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"I ondering about that," I said "It seems to me it shouldn't be much of a trick to prove that the new letter was typed on a different machine"

"Well, sure," he said "If it was typed"

"If it wasn't," I said, "he's got a funny kind of handwriting"

"I mean typed on a typewriter, which it wasn't, and neither were any of the earlier letters They were done on a computer and printed on a laser printer"

"Can't they identify the computer and the printer forensically?"

He shook his head "With a typewriter the keys'll be worn differently, and this one'll be out of alignment, or the E and O's'll be filled in Or the typeface is different A typewriter's like a fingerprint, no two alike"

"And a computer?"

"With a computer you can choose a different typeface every ti this key or that one You see how the signature's in script? You get that by switching to a script font"

"So you can't tell if two letters came out of the same computer?"

"I'm not a hundred percent in the loop on this," he said, "but there's a certain amount you can tell With Will's letters, the ones from Will Number One, they think there was more than one printer involved"

He went on to tell me more than I could take in, about ways in which you could compose a letter on one coh another computer and printer I didn't listen too closely, and eventually I held up a hand to stop him

"Please," I said "I'm sick to death of co hoonderful they are I don't care about the typeface or the paper, or if he composed it on the East Side and printed it out on the West Side I don't even care about the writing style What's so different it ju"

"How do you inal Will wrote open letters to the vies," he said "This one writes to McGraw Plus he lists three at once"

"Uh-huh And look who's on the list"

"Peter Tully, Marvin Rois Kilbourne"

"Adrian picked people society couldn't coot aith it A Mafia don who got aith everything A right-to-lifer who'd incited homicide and remained untouchable A racist firebrand who, like the rest of them, had found a way around the syste on the list, did he? That should have been grounds for suspecting hiot four people who could certainly be viewed as public eneue that the s-W Will was carrying out"

"And the new list?"

"A labor leader, a judge, and a critic They're right up there with Jack the Ripper and Attila the Hun, wouldn't you say?"

"Oh, I don't know," he said He knocked back the rest of his lass "I could probably think of a few people whoif Send-'ereat courtroom in the sky The son of a bitch hasa police officer the benefit of the doubt He sets nizance all the dae," I said, "and the people voted him into office, and they could vote him out if they really wanted to And one of these days they probably will"

"Not soon enough"

"What about Peter Tully?"

"Well, he's an arrogant prick," he said "What's Will have to say about hie to your lust for power as you threaten to thrust a wrench into the machinery of urban transit' You know, reatup with a sentence like that"

"Listen to his bill of goods against Regis Kilbourne 'Your power over the Broadway stage is near absolute, and it has absolutely corrupted you Drunk with it, you unfailingly choose for the willfully obscure at the expense of the well-made drama with a story to tell' There'sphysically unattractive, and how unfair it all is"

He thought about it while the girl brought his drink "It's not just the exotic aspect," he said once she was out of hearing range "It's also she happens to be gorgeous"

"You and Regis Kilbourne," I said, "placing an undue premium on physical appeal"

"We're both a couple of superficial bastards," he agreed "Who the hell would want to kill a critic?"

"Anybody who ever wrote a play or appeared in one," I said, "which in this toould have to include half the waiters and a third of the bartenders But they'd like to kill hie Send-'eht not break your heart if a piece of the cornice broke off a tall building and took him out when it landed But you wouldn't actually want to kill him"

"No, and I probably wouldn't juood for the systees"

"Or critics," I said, "or labor leaders, either You know the difference between the two Wills? The first one objected to the invulnerability of his targets, the way they'd ed to subvert the system But these three don't have that kind of invulnerability Marvin Ro the bench forever The voters'll probably boot him next time he comes up for reelection"

"Let's hope so"