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"Don’t drink," he said, "and don’t die"

I told him I’d see what I could do

When he left I decided I needed more than a shower I drew a hot bath and soaked in it until the water wasn’t hot anymore It took the tension out of my muscles and the back of my neck, but what it didn’t do was hts out, and of course the new mattress felt unfa with either of theht on Jiested I read the chapter on Step Seven in Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions as a cure for inso rhino in his tracks," he said "Years ago I’d read the first chapter of Swann’s Way, which is as far as I ever got with Monsieur Proust Put ood"

I read the first couple of paragraphs, then put the book back on the shelf and hauled out Jack Ellery’s account of the double hoh and set it aside and thought about it, and decided I wasn’t any closer to sleep than I’d been before, and that it felt out of the question, at least for the tiht about Motorcycle Mark, and how there’d been more to him than I would have suspected People surprise you that way, especially the sober ones It had been sheerest happenstance that led me to call him: a phone call from someone else had ledforme his, and I’d taken it fro else And, because I didn’t have my phone book with me, and because I still had his number in my wallet, he’d been the one I’d called And I couldn’t have made a better choice

Funny hoorks

I decided I ought to have his nu with the other cards and slips of paper in ht sort of task for , put a batch of receipts in the cigar box where I stow them when I remember, and found a fine-point pen to copy Mark’s number and the others I’d accumulated since I last forced myself to perforh, soht me up short I stared at the card in my hand, copied the number into my book, stared at the card some more, and returned it to my wallet

I picked up Jack’s confession, read it through oneI’d h "I will call him S," he wrote of his partner, and so he did, S for Steve And then when he described the killing itself, he called the man ES For Even Steven, obviously

Maker’s Mark, I thought There was Mark Sattenstein, and there was Motorcycle Mark, and now there was Maker’s Mark

Why had he picked that brand?

It wasn’t a very popular bourbon I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen it advertised--but then I tried not to pay much attention to liquor ads these days It was expensive, but less so than Dickel or Wild Turkey, and it didn’t have their reputation Nor was it a brand I ordered often

At bars I didn’t always specify the brand I ht look at the bottles on the back bar and naht my eye Old Crow, Old Forester, Jim Beam Jack Daniel’s There were bourbons I’d try because I liked the sound of their name, or the look of the bottle they caenerally cae, oro down easy, strong enough to do the job

It was Carolyn Cheatham who had a fondness for Maker’s Mark She was Toht she turned up at Ar’s without him She lived nearby on Fifty-seventh Street, just a few doors west of Ninth Avenue, in an Art Deco building with a sunken living rooan consoling each other and wound up sharing her bed, along with a fifth of Maker’s Mark

She killed herself in that apartiven her She called ot there too late, but in plenty of tis that To his wife, wound up going to prison for killing his girlfriend

I thought about all of this, and while I was thinking I was getting dressed--undershorts, shirt, pants, socks, shoes I grabbed a jacket and went out of ht and walked to the corner and turned right again

I got as far as the Pioneer--or Pioy little ino in and belly up to the bar, and the fellow standing behind it would probably be able to answer the question I’d coht ask? Whatever it was, he’d have the answer

XLI

BUT I TURNED around and went hoh for the newsstand at the corner of Eighth and Fifty-seventh to have the early edition of the Tiot to e and take ain and pulled the chair over to theand sat for a little while looking at nothing in particular

I’d headed for Ar’s because I had a question to ask And I’d turned back because I’d just spent a day that had put me physically closer to a drink than I’d been in the past year, and I was one day away from the one-year anniversary of my last drink I didn’t want a drink now, I didn’t feel like drinking, but enough had sunk in during the previous 364 days to erous that room was for me now

Oh, I could have called someone, some sober friend to keep me company while I asked my question But I didn’t have to do that either I could just go hoet to bed My question would still be there in the

I didn’t know if I’d be able to sleep I got in bed, turned off the light, stretched out on the unfamiliar mattress, settledI kneasI did after breakfast was call Dennis Redot him at the station house, and he was on his way out when I reached hi He said, "On Ellery? Because it’s gonna take a lot tobut suicide"

"Try G Decker Raines," I said "And Marcy Cantwell"

"Nohy are those names familiar?"

"A few years back," I said "A double hoe A Bohe to the Post, and--"

"I remember the case Still unsolved to this day, if I’ you knoho did it? Well, as it?"

"Jack Ellery"