Double Dealer

could make out where the stoop had started to draw away from the house, as if making a break for it. With O'Riley in the lead, they walked up the cracked-and-broken sidewalk and the two crumbly concrete stairs, the detective ringing the bell, then knocking on the door.

They waited-no answer.

O'Riley rang again, knocked again, with the same lack of success. O'Riley turned to Nick, shrugged elaborately, and just as they were turning away, a voice blared from behind them.

'Well, you don't look like Mormons!'

They turned, Nick saw a squat woman in a hot pink bathrobe and curlers.

'We're with the police, ma'am,' O'Riley said, holding up his badge in its leather wallet. 'We'd like to talk to you.'

Waving an arm she announced, as if to the whole neighborhood, 'Better get your asses in here then, 'cause I'm not staying outside in this goddamn heat!'

With arched eyebrows, Nick looked at O'Riley and O'Riley looked at Nick; whatever unspoken animosity might been between the cop and the CSI melted in the blast-furnace of this woman's abrasive personality. Nick followed O'Riley back up to the house and through the front door, glad to let the cop take the lead.

Little eyes squinted at them; her curlers formed a grotesque Medusa. 'Don't just stand there! Close the damn door. Do I look like I can afford to air-condition the whole goddamn city?'

'No, ma'am,' O'Riley said, the idea of a rhetorical question apparently lost on him.

Closing the door, Nick moved into the pint-sized living room next to the king-sized detective. Looking around, he couldn't help but feel he had just stepped into an antique mart-and a cluttered one at that. A maroon velvet chaise longue stood under the lace-curtained front window. Next to it, a fern stretched toward the ceiling, threatening to outgrow its pot. The room also contained two tall cherry end tables with doilies on them, a nineteen-inch TV on a metal stand, and the oversized Barcalounger tucked in a corner. In the opposite corner was a writing desk, and everywhere were stacks of things-TV Guides, women's magazines, antiquing newsletters, newspapers, mail.

O'Riley, rocking on his feet, said, 'Are you Marge Kostichek?'

'That's the name on the mailbox, isn't it? Aren't you a detective?'

'I'm Detective O'Riley,' he said, either ignoring or not recognizing the sarcasm, 'and this is CSI Nick Stokes.'

'Cee ess what?'

Nick amplified: 'Crime Scene Investigator.'

'Why, is it a crime to be a goddamn slob, all of a sudden?'

'No, ma'am,' O'Riley said, flummoxed. 'What I mean is, ma'am-'

'Let me see that goddamn badge again. You can't be a real detective.'

Flustered, O'Riley was reaching for the badge when the woman grabbed his arm.

'I'm just pulling your pud, pardner.' She laughed and various chins wiggled. 'A big dumb boy like you couldn't be anything but a cop.'

Nick had to grin. In spite of himself, he was starting to like this cranky old woman, at least when she wasn't on his ass.

'We'd like to ask you some questions,' O'Riley said.

'I didn't figure you stopped by to read the meter.'

Listening, Nick began to prowl the room-just looking around, stopping at this pile of magazines and mail and that, snooping. It was his job.

O'Riley was saying, 'We'd like to ask you about Swingers.'

'Oh, Jesus Christ on roller skates,' she said, plopping into the Barcalounger. 'I've been outa the skin racket for years now. I figured this was about that damned dog, two doors down! Goddamned thing won't shut the hell up. Bark, bark, bark, all the time, yapp, yapp, yapp. Isn't there a law against that crap?'

'Well . . . ' O'Riley said.

'Actually,' Nick said, back by the writing desk, 'we're here about a girl who used to dance at your club.'

'Just make yourself at home, good-looking. You gotta pee or something?'

'No, ma'am.'

'Are you nervous? Why don't you light in one place?'

'Yes, ma'am. About that girl, at Swingers . . .'

She waved a small pudgy hand. 'Been a lot of them over the years. Hundreds. Hell, maybe thousands. They don't keep their looks long, y'know-small window, for them to work.'

From the file folded in half in his sport-coat pocket, O'Riley pulled out the photo of Joy Starr and handed it to the woman.

Nick noticed her lip twitch, but she gave no other outward sign that she might recognized the girl.

'Joy Starr,' O'Riley prompted.

Ms. Kostichek shook her head. 'Don't remember this one.'

Interesting, Nick thought: suddenly no wise-ass remark.

O'Riley pressed. 'About sixteen years ago.'

She shook her head some more.

'Her real name was Monica Petty. She disappeared . . .'

Marge Kostichek cut him off. 'A lot of them disappeared. Here one night, gone the next. Met some guy, did some drug, had a baby, overdosed, here a sad story, there a happy ending, they all had one or the other. So many little girls with nothing but a body and face to get 'em somewhere, hell-how could I remember 'em all?'

Nick, still poised at the writing stand, said, 'But you do remember this girl.'

The old woman looked at Nick and suddenly her face froze, the dark eyes like buttons. 'Why don't you come closer, Handsome? Where I can hear you better?'

The better to see you with?

Something about this 'granny' struck Nick funny-and something told him he was standing right where he needed to be. . . .

'I'm okay here, ma'am,' Nick said. 'The detective asks the questions.'

The eyes tightened; something was different in that face now. 'I musta been dreamin', then, babycakes, when you asked me that shit?'

O'Riley said, 'Please take another look at the picture, Ms. Kostichek.'

Giving it only a cursory glance, she said, 'Don't know her, I said. Said I didn't, and I don't-if she worked for me fifteen, sixteen years ago, why the hell are you askin' about her now?'

Nick, without turning, glanced down at the writing desk. Numerous piles of opened letters, back in their envelopes, were stacked here and there, overlapping, haphazard. Private correspondence, bills, even junk mail . . .

The woman thrust the photo out for O'Riley to take; he did. 'Why are you digging up ancient history, anyway?' she asked. Almost demanded.

Nick didn't handle a thing-but his eyes touched the envelopes on the desk.

O'Riley said, 'Her name has come up in the investigation of another case.'

A cloud crossed the old woman's features and disappeared. But if she wondered what that case was, she didn't ask.

O'Riley cleared his throat. 'Well, thank you for your time, Ms. Kostichek.'

On the far side of the desk, barely within his eyes' reach, he saw it: a letter postmarked in Los Angeles, the name on the return address . . .

. . . Joy Petty.

Nick froze, only for an instant, then turned back to the frumpy, feisty woman. 'Yes, thank you, ma'am.'

'Don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out, fellas,' she said.

He followed O'Riley, as they let themselves out, O'Riley pulling the door shut behind them. Inside the Tahoe, Nick put the key in the ignition, but made no move to start the vehicle.

'Something on your mind, Nick?'

He turned to the detective. 'She's lying.'

With a shrug, O'Riley smirked, said, 'You think? That old broad wouldn't give a straight answer to a