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"No"

"Or anything to set theht have been in his Fourth Step, Matt"

"But he kept theht by I told you I was trying not to dwell on what I was hearing"

"Yes"

"A fine time to play Second Monkey"

"How’s that?"

"You know, Hear No Evil If I’d been paying closer attention--"

"You don’t want to go there, Greg"

"No"

"It’s a shame you don’t have a copy of his Fourth Step"

"I never read it I just got to hear it, or to hear the parts he read to me"

"I know Then what did he do with it?"

"I told hie?"

"Well, tear it up first"

As I’d done with ht

"That’s what I tell ot all of that out of your system, and you shared it with God and with another person--’ "

"How do you share it with God?"

"I’ve often wondered I guess you just assu when you share it with your sponsor Where was I? Oh, right ‘You shared it with another person, and now it’s tio of it’ "

"And they take it home and burn it Or shred it, or whatever Is that what you did with yours?"

"What else?"

Shortly before noon I decided I could stand a change froer walk I went to a group called Renaissance, on Forty-eighth off Fifth Avenue The midtown location drew a lot of coo home to the suburbs after work Thatthan was the nors, but there was certainly no dress code, and the unshaven guy seated next toin a cardboard box

Afterward I called one offor an unsolved ho dealer and his wife or girlfriend Both shot dead, and it would have taken place on the Upper West Side sometiht is there’s been hundreds, but you got two people dead, both of gunshots, and the case is still open That narrows it down I’ll see if it rings a bell for anybody"

I had essentially the sa up fairly certain that I wasn’t going to get anywhere that way I walked a few blocks down Fifth to the main library, where I spent an hour with bound volumes of the New York Times Index and another couple of hours in thefor a needle in a pasture full of haystacks

Pointless

At St Paul’s that night a wo pretty close to my one-year anniversary Pretty soon, I said She said she was sure it would be the first of many, and advised me to re Mark wasn’t there, I was ht up with Motorcycle Mark at the coffee urn and asked if he’d called the night before He said he hadn’t, that he didn’t even have my number I said it ht up the subject, could I let hiave him one of my minimalist cards and he found a home for it in his shirt pocket Then he borrowed a pen and wrote out his own name and number on a scrap of paper It seemed only polite to thank him and tuck it away in ested she’d coht fro over her eyes She confirmed that I’d be able to show up as scheduled

"Three tohty-fourth and Aave my arm a squeeze

Maybe it was the habit she had of touching my arm, or maybe it was more the result of how she looked in the well-tailored skirt and jacket The last conversation I’d had with Janto do with it, too Whatever it was, I spent the second half of theathering afterward at the Flame

She didn’t show up, which was hardly surprising I couldn’t recall that I’d ever seen her there in the past I didn’t stay long ed to skip dinner--and said es, but I wasn’t in ht first of Jan, then Donna, and finally Mark--Motorcycle Mark,use of my number, or the Mark who’d called before

I settled the