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numb. Perhaps it was the cold.
    The letter lay in front of Daffy. He must have read it.
    "She's a student who means something to me," said Kasper.
    "They owe me money, they aren't coming back. I have no address, no trace of them."
    The watchman raised one hand. It was empty. He turned it around. Nothing behind it. He moved it along the desk. From the top of the desk a card appeared.
    "The tall man. The emperor. He had this in his wallet."
    Kasper picked up the card. A name was printed on it. ASKE BRODERSENa. Beneath it, written in pencil, was a telephone number beginning with 70. He turned over the card. On the back the same pencil had written the name of a person or a place, BOHRFELDT.
    "The names aren't listed," said Daffy. "The number isn't either."
    When Kasper was a child, tent workers and craftsmen were called "circus specialists." They were Danish. At the beginning of the season they emerged from the ground; in October they disappeared without a trace. Since then the name had been changed to "technical workers." Now they were groups of Poles and Moroccans who traveled through Europe led by a team boss, like highly specialized ships' crews. When a circus docked, they went on to the next job. Their tone had remained the same, a tone of discipline, professional self-confidence, and raw effectiveness. He had always loved the sound--he had heard it ever since he first met Daffy, and also heard it now.
    But there had been another sound too; he had missed it. Until now. The watchman set the telephone in front of him. Kasper looked out the window.
    "I wonder what time the sun will set," he said.
    Daffy turned toward the bookshelf. It held many manuals. Too many for a watchman who had gone to school for seven years at most. There was also an almanac. He looked up sunset times.
    "In fifteen minutes," he said.
    "Then I'd like to wait fifteen minutes. I express myself best at sunset."
    The watchman raised both hands. Brought them over the desk. Out of nothing appeared the fountain pen, visiting cards, loose change. The lottery ticket. The keys. Minus the one Kasper had given to Asta Borello.
    "Montblanc Meisterstück," said Daffy. "For important signatures. But the other pockets don't match up. No credit card. No wallet. Loose bills. Money is just passing through. No driver's license. No permanent address. Someone without roots. My professional opinion. Don't take it personally."
    It wasn't Kasper's own will that made him stand up. He would actually have preferred to stay seated. It was the orange impersonal rage that's awakened by criticism when it's justified.
    The desk was less than three feet away. In short distances he was as fast as a Chinese Ping-Pong player.
    He didn't reach it. Daffy's right hand dissolved. Rematerialized instantly. With a leather-covered conical stick two-thirds the length of a billiard cue. Made like a riding crop. With a shiny ball at the end about the size of a glass eye.
    It was an animal trainer's baton. Kasper remembered them from the early sixties, before carnivore menageries were prohibited. A man with a good forehand who knew where to strike could smash a lion's skull.
    He stopped in his tracks. He heard the refined tones he had ignored in Daffy. They were like those in the young Beethoven. The  world was about to discover him now. The muted treasures had been drowned in subsequent events.
    The watchman's hands dropped out of sight. Appeared again. With a laboratory stand, a dish of uncut diamonds, a box of toothpicks, two glasses, a bottle of slivovitz. He fastened a diamond to the stand, filled a glass with liquor, warmed it in his hand, and lit a match. Held it to the liquid mirror. A voracious, restless blue flame crept along the edge of the glass. He pushed it in under the diamond. The flame caught the mineral, which began to melt and drip down into the glass. It was rock candy.
    Kasper listened toward the sunset outside. He pulled the telephone over to himself, collected his thoughts, and