'They haven't yet.'
Both of us paused to watch a pair of young Harvard women jog past. As we watched them I said to Hawk, 'You think staring at them is sexist behavior?'
'Yes,' Hawk said.
I nodded.
'That's what I thought,' I said.
Hawk was silent for maybe twenty yards. The Harvard women were halfway around the turn.
Then he said, 'Quirk wants to find something, he usually do.'
'Yes,' I said.
'Don't know Epstein. But he don't get to be SAC 'cause he a good old Irish Catholic boy.'
'No.'
'So he might be pretty good, too.'
'Be my guess,' I said.
Hawk was wearing black satiny polyester running pants and a sleeveless mesh shirt. From the far turn the two Harvard women looked back at him.
'We think he good. We know Quirk be good,' Hawk said.
'So there a reason they don't find this report?' I shrugged.
'Maybe there's a reason they can't look,' I said. 'And maybe they hoping you'll do the looking for them.'
'That occurred to me,' I said.
Hawk looked at me for a minute. His expression was as unfathomable as it always was. 'Good,' Hawk said.
10
Pearl lay at full length between Susan and me. 'It's odd,' Susan said. 'Being in bed with a strange dog.'
'That describes my life before I met you,' I said.
'Oh, oink!' Susan said.
'Sexism again?' I said.
'In the extreme,' Susan said.
'You chicks are so sensitive,' I said.
'You too, big guy,' Susan said. We were quiet, listening to the faint breathing sound Pearl made as she slept.
'I don't love her yet,' Susan said. 'Like I did the first Pearl.'
'Not yet,' I said.
'But we will,' Susan said.
'Yes.'
The room was nearly dark, lit faintly by the ambient illumination of the outside city.
'It's fascinating to see her beginning to morph into Pearl,' Susan said.
'She's doing that,' I said. 'Isn't she.'
'I know it's me, of course,' Susan said. 'I know she's not really changing.'
'Maybe she is,' I said.
'You think?'
'There are more things in this world than in all your philosophies, Horatio.'
'I think you might have somewhat mangled the quote,' Susan said.
'Is there a copy of Hamlet in the house?' I said.
'I don't think so.'
'Then I stand by my quote,' I said.
Pearl stood up and turned around several times and settled back down with her feet sticking into my stomach.
'You're lying on her side of the bed,' Susan said.
'I prefer to think of it as her lying on my side.'
'Well, at least she's the only one.'
'Oh, good,' I said.
