"It's visible from the side street. I took a stroll down the side street and took a look. I saw a girl."

"Girl?"

"Yes, sir," said Blocker.

"I think it was the girl Sha.s.sad looked at him coldly. qaal girl" "The one we chased out of the Garden that night," he said.

"The one at the hockey game. The one we lost in the parking garage."

"Where the h.e.l.l was she?" demanded Sha.s.sad. Hearn leaned on the hallway wall and studiously looked into the vacant eyes of the corpse.

He listened intently and was completely expressionless.

"She was coming down the back staircase from jacobus's apartment" said Blocker.

"They have an outside back entrance."

"And?"

"And she looked around when she got down. I was about a hundred feet from her. She turned and saw me standing there and quickly turned and started the other way."

"Were you wearing a sign?" asked Sha.s.sad.

"One that said,

"I am a cop'?"

Blocker looked at his feet, as if waiting for permission to continue.

"Yeah? Then what?"

"I tried to follow her, but there was a fence in the way. She picked me up right away. Saw me trying to get past that fence immediately.

That's when she really started to move."

"Yeah? So? Where'd she move to?"

"I don't know. She might have disappeared into a store and waited for me to disappear. For a second I thought she'd slipped into this blue car."

"Get the plate number?"

"Out of state. That's all I know."

"Marvelous," sighed Sha.s.sad.

"Tell me, why do you come to work without your dog and your cane?"

"An expert," offered Grimaldi.

"Had to have been an expert the way she got loose."

"I ran to the end of that block and I looked in every direction.

Gone. Not a sign of her. No one had seen her. I circled back to the car where Jack was'" he nodded to Grimaldi, 'and she hadn't gone past him" it." Sha.s.sad listened bitterly.

"You were right," he uttered.

"You blew "Must have been an expert," Grimaldi suggested.

"Had different escapes all planned."

"The trouble is'" retorted Sha.s.sad, 'you gentlemen are supposed to be experts, too."

Sha.s.sad looked imploringly to Hearn, employing his best how did-they-let-them-get-out-of-the-police-academy expression. Hearn brought Sha.s.sad up to date on the subsequent developments.

Grimaldi and Blocker, Hearn explained, had then spent the rest of the day on their stakeout." But toward darkness, in the early evening, Jacobus had failed to show for his twelve-hour night shift.

The day manager of the office building had telephoned him. No answer.

Eventually, the owner of jacobus's home, the man who lived downstairs, was telephoned. The landlord agreed to go upstairs and ring the front bell. No answer to the bell. But when the owner glanced inside, the light in the front hall was still on. And the body of jacobus was plainly visible, even the details, like the pool of blood he lay in.

"Ta-rif-fic Sha.s.sad grumbled. He had a terrible headache. He had counted on Jacobus to help put together the pieces of the Ryder Daniels case for him. So much for that.

He glanced at his watch. It was twenty minutes past six.

"Know what we do now?" he asked Hearn.

"Daniels, of course ' "d.a.m.n straight," said Sha.s.sad with disgust.

"The girl's our suspect, he knows where the girl is. At least he's got to know who the G.o.d-d.a.m.n girl is. Material witness. We pick him up."

Grimaldi looked at his superior.

"Do you want us-?"

"You two head back to the One Nine," he said.

"We'll find Daniels."

"If we can'" added Hearn. Sha.s.sad looked at his partner as if to ask what that meant.

"I doubt that he'll be home" suggested Hearn.

Thirty-five minutes later, Sha.s.sad and Hearn knocked on the door to Thomas Daniels's apartment. Predictably, there was no response from within.

For Thomas Daniels, there had only been one decision. Whether it was insanity, risk, bad judgment, or simply a lethal brand of curiosity, he planned to meet Leslie McAdam. He was too deeply involved in the case, emotionally and professionally, to sidestep her.

Facts, simple facts, were what he wanted. Positive identifications of the players and their rightful teams, that was what he needed what he had to have -more than anything. There was only one way: maneuver Leslie face to face with Whiteside. Force them to identify each other . . . or call each other's bluff. It was the most fascinating case of his life, coupled with the most intriguing woman he'd ever met. Stay away? He couldn't. Trust her one final time? He'd have to.

Accept her warning and stay away from his apartment indefinitely?