"What I'm trying to find out, Max, is whether you might have dropped the girl off at St. Sab's First..."

"No, I .. ."

"... instead of Ainsley and Eleventh. You saw her going in an alley on St.

Sab's and First, did

"No."

"Because that's where she was found dead, in the alley there, you see.

We're wondering did these

black shits really rob her and kill her, or was it some other shits?

This is a serious thing here, Max."

"I know it is."

"So if you dropped her some place different from

what it says on your call sheet..."

"No."

"Or if she stopped some place to score..."

"No, no."

"Cause she was in possession of ten jumbo bottles, you see."

"I don't know what that is, jumbo bottles." "Crack, Max. Big vials of crack. Red tops."

"I didn't take her any place but Ainsley and Eleventh."

"Not even for a minute."

"Not even for ten seconds."

"So what took you so long to go three miles uptown, Max?"

The taxi went silent.

"Max, are you lying to me?"

"Why would I lie to you?"

"Well, I don't know.. You tell me, Max."

Outside on the street, an ambulance siren wailed to the night.

Liebowitz was silent. Ollie waited. The sound of the ambulance melted into the city's constant nighttime song, a murmur that rose and fell, rose and fell, the pulse beat of a giant metropolis. Still Ollie waited.

"Max," he said.

"Okay," Liebowitz said, "the young lady and I had relations, okay?"

"You and the young lady are related?." Ollie asked, being deliberately dense.

I I.

Liebowitz cleared his throat.

"No, we had relations."

"Ah," Ollie said. "Your mutual relatives are de

"We had sex," Liebowitz whispered.

"Sex?"

"Yes."

"You mean you had intercourse with her, Max?"

"No, no."

"Then what do you mean, Max?"

"She performed.." uh... fellatio on me."

"That's why it took so long to get uptown."

"Ah."

"I'm not a young man anymore, you see."

"I see."

"It takes a while."

"I see. Max, you could've got arrested doing that, Max?"

"I know."

"You did a foolish thing, Max. You could AIDS, Max, do you know that?"

"Please. Don't even mention such a thing."

"Very dangerous, what you did, Max."

"I.