

Judge blinked at him, knuckled his nose and pulled at his ear lobe. Those who died before the crackling guns were patterns in the bloody tapestry he had woven for the Circle. Each body he wrapped in concrete and plunged into the liquid coffin of surrounding lakes meant nothing more to him than just another job completed. How could those lakes have been mirrors reflecting his countenance?

Gone from Judge�s face was the criminal callousness, in its place there settled a pallor of dread. Judge�s eyes wandered the length of the room and settled on his automatic that nested in the leather shoulder holster on the chair. With his eyes riveted to the butt of the gun, Judge said with finality: �You know I�ve never refused a job.�

�But this one is different,� the big man reminded him. �This one is very different. The boss said only you could handle it.�

Normally a member of the Circle did not argue with another, especially against the giant, but Judge could not control the words that scrambled from his lips. �Sure! It figures, the boss gives me the nod! Why not? Ain�t I got the rep? Ain�t I the ace of the rod?� And the words, in their haste to rush past his lips, became jammed in his throat, and Judge gagged. �But�� he breathed heavily, �but, this one in particular � why must I do this one?�

Amazement flickered in the corner of the giant�s mouth. �Look, Judge, you know the reason. Ain�t a man in the Circle what can get close enough to him. He�d pop the moment he spotted one of us. He was always straight with the rod. But you, Judge, he trusts you. So you�re it.�

Judge raked his fingers through his pomaded, black curls. That was the trouble. He knew it. Eager now to rid the room of the giant he pounded his fist into his palm and muttered: �I�m it.�

The giant smiled, trying to offer friendliness, but on his face, the expression was a grimace. When he noticed no reaction from Judge, the giant lifted his hand, fingers outstretched in salute, and sauntered leisurely from the room.

Judge reached for his cigarettes and found that only one remained in the twisted package. Lighting it he fell back into the creaking chair. A clock on the mahogany chest mournfully reminded him of the passing minutes. He rose, shuffled to the chest, pulled open the doors and selected a bottle of whiskey from the frosted shelf. With his index finger he wiped the inside of a tumbler and poured himself a drink. Crossing the room he fell ponderously on the divan, stretching out his long legs over the coral rug and wearily allowed his head to settle back to stare thoughtfully at the ceiling. And with the thoughts that wandered through his mind, his strong body became weak, leaking every drop of courage he had ever dammed.

In everybody�s career there�s the one tough assignment. His head rolled and his eyes snapped hard on the automatic in holster. The gun was still warm from the last killing, now it was to be reloaded for another victim. Somewhere out there, in the snow-shrouded city, the victim knew. And perhaps the victim wondered. Wondered why the Circle, which he had served loyally, had passed his death sentence.

The boss was always right. This particular victim would permit him to get close enough to start blasting. It was only normal since the victim was his own brother.

Judge covered his face with his hands. �Why, Tony? Why?� He cracked his knuckles as punishment for having spoken out loud. Look back. How beautiful it was, back there. Two young kids with big eyes for big money. Your eyes are bigger than your stomach. Roaming the night-drenched streets, filling their pockets with the harvest of their evil occupation. Up the twisted ladder of success they dragged their eager bodies for quick money. And when disputes arose, their guns acted as their attorneys. At that time, independent operations were watched closely by the high priests of crime, and they were soon confronted with the ultimatum of joining the Circle, or being fitted out in a cement tuxedo. With their eyes still on those distant fields of green, they decided to fall into line; however, instead of remaining at a standstill, they were soon elevated to the proud ranks of the torpedoes. They became machines of murder, and by the biddings of the higher-ups, they quelled the opposition with their guns. Murder was no longer a business, it had become a sordid habit.

During their career of violence, they served as executioners. Putting to death members who had strayed off the line. Never had they realized that those victims were, in reality, themselves. Never thinking, like machines, after a button is pushed, they sought out the hunted. Any member of the Circle who was caught in the brilliant spotlight of the law was worthless and dangerous. He had to be eliminated. It was important to the Circle that none of these turned canary. And because of his own skill with a gun, he was often called in to take care of a rat.

Now the irony. It happened, it happens, and it will happen. Life is a tangled web of irony. Tony had decided to go straight. A simple decision, without warning, created out of a kiss with a girl. Tony wasn�t a canary � just a lovebird. The Circle couldn�t recognize the distinction. Nobody quits.

Two trigger men were dispatched to hit Tony, but upon arriving at his apartment they found he had left. They sifted through the city, searching every probable hiding place, until they had to admit that Tony had vanished. Failure in a duty is never savored by the Circle. Nobody vanishes unless the Circle applies the cream.

The Circle was the dealer and expertly they pulled their ace from the deck. Don�t under-estimate the top boys, they knew about the Judge long ago. Whether the top boys felt pity for him, or a feeling that he might break and run when faced with this task, they decided at first to dispatch two thugs from out of town to do the job. But the Judge was their ace, and now they were compelled to play him.

Judge rose to fill his glass again. Standing before the chest he held his drink at eye level and studied the amber liquid in the soft light of a gooseneck wall lamp. Could he ferret out his brother, embrace him, show him that there was nothing to fear, then coldly pull out his gun and squeeze the trigger? He closed his eyes at the idea, inhaling deeply, trying to believe that the whole picture was a fantasy. Here, in the warmth of his apartment, his heart was as cold as a slab in a morgue.

In the haze of his mind he remembered autumn. A cold day toward the end of the month when the leaves on the slumbrous trees curled up feebly and glided to the frosted earth. The earth that was to be torn open to receive his mother�s casket.

�Nick... Tony,� she whispered, her head framed by a pink pillow, the gray, silver-lined hair swirling around the pale, putty features, forming a soft halo. Her fingers were cold and damp when they closed over his hand, seeking some sort of assurance. �Nick � you�ll take good care of Tony. He�s such a young boy, and he always listens to you � he respects you � you�ll watch him, won�t you?�

He had fought off the urge to cry in front of his mother and brother. It was difficult to speak then, and the tears stung his eyes. What do you say to a dying person?

The letters were nailed together. �Sure, mom � I�ll take care of Tony � don�t you worry.�

�Those bad men, Nick, do you still hang around with them?�

Let the journey be easier. �No, mom.�

�I�m glad, Nick, I�m glad.�

I love you, mom. I should have told you that more often. I love you � honestly.

�Nick?� Her voice was sharp with fear. The window pane rattled as the El rumbled past. �Is that the doctor coming?�

Somebody great did this job. Somebody who knew how to do it. Peacefully she died. No blood. No terror. Just a gentle submission and the heart went on vacation forever.

He let the curtain fall into place and he returned to the table for his drink. A promise to his mother. But she was dead now, and what good were promises to the dead? Surely his promise wouldn�t save him from the tentacles of the Circle. He searched his pockets for a cigarette and realizing that he had smoked the last one returned to the window. It was snowing harder now. If he left now, with good luck, he would have a good start. By tomorrow he could be thousands of miles away. Why not? He had been their crutch long enough. They weren�t keeping score on his perfect record. A record so prominent that at any time he risked being sent away for a big jolt at the State College, or maybe take a rap for the hot squat. Were they square with him? That was a question that didn�t take much deliberation. He recalled the jewelery theft.

It was a one-man job. And he fit the pattern. It was a set-up where he crashed a party that sported expensive merchandise. He put the snatch on a set of sapphires and slipped out of the noise and smoke, undetected. Downstairs he hurried around the corner to a waiting car. At the hideout the boss was waiting, impatiently. The boss sat glumly at a table with a deck of cards fanned across the top, one eye squinting from the attacking smoke of his cigarette. After a moment of contemplation, he snapped a card down on the table. �It took a little while, didn�t it, Judge?�

Nothing pleased him, Judge thought, as he moved toward the table, removing a handkerchief from his pocket and opening it, letting a half dozen glittering sapphires roll across the cards. �I got them.�

�Good,� the boss said, sorting the stones with his fingers. �Good,� he repeated, counting them. Then his eyes hardened. �Jo-Jo,� he snapped, �how many is supposed to be?�

�Seven, ain�t it?� Jo-Jo said, looking for confirmation from a man who stood beside him.

�That�s right,� the man said, after staring up at the ceiling to do some quick calculating. �Supposed to be seven to the set. Why, boss?�

The boss directed his gaze at Judge. �There�s only six here.�

Judge stepped forward, bent over the table and counted them. He counted them again. �I don�t understand.�

The boss studied him, as if he were wondering how genuine his words were. �How come?� he asked, drawing the canopy of his shaggy eyebrows tight over his eyes.

Judge shrugged. At first he did not realize the significance of the missing stone. �I�m sure I put the snatch on the whole set.�

As if to prove this statement, he counted the sapphires again, rolling them carefully to one side. His mouth remained open. �I don�t get it.�

The boss made a tired gesture and two triggermen eased up behind him and began to pat his clothing. �Hey!� Judge protested, backing off. A man behind him stood in his way.

The boss arched an eyebrow as if he were surprised to see him indignant about being searched. �What�s the matter, Judge?�

�What�s the idea? What are you putting the heat on for? I didn�t palm one.�

The boss smiled and leaned back in the chair. �Maybe it�s in your clothing Judge � without you knowing it, of course. I�m sure you don�t mind the boys helping you find it.�

It was the manner in which the boss said it that made Judge push away the groping hands. �What is this?� he snapped. �I�m clean.�

A man locked both of his arms behind him while another continued to search through his pockets. The boss rose. �Why don�t you cooperate?�

Judge struggled to free himself. �I don�t have to take this.�

Calmly the boss circled the table and with his opened hand slapped Judge�s head back viciously. �I don�t like your attitude. Now, keep your lips zipped.�

Judge held his head back. One of the men searching him looked up. �Nothin�, boss, he�s clean.�

The boss grunted. �I�m not satisfied.�

�And I�m not either!� Judge shouted. �You guys must be bugs. I put the snatch on the whole set. What do you take me for? I must�ve lost it.�

Nobody spoke. Gelid eyes testified tacitly to the suspicion that crawled through the minds of the men.

Judge clenched his fists. �What the hell � you fanned me � aren�t you satisfied?�

The boss nodded to the door. �Toss him in there, and gun him for the night. Charlie, Getzie, retrace your steps and skin your eyes for the piece. I want you to shake the entire area � comb the car � check everything. And get back as soon as you can.�

The night he had spent in the room was one filled with dread. Opposing the Circle was a treasonable act, and his being innocent of the suspected treachery deepened his gloom. Every five minutes his eyes would dart to the luminous clock on the table. At two o�clock the gunmen returned. He could hear their voices humming in the other room. Silence followed, and then they invaded the room. The boss looked at him, smiled wryly, and scratched his head.

�They couldn�t find it.�

Judge stared moodily at the boss. His mouth felt like a dried-out mudhole.

The boss looked down him scornfully. �We�ll give you until morning, Judge. Think about it.�

Then they were gone. Each new tick of the clock was met by the beat of his throbbing heart. His fingers clawed inside of his clothes in search of a cigarette, and upon finding it had to straighten it out, because his nervousness in taking hold of it had damaged it. In the orange flame of the match the shadows leaped off the walls at him, reaching for him, and he hastily waved out the match, sending away the shadows to mingle once again with the swollen darkness. All that he had to do was to rise and flip the switch on the wall, and he would have had light, but something within him kept him nailed to the sofa. He was afraid to move. Perhaps the slightest sound would bring them running into the room with their guns drawn. He wanted to fondle every moment from now until the dawn. He settled back, gazed up at the ceiling, and ran his tongue slowly around the inside of his mouth, inspecting the crevices between his teeth. The texture of his teeth reminded him that he had not brushed them that morning, and strangely enough, for the first time, it bothered him. He wished he could do it now. No matter how many times he swiveled his tongue around in his mouth, or pursed his lips, he could not expel the dryness that clung tenaciously to his palate.

What would they do to him? That was an absurd question! What does the Circle do with men who are no longer useful, or are under suspicion? At dawn they would come to question him, and his answers would be the same. He pulled hard on the cigarette as he thought about it. His eyes narrowed as his ears devoured every little sound. The clanging of a trolley that passed outside the window. A swish of tires as a car swayed over the trolley tracks. The buzzing of a broken neon sign that spelled DI E over the little diner across the street. A sandpaper growl of an alley cat somewhere below the window.

When the dawn came, the softness of its light poked at his eyelids. Quickly he swung his legs off the sofa and glanced around the room. He was alone. The clock yawned six minutes past six. Judge scratched his arm and let his shoulders sag forward. Sleeping on the sofa for the night had put a cramp in his back. If only he could go home and go to the bed. Nothing stirred in the outer room. He fished a broken cigarette from his shirt pocket.

The door opened. Two men drifted in casually. One of the men kicked the door shut with his heel. They stared at each other, then at Judge. One of them gestured wearily.

�You can get up.�

Judge rose slowly, but he kept his eyes on the men. His mind labored toward a plan. If need be, if worse came to worse, he would fight his way out. His body became tense.

One of the men smiled broadly. �You�re lucky, Judge. The boss just heard on the radio that somebody found the sapphire in the street and reported it to the police. You can go now.�

Tiajuana is a wide open town and Garcia had a product to sell that even the police smiled upon.

Garcia arranged the pictures in neat stacks and placed them in the drawer of the table, with the little books on the right-hand side in rows of eight. He turned out the light and locked the door to his shack and walked up the side street toward the corner where he worked. One of the girls in the house next door yelled something to him as he left, but he did not answer. When he reached his corner, he saw that Manuel, the taco man, already had his cart out and was doing business. Only the Mexicans were eating now, but later the Americans would come out of the bars and stagger down the street looking for food and trying to sober up enough to drive back across the border. Manuel�s tacos would sober them up all right, Garcia thought to himself, if they knew what he put in them. He smiled at Manuel and took his place on the corner, with his back to the wall, and casually watched the tourists as they streamed up and down and across the gaudy, dirty, and very busy street.

Just off the curb, standing in the street, was Torres, grabbing at the lone men and the small groups of men without the protection of their wives or girlfriends.

A pair of young sailors strolled by and Torres caught one by the arm as he stepped into the street and pulled him aside, franticly motioning for the other one to follow. Garcia watched as Torres talked and winked and rolled his eyes and made curves in the air with his hands while the sailors took in every gesture with obvious and eager delight.

�Okay,� Torres said loudly, and motioned them to his taxicab; they got in quickly and Torres raced the engine and slung the car around in the street and off they went. Watching them, it was hard for Garcia to decide who was the most anxious, Torres or the sailors.

Garcia, unlike Torres, did not hail people promiscuously or grab them or follow them down the street trying to promote his business. His customers were more elite � or unique, if you like � and if they wanted what he had to offer, they would let him know right away and would not try to escape.

Juan Tellechea, in his leather jacket and brown police cap, shuffled slowly across the street. ��Hola!� he called to Garcia, and Garcia nodded. They talked for a few minutes in Spanish and then Juan moved on down the street, looking in the bars and waving and talking to people.

A short, middle-aged man with puffy lips and a thick crown of blond hair rounded the corner and Garcia hissed �Books � peek-tures?� and the man looked around but kept on walking. �Nah,� he said, and Garcia shrugged his shoulders, rested his back against the wall and waited for the next prospect.

Three boys in a group came out of a bar across the street and crossed over to Garcia�s corner and as they passed by, he whispered to them, but they were not interested. Manuel smiled at him from his taco cart, then turned around to shout �Taco, meester?� to a Marine corporal who ignored him. The corporal stepped into the street just as Torres parked his taxicab, and Torres tore out of the car and approached the Marine, talking rapidly and waving his hands, but the Marine kept on walking. Torres threw up his hands and yelled something to Manuel who agreed with him.

Garcia waited until the corporal was right in front of him. �Books � peek-tures?� He stopped. Garcia waited. The Marine looked around, then stepped up close. �What you got?� he asked carefully.

�Good stuff. Ver-r-ry good.�

�I don�t see nothin�.�

�Come on � I�ll show you.� Garcia pointed down the side street.

�Oh no! I ain�t failin� for that.�

�No,� Garcia answered. �Eet�s okay. My place ees right there. You see tha� leetle place.�

�Well... okay,� the Marine answered. He was a tall, bony, brown-eyed kid, not more than twenty-two, with a clean shave and an immaculate uniform. On his chest he wore a single row of service ribbons, none with stars or clusters. Garcia led the way and the Marine followed stiffly to the shack. The house next door had four windows on the front, and as Garcia unlocked his door, one of the girls leaned out and saw the Marine.

�Hey, soljer,� she called, smacking bubble gum between her teeth, �you want some real theeng, maybe?� The corporal did not look at her and she called again, using more descriptive, provocative language. Garcia yelled ��Caete! Este j�ven ya est� ocupado,� and the girl spat, made a face at him, and went back to blowing bubbles. Garcia turned on the light and closed the door behind the corporal. �Now you see,� he said, opening the drawer and removing a thin stack of pictures. �Look at thees one,� he said, picking out a particularly obscene picture. The Marine nodded and took the stack and began appraising each one. �Ooo-eee!� he squealed when he came to a shot of a girl doing a bizarre trick that looked anatomically impossible. �How much?�

�One dollar � each,� Garcia answered. ��Ow �bout books? �Ave lotta books.�

�Lemme see,� whispered the Marine. His mouth hung open and his hands trembled as he thumbed through the little books. �How much�re these?�

Garcia held up one hand, fingers spread wide. �Five for dollar.�

The corporal wrinkled his brow.

�That ees good price,� Garcia whimpered. �Only weeth peek-tures, five for dollar.�

They bickered and bargained, but Garcia knew he had a pigeon. Usually he received about five dollars a dozen for the large prints, and sometimes threw in the books free; but the younger the customers, the more they paid.

�Okay,� Garcia said. �Tan dollars for dozen � no books.�

Happily, the Marine agreed and gave Garcia a twenty dollar bill which immediately he stuffed into his pocket. He pulled a manila envelope from the table, blew the dust off, and slid two dozen pictures inside.

�Good deal,� he said, smiling.

The young corporal went out and walked up the side street with the envelope snuggled under his arm, and Garcia watched him until he rounded the corner, then sat down at his table and laughed. He laughed long, hard and loud.

The Marine was half-way down the block when Juan Tellechea, seeing the brown envelope, stopped him. �What you got there?� he asked.

�Nothin�.�

�Let me see thees nothing.�

The corporal looked around, wiped his brow, shuffled his feet and stammered, �It ain�t nothin�. It�s mine � just some stuff of mine.�

Juan reached for the envelope and the Marine backed away. �No trubble,� Juan said, holding him and taking the envelope. He opened it, shook the pictures out, and exclaimed: �Oh, se�or, thees ees illegal. Don� you know?�

�I didn�t know nothin� wuz illegal down here. Now gimme back my pictures.�

�No, se�or,� Juan said coolly. �Illegal.�

�Dammit, you�� He stopped when Juan pushed the leather jacket aside and the pistol came into view.

�You want go Police Station?�

�No... it�s awright,� the Marine answered sadly, then turned and walked away, leaving Juan Tellechea and the pictures behind.

The policeman, flashing a big grin, pulled his jacket straight and walked to the corner. The taxicab pulled away with three men inside and Torres yelled �Hasta luego� and Juan waved to him, then winked at Manuel across the street. Manuel chuckled in return and watched him go down the side street and into Garcia�s shack, the envelope of pictures tucked under his arm.

The ageing husband and his wife�s young lover met in an isolated hunting lodge. The older and wiser man posed a question... and the arrogant young man was left with a difficult decision.

I suppose that every older man with a young and beautiful wife asks himself these same questions sooner or later. Sooner or later he awakes one morning and sees his wife lying there beside him, sees her young and warm and desirable there in her sleep, and for no reason at all a little sliver of panic suddenly forces itself into the back of his mind.

He hurries into the bathroom, turns on the light and hopefully examines himself closely in the mirror, searching for a reassurance that is not there. He sees instead a man no longer young, grey flecks in the stubble of beard, white in the hair at the temples, and eyes pouched and tired.

And then the panic sharpens unreasonably and the questions begin to flood into his mind. Will a younger man try to take her away from me? Who will he be? What will he look like? What will she do? What will I do? These � and a thousand others like them.

For most men these questions need never be answered, simply because, like most things we worry about, the event never occurs. For others, like myself, the questions are forced on them and must be met.

When the time comes, however, some of them will obviously answer themselves. For example, what will he look like? There was no longer any reason to wonder. He sat across from me now, a young man of about her age, handsome, almost pretty, soft like his expensively tailored cashmere jacket, soft like the skin on his beautifully tapered hands, strangely out of place here against the worn books and racked guns and roughly hewn logs of my hunting lodge.

�Really,� he said petulantly, looking about the room with obvious distaste, �I don�t see why you should ask me to drive up to the top of this Godforsaken mountain.�

�I�m sorry,� I said, �but I�ve always found that I can think better, clearer somehow, up here at the lodge. The mountain air perhaps, the clean scent of the pines. I thought we could make our decisions more intelligently up here than in some crowded bar in the city.�

�Decisions?� He flicked at an invisible spot on his cashmere lapel. �There was only one decision to be made. That was hers and she made it. She�s leaving you. That�s all there appears to be to it.�

I leaned forward in my chair. �But has she really made that decision?� I asked him. �Does she know you well enough as a man to decide that she can love you better than she has loved me?�

�I don�t follow you,� he said, his voice sulky, bored.

�I�m suggesting,� I said, watching his delicate hands, white against the dark oak of the table, �the possibility that she doesn�t really love you, the possibility that she is only temporarily infatuated because you are a rising young concert pianist and because she has always loved music. I�m suggesting that perhaps she is in love with your talent, with the artistry in your hands, not with you as a man.�

His lip curled disdainfully. �That�s ridiculous,� he said.

�Ah,� I said, �but how do we know? That�s one of the questions which must be answered.�

He looked at his watch and yawned. �Really, if this is all you have to��

�No,� I said, �it�s not all. There�s also the question of what I will do about it.�

�What you will do about it?� He shrugged. �And what do you think you can do about it?�

�The choices are simple,� I said. �I can let her go or I can refuse to give her a divorce and keep her. On the other hand, the decision between these choices is much more difficult. You see, it�s not easy to give up the woman you�ve adored for almost five years.�

He shrugged again and smiled. �I wouldn�t know,� he said.

�No,� I agreed, �I suppose you wouldn�t, and yet I want you to understand exactly how I feel, appreciate the importance of this decision to me.� I thought for a moment and then my eyes stopped and steadied on those soft, white beautiful hands of his. �Yes,� I said slowly. �Yes, I believe that�s it. I believe that losing her would mean as much to me as, say, losing one of those hands would mean to you.�

He winced involuntarily and pulled his hands back into his lap.

I laughed. �I�m sorry if that upset you,� I said. �I was only trying to draw a comparison.�

He cleared his throat, moved uneasily in his chair and looked at his watch again.

�So there we have it,� I said, before he had a chance to speak. �She has a question to answer and I have a question to answer. And yet, oddly enough, neither of us can come to an intelligent decision until we know how your question will be answered.�

�Question?� I watched him closely. A few tiny beads of perspiration were beginning to form along his brow. �I�m not aware of any question I�m supposed to answer.�

�Ah,� I said, �but don�t you see? That�s just the point. Of the three of us, you�re the only one who has no question to answer, no decision to make, everything to gain, nothing to lose. It offends my sense of fairness.�

He started to get up. �Really�� he said.

I stood up with him. �I�m sorry,� I said. �I�m afraid that I�ve been a poor host, moralizing to you like this, not even offering you a drink.� I went to the cupboard and took down two glasses. �Surely you�ll at least have one with me now before you go.�

He hesitated for a moment, then, �All right, just one,� he said, �just one for the road.�

�Just one for the road,� I agreed and went to the heavy ring bolt in the floor in front of the fireplace and tried to lift the trapdoor. �I keep my liquor in the little cellar under here,� I explained and pulled on the ring again, tugging at it this time. He had moved over to watch me and I looked up at him. �I haven�t opened it for some time and it seems to be stuck,� I said apologetically. �Perhaps you�d�?�

He knelt down and grasped the ring with me, his right hand against my left. �All right,� I said, �all together when I give the word.� I put my right hand into my hip pocket and removed the steel handcuffs. �Now,� I said. He strained upward and I snapped the cuffs tight, one about his wrist, the other through the ring. Then I stood up.

He looked at the cuffs and then at me, his face suddenly pale. �What is this, a game?� he said tightly. �Are you crazy?�

�No,� I said �or at least I�m reasonably sure that I�m not. I�m merely trying to illustrate what I was saying before, that of the three of us you alone have had no question to answer, you alone have been spared the pain of a decision.�

I walked to the mantle over the fireplace and took down a heavy hunting knife and balanced the point thoughtfully on the tip of my forefinger. He watched me, fascinated at first, then little sounds like whimpering beginning to come from his throat. I laughed. �Don�t worry,� I said, �I�m not going to harm you. The decision will be entirely your own.� I held the knife out to him, handle first, but he only stared at it, refused to touch it, and so I drove it into the floor beside him, where he could reach it when the time came.

�They�ll find me here,� he said. The whimpering had become more distinct. �They�ll miss me. They�ll come looking for me.�

�Yes,� I said. �Yes, they�ll come looking for you, but in the meantime you�ll have already made your decision and then perhaps she and I will be able to make ours.�

I turned my back to him and went to the corner and took the can of kerosene and began to soak the walls, the books, everything. I felt his eyes on me and heard the rising panic in his harsh breathing but I didn�t look at him again until I had tossed a wad of burning rags against one wall and watched the flames leap to the ceiling.

I went to the door then, opened it and turned. I saw him through the eddies of smoke, on hands and knees, choking, sobbing, frantically digging at the wood about the bolt with the knife.

�It�s no use,� I said. �It�s four inch oak and the door has been bolted down.�

He stopped and looked at me, the sobs rising to a scream. �Don�t leave me, I�ll burn, I�ll burn.�

I shook my head. �Not necessarily,� I said.

Slowly then his eyes left me and went to the gleaming knife in his left hand, to the white wrist imprisoned by the steel cuff. Finally, realizing, eyes wide with shock, he looked back to me.

I bowed slightly. �Your question,� I said and closed the door and got into my car and drove down the mountain to the broad highway leading into the city, never looking back.

Vinnie got his feet wet when he accepted the job from Big Mack Silverman. Then he met Fran, Big Mack�s girl � and it was just a matter of time until he was in over his head.

Some people are born to be in business for themselves and some are born to work for somebody else. The day I stood outside my joint and watched the For Lease sign being put in the window, I realized I came in the latter category. For almost two years I had run an honest joint, sweating out taxes, cops, hoods, payrolls, the price of booze and everything else in the book, and had finally gone broke.

And during those last days as a businessman, I began to wonder about something else. I�d see Mack�Silverman driving through the streets in a black Cadillac half a city block long and somewhere I�d hear a little voice saying, �Crime does pay � and damned well!�

Mack wanted me to come to work for him, even though the pressure that put me out of business had been indirectly exerted by him. It seemed to me to be more than coincidence that the big black Caddie pulled up at the curb just as they finished hanging the For Lease sign. Mack himself was leaning forward in the back seat, the window rolled down, and his big face smiling ruefully out at me.

�It�s a tough business, Vinnie,� he said. �A tough business.� Then he opened the door. �Come on, Vinnie, get in. I got a proposition I want to talk to you about.�

I hesitated a moment, then I saw past him and even if Mack hadn�t asked me to get in I would have tried to anyhow. The girl sitting beside him was no ordinary broad, even from five yards away with about 300 pounds of Mack Silver-man between us, I could tell that much.

What I could see of the nylon-sheathed leg and the plunging neckline that was fighting a losing battle on two fronts only made me want to see more.

�I�m looking for a proposition,� I said, and walked across the sidewalk to the open door.

He slid back in the seat and I climbed through, coming to rest on the other end of the seat, with the girl between us.

Mack smiled affably at me. �Vinnie, meet Fran. Fran, this is Vinnie Pratt.�

�Okay, Herbie,� Mack said to the man at the wheel, and the Cadillac pulled away from the curb. We tooled through the taxpayers� streets with no regard for law. I saw at least two harness bulls make a point of looking in shop windows when we busted a couple of red lights. I wondered if the show was for my benefit. Regardless, it was an effective demonstration of the depth of Mack Silverman�s hold over the city.

�Vinnie, I got a job open at the Zebra Club, that is, if you�re looking for work,� he said.

�What sort of job, Mack?� I asked.

�Independent, that�s what I�ve always liked about you,� he said, with a laugh. �Bar. Start you at the bar.�

�I�m pretty good at sweeping floors, too. Anything like that open?�

The girl looked at me in a funny way, as if she hadn�t heard anyone talk to Mack like this. But Mack laughed again. �Didn�t I tell you, baby? Didn�t I tell you this guy was a riot?�

A couple of minutes later, Herbie swung the car into the lot behind the Zebra Club, and stopped at a back entrance. �Let�s go up to my office and see what we can come up with Vinnie. I can find something that�d suit you.�

�Sure. There must be something,� I said, and caught Fran�s eye. Mack was getting out of the car and didn�t see me, but Fran didn�t miss my meaning. We went in the door and down a hall to an elevator. It carried us up to Mack Silverman�s private office on the third floor of the building. Up there the carpets were ankle-deep, the walls worm-eaten by imported worms, the furnishings as mellow as Kentucky whiskey.

�Fix yourself a drink, Vinnie,� Mack said, indicating the bar at one end of the room. �Look after him, Fran.� Mack went through a door at the far end of the room and Herbie followed him.

�What can I fix for you, Fran?� I said when we were alone.

�Whatever you�re having,� she said. �I�ve got a feeling I like the same things you do.�

�Yeah. Me too,� I said. I made a couple of martinis, which is one thing I�m good at. I handed one to her. �You know Mack for long?�

She seemed suspicious of the question, thinking maybe that I was feeling her out for Mack. �Let�s talk about you. Mack says your bar folded. What was the matter? I thought this town was a good one for bars.�

�It is. That�s why there�s so many of them.� I shrugged. �There was one too many.�

That got a smile out of her. I wanted to say something else to make her smile, but Herbie came out of the door at the end of the room. �Mack says to come in.�

I tossed off my drink and went into the inner office.

Mack Silverman sat behind a huge desk, which seemed only average with him behind it. He was a big man, heavy, but not fat. Solid, like a big piece of gristle. His head grew right out of his shoulders. If he had a neck, he kept it a secret. His head was a furry watermelon, with the nearest thing to handle-bar eyebrows I ever saw. When he laughed � which was often � his face squeezed together into a big prune, his eyes became knife-slits, but in the slits something shone like drops of wet lacquer. You knew he was looking at you.

This room was even plusher than the other one. There were a couple of sofas, a wall bookcase, another smaller bar, and the big uncluttered desk. This was the throne room.

Fran came in behind me and moved to the edge of his desk, where she took a seat. I got a fleeting impression of a parakeet perching on someone�s shoulder, ready to echo his words.

�Well, how about it, Vinnie? Ready to take the job?� Mack said. �Could be just a start you know.�

�It might be interesting to meet a payroll coming instead of going.�

That knocked him out. �Good!�

He came from behind the desk and clapped me on the shoulder. �Why don�t you start tomorrow. No need to rush. Come in in the morning at eight-thirty. Start with Carlos down at the main bar.�

�Whatever you say.�

�Let�s go downstairs and have a drink to your new job, Vinnie.�

Herbie and Fran stayed behind at a word from Mack and the three of us � Mack, the bodyguard, and myself � took the elevator down. The bodyguard stepped out first. I was second. But as soon as he was clear of the elevator, out where he could see down the hall toward the rear door, he reached quickly inside his coat and came out clutching his .38. There was the harsh crack of a shot, but not from his gun. He slumped, the .38 skittering across the carpetted floor of the hall. I didn�t know what was happening, but I knew I�d be next whatever it was. So I hit the deck and rolled, and as I did, I wrapped my fingers around the butt of the pistol lying on the floor. In that split second two more shots rang out. I expected them to be for me, but I heard Mack Silverman grunt with pain behind me. At the end of the hall I saw them, two of them, and the pistol in my fist came up firing. I didn�t think I�d forgotten how to use one, and now I was certain. The two men folded without another sound. Outside the door at the end of the hall a car roared off, spewing loose gravel behind it.

I got up and went down the hall, the .38 aimed at the two figures on the floor ahead of me. But they were past doing anything about me, and I turned and went back to where Mack Silverman sat leaning against the wall, looking down at a stain that spread rapidly across the broad expanse of his coatfront.

�You hit bad?� I asked him. A head poked cautiously in at the end of the hall toward the bar. It was Juan Carlos, a bartender I�d worked with in Florida some years back. When he saw me kneeling beside Mack, he pushed the door wide and came running. Others followed, some with drawn guns.

�Get a doctor,� I told Carlos.

�And a shot of brandy,� Mack added, then looking at me, he added, �Make that two shots.� Carlos rushed off.

�How about it?� I said.

�I don�t think they did much damage,� Mack looked down at his hand. Blood was squeezing out from between his fingers where he held them against his body. �Just hit some of the plumbing.� He started to laugh, but stopped short with a pained look on his face.

Everybody was talking and staring. �Get �em out of here, Vinnie! Get �em all to hell out of here!�

I broke up the crowd, and in a few minutes, no one was in the hall but Mack, Herbie, myself, and three stiffs. From somewhere outside came the sound of sirens.

�Vinnie,� Mack said, �why didn�t you tell me you could handle a rod like that? Where�d you learn it?�

�I did a little shooting for the Marine Corps,� I said.

He grunted. �Well, it�ll get you more than a medal with me.�

A doctor was there in a few minutes, followed closely by a couple of detectives and a uniformed cop. One of the detectives came over to me. �You�re Vin Pratt, ain�t you? What�d you have to do with this?�

�Lay off him, Delaney,� Mack said. �Vinnie�s working for me now.�

The cop�s eyebrows went up and he turned and joined the other two who were examining the dead men.

The doctor looked at Mack�s wound, then turned to Fran. �He�ll be okay, at least it looks that way. Is an ambulance on the way? I want to examine him at the hospital.�

�We called the hospital before you got here,� she said, then turned to me. �You saved his life.�

I shrugged. �I saved mine too.� She gave me a strange look and went back to Mack.

The cops finished their search of the two dead hoods. �Must be out of town boys, Mr. Silverman,� one of them said. �No identification on either of them. Malone here don�t recognize them and neither do I. We�ll run �em through R&I.� He turned his attention to me. �We�ll need a statement from you, Pratt. Come down to the station as soon as you can.�

The plainclothesmen touched their hats to Mack and turned and went out, leaving the uniformed cop to watch the bodies until the meat wagon arrived. It was that easy, when you had connections in the right places. And Mack Silver-man had them.

The detectives, Eckert and Fowler, sat in the shabby hotel room and waited for Zoda. Eckert stared at the girl, Zoda�s girl, smooth, beautiful and bored... and his eyes glinted with hatred and disgust.

As we started for the garage, I suddenly stopped, patting my pockets. �Be right with you,� I told Steve. �Forgot my cigarettes.�

Cutting through the locker room, I went back to Captain Horan�s office. His craggy brows arced quizzically at my return.

�I couldn�t say this before, sir,� I said, �but I�d like to take Zoda alone. Things may get rough and Eckert has a kid.�

Horan�s gaze was shrewd. �That the only reason?�

�No, sir.�

�Eckert�s trouble?�

I nodded. �Basically � from the angle of a faithless woman � the setup suggests what Eckert went through last month. He�s still.�

�So we spoon-feed him?�

�That�s not what I mean, sir � brooding over it.�

Horan nodded. �I know what you mean, Fowler. Why rub salt in a wound?� He pushed aside a sheaf of reports. �I know; Eckert is taking his wife�s desertion hard. I can sympathize with that, and as long as it doesn�t affect his work, there�ll be no complaint. But we�ve all got a job to do. Assignments come up. Eckert happened to draw this one with you.�

I said, �But I can take Zoda myself. I don�t need Eckert.�

Horan went back to the reports. �It�s set up, Sergeant,� he said flatly. �You and Eckert. I suggest you get on with it.�

I took a deep breath. �Yes, sir,� I said. I left the office, went back to the garage.

Steve had already checked out an unmarked sedan. I climbed in beside him and he tooled the car from headquarters, eased into traffic.

�Took you long enough,� he muttered.

�I ran into Carmody. You know Carmody, always with a gag.�

�Yeah, mostly lousy.� Steve swung the sedan around a corner. �The Tremont?�

�That�s right.�

�Crumby dump. Zoda must really be laying low since he hit town.�

�Maybe that�s why the dame is blowing the whistle,� I said. �Not enough excitement.�

Steve spat out the window. �Maybe. Or maybe she�s just tired of the guy, got somebody new to sleep with.�

I gave him a sidewise glance; he was sitting hunched over the wheel, staring straight ahead, lean jaw bunched.

I fired a cigarette. �Afterward, how about some bowling?� I asked him. �I�ve been working on my back swing. I think��

He wouldn�t be switched. �What�s the name of this broad?�

�Lang. Wilma Lang.�

�How long�s she been Zoda�s woman?�

�I don�t know. A year, maybe two.�

�Couple of years.� A red light loomed and Steve kicked the brake pedal hard. �Even if she only wanted the bedding, they must�ve hit it off, going two years. How come all at once she decides to turn him in?�

I shrugged. �The reward, probably,� I said. �Since that Denver killing, Zoda�s carried a five-grand tag.�

He spat again. �Mercenary bitch.�

I frowned. �Unwind, fella. Regardless of what you think about the girl, Zoda�s a gun-happy killer wanted in six states. We�ve got a chance to take him.�

My tone pricked him; briefly, he met my gaze, unblinking. �So we�ll do just that,� he told me.

Neither of us spoke the rest of the trip across town. Steve parked the sedan on a side street next to the hotel. As he set the hand brake he glanced at his strap watch.

�Three o�clock?�

�As near as she could figure,� I said. �When she phoned, she said Zoda would be out the early part of the afternoon, but expected to be back around three.�

�She mention the room?�

�Five-O-eight.�

Steve drew, checked his .38; I did the same. �It�s one-fifty now,� I said. �Let�s get up there.�

The desk clerk was a gray-haired oldster dozing over a racing form. Momentarily, I considered alerting him, decided against it. We bypassed the desk, rode the grubby automatic elevator. Five-O-eight was at the end of the hall. We flexed our rigging, set ourselves before I rapped. Zoda could have returned early.

He hadn�t, but the girl was ready for us. She opened the door quickly, a lush titian-thatched figure in snug coral skirt, form hugging the blouse of white silk.

�You�re the police?�

I indicated Steve as I flashed my buzzer. �Sergeant Eckert I�m Sergeant Fowler.�

She stepped back to allow us to enter. The room was drab, two straight-back chairs, the bed and a battered dresser comprising the furnishings. Steve checked the adjoining bath as I closed the door, leaned against it.

�Zoda�s out per schedule?� I asked.

The girl smoothed her lips. �He went to see some guy. Something about going to Florida.�

�But you expect him back around three?�

�From the way he talked, like I told you.�

Steve again eyed his watch, sat down on one of the chairs. �About an hour,� he told me. �Maybe less.�

The girl�s full lips pouted as Steve settled. �Does it have to be here? Couldn�t you take him down in the lobby?�

I caught the quirk of Steve�s mouth. �You don�t want to see Zoda again?�

She looked at him. �Mister, he�s got a gun...�

�Don�t worry,� I said. �We�ll be on either side of the door. Just let him in, then hit the bath.�

She considered my assurance, then shrugged. �Just so you get him.� She plumped down on the bed, carelessly crossed sleek legs, indifferent to the revealing hike of her skirt.

�How about a drink?� she went on. �There�s a bottle around here someplace.�

�No, thanks,� I said, taking the other chair. I noted the distaste in Steve�s eyes as he studied the girl.

�Suit yourself.� The redhead patted at her hair, then checked her nails. �Only if he�s not early, it�ll be a drag, just sitting here.�

Steve�s tone was cool. �You�re in a hurry to collect that five grand?�

She regarded him amusedly, deliberately recrossed her legs. �I�ve got plans for it.�

�Alone?�

Her smile was suggestive as she smoothed the bed. �Not necessarily. A girl needs a change after awhile.�

The disgust in Steve�s gaze was naked now. �It figures,� he muttered.

I said, �Easy, man��

The girl cut me short; her thrusting breasts lifted as she finally tabbed Steve�s repugnance. �Listen, cop,� she flared, �I don�t need any cracks��

Steve�s lips thinned. �Sure, you don�t.�

�If I want to shake Zoda, that�s my business. I�m doing you guys a favor��

She broke off. Outside, the sudden whirr of the elevator echoed, then the snick of the door sliding back. Footfalls sounded down the hall.

Steve was still staring at the girl, a muscle jumping in his cheek. I shoved him into position, drew my .38. The girl slid off the bed, abruptly wide-eyed, uncertain. �Relax,� I whispered. �If it�s him, open up, then fall back fast.�

It was Zoda; his knock came an instant later. �Okay, kid.�

The girl turned the knob. Zoda entered the room with a big grin. �It�s all set, doll. We leave tomorrow��

That was as far as he went. I was flattened against the wall to his right, and even as the girl whirled from the door, the tail of Zoda�s eye caught my bulk. I yelled, �Hold it, Zoda!� but he ignored me, plunged to his knees, whipping free a heavy automatic as he rolled for position.

He never made it; I squeezed off two fast shots. Simultaneously, Steve lunged from behind the half-open door, also blasted. Zoda crumpled � and so did the girl, across the room.

My heart lurched. I�d been right on top of Zoda; I knew I hadn�t missed. But Steve had also been only a step away, was a surer shot than I...

Zoda wasn�t moving. I dropped beside the girl. She was writhing and moaning in agony, fingers digging into her belly.

I looked over my shoulder at Steve. �For God�s sake, man...!�

He met my gaze stolidly, the tic in his cheek riotous now. �She was slow,� he said. �You told her to get back fast, but she was slow.�

�No, Steve...!�

His jaw set. �Yes.�

My mind spun. Vaguely, I was aware of shouting outside. I got to my feet, a cold sweat drenching me. Steve stood spread-legged in the center of the room, looking down at the girl, his features now cold and impassive, devoid of all expression.

�She was slow,� he repeated quietly.

He was still standing there as I stumbled into the hall to quiet the uproar, call an ambulance.

Carl Herz, the morgue attendant, stood on the other side of her, lifting the white shroud from her face.

�You... you want a better light, Phil?� the old man asked respectfully.

Phil shook his head no. There was no need for more light. It was Denise. No longer warm and radiant with life. It was Denise.

She looks asleep, he thought. There was no sheen to her long golden hair, and her skin did not have its warm white glow anymore, and her lips were not a soft moistened red anymore, but in the dimness, her eyes gently closed the way he�d seen them so many times, she might have been asleep. She was dead.

He bent over a little closer to her face and saw the dark blotch on the side of her thin jaw, and the marks left on her graceful neck by the garroting nylon, and a thin cry squeezed through his lips. He lifted his hand and softly touched her silent lips, her cold cheek, her soft hair, then kissed her forehead gently. He clamped his eyes tightly shut, whispering to her, �Denise... Denise...�

He felt Mac�s hand squeeze his shoulder reassuringly, and he straightened slowly, drawing air deeply into his lungs.

�Terrible thing, Phil,� Carl muttered quietly, �...terrible... terrible...�

He stood there looking at her for a long time, remembering how lovely she�d looked last night before she left the apartment. Her red mouth full and sensual, smiling over gleaming white teeth, her flowing hair cascading fire over her smoothly rounded shoulders, the green eyes dancing with life, the new low-cut gown a clinging white glove around the supple lines of her body. He remembered the throaty bubbling sound of her laughter, and the soft swishing sound of her nyloned thighs as she walked to the door, and he remembered the door closing and then the crowding stillness of the apartment. He remembered all that, and it suddenly seemed as though it might have happened a century ago.

She was dead now.

He let out a long, heavy sigh, and stepped back slowly. �All right, Carl,� he said sullenly.

He watched the old man cover her face and then push the file drawer in carefully, quietly, unlike the way he�d seen Carl slam them closed dispassionately so many times, as though it was just so much more meat in the refrigerator. And he saw the guilty look on Carl�s face, as though the same thought had suddenly filled his mind. He watched the old man shuffle across the immaculate tiled floor to his desk, his thoughts focusing on Gail, wishing that that part of his duty was also a part of the past.

Mac followed him down the corridor to the street, their heels resounding dully in the dimness.

She was an actress and he was a writer. Their marriage was held together by sex and poverty. It couldn�t last and it couldn�t end... except in violence.

When he let himself in the apartment he heard the shower running and saw the mess through the open bathroom door. The shower curtain hung outside the tub, and the floor was covered with water and soaked towels and discarded underwear. Turning off the shower, he followed the unsteady trail of wet footprints across the small foyer and down the two steps into the living room and glared at the naked woman sprawled on her back on the low studio bed.

She made him think of a drowned cat, and that�s what she was, he thought grimly; drowned in gin and self-pity. The thin, deeply-lined, once-beautiful face was turned to one side, the sullen mouth slack like a dead cat�s, the abandoned pose just as feline. He stood looking down at her, and in spite of his anger and disgust, he couldn�t help the stirring in his loins. She still had the soft body of a young girl, in startling contrast to the dissolute face and scrawny neck, the skin pink and smooth and glistening with dew from the shower, one slender, ringless hand in an ironic virginal gesture, lying between her thighs.

The hate and disgust died as desire came to life, and ignoring the sleepy snarl of protest he took her roughly in his arms, but when he got up he caught the gleam of triumph in her slitted green eyes and the twisted, mocking smile, and he knew she had been waiting for him. A rag and a bone and a hunk of sex, he muttered to himself in sudden revulsion; and as coy as a man-eating tigress.

She sat up in bed and there was even nakedness in the way she lit a cigarette and sipped from the half-finished drink on the bedside table, and again she made him think of a cat; a cat licking its paws after a hearty meal!

A feeling of despair rose within him just as desire had, and he sank down in the chair by the window and stared at the blank sheet of paper in his typewriter. She had been like that ever since their marriage; the feline lure, the snarling, catlike reaction, the pretended angry resistance, and when it was over, the purring satisfaction. It was hate, not love; rape, not fulfillment, but it had held them together like their poverty. They were two frustrated animals in a cage of their own making.

He watched her with a morbid curiosity as she got up and finished her drink in the drained silence. Her body was the only youthful thing she had left, and she displayed it, artlessly, like a child with a new dress, utterly unconscious of the fact that it would soon be as dissolute as her deeply lined face. She had taken only a few puffs on the cigarette, but she left it to die on the ashtray as she usually did, and when she returned to the bathroom he shuddered; their aftermaths were always like that; cold, dead ashes.

Their first affair had been the only romantic one, and he had thought it was love then, as he had so often before, but it hadn�t taken him long to find out that it was just lonesomeness and the hunger for companionship and a woman�s warm body, and the rebound from the only real love he had ever known, a love he had squandered like everything else he had ever owned. He had tried to blame it on the war, and his disillusionment and unrest on his return, but it hadn�t been that; the war had been just another excuse for further profligacy and Ruth had finally divorced him. He shook his head with a sardonic grimace; now Connie was Mrs. Barry Middleton � until death do us part!

His eyes went to the desk on the other side of the room, and the drawer where the German Luger he had brought home lay hidden under a pile of old manuscripts. In his deepest moods of depression he had been tempted to use it, but, curiously enough, the thought of suicide always brought a last glimmer of hope that his failure was only temporary.

His remorseful gaze came back to the sheet of paper stuck in the typewriter; it had been there for a week, as blank as his mind, and he knew it would stay that way. All he needed was another mystery like the others he had turned out so easily, but his life was as overdrawn as his last novel. He had finished it nearly a year ago, but the advance royalty had long since vanished, as had the money his agent had loaned him, and the book wasn�t even published yet!

Now he was face to face with his own personal mystery and without a clue to the solution of it. It was ironic; he was in the same position as the doomed souls he wrote about, and caught in his own trap. He got up wearily; he wouldn�t be able to work now even if he wanted to. The only chance he had to write was when Connie was out on her daily rounds of manager�s offices.

He let out a heavy sigh as he looked at the framed theatrical photograph on the bookcase, with her flamboyant autograph scrawled across the corner of it, and remembered the first time he had seen her on the stage. It seemed ages ago, and yet it was only five years, just before Ruth had divorced him. Connie had been the last straw.

His mind went back to the night he and Bob Riva, an artist pal had seen the play; Connie had created quite a sensation in it, portraying the role of a dipso, but he hadn�t known then that it wasn�t an act and that she was playing herself. He and Bob had dropped into Sardi�s for a drink after the show and she had come in with one of her current suitors and he had been introduced to her. She was a startlingly attractive woman, despite the dissipation that showed on her face, but her aristocratic features and heavy makeup offset the hardness, and there was a physical allure about her that fascinated him as much as her brazen sophistication. She used both with a deliberate insouciance and her green eyes heightened the effect. They were laughing when she said, �I think I�d like to have an affair with you,� and he had laughed too, but with an inner sense of excitement.

They had gone on to a couple of nightclubs after that, and dancing with her, the physical attraction was like an electric current. That had been the beginning of a dizzy courtship and during an alcoholic weekend they had gotten married. It had been gay as hell at first and her moving into his little apartment had been a great lark with a nightly round of parties after the theatre. Their mornings became hangovers, and she treated his writing as a lark, interrupting his work continually with �coffee breaks,� as she called her drink mixing, and flaunting her nakedness at every opportunity, but as the day wore on her gaiety became strident and their drunken quarrels lasted until she had to leave for the theatre. It was the only thing that saved both of them; the thrill of each performance and the applause revived her like a drug, and when she came home her gaiety had returned.

It was a vicious circle, getting wider and deeper, and he finally realized he had married a confirmed alcoholic. While the show was running he tried to write a little in the evenings, but his work had already been effected and his income along with it. He found himself drinking almost as heavily as she did, and when the play closed it became a living nightmare. A nightmare of sex and poverty holding them together; even though he hated her, her flesh drew him like a magnet, and he couldn�t understand it. Her body was perfectly formed but there was nothing voluptuous about it, except that her breasts were full and upthrust for such a slender figure, and the rest of her was no different than any other female.

Maybe it was in the pigmentation of her skin; there was a curious, petal-like softness to it, a faint, rosy pallor that gave her body a fresh, dewy surface like a Boucher nude. Or perhaps it was the sharp contrast between that and her dark, almost decadent face. It was a fleshly anachronism, as if only her face had been exposed to the years and the elements.

He stared at the abstract portrait hanging on the wall that Riva had done of her when they were first married and just before the play had closed; it was a wild conglomeration of raw-colored cubes, and he had always wondered why Connie�s personality had given the artist that impression. He smiled grimly; if Riva had ever caught her in one of her naked moments he might have seen her in a different light!

It took him back to the night the show closed. Connie�s final performance had been played up in all the gossip columns; she had gaily tossed a bottle of gin into the audience, and her strip-tease act was only saved from pandemomium by the hasty lowering of the curtain. At four in the morning she had arrived at the apartment with the more hardy members of the company, including the beetle-browed actor who had played the lead, and he had suspected then, from her drunken embraces that they had been more than just members of the same cast.

The celebration had lasted three days and Connie had ended up in Doctor�s Hospital where she held court for a week, her room filled with flowers and convivial friends. She deserved a good rest, she told him, and she wasn�t even going to consider another play until she found the right script. What she didn�t know was that she was through in the theatre; that had been her last good part. She had hit the skids the way she had hit out at life, and managers could no longer trust her. Anger and bitterness had been added to drink, and he had come along just in time to reap the whirlwind, and to be included in the blame for her downfall. No wonder she couldn�t get a part when she had no clothes to wear and had to live in squalor with a drunken failure!

Those scenes on her return from the theatrical rounds were always reminiscent of her last play, getting more and more violent as he in turn angrily accused her of being the reason for his failure, ending up in gutter epithets and throwing anything she could lay her hands on. He knew it would be the same when she came out of the bathroom, and with a convulsive shudder he left the apartment again.

He walked down the street to Pete�s, and was sitting at the bar staring moodily at his reflection in the dusty mirror when Ruth came in. He wasn�t surprised to see her; her studio was in the same block, and curiously enough, she was still part of his life, even if it was only compassion on her part. She was like that; as forgiving as she was resolute, and the fact that she felt sorry for him was what hurt the most. It had given him a strange, little boy feeling toward her; every time he saw her now he wanted to bury his head in her lap and tell her how sorry he was.

She�d been responsible for whatever success he�d had; being an artist she understood his discouragements and his lack of confidence, and she had cheered him up and nursed him along until he�d sold his first book. After that it had been easy, but he couldn�t take success any better than he could failure; he�d started drinking again, and then he�d met Connie and that had completed his demoralization.

He was so glad to see her he had difficulty keeping the tears back, but he managed a feeble smile and waved to the bartender. �Joe, a drink for my favorite wife.�

�How�s it going?� she said, and he knew he hadn�t fooled her any; he never had.

�It�s hell,� he admitted. �A nice private little hell, with hot and cold running temperments. I couldn�t have done a better job if I�d written it for one of my own villains. A self-service job,� he grimaced.

�She�s still drinking?�

�With added refinements. Phenol-barbital and aspirin.�

�Hasn�t psychiatry helped her any?�

�Dick? He gave her up long ago, just as A.A. did.� He smiled wryly. �She�s a worse basket case than I am, Ruthie. I know I�m a bum, but she still thinks she�s Camille.�

�Why don�t you get out? Before it�s too late,� she added, after Joe had served the drinks.

He made a despairing gesture. �Get out where? Dispossessed is more like it. I�m already four months behind in the rent.�

�What about the new book? Isn�t it coming out soon?�

�I�ve already drawn down on it, and I owe Mike Ferris my life. He�s been advancing me money for six months.�

�Maybe he can sell it to the movies.�

He gulped down his drink; it was his fifth, and he laughed sardonically. �Maybe I can sell Connie to the movies. That�s all she talks about when she�s slightly coherent. The hell with Broadway! If I had some decent clothes, I could go out to Hollywood and make a new start.� His laughter was as false as his cynicism. �As a zombie in one of those horror pictures!� The laughter died and he stared at Ruth in honest bewilderment. �You know, it�s strange, but I feel sorry for her. Maybe it�s because I�m in the same boat. It takes a drunk to understand a drunk. She�s a schizo; she still has delusions of grandeur.� He grinned crookedly. �At least I never had that. It must be tough for her; after all, she was a damn good actress, and a star only a few years ago.�

�She was just playing herself.� There was no venom in Ruth�s voice, just blunt honesty, and now it was directed at him. �You�re a strange man, Barry Middleton. You always feel sorry for the wrong people, including yourself. Connie�s not only an alcoholic, she�s an utterly selfish, self-centered woman who destroys everything around her, and she�s going to destroy you if you don�t get away from her.�

�You�re describing me,� he said grimly.

She shook her head. �No, you�re not cruel. You don�t mean to hurt people.� She smiled at him as if he were a little boy. �You make me think of Dostoyevski�s heroine, the one who cried her eyes out at the sad play she was seeing while her coachman froze to death outside.�

He had to laugh. �Maybe I can get Connie to play Russian roulette with me.�

�You�re both doing that now,� she said, and turned at the shrill laugh behind her.

�Well, isn�t this quaint!� It was Connie standing in the doorway, with the same dramatic entrance she had made in the play when he first saw her; the same mocking smile and the arrogant swagger as she came up to the bar. �The ex-wife, and the ex-writer!� Again the twisted grimace, the stagey, drunken laughter. �Why don�t you take him back, Ruth? You can have him with my compliments!�

She stood between them in the awkward silence, swaying unsteadily, taking a sadistic delight in their embarrassment, then she waved gaily to the bartender. �Drinks for the eternal triangle, Joe.�

�One side of it is leaving, Connie,� Ruth said with a grim smile, �Thanks for the offer anyway.�

Connie watched her exit with a triumphant sneer and with one of her mercurial changes bowed politely when she got up on the stool and he prevented her from falling off it. �The big love �em and leave �em boy!� She waved again to Joe, this time imperiously.

�Don�t you think you�ve had enough,� Barry said hopelessly.

Her laughter was shrill. �Yes, I�ve had enough, lover boy, but what am I going to do about it? If I had any money or could get a job I�d leave you like a shot, but I�m trapped. Trapped in a squalid hole in the wall with a writer who can�t even write.�

�You thought it was quaint when we were first married,� he said with biting sarcasm.

She laughed mockingly. �Why don�t you put that great talent for mystery stories to some practical use. Rob a bank and pay me off, and we�ll both escape. All I need is enough money for new clothes and my fare to Hollywood � and a divorce.�

�This is where I came in,� he said wearily, and regretted it; they were already attracting attention, and Connie rose to it like a stage cue, swinging around on her stool with a deliberate display of legs, and surveying her audience with lofty disdain.

�The natives are revolting,� she said in a loud voice and glared at the bartender. �What do you have to do to get a drink in this cheap ginmill, Joe?�

Joe shook his head. �No more, Connie.�

�Why, you cheap��

Barry took hold of her arm. �He�s right. Come on, you can have one at home.�

She swept his hand away and as she did she saw his half-emptied Old-Fashioned glass on the bar. Picking it up, she drained it in one gulp, and holding the heavy bottom in her palm she rammed the rim into his protesting mouth with a vicious jab.

Magda screamed, �I�ll kill you!� The man lifted the axe. Magda closed her eyes and pulled both triggers of the shotgun.

Magda Sanderson peered wistfully through the frosty window. The leafless trees lining the drive seemed to be waving goodbye, just as she�d done when Chuck left shortly after three. Was it really only an hour ago or was it a day or even a week? The timeless, snowy landscape offered her no reassurance. Why on earth had they picked this weekend to come up and close the cottage?

Of course, yesterday it had seemed merely an early-winter lark. �Why don�t we take a spin up to the lake ourselves instead of getting old Krupp to button down the place for the season,� suggested her husband. �After all, the baby isn�t due for another two months and Dr. Cannon told you a little exercise might be a darned good thing.�

With moonlight sparking the snowcapped hills, the drive had been beautiful, and in the morning a fresh whiteness had turned the woods about the cottage into a fairyland. Even the storm that started just before noon pleased Magda. It was exciting to imagine being cut off from the world with danger all around and her stalwart Chuck there to protect her. Then that damn� phone call had spoiled everything.

�Sure, it�s inconvenient,� Chuck had admitted, rubbing a hand across his dark brushcut, �but we can work it out all right. And after all, what the boss says goes. You want your rising young executive to keep on rising, don�t you Mag?�

�You know I do Chuck,� she�d said with that bright little smile she used so often lately to mask the tiny doubts that nibbled mouselike at her happiness. �Only...�

�I�ll drive on to Weston and contact this Mr. Bigelow while you pack the stuff here. Then tomorrow I�ll pick you up and we can stop in the village to see the Krupps.�

Struggling into his overcoat he�d added, �Now don�t worry, this little snow flurry will be over soon, There�s plenty of food and fuel on hand. You�ve got the radio for company and if anything does come up you can phone Mrs. Krupp. Actually you�re probably safer here than in the city. But, if it will make you feel any better, I�ll just load that old twelve-gauge of mine with buckshot. Here, let�s have a big smile and a kiss to keep me warm.�

Idly tracing the frost patterns with her fingertip, Magda shivered as a sharp blast of wind made the cottage sigh and creak. So here I am, she mused smoothing her maternity jacket, here I am in solitary confinement. Nervously laughing at her pun she turned from the window to the comforting glow of the fireplace. Being alone had always bothered her and it seemed that pregnancy merely intensified this feeling.

Chuck was so strong, so self-assured. No matter what the situation he always radiated confidence like some strong and dependable beacon. And Magda was only a mirror. Without his light to reflect, shadows crept in and nameless worries ate into the quicksilver of her conscious thought.

She ran a comb through her black hair and then tried to shake off her mood by busily tidying up the cottage and packing the clothes and knicknacks they would take back to the city. As darkness sifted through the afternoon sky the snowfall ended and the wind subsided slightly. Only an occasional gust reminded her that the cottage still lay under winter�s icy hand. When the last trace of daylight faded, she curled up on the couch before the fire and began working a crossword puzzle to smother the obscure and formless fears that still tiptoed through her mind. Absently she reached over and flicked on the radio.

Above the crackle of static Magda caught the words of the announcer. �...Woodside Mental Home. All Lake Indigo residents and all motorists are cautioned to be on the lookout. The escapee, Carl Johanson, is thirty-three, blond and of medium height; he weighs 160. This man...� The static cut in abruptly and then faded. �...we repeat, regarded as potentially very dangerous. If you have any information, please contact...�

Magda lost the rest of the sentence in a surge of panic that welled up within her. She sat there frozen, staring blankly as the radio droned on. The pencil clutched in her fingers suddenly snapped and the sound released her. She quickly checked the door and window fastenings. Finally she remembered the phone. Stabbing frantically at the dial she managed to get Mrs. Krupp on the third try. The German woman�s placid tone soothed and comforted her.

�Oh yah, Mrs. Sanderson, I hear the radio. What, you out there all alone? Well, you don�t worry. Just keep door locked. I send over my boy Paul, he�s home from the Lakes now. You know Paul is big engineer but winter comes he gets vacation. Yah, too much ice even for ore boats. I have him bring you back here to our place for tonight. He don�t say much but is strong and smart, can give you good protection. You be just fine with my Paul.�

�Thank you, oh thank you Mrs. Krupp,� sighed Magda. �I... Hello, hello...� The line was dead. Confidence drained from her like molasses oozing from a broken bottle. She tried the radio again but got only bursts of static. Carefully she inspected the windows and tried the door a second time. Outside the snow muffled the landscape whitely.

I must keep calm, she reminded herself. There�s nothing to worry about, nothing at all. Chuck told me that. Mrs. Krupp told me too. I simply must keep calm. The nails of her clenched hands bit deeply into the palms but Magda didn�t notice.

�I�d better pack a few things for tonight,� she said aloud. Her voice sounded oddly strained and unfamiliar. As she headed toward the bedroom, the lights dimmed and then became brighter than ever. Oh God, not that; if the power fails... She refused to complete the thought. A disconnected prayer began forming in her mind just as the lamps winked out. Only the glowing embers on the hearth relieved the inky blackness.

Hastily she piled fresh wood on the fire and huddled close, trying to draw some sense of reality from the bright blaze. Chuck�s shotgun stood in the corner and she wondered hesitantly if she really remembered what he�s showed her about it.

Then the noises began. The small, ordinary, everyday noises translated by her terror into monstrous threats. Snow sliding from the roof became a stealthy footstep. The wind tugging at the shutters was the fumbling of a madman. Each new sound rasped like sandpaper on her already raw nerves while the minutes dripped by as slowly as resin falling from a splintered pine.

Suddenly a clear, unmistakable footfall came from the porch. Jaggedly she rose and cried shrilly, �Who�s there?� Silence save for the keening of the wind through the evergreens. �Paul, is that you?� Imagination, only imagination. She timidly tried again. �Is someone out there? Paul? Who is it?�

At that moment a pale face flattened itself against the glass in the door. Magda screamed and sank back into the shadows. A soft rapping began and slowly the doorknob turned back and forth as she watched in horror. Again the face pushed against the glass. Thin blond hair straggled down over the forehead and a vacant smile played about the lips.

This time the pounding sounded stronger. From her crouching position along the wall Magda reached out and felt for the loaded shotgun. Carefully she raised it and tried to steady her shaking hands.

�I have a gun here,� she called, controlling her voice as well as she could. �You�d better go away. I... I�ll shoot.� The stranger gazed blankly through the pane of glass. �Go away or I�ll shoot!� she repeated loudly.

Squinting against the glare from the hearth the man raised his left arm and the object in his hand caught the firelight. The door shook under the force of his mittened fist while Magda stood motionless, staring at the axe the man held. Once more the door quivered.

She screamed, �I�ll kill you!� The man lifted the axe. Magda closed her eyes and pulled both triggers.

The blast wrenched the gun from her grasp and she fell fainting to the floor...

Vaguely she became aware of the icy chill searching its way through the smashed glass. Next she noticed that the lights were on but the fire had died to powdery ashes. She dragged herself up and walked unevenly to the door. Looking about, she tried to shake off the fog engulfing her. Then she gasped and gagged. There on the porch sprawled a still figure clutching an axe which shone dully in the moonlight. A dark stain spread across the snow from what had once been a human face.

�Oh my God,� she moaned over and over. �But I had to do it, I had to.�

The jangling of the phone ripped the fabric of her agony. Picking up the receiver Magda stood silent, listening to the rumble of Mrs. Krupp�s warm, excited voice.

�Yah Mrs. Sanderson, you�re there yet. Good. I guess they fix the lines okay now. Well, I call to say they think that escaped fella is heading out your way. The men found his tracks and are following. You tell my Paul that. Maybe you better write it down for him. He�s so deaf you know from the big engines. Stay inside and keep your door locked tight, soon the men will come. Maybe get out your husband�s shotgun too, Paul�s axe is nothing against crazy man...�

Quietly Magda laid down the phone as she heard the crunch of footsteps outside. Then she saw a man standing in the moonlight looking in at her. Almost absently stepping over the body on the porch he stooped and picked up the gleaming axe. Blond hair straggled down over his forehead and an empty smile played about his lips as he reached through the splintery opening and unfastened the broken door.

He was successful, respectable beyond reproach, and conveniently married. But then he had an affair with a woman... and she fell in love with him.

Bill Powers found the sealed unaddressed envelope among a sheaf of business papers on his desk when he returned from lunch, knowing who had put it there even before he picked it up. Although his secretary had taken the afternoon off, still he glanced nervously toward the door leading to her outer office before he opened the envelope, withdrew the note and read it:

Frowning, Bill tore the note into pieces, then put them in his jacket pocket to be disposed of later. At one time Peggy Webster�s silly little notes had amused him, but lately they had become a source of irritation. Somebody, he�d warned her, might find one, put two and two together and there could be the very devil to pay.

�They make me feel closer to you, Bill.� Peggy said. �Working only two doors away and not being able to talk to you is rough.�

His lips tight with annoyance, Bill sat down, the pleasant glow of his recent luncheon dissolving into a thumping headache. He reached for the aspirin bottle on his desk, alarmed that the mere thought of Peggy Webster affected him like a poison. The hope that she would leave him alone, in view of the recent scandal here at Continental Carpet, was only wishful thinking, he knew. Her brief memo today was in reality a command, for he hadn�t had a date with her now in over a week.

William E. Powers was a tall vigorous man of thirty, with thick dark hair and resolute gray eyes. He had come to Continental Carpet five years ago as an accountant and three years later married Isobel Connor, the sister of James Connor who was then the vice-president of the firm.

Bill got along reasonably well with Isobel. Although her frigidity bored him, he admired her background and the things she could do for him. While he had worked himself up from the position of accountant to sales manager the hard way, still, he knew, being married to the vice-president�s sister had made his ascent smoother. Besides, Isobel Connor Powers owned a substantial share of the firm�s stock...

Too, he liked Isobel�s appearance. Slender and blonde, with a cool clipped New England voice, she was a gracious wife for a rising young executive. She had also given him a fragile honey-haired daughter, the only person in the world he deeply loved. His future plans revolved around the baby, for he was determined to give Susan all of the things he had missed in his well-remembered poverty-ridden childhood.

He had met Peggy two years ago when she came to work for the late James Connor. And a short time later, on a warm evening in June, he had ridden down in the elevator with her, discovering that both had been working late, that both were hungry and that Peggy had a cold supper in her refrigerator that would easily serve two. As Isobel was vacationing in Maine with Susan, Bill was at loose ends, looking for something to do beside his usual evening at a movie.

The walk across town in a sudden warm summer shower had been fun; the rain-cooled breeze sweeping in from the East River brought them the exciting smell of the sea as they paused in front of Peggy�s apartment on the ground floor, front, in one of the few still-standing brownstone houses in New York City.

They had had tall cool drinks of gin and tonic. Peggy had served their cold, supper in her comfortable livingroom, cool and quiet and softly lighted. And Bill Powers might not have visited the apartment again had he not taken her in his arms and kissed her goodnight...

With the exception of her glowing reddish-brown hair, Peggy Webster wasn�t attractive. She was tall and quite thin and she had never married. She was five years older than Bill although she claimed the age of twenty eight. Her hunger for affection and her unprobed smouldering passion had at first astonished Bill Powers, then excited and intrigued him. In Peggy�s love he had found all that he wanted so desperately in the woman he married.

They had kept the affair quiet, confident that none of their working colleagues suspected that Mr. Powers and Miss Webster had more than a speaking acquaintance with each other. During that first summer, Isobel prolonged her vacation with the baby in Maine and Bill saw Peggy several times a week but always in her apartment.

It had been a perfect place for their dates. Bill carried a key to Peggy�s front door which was three steps down from the street. A door hidden from the eyes of pedestrians by a tall boxed evergreen hedge, put there by a former tenant. Usually arriving around nine o�clock in the evening, Bill let himself into the apartment. He always left at midnight.

It had all been a lot of fun, Powers was thinking now, but since James Connor�s shocking expose it had become a dangerous kind of fun and Bill wanted no more of it.

He looked at his wristwatch. The time was three forty. Grateful for not having any business appointments this afternoon, he rummaged in a desk drawer for his pipe, then forgot about smoking as he pulled out a New York newspaper, dated three weeks before, with the full coverage of James Connor�s murder and triple love life. Across the front page were pictures of handsome fifty year old Connor, his weeping wife, the hysterical castoff mistress who had killed him and a calm-faced girl of twenty, the beautiful cause of the tragedy.

As he had done many times since the shooting, Powers stared in fascinated horror at the image of his dead brother-in-law. And all the time, Bill thought grimly, you seemed to be a model husband and father, just as I appear to be.

His hands were shaking, partly from the shock of Connor�s violent death and partly from a sudden jolting fear. What did Peggy Webster really think about it all? During the height of the scandal, Bill remembered that she had been strangely silent about her employer�s murder, going calmly about the business of winding up his affairs as any efficient secretary might do.

He got up from his chair, crossed the office to an open window and stood staring down at Madison Avenue swarming with pedestrians in the bright September sun. Suppose, thought Bill Powers, that Connor�s aging mistress had given Peggy something concrete to think about? Peggy was far from stupid, Bill knew, surely she must have known that their love affair was over and done with long ago.

He shivered in the mild breeze and wondered desperately how he was going to get off the hook. He knew what Isobel would say in her cool unforgiving voice if she ever found out: �I�m leaving you, Bill. Any divorce court will give Susan to me.�

The thought of losing his small daughter haunted him now with sheer terror. Rubbing his aching temples, Bill went back to his desk and sat down. Actually, he began to tire of Peggy a year ago. The best way of breaking it up, he finally decided, was to take a trip. When he informed Peggy this past summer that he intended flying to Burmuda on his month�s vacation, she said happily: �I have a lot of vacation time coming. I�ll go too. On a different plane of course.�

He stared at her. �Good God!� He exploded. �Get off my back for a while, will you, Peg? Besides, you know Isobel. She might go with me or decide to join me there.�

�Isobel!� Peggy shrilled suddenly. �I�m sick and tired of playing second fiddle to the high and mighty Isobel! I hate her! I detest her because you don�t love her and yet she has everything I�ve ever wanted!�

White-lipped with rage, Bill had grabbed his coat and started for the door.

�Bill � wait!� She pleaded, running after him. �I�m sorry.� She pulled his head close to hers and kissed his lips with a bruising fierceness that alarmed him. �The truth is,� Peggy whispered, �I don�t know what I�d do for a whole month without you. I love you, Bill.� She crumpled against him, her thin face adoring him. �Take your vacation,� she added, �I�ll stay here and miss you. I�ll miss you dreadfully.�

From that night on their scenes had become frequent. Peggy was restless, becoming more and more possessive, tired of keeping the affair under cover. Bill had gone on his vacation alone, returning to New York with a deep tan, a deeper tiredness, to find Peggy�s little welcome note hidden slyly under his pipes in a desk drawer. Absence, it read, makes the heart grow fonder. Savagely Bill Powers tore the clich� into pieces, knowing that he had a fighting clawing love-hungry tigress by the tail and to let go now meant destruction to a future he had planned for so long.