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A friend of Donny’s called a day or two later He had a paint job co was okay Three days for sure, maybe four, and he could pay the same ten bucks an hour Could Nick use the work?

They wrapped it up in three days, and he had the weekend and twoup to say that he’d bid on that job and got it, and could Nick co? Keller wrote down the address and said he’d be there

"I’ll tell you," he said to Julia, "I’ this way"

"I don’t knohy not If I can rade--"

"But you’ve got qualifications"

"What, a teaching certificate? You’ve got qualifications, too You’re sober, you show up on tilish, and you don’t think you’re too good for the job I’m proud of you, Nicholas"

He was used to Donny and the others calling hi called Nicholas by Julia She still called hie, and that was okay He’d been lucky, he realized, in that the name he’d found in St Patrick’s Cemetery was one he could live with That hadn’t been a consideration when he was squinting at weathered headstones, all he’d cared about was that the dates worked, but he sa that he could have been saddled with a far less acceptable na her half his pay for his share of the rent and household expenses She’d protested at first that it was too ht too hard And what did he need ht not be a bad idea to save up for a new car, or at least a new used car, because he was fine until soistration)

After dinner, they took their coffee out on the front porch It was pleasant out there, watching people walk by, watching the day fade into twilight He sahat she row a little too tall, and cut off a little too ht and the view

He could probably work out how to trim it As soon as he had a day off, he’d see what he could do

One night, after they had made love, she broke the silence to point out that she’d called hi was that he hadn’t even noticed It seemed appropriate for her to call him that, in bed as well as out of it, because that seemed to be his name

That hat it said on his Social Security card and his passport, both of which had turned up in the ht the passport also contained an invitation to apply for a credit card He’d been preapproved, he was told, and he wondered just what criteria had been used to preapprove hi address and a pulse, and evidently that was all they required of hi blades of the ceiling fan, he said, "I guess I ht not have to sell those sta about?"

She seeht you lost theht you said your whole collection was stolen"

"It was, but I bought five rare sta went to hell They’d be tough to unload, but they’re still the closest thing I’ve got to a negotiable asset The car’s worth er market for it, but you have to have clear title, and I don’t"

"You bought the staot the stas, and switched on the bedside lamp to show her the five little squares of paper She asked a few questions -- how old were they, ere they worth -- and he wound up telling her all about them, and the circumstances of their purchase

"I would have had plenty of cash for the trip back to New York," he said, "if I hadn’t shelled out six hundred dollars for these That left me with less than two hundred But at the ti everything, including ht home I had the stamps all paid for when the announcement came over the radio"

"You mean you hadn’t heard about the assassination?"

"Nobody had, not when I was talking ford was eating rubber chicken with the Rotarians right around the tirasp the significance right away, I thought it was coincidence, ure was assassinated I had a coht I did, and, well -- what’s the matter?"

"Don’t you see?"

"See what?"

"You didn’t kill the ford You didn’t kill hi It seeo"

"No, you don’t get it You know you didn’t do it, and I know you didn’t do it, but what you and I know is not enough to stop all those policeht"

"But if you were sitting in some stamp shop in -- where did you say?"

"Urbandale"

"So there at the veryacross from you--"

"McCue"

"Whatever"

"His nairlfriend said she wouldn’t ed it"

"Shut up, for God’s sake, and let et this out This is important If you were there and he was there, and he’ll remember because of the announcement on the radio, then doesn’t that prove you weren’t don shooting the governor? It doesn’t? Why not?"

"They went onthat announcement all day," he said "McCue will reht even reht around the time he heard about the assassination But he won’t be able to swear exactly when that was, and even if he did a prosecutor could make him look like an idiot on the witness stand"

"And a good defense attorney--"

But she stopped when she saw the way he was shaking his head "No," he said gently "There’s so you don’t understand Let’s say I could prove my innocence Let’s say McCue could offer testiet me off the hook, and while we’re at it let’s say that some other witness, so to corroborate his testimony It doesn’t matter"

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