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catching her eye. He walked toward her and she smiled as he drew closer. Her smile evaporated when he took out his shield.
    “I’d like to have a few words with you if you don’t mind,” Rackman said.
    “What if I mind?”
    “It won’t matter.”
    “Are we gonna talk right here?”
    “In back.”
    He led the way to the back room and offered her a Lucky, which she accepted. Her sweet, flowery perfume wafted over him, and she wore the customary long eyelashes but not much other makeup. He lit her cigarette and she inhaled, leaning against the refrigerator and looking him up and down.
    “You’re not bad-looking, for a cop,” she said.
    “I bet you say that to all the cops.”
    “Fuck you.”
    “Where were you at three-thirty this morning?”
    “Three-thirty this morning?’’ She thought for a few moments. “I was here.”
    “Alone?”
    “No.”
    “Who else was here?”
    “Genrizi and a couple of the other goons. Also Mary Gomes, Barbara Leeds, and I think Demaris Garcia.”
    “What were you doing here?”
    “I was waiting for my boyfriend to pick me up.”
    “I understand you didn’t like Cynthia Doyle very much.”
    “I didn’t, but I didn’t kill her, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
    “You’re not sorry that she was killed, though.”
    “No. We didn’t get along. None of us up here liked her.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because she was always playing silly fucking games.”
    “Like what?”
    “Oh, she always used to act like she was better than the rest of us. But no John ever went back to her twice. That’s the kind of whore she was.”
    “Did she ever have any trouble with her Johns?”
    “Once in a while one of them would complain about her, but Genrizi would just tell them to pick somebody else next time. They’d never fire her because a lot of black Johns and P.R.s like young blonde girls.”
    “Did she have any trouble with any of her Johns recently?”
    “I don’t think so, but I didn’t exactly keep track of her.”
    “How about last night?”
    “I can’t think of anything last night.”
    “How about the night before?”
    “I don’t remember. All the nights seem to blend in together here. Oh yeah, something happened last night—I remember now. There was some john of hers who couldn’t get it up, and she made a few remarks when he was leaving. He looked pretty mad.”
    “Did you get a good look at him?”
    “I don’t know how good it was, but I saw him. He was a fat guy.”
    “How tall was he?”
    “About six foot tall I’d say.”
    Rackman wrote on his notepad. “What color hair did he have?”
    “Dark hair.”
    “Like mine?”
    “Yeah.”
    “What was he wearing?”
    “I don’t remember.”
    “Could it have been a suit?”
    “No, he was more like a working guy.”
    “Was he wearing a topcoat?”
    “It was some kind of jacket.”
    “What color?”
    “I don’t remember.”
    “Was he wearing glasses?”
    “I don’t remember. It happened very fast.”
    “What did his face look like?”
    “He was ugly, but I didn’t get that close a look at him.”
    Rackman puffed his cigarette and looked over her shoulder. Sylvia Suarez and Reynaldo Pifla had seen a fat guy run out of the alley where Cynthia Doyle was killed. That might not be the same fat guy, and in fact it probably wasn’t, but it was a lead.
    He took out one of his cards. “If you think of something else, give me a call.”
     

Chapter Three
    On Sunday, Rackman had the day off. No new information had developed in the murder case, and he felt he should go to Queens and see Rebecca, his daughter. He took a quick shower and shave, threw on jeans and a tweed jacket, and left his apartment before the phone could ring.
    At the McDonald’s on West Fifty-sixth Street he had eggs and sausages for breakfast while looking out the front window at a black man fishing with a string and magnet through the subway grating for stray coins. After breakfast Rackman strolled to the public telephone on the