Miaow looks up at Rafferty again and then down at the center of his chest. 'He never yells at me. Not even once.'
'Tell me one thing you don't like about Poke.'
She gives it a moment's thought. 'His clothes. He doesn't have any pretty clothes.'
'I do too,' Rafferty says immediately.
'Do not.'
'Do too.'
Morrison's eyes go back and forth between them.
Miaow grabs a handful of Rafferty's sport coat and gives it a tug hard enough to pop a button. 'You don't have any pink shirts except the one I bought you.'
'You bought Poke a shirt, Miaow?'
A decisive nod. 'All of his are ugly.'
'I've noticed,' Morrison says.
'Two against one,' Rafferty says bitterly.
Miaow barks a laugh and elbows him, surprisingly hard, in the ribs. 'Same as Rose and me.'
'Tell me about your room, Miaow.'
'It's pink,' Miaow says. 'Poke bought me a pink rug, too. And I have two beds, on top of each other, like a building-'
'Bunk beds?' Morrison asks.
'And I can hang pictures anywhere I want, and there's a really little room that's just for my clothes. A room just for clothes. And I have almost enough clothes to fill it, and they're new clothes, too. They smell good. And if I don't want anybody to come in my room, I can close the door.'
'Do you lock it?'
'No. I use the frowny face when I don't want anybody to come in. When it's okay for people to come in, I use the smiley face. I made them,' she adds, in case Morrison is confused. 'They're really cardboard, but I drew faces on them.'
'And you sleep there all alone.'
'Except for Superman,' Miaow says, and Morrison's eyebrows leap half an inch.
'It's temporary,' Rafferty says, but Miaow is already talking.
'He used to sleep on the couch, but now Poke sleeps there. With a gun. To protect us.'
'Really,' Morrison says icily, and Rafferty's cell phone rings.
'Ummm,' Rafferty says, and answers the phone.
'People keep beating him up,' Miaow says happily.
'Arthit?' Rafferty is aware of Morrison's very level blue eyes on him.
'We've got her,' Arthit says. 'We've got an address, I mean.'
'Is anybody home?'
'How would I know? We found a neighbor lady who knows where the sister moved. They might still be together.'
'Is your man still on the scene?'
'Sure. He just called.'
'Have him watch the door. He shouldn't talk to her, unless she tries to leave. He can't let her leave.'
'Poke,' Morrison says, flagging for attention.
'Where is it?' Rafferty asks, pulling out his notebook.
Arthit gives him an address.
'I'll get there as fast as I can.' He hangs up and finds Morrison regarding him questioningly.
'I have a problem,' Rafferty says. 'Start with Miaow, okay, Hank? I'll be back by the time you're finished.'
'This is an important meeting,' Morrison says. 'It's not something we can start and stop again. You should have cleared the afternoon, Poke.'
'I did, Hank. This is something I can't help. It's an emergency.'
'Emergencies. Sleeping in the living room with a gun. This is not what I wanted to hear today.'
'Miaow will explain it. Is that okay with you, Miaow?'
Miaow looks from him to Morrison. 'I guess.'
'Hank, it won't happen again. All this stuff is temporary. I'm trying to help somebody, and it just-'
'I'll let Miaow tell me about it.' Morrison is obviously disconcerted. 'But if you're not back here in ninety minutes, Poke, we're going to have a problem.'
Rafferty rises, adjusting his jacket to keep Morrison from seeing the gun. 'I'll be back. This is an emergency. Only this time, Hank. Seriously. Once in a lifetime.'
As he leaves the room, he hears Miaow say, 'He's always like that.'
'I don't know where she is.'
Doughnut's sister walks with a limp so severe it almost looks like a parody, dragging a flopping foot behind her like a stone. She grips the furniture as she goes, looking for balance. The living room is arranged so there is something solid for her to hold on to every three or four feet. She wears a loose, shapeless black dress, ankle length, and a wide black plastic bracelet on her left wrist. Her face puts her somewhere in her thirties, but they have obviously been hard years. Strands of gray are already woven through her hair.
Rafferty is standing in the doorway, since she did not invite him in. 'But you can get a message to her.'
She makes an equivocal gesture with her right hand: Maybe, maybe not. Her left hand is holding on to the back of a chair.
'This is important,' Rafferty says. 'To your sister and to you, too.'
A dubious shake of the head. 'So what is it?'
'I want you to tell her this: I understand why she kept the three disks from Claus Ulrich's apartment. Tell her I know what happened to Claus and why, but no one else does. There are no police involved. If she talks to me, I'll try to make sure that no police become involved.'
Her eyes had widened fractionally at Ulrich's name, but now the impassive face is back in place. 'And if she doesn't?'
'Then there may be cops. I figured out what happened. How long do you think it would take them?'
She brings her left hand up to clear an errant wisp of hair from her eyes, and the wide bracelet slides up her arm. Rafferty sees the deep white scars crisscrossing the inside of her wrist. There are at least a dozen of them: She had hacked at herself frantically. She realizes what he is looking at and lets her arm drop. The bracelet slips back into place, masking the scars.
'You'll tell your sister.'
'If I see her.'
'Here's how she can reach me.' He writes his name and phone number on a page in his notebook and tears it out. She tugs the bracelet down and reaches for it. 'You'll give it to her.'
She folds the paper in half without even looking at it. 'If she gets in touch with me.'
'Of course,' Rafferty says. 'If she gets in touch with you.'
Miaow's eyes are swollen and red, but the smile she gives Rafferty is the broadest he has seen all day.
'You two getting along okay?' Rafferty asks.
'She's quite a girl,' Hank Morrison says. He is sitting next to Miaow on the couch, which in itself is a good sign. 'You're a lucky man, Poke.'
'I know.'
'Hey, Miaow,' Morrison says. 'There are some kids outside, and I'll bet you already know a few of them. Why don't you go out and see?'
'I want to be here,' she says.
'Not now. Poke and I need to talk alone, just like you and I did.'
'Are you going to talk about me?'
'We might say how wonderful you are,' Morrison says. 'We might talk about how smart you are and how well you take care of Poke. But mostly we're going to talk about Poke.'
