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water and carried the pill out to her. A cat ran from under her chair and hid in the next room, looking back at Bekker with cruel eyes.
    “This’ll help. I’ll get more tomorrow.”
    “Thank you.” She took the pill and drank greedily from the glass.
    “You have your pipe and lighter?”
    “Yes.”
    “You have enough of your tea?”
    “Yes, thank you kindly.” She cackled. She’d washed out of the bohemian life of the forties, but she still had her tea.
    “I’m going out for a while,” he said.
    “Be careful, it’s dangerous this late . . . .”
    Bekker left her in her chair and went back down the stairs and carefully checked the lean-to again. Nobody.
    The Lacey building fronted on Greene Street. The buildings on either side ran all the way back to Mercer, but the Lacey building filled only half the lot. The back lot, overgrown weeds and volunteer sumac, was closed off with a ten-foot chain-link fence. Before Bekker had arrived, vandals and bums had been over and through it and had broken the lock on the gate. After Bekker had bought the Volkswagen, he’d had the fence fixed and a long twisty strand of razor wire laid along the top.
    Now he backed the Volkswagen out of the lean-to, wheeled it to the fence, hopped out, opened the gate, drove through, stopped once more, and locked the gate again.
    New York, he thought.
    Bagels and lox/Razor wire and locks.
    Bekker giggled.
     
    “Door,” said Thick. He was standing by the window, the M-15 at his shoulder.
    On the street below, an old-fashioned Volkswagen, a Bug, zipped past. Thick, looking through the scope, ignored it. A man had stepped out on the street and paused. He had light hair, slightly mussed, and gold-rimmed glasses. Narrow shoulders. He was smiling, his lips moving, talking to himself. He was wearing a blue short-sleeved shirt, and jeans that were too long for his legs. He used his index fingers to push his glasses up on his nose.
    “Yes,” Thick grunted, his finger tightening on the trigger.
    “No . . .” said Thin, taking two steps toward the window.
    But a red dot bloomed on the target’s chest. He may have had an instant to think about it; again, maybe not. The blast of the gun was deafening, the muzzle flash brighter than Thin had expected. The target seemed to jump back, and then began a herky-jerky dance. Thin had once seen a film showing Hitler dancing a jig after the fall of France. The man on the street looked like that for just a second or two: as though he were dancing a jig. The thunder rolled on, six shots, eight, twelve, quick, evenly spaced, the lightning flickering off their faces.
    A little more than halfway through the magazine, Thick flicked the selector switch and unloaded the remaining cartridges in a single burst. The target was now flat on the sidewalk, and the burst of bullets splattered about his head like copper-jacketed raindrops.
    Thin stood by the window, unspeaking.
    “Go,” said Thick. He dropped the rifle on the floor. “Hands.”
    With their gloved hands pressed to their faces, they walked down the hall to the back of the building, ran down a flight of stairs, along another hallway, then out a side door into an alley. The alley led away from the shooting.
    “Don’t run,” said Thick as they emerged onto the street.
    “Watch it,” said Thin.
    A Volkswagen lurched past, a Bug, catching them in its lights, their pale faces like street lamps in the night. It was the same car that had driven past the restaurant just before the computer fag came out on the sidewalk . . . .
     
    With the body beside him, Bekker was tense, cranked, watching for cop cars, watching everything that went by.He had a small pistol by his side, a double-barreled derringer .38 Special, but if he had to use it, he’d probably be finished.
    But so far, so good.
    SoHo streets were quiet at night. Once out of the neighborhood, things would get more complicated. He didn’t want anything high beside him, a van or a truck. He