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"And I was to call her as soon as I caht Last time or two she called, it was already late, and that hen she stressed it No ht away"

"And she didn't leave a nu to think straight, and in a wink the years fell away and I was a cop, a detective attached to the Sixth Precinct "Call for you, Scudder," so "It's your cousin Frances"

"Oh, for God's sake," I said now

"Soht," I told Jacob "I suppose it would have to be her It couldn't be anybody else"

"She said-"

"I knohat she said It's all right, you got it straight It just took me a minute, that's all"

He nodded "Sometimes," he said, "it'll do that"

I didn't know the number I had known it, of course I had known it well for many years, but I hadn't called it in a while and couldn't suh I had recopied my address books several times since I'd last had occasion to call that nuain, because each time I'd chosen to preserve it

Elaine Mardell, I had written And an address on East Fifty-first Street And a phone number that was familiar to o upstairs to use it Instead I crossed the lobby to the pay phone, dropped a quarter in the slot, and, and Elaine's recorded voice repeated the phone nue at the sound of the tone I waited for it and said, "This is your cousin returning your call I'm home now, and you have the nu off There Thank God you called"

"I was out late, I just got your e And for a minute or two there I couldn't reuess it's been a while"

"I guess it has"

"I need to see you"

"All right," I said "I' I can't find a free hour in What's good for you? So?"

"Matt, I really need to see you now"

"What's the problem, Elaine?"

"Come on over and I'll tell you"

"Don't tell o and blow a main fuse?"

"God No, it's worse than that"

"You sound shaky"

"I'm scared to death"

She had never been a wo in the saht over

As I left the hotel an e by on the other side of the street, heading east I yelled at him and he stopped with a squeal of brakes and I trotted across and got in I gave him Elaine's address and settled back in my seat, but I couldn't stay settled back I rolled down theand sat on the edge of the seat and looked out at the passing landscape

Elaine was a hooker, a classy young prostitute orked out of her own apart just fine without a piot to know each other back when I was a cop I met her for the first time a couple of weeks after I e, feeling very good about the new gold shield in my pocket, and she was at a table with three European irls At the tiood deal less whorish than her sisters, and a lot more attractive

A week or so after that I an's Pub I don't knoho she ith, but she was at Danny Boy Bell's table, and I went over to say hello to Danny Boy He introduced me to everyone there, Elaine included I saw her once or twice after that around town, and then one night I went to the Brasserie for a late bite and she was at a table with another girl I joined the two of theirl went off on her own, and I went home with Elaine

For the next several years I don't suppose there was a hen I didn't see her at least once, unless one or the other of us was out of town We had an interesting relationship, and one which seemed to serve us both I was a sort of protector for her, usefully supplied with cop skills and cop connections, someone she could lean on, someone who could push back hard if anybody tried to lean on her I was, too, the closest thing she had or wanted to a boyfriend, and she was as irlfriend or mistress as I could have handled Soht at the Garden, to a bar or an after-hours Sometimes I dropped in on her for a quick drink and a quick bounce I didn't have to send flowers or remember her birthdays, and neither of us had to pretend ere in love

I was e was a mess, but I'm not sure I realized it at the tied house out on Long Island, and I e would last, just as I assuulations forcedwith both hands in those days, and while it didn't see a subtler effect all along,it res in my life I didn't want to look at

Ah, well What Elaine and I had was a none of convenience, I suppose, and ere hardly the first cop and hooker to have found this particular way to do each other so or suited us so well if we hadn't liked each other

She had becoes forsuspicion We didn't use the code often because there wasn't much need for it; our relationship was such that it was usually I who called her, and I could leave whatever enerally either to break a date or because of an eency had co to her, and I'd alluded to it, recalling when someone had blown a main fuse The soht patent attorney with offices way don on Maiden Lane and a hoular john of Elaine's, showing up two or three tirief until the afternoon he picked her bed as the site for what a medical exah on every call girl's list of nightht to what they'll do if it happens What Elaine did was call me at the station house, and when they said I was out she told theency, that I should call my cousin Frances