For several years after the death of his first wife Flo, Glitsky had a live-in housekeeper-a woman born in Jalisco, Mexico, with the German name of Rita Schultz. She had slept in the living room of his duplex behind a shoji screen and had come, in her own way, to be almost one of the family. After the marriage, when Treya and her then sixteen-year-old daughter Raney had come to live with Glitsky and his sixteen-year-old son Orel, Rita wasn't needed anymore and Glitsky, regretfully, had had to let her go.
Now and for the past eight months since Treya had gone back to work at the DA's office, Rita, no longer living in, was again at the Glitskys' five days a week, taking care of the baby. Two months ago, the big kids had both gone off to college-Orel to his dad's alma mater of San Jose State, and Raney all the way across the country to Johns Hopkins, where she'd gotten a full academic scholarship and planned to major in pre-med. The baby Rachel moved out of Abe and Treya's bedroom and into Raney's old room behind the kitchen.
Over the summer, he and Treya had actually fixed up the place a bit. They tore out the old, battle-worn gray berber wall-to-wall carpet in the living room and discovered the original blond hardwood underneath. Over one weekend, they stripped the seventies wallpaper and repainted the walls a soft Tuscan yellow. Then with the fresh new look, they got motivated to go out and buy a modern brown leather couch and matching love seat, some colorful throw rugs, Mission-style coffee and end tables. They put plantation shutters over the front windows.
It wasn't a large place by any means, and Glitsky had lived in it for more than twenty years, but with all the recent changes, he would sometimes come out into the new living room holding Rachel in the dimly lit predawn and wonder where he was. He knew it wasn't just the room. In reality, everything seemed different. The whole world since the terrorist attacks, the new reality perhaps more psychic than physical, but all the more real for that. All his boys now moved out, his old job gone, a new marriage with a young woman, and for the past fourteen months, their baby girl.
At such times-now was one of them-he would stand by the front windows with Rachel in his arms and together they would look out at the familiar street. He'd done the same thing dozens of times with Isaac, Jacob and Orel when they were babies, but now he did it to try and convince himself that he was the same person with Rachel that he'd been to his sons, and that his home was not foreign soil.
He opened the shutters and looked down the street toward its intersection with Lake. The rain had kept up throughout the night, but the wind had finally abated with the first sign of light. Now outside it was all heavy mist under high clouds that would hang on all day if not longer. Glitsky stared out through it, holding his daughter up against him, patting her back gently.
A pedestrian appeared at the intersection and turned into his street. Though he wore a heavy raincoat that hid the shape of his body and had pulled a brimmed hat down over his face, Glitsky knew who it was as soon as he saw him.
"What's grandpa doing here?" he asked his daughter. His own brow clouding-this could only be bad news-he watched his father plod slowly up the street, hands in his pockets, head down. When he was out front, Glitsky moved to the front door and opened it. Nat was already coming up the stairs, the dripping hat in one hand, lifting his feet, one heavy step after the other.
"What?" Glitsky asked.
His father stopped before he got to the landing. He raised his eyes, but something went out of his shoulders. "Abraham." The way he said his son's name made it sound as if just getting to him had been his destination. He let out a breath. "Sam Silverman," he said, shaking his head. "Somebody shot him."
Nat walked the last few steps up and Abe stood aside to let him pass. While Nat hung his coat on the rack by the door, his son went in to wake Trey a and give her the baby. When he came back out, his father was sitting forward on the edge of the new love seat, his hands clasped between his knees. He looked feeble, a very old man.
In fact, he was eighty years old, but on a normal day, no one would guess it. Abe went down on a knee in front of him.
"Did you get any sleep, Dad?"
Nat shook his head no. "Sadie called me about midnight. I went over there."
"How's she holding up?"
His father lifted his shoulders and let them drop. A complete answer. Treya was holding the baby and came up beside them. "How are you holding up, Nat? You want some tea?"
He looked up at her, managed a small smile. "Tea would be good," he said.
Treya moved around her husband and sat down next to Nat. Rachel reached out a tiny hand to touch his face, said "Gapa," and got a small smile out of him. Treya put an arm across his shoulders and rested her head against him for a beat, then kissed the side of his head and stood up again. "We'll be right back."
The men watched them leave. Nat turned to Abe. "Why would somebody do this? To Sam of all people. Sam who wouldn't hurt a fly."
Glitsky had heard the refrain hundreds of times when he'd been in homicide, and the answer was always the same. There was no answer, no why. So Abe didn't try to supply one. Instead, as though knowledge could undo any of it, he asked, "Do you know how it happened?"
"I don't know what you want me to do. I'm not in homicide anymore."
"What, nobody remembers you over there?" The two men were at the kitchen table. Rita had arrived and could be heard reading a children's book in Spanish to Rachel in the living room. Treya was getting dressed for work. Abe had no intention of snapping at his father, but it took some effort. Even after four months on the new job, the topic of his employment with the police department still tended to rile him up. He forced an even tone. "People remember me fine, Dad, but I don't work there. It'll look like I'm meddling."
"So meddle."
"In what way exactly?"
"Just let people know this one is important. People care who shot Sam."
Abe turned his mug. "They're all important, Dad. Most people who get shot have somebody who cares about it."
With his index finger, Nat tapped the table smartly three times. "Don't give me with everybody cares, Abraham. I've heard your stories. Most are what do you call, no humans involved. I know how it is down there. I'm saying go make a difference. What could it hurt?"
"What could it hurt."
"That's what I said."
"I heard you." Abe sighed. "You want me to what exactly?"
"Just keep up on it. Keep them on it." Nat put a hand on his son's arm. "Abraham, listen to me. If they see it's family…"
Abe knew that wouldn't help, not in any meaningful way. The inspectors on the case-and he didn't know who they were yet-were either good at their jobs or they weren't, and that more than anything else would determine whether they succeeded in identifying and arresting Sam Silverman's killer. "Then what?" he asked. "They look harder?" He shook his head. "They'll look as hard as they look, Dad. They'll either find him or not. That's what will happen, period. Me butting in won't make any difference. It might, in fact, actually hurt."
Nat's eyes flared suddenly, with impatience and anger. "So what, then? You can't even try? You let the animals who shot Sam walk away?"
Abe couldn't completely check his own rush of frustration. He bit off the words sharply. "It's not up to me. It's not my job anymore."
"I'm not talking job. I don't care from job! I'm talking what's right." He drew a deep breath, again rested his hand on Abe's arm. "Just so they know. That's all. This one matters."
Abe glanced down at his father's hand. Since he'd started with payroll, he hadn't even shown his face once in homicide, even for a social visit. He realized now that his reluctance with his dad was probably more about his own demons than whether he could actually have any effect in turning the heat up on any given investigation. It might not hurt after all. He put his own hand down over his dad's. "All right," he said. "But no promises."
"No, of course not. Heaven forfend."
The Payroll Detail had four entire rooms, each twelve feet square. Glitsky was the sole occupant of his. He had a standard, city-issue green desk, four wooden chairs, a computer and his own printer (which also served the rest of the detail), and natural light through the windows that made up the back wall. These overlooked the ever-scenic Bryant Street and the rest of the industrial neighborhood to the south. All the free space around the other three walls was taken up with mismatched black, gray, or green filing cabinets, except for one metal floor-to-ceiling bookshelf filled to overflowing with bound computer payroll reports going back four years.
An hour after he got to work, he was talking to Jerry Stiles in his office. Stiles was the lieutenant in charge of narcotics. Before that, he had been in many people's opinion the absolute best narc in the city. Certainly his arrest record backed that up, his seizures of illegal substances. Three years ago, before his promotion, he'd been named "Police Officer of the Year." Stiles was thirty-eight years old.
In spite of his administrative role, he often found an excuse to get back on the street, and today he wore a ratty beard and looked as though he hadn't combed his greasy brown locks since the World Series. In fact, currently he could have been mistaken pretty much exactly for a typical street drunk, but that came with the territory.
Making Glitsky's small, airless office a less than optimal spot to talk to him.
That office was one floor up from homicide, on the fifth floor of the Hall of Justice. Glitsky's normal staff in his new role in payroll included five civil service secretaries, two half-time sergeants of police, and one rotating patrolman-grade gopher. This morning, he'd been planning to check in at his desk, then zip on down to homicide while the motivation held, but instead he found a note from Frank Batiste on his chair telling him to expect Stiles within the hour. Glitsky and Batiste had already discussed Stiles's situation with some heat.
Luckily for Glitsky's peace of mind, since he had no other duties at the present moment, within the hour turned out to be about ten minutes.
He and Stiles made small talk, catching up for a while. They'd worked together on cases before and gotten along. Beyond that, they'd both caught lead in the line of duty, and that put them in the same club. Stiles made a few profane remarks that made it clear he thought Glitsky's latest career move was unjust. Abe didn't comment, though the sentiment did his heart good.
Finally, though, the air got a little ripe and Glitsky decided to get to the point. He went around his desk, tried the windows-both hermetically sealed, no chance-and sat down. "So," he began, "sorry to pull you in after your shift."
"Hey." A shrug. "It's overtime. I'm here anyway. I'm not complaining. What's it about?"
"Well, funny you should mention."
"OT? Is somebody bitchin' about OT again?" Stiles straightened up in his chair, his eyes getting some life in them. "They can kiss my ass."
"Yeah, well…" He let it hang. Of everything Glitsky hated about this new job, this kind of bureaucratic nonsense was first. "I'm just delivering the message, Jerry, and only because I've been requested to. Informally. I'm not keeping any record of this meeting."
"Fuck that. As if I care. Who requested, if you don't mind my asking? Just curious."
"It doesn't matter."
"Right. What do you think's got into Frank lately?"
"I don't know. He must be getting mature." But Glitsky didn't want to discuss Batiste. He pulled a printout from a file in front of him, glanced at it, then turned it around and slid it across the desk.
Stiles, all belligerence now, came forward and snatched it. He raised his voice in the small room. "So what's the message? Tell my guys to go out and risk their lives every night, live with these scum, smell like a sewer, and do it all for free?"
Glitsky had his elbows on the desk. He templed his fingers at his mouth for a moment, then pointed at the paper. "Your unit's OT is about twenty percent over department guidelines." He raised his eyes, met those of his colleague. "I've been asked to bring the matter to your attention." Glitsky tried to avoid profanity, but this was so much bullshit and nothing else that the temptation was almost too great. Instead, he said, "Now I've done that."
"All right. So what?" Stiles stared at the paper for another couple of seconds. "Narcotics works nights, Abe. We catch bad guys and the DA takes them to court during the day. Quite often on a day after a night shift. You know why? We get subpoenaed to show up, that's why. We're the fucking key witnesses. Without us there's no case. Get it? So what do they want us to do?" But Stiles didn't want an answer. He wanted to vent. "The reason we work nights is because that's when these lowlifes crawl out from under their rocks. It's when they buy their shit and make their deals and have their fights. It's when it works]" Stiles turned on his chair, stood up, sat back down, glared across the desk.
Glitsky did his Buddha imitation.
Stiles started again, even louder. "They don't want to pay the guys extra, maybe they can have night court. 'Course then nobody's out on the street doing the job. Or maybe we could just ask these scumbags if maybe they could do all their business between eight and five? Business hours." He half turned again on his chair, ran a hand over his forehead, finally settled a little, shook his head back and forth. "I don't believe this shit."
Glitsky came forward an inch. "You might want to take it up with the chief, Jerry. Either that, or tell your guys they can only work days."
"We'd never bag a soul."
"But your detail would be under budget, and that's the important thing, right? Who cares about crime?" Glitsky gave no sign he was joking.
Stiles sat still a moment. "Abe, we're the police department. What are these clowns thinking?"
When Stiles left, Glitsky didn't give himself any more time to think about it. He stood up, came around his desk, and looked in at the room next door. There, two of his secretaries-Mercedes and Jacqueline-were engrossed at their respective desks in front of their computers. Jacqueline didn't look up when he cleared his throat at the door- she must have been at a really juicy part of her romance novel-but Mercedes, in the middle of her daily crossword puzzle, brightened at the sight of Glitsky's face. "Lieutenant. Nine letters, 'Jackson A.K.A.' Ends in 'L.' "
It took him less than ten seconds. "Stonewall."
"That's it! Stonewall. I was thinking something about Michael, if there was another way to spell it, but normally that's only seven letters. But Stonewall. Andrew, right? You're great, Lieutenant." She looked over to Jacqueline. "Stonewall," she said.
The other woman nodded. "Umm."
Glitsky pointed down the hallway. "I've got an errand. You women okay holding the fort?"
But Mercedes was leaning over her newspaper, carefully filling in her boxes, and didn't respond, or notice as he left.
Down a flight on the internal stairs and in a few more steps he was back where he'd lived for all those years. It brought him up short how physically close the homicide detail was to his current office, where nothing important had or ever would happen. It was probably no more than sixty feet, although the spiritual distance was incalculable.
Standing in the middle of the familiar room, he was surprised by how little it had changed in the near year-and-a-half since he'd been here. As usual on a weekday morning, the place was deserted-some inspectors were out working cases, others might be in court or, increasingly, had not come in at all because of vacation, alleged sickness, special training, or any of a dozen other reasons. Somebody had moved the full-size working stoplight off of Bracco's desk and it now hung from the ceiling. A floor-to-ceiling picture of the World Trade Center at the moment of the second impact was attached to the pillar behind Marcel Lanier's desk, and the old bulletin board on it-formerly reserved only for the grossest, most explicit crime scene photographs-had been done over with an Osama bin Laden motif, mostly email printouts of the terrorist being sexually abused by a variety of weapons and animals.
Otherwise, the decor was the same. So was the smell, but at least Glitsky knew what that was. As usual, the last one out had left the coffee cooking and it had turned to carbon at the bottom of the pot. He automatically walked over, leaned down to make sure, and turned it off.
"Can I help you?"
He straightened up and turned at the voice. The lieutenant had silently come out of his office. Or maybe Glitsky's senses were taken up with his impressions. In any event, for a heartbeat he felt somewhat bushwhacked, although there was no indication that that had been the man's intention.
It was Barry Gerson. Glitsky recognized the face immediately from the newspaper pics, which he'd had occasion to notice when they'd announced the appointment. Ten years Glitsky's junior, but no kid himself, Gerson had gone a bit to paunch and jowl, though he didn't come across as soft or flabby in any way.
Here on his turf, he appeared relaxed and in complete control. The smile was perfunctory, but there wasn't any threat in it. "You're Abe Glitsky."
"Guilty."
"I didn't realize you were back at work."
"Four months now." Glitsky kept it low-key. He pointed at the ceiling, put some humor in his tone. "Payroll, the throbbing pulse of the department."
Gerson, to his credit in Glitsky's view, clucked sympathetically. "They give you that 'varied administrative experience' crap?"
A nod. "It's making me a better cop. I can feel it every day."
"Me, too," he said, then, more seriously. "Sorry I turned out to be the guy."
Glitsky shrugged. "Somebody had to be. Not your fault." He added. "I'm not hearing any complaints, though I can't say I've been in touch."
Gerson cocked his head, as though the comment surprised him. His next smile might have been a bit more genuine. "Not even Lanier?"
This question wasn't a great surprise. Marcel Lanier was a long-time homicide veteran inspector who'd passed the lieutenant's exam well over two years before. It was no secret that he'd craved the appointment to head the detail after Glitsky. He'd even turned down a couple other of the varied administrative experiences he'd been offered, waiting for the homicide plum, only to be disappointed at Gerson's appointment. Like Glitsky, Lanier was homicide through and through. His refusal to take what they offered before he'd even made his bones as a lieutenant had, at least for the time being, doomed him with the brass. But Glitsky hadn't talked to him in six months or more.
"Not a word," he told Gerson. "He making trouble here?"
The lieutenant seemed to consider what he would say for a minute. Then he shook his head. "Naw, he's all right." And suddenly the preliminaries were over. "So how can I help you?"
Three hours after concluding his meeting with Gerson, Glitsky was in another of the payroll rooms, this one internal and hence windowless, and more crowded since it held not only as much paper and other junk, but also two desks to accommodate its two workers. In practice, because the two office residents rarely worked the same days, one desk probably would have sufficed, but nobody ever brought this up, or suggested that the second desk be removed to make more room. That, of course, would mean that neither person working there would have his own desk, and wouldn't that be just an unbearable slight? In any event, pride of desk was typical of a number of similar crucial issues facing the detail.
At this moment, Glitsky was behind the closed door of this office with Deacon Fallon, who it appeared was having continuing problems with Jacqueline, the romance novel fanatic from the office across the hallway. As a sergeant with the police department, Fallon made more money per hour than Jacqueline did. In spite of his part-time status, he had conceived the notion that he somehow outranked her, a mere clerk originally hired from the civil service pool, though by now she'd been working full-time for five years, three more than Fallon.
Fallon was in his early forties. His wife had some honcho job in what he called the private sector. Between the two of them and the police union, they'd brokered a deal with the city whereby Deacon could stay home a lot with the kids. He'd been in the department for twenty years and could have already retired on pension, but the department had a few of these part-time positions, and Deacon could increase his retirement base one year for every two he worked, which he considered a good deal.
Glitsky, propped on the corner of one of the desks, sat back with his arms crossed. His concentration had been wavering in the tedium and now he realized that Fallon- pacing in front of him while he'd been talking-expected some sort of response. "I'm sorry, what?"
Fallon sighed. "Jacqueline. She says she's always taken her lunch between noon and one, though we know that isn't true, and she doesn't have to change now if she doesn't want to. But Cathy and I…"
"Cathy?"
"My wife."
"Okay, right."
"Cathy and I signed up for this incredible six-week course on Website design. I know, I know, but it's the new wave of this net stuff, believe me. It's going to explode. It really is a great business, Abe; you might even want to look into it yourself. The opportunities are just…" Perhaps sensing Glitsky's lack of enthusiasm for the project, he wound down. "Anyway, it's twice a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays, at noon."
"Which happens to be when you're supposed to be here."
"Right. I mean, I get the hour lunch, which is enough time. Each lesson is forty-five minutes." Glitsky knew that what Fallon meant was that by leaving twenty minutes early and getting back half an hour late, then eating lunch at his desk, he could squeeze the class into his "hour" lunch. Nobody would ever say a word about an abuse of free time like this. These were the little perks enjoyed by those ready to lay down their lives for their fellow citizens. "But it's got to be the noon hour, and Jacqueline won't trade."
He looked expectantly at Glitsky, who hadn't moved. His posture was relaxed, his arms still crossed over his chest. He might have appeared to be thinking hard.
"Abe?" No response. "I mean, I don't want to have to go to the union about this." He tried another tack. "Maybe we could both get off at the same time, me and Jacqueline. It's only for six weeks."
Finally, Glitsky took a deep breath. His eyes came into focus. "When I came on here, didn't I read in your file that you decided that you'd like to have lunch from one to two? And didn't Jacqueline agree back then to change to noon so the office would be covered?"
"Yeah." Her earlier scheduling flexibility didn't seem to have made much of an impact on Fallon. "But that was before this class, and I'm the sergeant here after all. Besides, she's not doing anything special, just meeting her regular friends. And hell, it's only six weeks…"
Glitsky later told Treya that the knock at the door probably saved him from at least a charge of aggravated mayhem if not homicide. It was Mercedes, telling him Frank Batiste was on the line and wanted to talk to him immediately. He thanked her, slid off the edge of the desk, and without so much as a glance at Fallon, hurried from the room.
The rain continued unabated, a fine slow drizzle that only seemed heavy to Glitsky because he hadn't supposed he'd be leaving the building and so was in his shirtsleeves. Batiste had been standing, waiting at the head of the hallway that led to his office. When Glitsky got off the elevator, he'd fallen in beside him and without much preamble led the way out the Hall's front entrance to the street.
"Where are we going?" Glitsky asked on the outer steps.
"I thought Lou's. Sound good?" Batiste broke into a jog and Abe had no choice but to follow across Bryant and down to the floor below the bailbondsman's place, where Lou the Greek's had operated continuously as the legal community's primary watering hole for nearly thirty years. The last of the lunch crowd was finishing up and they had no trouble finding a booth under one of the small, elevated windows that, because Lou's was below ground level, opened at about gutter height to the alley outside.
Lou was a hands-on and voluble proprietor who knew everybody who worked at the Hall of Justice by first name. He came by before they'd gotten settled and offered them a once-in-a-lifetime deal on the last couple of servings of one of his wife's inspired culinary inventions, Athenian Special Rice. "Minced pork, scrambled eggs, I think some soy sauce, cucumber and taramosalata. Everybody's raving about it."
"Taramosalata," Glitsky said. "That would be fish roe dip?"
Lou grinned. "I know. I told Chui the same thing, but that's why she's the genius. The taramosalata is like anchovies, just included for flavor. You don't even taste it."
"I bet I would," Glitsky said.
"It sounds terrific, Lou," Batiste said, "but I don't think we're eating. Thanks."
Lou wasn't five steps away, putting in their orders for tea and coffee, when Glitsky spoke. "So this isn't about Jerry Stiles and his department's overtime."
Batiste checked the surrounding area. No one was in earshot, and still he leaned in across the table between them. "I thought it'd be helpful if we had a talk, Abe. Just you and me, man to man, friends like I think we've always been."
Glitsky thought that the friendship they'd always shared would not have allowed one to peremptorily summon the other for a serious discussion of issues during work hours, but he only nodded. "No think about it, Frank."
"Good." Batiste folded his hands on the table between them. "I know you haven't been exactly thrilled with the new job. I sympathize. I spent a year before I got homicide in personnel records, so I know. It's been what now, a couple of months?"
"Four, but the time's just flying by."
A pained look. "That long?" Batiste sighed. "Well, I'm aware of you up there. The rest of the administration is, too. It's not going to last forever."
"I thought it already had." But the comers of Glitsky's mouth turned up, for him a broad smile. He was keeping it light and friendly.
"Well, I'm sure it does seem that way, but I've got my eye out for a chance to get you out of there. Lateral or up, either way. Getting back to homicide isn't even out of the question."
"That's good news, Frank. Thank you."
Lou returned at that moment with their drinks, and it broke their rhythm. When Lou walked away again, a silence fell. At the window by their ear, the rain picked up. Batiste put some sugar into his mug and stirred thoughtfully. Glitsky blew over the surface of his tea.
Finally, Batiste found the thread again. "I guess what I'm trying to say is that it would be well worth your while if you could just hang in there a little while longer. You've got great support across the board, Abe. You've been a hero and now you're putting up with this
… this waste of your talents for the good of the team. Don't think people don't recognize this. Don't think it doesn't matter."
"Well, that's gratifying," Glitsky said.
"I mean it. It should be."
"It is." Glitsky put his mug down, leveled his eyes across the table. "So why am I hearing a 'but'?"
Now Batiste broke a small and formal smile. "Could it be that finely honed and well-deserved reputation for cynicism?"
Glitsky allowed his own expression to match Batiste's. "It could be that, but I'm thinking maybe it's also that Gerson talked to you."
A slight pause, then a nod. "Maybe some of that."
Glitsky let out a heavy breath, turned his mug around on the table. He hated to explain, to be on the defensive, and his jaw went tight. Still, he kept his voice tightly controlled. "Silverman, the victim, was my father's closest friend, Frank. I asked Barry if he could just keep me informed. No press at all."
"That's what I heard, too." Batiste spread his hands, all innocence. "He didn't come to me with it as any kind of complaint. We were just having lunch and it came up."
Glitsky nodded, perhaps somewhat mollified. "All right. But what?"
"I'm talking as your friend. What I said when we got here. This is the kind of thing that's nothing in itself. Hey, one time. Your dad's friend. You want to be inside. Who wouldn't understand?"
"That's all it was. One time. Four months back and I finally stop by homicide once…"
Batiste reached out his hand over the table and touched Glitsky's. "You're listening to me, Abe, but you're not hearing. It wasn't a problem. Really. Not with Barry, not with me." He drew his hand back. "I'm talking about the future, just that you be a little careful, you don't want to have people-and not only Barry-misinterpreting. That's all. People are touchy. You know what I'm talking about."
"I told my dad the same thing this morning."
"There. See?"
"Okay. But then I figured what could it hurt to go to the horse's mouth? I was completely up-front with Barry. I'm not horning in on him or anybody else."
"Nobody's saying you were."
"Lanier, Thieu, Evans"-all homicide inspectors-"any of them would have found out anything I wanted, but I didn't want to go behind Barry's back." The explaining was wearing him out. "I thought if I could, I'd give my dad a little more peace of mind, that's all."
"I hear you, Abe. I do. I also know how badly you want homicide back. And I wouldn't be a friend if I didn't make it crystal clear that this wouldn't be the way to go about getting it."
"That never occurred to me."
"I didn't think it would. But I wanted the air clear between us. I'm trying to fast-track you and it wouldn't help if it looked like you were trying some end run."
Glitsky shook his head. "Not even a double inside reverse, Frank. But just for the record, I truly am ready for another assignment."
"I'm trying, Abe, I really am." He finished his coffee. "Think you can make it another couple of months?"
Glitsky put his own cup down. "If a couple doesn't mean a whole lot more than four," he said.