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I assured her I hadn't come for the cat, that she could keep the animal if she wanted She was surprised, and obviously relieved But if I hadn't coave her an abbreviated explanation of ained access to Kiiven her a key toout of town and wanted her to water ave me her key I can't remember why Did she want me to feed Panther? I really can't ree his na your pardon?"

"It's just that I don't much care for the cat's nae it I don't believe he recognizes it What he recognizes is the whirr of the electric can opener, announcing that dinner is served" She smiled "T S Eliot wrote that every cat has a secret name, known only to the cat himself So I don't suppose it really matters what name I call him"

I turned the conversation to Kim, asked how close a friend she'd been

"I don't knoere friends," she said "We were neighbors We were good neighbors, I kept a key to her apartment, but I'm not sure ere friends"

"You knew she was a prostitute?"

"I suppose I knew At first I thought she was a model She had the looks for it"

"Yes"

"But soathered what her actual profession was She never mentioned it I think it uess what it was And then there was that black man who visited her frequently So he was her pimp"

"Did she have a boyfriend, Mrs Siht about it, and while she did so a black streak darted across the rug, leaped onto a couch, leaped again and was gone "You see?" the woman said "He's not at all like a panther I don't knohat he is like, but he's nothing like a panther You asked if she had a boyfriend"

"Yes"

"I just wonder She must have had some sort of secret plan because she hinted at it the last tioing to take a turn for the better I'm afraid I wrote it off as a pipe dream"

"Why?"

"Because I assu to run off into the sunset and live happily ever after, only she wouldn't say as much to me because she'd never come out and told me that she had a pimp, that she was a prostitute I understand piirls are unio off and buy a sheep station in Australia or soht of Fran Schecter on Morton Street, convinced she and Chance were bound by karmic ties, with innu on leaving her pimp," I said

"For anotherto find out"

She'd never seen Kim with anyone in particular, never paid much attention to the ht, anyway, she explained, and she herself was at work during the day

"I thought she'd bought the fur herself," she said "She was so proud of it, as if soht she wanted to conceal her sha had to buy it for herself I'll bet she did have a boyfriend She showed it off with that air, as if it had been a gift from a man, but she didn't come out and say so"

"Because the relationship was a secret"

"Yes She was proud of the fur, proud of the jewelry You said she was leaving her pimp Is that why she was killed?"

"I don't know"

"I try not to think about her having been killed, or hohy it happened Did you ever read a book called Watership Down?" I hadn't "There's one colony of rabbits in the book, a sort of seood supply there because hus leave food for the rabbits It's sort of rabbit heaven, except that the men who do this do so in order to set snares and provide themselves with a rabbit dinner fro rabbits, they never refer to the snare, they never mention any of their felloho've been killed that way They have an unspoken agreement to pretend that the snare does not exist, and that their dead co to one side as she spoke Now her eyes found mine "Do you know, I think New Yorkers are like those rabbits We live here for whatever it is that the city provides- the culture, the job opportunities, whatever it is And we look the other hen the city kills off our friends and neighbors Oh, we read about it and we talk about it for a day or two days but then we blink it all away Because othere'd have to do so about it, and we can't Or we'd have to move, and we don't want to move We're like those rabbits, aren't we?"

I leftShe said she would I took the elevator to the lobby, but when it got there I stayed in the car and rode it back to twelve again Just because I'd located the black kitten didn'ton a few more doors