Comeback

would have been more useful, but it didn't matter.

It was getting darker in here, hard to read, but once everybody was settled, with Quindero once again seated against the right wall, mouth full of pizza, Parker held the newspaper angled to catch the light from the windows and out loud read, 'Walter Malloy, the Quindero family attorney, issued a plea late this morning for fugitive Ralph Quindero to give himself up, saying, 'There are no substantive charges against Ralph. At this point, the police merely want to talk to him as a witness. The longer he stays in hiding, the more he risks facing some sort of charge down the line.' Police have announced a special telephone number for anyone with information on any aspect of the investigation.' Parker looked over at Quindero: 'You want the number?'

Quindero blinked a lot, staring back and forth between Parker and Liss. 'What does that— What do they mean?'

Parker said, 'Oley oley in free.'

Liss laughed, and looked at Quindero, and told him, 'It's a good thing we don't believe what we read in the newspapers, huh, Ralph?'

Quindero simply stared at him.

'Because, if you did believe that bullshit,' Liss went on, 'I'd have to kill you now. I can't have you go home and tell stories about me. But we don't believe it, so that's okay.'

Quindero said, 'We don't believe it?'

'Oh, come on, Ralph,' Liss said. 'That's the stuff they say every time. They'd say it to me if they could. Come on in, there's no problem, nobody's mad at you. Oh, okay, you say, I'm all right. And you go in, and the first thing, they slap the cuffs on you. You've had the cuffs on you, remember, Ralph?'

'I remember,' Quindero said.

'And that was before all this other stuff. Everything's okay and you should come in now? When back before old Tom got his, and you and I headed out of there, way back then they had the cuffs on you?'

'That's right,' Quindero said.

Liss looked at Parker, and shook his head. 'Parker, why do you want to upset my partner here? That's not a good thing to do.'

Parker looked at the top of the paper. 'It says there's a chance of rain tomorrow.'

'We don't care about that,' Liss said. 'We're long gone by then. One way or another.'

7

It's getting too dark in here,' Liss said.

They'd all been silent for a long while, Quindero brooding, Liss and Parker both waiting. But it was true; darkness had spread in this east-facing room, faster than outside, where the shadow across the way had not yet quite reached the rim of the ravine. Clear sunshine tinged with red made a kind of fire along the rim, a line of concentrated brightness, with the sky beyond it a deep blue turning gray. Inside, they could still see one another, but no one would be able to read the newspaper. Thorsen's gun no longer gleamed on the floor. And Liss wasn't happy.

Parker felt Liss's eyes on him, but didn't respond. He kept on watching the rim of the ravine out there. When the last of the sunshine left, there would be a sudden drop in reflected light into this room. Not a big change, not even very noticeable. But enough to make everything blur, everything out of focus, until their eyes could adjust. In that instant, Parker would go for Thorsen's gun.

But Liss was unhappy. 'Parker,' he said, 'I don't know about this.'

'What's the problem, George?'

'Same as always. You.'

Parker kept watching the rim. The sun moved very slowly. 'Nothing's changed,' he said. 'We're all still like we were.'

'I don't want you loose when it's dark in here,' Liss said.

'Midnight doesn't come for a while, George.'

'Even if I had a flashlight, I couldn't use it,' Liss said. 'Not with all those windows. There's always some nosy son of a bitch with time on his hands to call the cops.'

'We've been doing fine up till now, George.' The light hung on the rim, golden red. The air was so clear you could see individual branches, fall shades of yellow and tan on the weeds and underbrush, turned Technicolor by the sun.

Liss abruptly stood. 'Ralph,' he said, 'put your foot on that gun.'

Parker didn't bother to watch Quindero obey. He also stood, watching Liss's hands, waiting for one of them to reach to a pocket or behind his back. 'George,' he said, 'don't fuck things up.'

'There's a closet,' Liss said. 'Ralph and me, we looked the place over when we first got here. Downstairs, next story down, there's a closet with a door on it and a lock on the outside.'

'George, you don't want me to—'

'It's that or I wound you,' Liss said. The strain was coming back into his voice. 'Maybe that'd be easier anyway. Don't have to gut-shoot you, I can take out both your knees, and Ralph can carry you when it's time to go.'