Butchers Hill

me pretty easily, but I'll never be able to find her.'

The Light Rail train pulled up just then, half-empty as usual. A tall, broad-shouldered man with curly blond hair poking out from beneath the brim of a Yankees cap got off and sat down next to them, studying the sports pages of the New York Post. He wore a denim shirt, untucked, faded jeans and dirty-white Chuck Taylors. Normally, wearing a Yankee cap in Baltimore was akin to sporting a 'kick me' sign, but it was hard to imagine anyone bothering this man. It wasn't just his size. He carried himself with an assurance as formidable as it was irritating to Tess. She disliked natural self-confidence, given how much she had to work at faking it.

'If you're headed to Camden Yards, you're about six blocks too far north,' Tess told the man, put off by his invasion of their personal space. What kind of creep sat down right next to you when there were plenty of benches free? 'If you're heading for Yankee Stadium, that's two hundred miles to the north.'

'Believe me, I know where I can go when I want to watch some real baseball,' the man said in a quiet voice, his eyes focused on the box scores. 'The Yankees are only three back in the all-important loss column. Only three back in the loss column, five out of first place. You know baseball? You understand the significance of that?'

'We're sort of having a private conversation here, and it's not about baseball geekery.'

'Donald, you might want to tell this woman who I am. Well, not who I am, but why I'm here.'

'Tess, Miss Weir, call this gentleman Mr. Mole.'

'What, are we playing Wind in the Willows all of a sudden?' Tess asked. 'Dibs on being Mr. Toad.'

Mr. Mole studied her, but not with the squinty, sun-averse gaze of his namesake. He had bright blue eyes, eyes that burned so bright they seemed freezing cold. He easily won the stare-down.

'Mr. Mole works in the Health Department,' Uncle Donald said. 'He has access to birth certificates, which are private under Maryland law. As I said, we know what's on the original birth certificate, because Jackie filled that out herself. What Mr. Mole proposes to do is go through all the birth certificates in the eighteen months following the birth of Jackie's daughter.'

Tess didn't see how this would work any better than everything they had tried. 'How can you match the new certificate to the old? At this point, we're not sure of any of the clues we started with-not the name, not the parents' names, not their location. For all we know, everything we were told was a lie, or just flat-out wrong.'

'I don't need a name,' Mr. Mole said. 'I can immediately narrow my search to any certificate that has a different issue date than the date of birth. That's the tip-off, you see, it indicates there was an adoption. Otherwise, the two dates are the same.'

'How broad a field of possibilities are we talking here?' Tess asked, still skeptical.

'Pretty small, actually. The certificate had to be issued through the city, because that's where the adoption took place. It has to be a girl. I'm going to go through the county records, just in case, but I'm confident I'll find it in the city records. This baby was biracial, right?'

'Right,' Jackie said, glancing sideways at Tess, checking to make sure she was allowed to give this much information. She had immediately understood and accepted Tess's condition that the Weinstein family be sheltered from the exact details.

'Once you have the parents' names and the kid's name, you'll be amazed at how easy it is to find them. Computers today-'

'I know all about computers today,' Tess said. Even to her own ears, she sounded like a cranky, know-it-all child.

Jackie was pulling out her checkbook and Mont Blanc pen again. 'So how much do I owe you for this?'

Mr. Mole shook his head. 'No money.'

Now Jackie was the skeptical one. 'Then why do it? What's in it for you?'

'I'm adopted. When I started at the Health Department, they showed me how to pull birth certificates and I found the original of my certificate, with the name of my mother on there. It was supposed to be under seal, but it's a bureaucracy, you know? It involves people and people fuck up. I found my mom. She had lived two miles from me the whole time I was growing up. It didn't change my relationship with my ‘real' Mom and Pop, but it made me feel as if some question had been answered. Why shouldn't I give other people a shot at the same deal?'

They could hear the rumble of the next Light Rail train approaching from the south. Mr. Mole stood and tossed his newspaper in the waste bin.

'I need to know what the original birth certificate says, just in case. Donald told me it was a baby girl born August eleventh, thirteen years ago this summer, right? What does the certificate say for mother and father?'

Tess looked anxiously at Jackie. They hadn't anticipated this question.

'Mother, Susan King,' Jackie said. 'Father unknown.'

The Light Rail's squealing brakes covered the sound of Tess's relieved sigh. She didn't know if Jackie had told the truth or not about the father being listed as unknown, but she was keeping her end of the bargain. Mr. Mole wasn't searching for the original birth certificate, anyway. And if he should see it, Tess knew he would be discreet. Mr. Mole wasn't someone she could like, but she had a feeling he was someone she could trust. He boarded the train without a backward look.

Uncle Donald stood, clipboard at the ready. 'Back to work. I have many corridors to roam, many cups of coffee to drink before this day is through.'

'How long before we hear from Mr. Mole?' Jackie asked.

'No idea. He'll signal me with a coded memo. Truthfully, I think he likes making this a little more mysterious than it has to be. It's not that exciting, you know, working at the Health Department.'

'How did you find him, anyway?' Tess thought Mr. Mole looked vaguely familiar, like an old Star reporter who had gone to work as a Public Information Officer for the state when the paper folded, then later dropped out of sight completely.

'A guy who doesn't charge for information? Oh honey, he's famous in my little network. Scares the piss out of people. A few more like him, and the whole system collapses.' Whistling to himself-'Hey, There' was today's selection-Uncle Donald headed back into DHR and another long day of underemployment.

Tess and Jackie were in unspoken agreement that it was bad luck to be too optimistic. They had thought they were close before, only to find themselves completely stymied. So they did not discuss Mr. Mole when they stopped for lunch at the Women's Industrial Exchange, or anything about the case at all. Which left them with very little to say.

'I can't believe this place almost closed down,' Jackie said, for the second time since they had been seated.

'It's okay, if you've got a thing for tomato aspic.'

'I have to admit, I always feel cheated when I don't get Miss Marguerite as my waitress.' Jackie was chattering, as Tess had once chattered to her, trying to get a response. 'Do you think they reserve her for the big shots, like Jim McKay, since she had her little cameo in Sleepless in Seattle?'

'I don't know,' Tess said listlessly. 'Why would you want to be waited on by a ninety-seven-year-old woman, anyway? Besides, she's retired.'

'It's all part of the experience.'

'It just reminds me to start a retirement fund so I'm not waiting tables at ninety-seven.'

'You haven't done that yet? Girl, you really need to get with it. I hate to be the one to tell you, but this is your life. You may be waiting for something to happen, but it already has. Your life is here.'

They fell silent, Jackie fiddling with her tomato aspic, Tess eating a Charlotte Russe, because it was what she really wanted and she didn't see the need of faking her way through a BLT or a tuna salad for the privilege of dessert. She was a big girl now, she could eat what she wanted, when she wanted.

'You sure you don't still have an eating disorder?' Jackie asked.

'This is proof positive that I'm cured.'

Another awkward silence. She and Jackie had just been getting to the point where they could almost speak, instead of fencing clumsily with one another. But since Jackie's revelation-was it really just four nights ago?-Tess could barely make eye contact with the other woman. Long disdainful of the modern mania for apologies, she now