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IF HE’D KILLED JACK," I told Greg Stillman, "he’d have called the cops himself and claimed full credit for it He was so happy to hear Jack was dead I thought I was going to get soood news"

" ‘Ding-dong, the witch is dead’ He must have felt like the Munchkins after Dorothy’s houseAnd you did say he was short, didn’t you?"

"I don’t think you’dafter I left Dukacs, met him at a coffee shop a few blocks away "And he’s not the type to burst into song But I think he felt liberated in about the sauess not" I drank soet when youto that step"

"That was Jack’s reaction," he said "I had to tell him he was mistaken"

"Oh?"

"He wasn’t specific He called y thrown back in his face He didn’t tell me who the man was or any of the circumstances, just that he’d been rejected and cursed out and ordered off the prearded the whole incident as a complete and total failure, and wondered if he could cross the fellow off his list or had to find a way to take it a step further"

"And?"

"And I told him he’d done it perfectly That the object of the action wasn’t to be forgiven That’s just a fringe benefit He got the point, but he ree he’d done Or that you couldn’t entirely undo it"

I was still thinking that one over when he said, "Unless I’ve ot one name left And it’s cloaked in John Doe–style anonymity"

"Robert Williaht as well be Robert Willia wife What are the odds?"

"That I’ll be able to find him? Or that he’ll turn out to be the killer?"

"Either"

"Sliht Matt, are we done?"

I looked at my cup There was still coffee in it

"No," he said, "I mean overall I think you’ve done what I hired you to do There were five names on the list, four after you ruled out the one in prison--"

"Piper MacLeish"

"--and you’ve cleared Sattenstein and Crosby Hart and now Mr Dukacs, and the object was to see if there was a naive to the police The only naive that to the police--"

I nodded, and io he had an affair with this guy’s wife, and he may have tried to find hiht

"I don’t kno many hours you’ve put in," he said, "but it seeave you Did you have to pay for information?"

"A few dollars here and there"

"So you didn’t even clear the thousand Do I owe you money, Matt?"

I shook my head "You can pay for the coffee"

"And that’s all? Are you sure?"

"I ht," I said "And there’s still a chance I’ll be able to clear Willia You never know"

And I guess you never do, because the following night I got hoht Jacob was behind the desk, in what I’d co, and he told emmun," he said, "each time sayin’ he’d try you later, and not once leavin’ a name or a nulad one to a , then over to the Flaer than usual I decided to tell Jacob to holdfor it I picked it up, and a voice like thirtyto Matthew Scudder"