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will only feed his—”
    I threw my hands up in surrender, explaining I had no intention of taking the case. I understood, I said, that Arthur Rosen wasn’t exactly making lucid decisions when it came to the matter of his long-dead sister. I told the doctor about Rosen’s showing up at the shop, about my having gone to school with his sister, about the article in Gotham Magazine .
    “Look, Doc, I kinda kicked him outta my store the other day. I couldn’t remember his sister, and then, when he told me she was dead … I mean, what was I supposed to think? I just want a few minutes to apologize. That’s all.”
    Dr. Prince asked me to give him a minute while he found someone to cover the desk for him. He made a call or two. Eventually, a slender young black man came and took Rasputin’s seat. A few whispered words passed between them.
    Prince led the way up the stairs. He told me he wasn’t Rosen’s therapist, but as clinic director was fairly familiar with the file. He laid down some preconditions for my talk with Arthur. He, Dr. Prince, would enter the room first and make certain Rosen was willing to meet with me. Prince would remain in the room for the duration of the visit. I was not to raise my voice or have physical contact with Rosen beyond a handshake, and then only if Rosen initiated the contact. If Rosen became agitated, I was to leave immediately. I was to leave immediately if Dr. Prince, for whatever reason, indicated that I should.
    “Do I have to sign away my firstborn?” I whispered as we stepped out into the hall.
    He understood I was joking, and I understood it was his job to protect the patient.
    Sunshine Manor was a converted four-story walk-up, so it did not feel institutional, per se. In appearance, it rather reminded me of my grandparents’ old building on Avenue P and East 4th Street in Brooklyn. Their hallway was always fragrant with the sweetly sulfurous scent of frying onions and garlic, roasting chickens, and meats stewing on the stove. But any stirrings of romance over my past were murdered by the nostril-burning, lung-choking minty-pine scent of industrial cleaner. Hospitals, jails, courthouse washrooms—they all smelled this way. Looks can deceive, but not smells.
    Dr. Prince, reading the expression on my face, explained that this was only a semi-secure facility. “This is, for lack of a better term, a halfway house. The people staying with us have been thoroughly evaluated and are not considered dangers to others or, for the most part, to themselves. Depending upon the situation, the clients are allowed a certain amount of unsupervised time outside the confines of the building. Many of them have jobs. As long as they take their meds and follow the rules, they have a lot of freedom. There are curfews and bed checks and small windows on the doors, but, with few exceptions, we don’t lock people in. Here we are,” he said, tilting his head at the door.
    I bowed. “I know, you first. I’ll wait right here.”
    He knocked, announced himself, hesitated a second or two, and pushed the door in. “Arthur, there’s someone here to … Holy shit!”
    I didn’t wait for an engraved invitation.
    I smelled death even as I crossed the threshold. Maybe I just imagined I did. Not all death smells the same. Ask any cop. There’s old death, death where rigor has set in and let go. Death where flies have had time to lay their eggs. There’s death that stinks of maggots and flesh rotting in the heat of a sealed black garbage bag beneath the noonday sun. This was not what I smelled as I ran into Arthur Rosen’s room.
    This was a fresher death. The stench of urine and feces hung in the air, not quite overwhelming the minty-pine atmosphere. Arthur Rosen’s nude, soiled body was slumped in the corner. He’d hanged himself with his belt tied to the closet-door handle. They did it in Rikers this way sometimes, with a bedsheet. You have to really want to die to do it this way. It’s not like kicking