Mister X. John Lutz

like Linda’s it,” Pearl said to Fedderman.

      He showed no reaction but said, “I’m surprised. She seems like a good kid.”

      “Maybe she is, but she’s going down for this one. Carries a mimic card swiper in her apron pocket.”

      “I watched for those and missed it,” Fedderman said. “She must be smooth.”

      “You can tell she’s done it before.”

      “Let’s not spoil her evening,” Fedderman said, sipping some of his martini that he hadn’t poured into his water glass. “Let’s let her copy some more numbers, build up the evidence against her.”

      “Watch her keep breaking the law?”

      “Sure.”

      “Doesn’t that kind of make us accomplices?” Pearl asked. Since becoming an associate and not having the NYPD to cover legal expenses, she’d become cautious about exposing herself and the agency to potential litigation. Or maybe this was because she’d become fond of Linda and didn’t want to compound the mess the young woman was in.

      “In a way,” Fedderman said, “but nobody’ll know but us. And you and me, Pearl, we’d never rat each other out.”

      “I suspect you’re half right,” Pearl said.

      She waited till an hour before closing time to call the NYPD, and Linda was apprehended with the card recorder in her apron pocket. It contained the names and credit card numbers of five diners who’d paid their checks with plastic that evening. Damning evidence.

      As she was being led away, Linda was loudly and tearfully blaming everything on a guy named Bobby. Pearl believed her.

      “Men!” Pearl said, with a disdain that dripped.

      Fedderman didn’t comment, standing there thinking it was Linda who’d illegally recorded the card numbers.

      A beaming and impressed Sammy told them his check to QAI would be in the mail, and Pearl and Fedderman left the restaurant about eleven o’clock to go to their respective apartments. They would write up their separate reports tomorrow and present them to Quinn, who would doubtless instruct Pearl to send a bill to Sammy even though it might cross with his check in the mail. Business was business.

      Fedderman waited around outside the restaurant with Pearl while she tried to hail a cab. The temperature was still in the eighties, and the air was so sultry it felt as if rain might simply break out instead of fall.

      It never took Pearl long to attract the eye of a cabbie, so they’d soon part and Fedderman would walk the opposite direction to his subway stop two blocks away.

      Pearl extended one foot off the curb into the street and waved, kind of with her whole body.

      Sure enough, a cab’s brake lights flared, and it made a U-turn, causing oncoming traffic to weave and honk, and drove half a block the wrong way in the curb lane to come to a halt near Pearl.

      “It might have been Bobbie with an ‘I-E,’” Fedderman said, as she was climbing into the back of the cab. “A woman.”

      Pearl glared at him. “Dream on.”

      She slammed the cab’s door before he could reply.

      Fedderman watched the cab make another U-turn to get straight with the traffic. He wondered if Pearl had always been the way she was, born with a burr up her ass. She was so damned smart, but always mouthing off and getting into trouble. What a waste. She’d never had a chance to make it any higher in the NYPD than he had. Fedderman was steady, a plodder, a solid detective, unskilled at departmental politics and wise enough to stay out of them. Staying out of things was another of Pearl’s problems. She couldn’t.

      Another problem was that Pearl was a woman, and she had those looks. Her appearance drew unwanted attention, and she’d always been too hotheaded to handle it. She’d punched an NYPD captain once in a Midtown hotel after he’d touched her where he shouldn’t have. That alone would have been enough to sink most careers. It hadn’t quite sunk Pearl’s, but there was always a hole in her boat, and she’d had to bail constantly just to stay afloat. That was why she’d finally drifted out of the NYPD and into the bank guard job. She could be nice to people ten, twenty seconds at a stretch, so it had worked out okay for her. But she’d never been happy at Sixth National. She missed the challenge, the action, the satisfaction of bringing down the bad guys, even the danger.

      The way Fedderman had missed that life while chasing after elusive golf balls down in Florida, or fishing in Gulf waters and pulling from the sea creatures he didn’t even recognize as fish.

      Like Pearl, he’d been ripe for Quinn’s call.

      Fedderman smiled in the direction Pearl had gone and then walked away, his right shirt cuff unbuttoned and flapping like a white surrender flag with every stride. If he knew about the cuff, he didn’t seem to mind.

      He did kind of mind that there would be no more free drinks and appetizers at Sammy’s.

      3

      The next morning they were sitting in the arrangement of desks that made up Quinn and Associates’ office. Quinn was seated behind his desk, Pearl and Fedderman in chairs facing him. Low-angled sunlight invaded through the iron-grilled window and warmed the office. The Mr. Coffee over on the table in the corner was chuggling away, filling the air with the rich scent of fresh-brewed beans.

      Fedderman had his suit coat off and was slouched sideways, taking notes. His right shirt cuff was already unbuttoned. That usually happened because of the way he cocked and dragged his wrist over paper as he wrote. A sunbeam alive with dust motes had found Pearl and made her more vividly beautiful than ever. Quinn wished, as he often did, that what they’d shared together hadn’t ended. He liked to think that maybe it hadn’t. He knew Pearl liked to think that it definitely had, for her, anyway. Could be she was right.

      Quinn had made copies of the clippings Chrissie Keller had given him, and he explained the situation. Pearl and Fedderman listened carefully. This was the sort of investigation they all liked—multiple murder rather than credit card pilfering. In the world of catching the bad guys and setting things as right as possible, solving this one could make a person feel useful. If only the case weren’t more than five years old. They all knew the odds of rekindling the past and nailing the Carver were long.

      “I’ve read a lot about the mystical link between twins,” Pearl said, when Quinn was finished talking. “I’d like to say it’s bullshit, but I’m not so sure.”

      “I don’t see how the mystery of twins is in any way relevant to this,” Fedderman said. “Other than motivating our client.”

      “That’s enough relevance,” Quinn said, “considering we’re no longer paid by the city.” He looked at Pearl. “Or by a bank.”

      They had all stuck their necks out to create this investigative agency, and they knew it.

      Three people, working without a net. No one said anything for a while.

      “That was a pregnant pause if ever I didn’t hear one,” Pearl finally said.

      Fedderman, who’d been adding tooth marks to his dented yellow pencil, glanced over at her. “Does that mean we can expect another, smaller pause?”

      “Point is,” Quinn said, “however a client’s motivated, if it’s legal and ethical, we’ll gladly accept payment.”

      “One out of two would be okay,” Pearl said.

      She was ignored.

      “You mentioned our client had won some sorta jackpot,” Fedderman said to Quinn.

      “Slot machine thing. She hit a kind of tri-state trifecta and got temporarily rich. This is how she feels compelled to spend her money.”

      “That mysterious twins business,” Pearl said. She’d also