before I got a hand on the doorknob, as if a psychic doorbell had rung inside his head. He was older
and grayer and arthritis had slowed him down, but he was as starched and precise as ever.
“Good evening, sir,” he said with a smile, as if it were twenty years ago and I was dropping by for
dinner. Then he looked closer at both of us and added, “Gracious, ire you all right?”
“We‟re okay,” I said as we went into the broad entrance hall. I had feared coming hack to this house
with its ghosts, long gone. But now I had too many other things on my mind, and so there was only
curiosity. I figured the years would have distorted my memory of the place, but there were few
surprises. I doubt that a single picture, vase, or stick of furniture had been moved in two decades. It
was like a museum, preserving the past for future generations of Findleys, generations that would no
longer carry the name, which had died with Teddy. Warren led us through the sprawling entrance hail
with its twin curved staircase at the far end, and into a sitting room large enough to accommodate a
Legionnaires‟ convention.
Chief and Titan were waiting there. It was a room cloyed by nostalgia, all wicker and antiques, its
tabletops choked with framed pictures of every size and shape—laughing pictures of Doe and Teddy
as children, teenagers, college kids, and finally adults, if in fact they had ever grown up.
The old man looked up from his wheelchair with almost orgasmic relief when Doe came into the
room. He held out his arms and she rushed into them, as if she had just returned from a long trip.
Titan stood in front of the dominant fireplace, smoking a short, stubby cigar which he held between
two fingers like a cigarette. You could almost feel the relief in the room, like a warm breeze seeping
through the shuttered windows.
Chief was the first to speak. He looked at me over Doe‟s shoulder.
“Thank you,” he whispered. “You‟re a brave man.”
“Not really,” I said. “It was my stupidity that got us into trouble in the first place.”
Doe said, “We‟re back, Daddy. That‟s all that matters.”
“We‟ll make it up to you, son,” Chief said, hanging on to her as if he were afraid the tide was going to
rush in and carry her away.
“You don‟t owe me anything,” I said. “It was Stick who bailed us out.”
“Stick?” Chief said.
Both he and Titan tried to cover their surprise, but they were not very good actors.
“A cop. You probably know him better as Mickey Parver,” I said, when it had sunk in.
“What happened out there, doughboy?” Titan asked. “There hasn‟t been much in the way of radio
communication for the last two hours.”
“We were too busy to bother,” I said curtly.
I gave them a sketchy report on what had happened from the time we left the Breezes until the
shooting was over.
“Costello, Bronicata, Chevos, and Turk Nance are all dead, along with nine of their gunslingers,” I
said.
“My Cod,” Chief whispered, clutching Doe even tighter.
“The four of them were behind the Tagliani killings,” I went on. “My guess is that Nance did most of
the work, although we‟ll never know for sure.”
Titan looked up as if a bee had stung him, then said, “Well, I‟ll be damned.”
“It will all work out because Parver didn‟t make it,” I said. “He went down saving me and Doe.”
Titan stared at me. A long minute crept by before he said, “What do you mean, it will work out?”
“I mean for the record, it will work out.”
“1 thought you just said Costello was behind it all, doughboy,” Titan said cautiously.
“I think I can sell the idea. Who‟s around to argue, right?” Doe looked at me with curiosity.
“I don‟t understand,” she said.
“We don‟t need to talk about this right now,” Chief said.
“Talk about what? You couldn‟t get me out of the room now if you tried!” she protested.
“Let it pass,” Titan said, looking at his feet.
“No!” Doe said. She stood up. “That is this all about?” Chief said, “It‟s nothing, baby. just business.”
“What kind of business?” she persisted.
I said, “The business of murder.” I wanted her to know. I wanted all the dark corners swept clean,
once and for all.
„Tell her,” said Chief. He was too old and tired to argue.
“The thing is, we know better, don‟t we, Mr. Stoney?” I said. Titan turned his back to me and stared
into the empty fireplace. “Parver was an agent of the Freeze, the same outfit I‟m in, but
he was assigned to Dutch Morehead and his squad,” I said. “Stick claimed he didn‟t know anything
about the Cincinnati „Triad until my boss, Cisco Mazzola, tumbled on to it a month or so ago. It went
by me at the time. I‟ve never been much on filing reports. That was one of my mistakes.”
“You mean you‟re capable of making a mistake?” Titan asked caustically.
“Oh, I made a lot of them,” I said. “We all did.”
“For instance?” Titan asked.
“For instance, I had a five-man team in Cincinnati for three years working on the Tagliani case. There
were pictures, newspaper clippings, snitch reports, and a link analysis on the Triad in our confidential
files. Stick had spent six months studying our computer reports before he came here. He knew all
about Tagliani and his bunch. Stick made the Triad right after he got here. Had to be. The question is,
who did he take the information to?”
Nobody said anything. Doe still looked confused.
“No takers?” I said. “Okay, I‟ll try. I think he came to you, Mr. Stoney. You‟re the logical one, not
Dutch. You‟re the one with the iron hand. You represented the law on the Committee.”
He didn‟t say anything, he kept staring at the fireplace.
“So you asked Parver to kill Tagliani,” I finished.
Titan turned around and glared hard at me from across the room.
“Now why would he do a damn fool thing like that?” Doe said, getting defensive.
“Two reasons, I can think of. To protect Harry Raines‟ career, and to break the Triad‟s back.”
“Hah,” said Titan. “I‟m not a miracle worker.”
“You‟re just finding that out,” I said, and before he could respond, I went on, “I think you honestly
believed by getting rid of Tagliani, you could run the Triad off, the old „get out of town before sunset‟
routine, but it was a risky move. Then you found out I was coming down here and the whole story
would come out, so you cut Stick loose in desperation. You knew the press here would buy anything
they were told. You could write the killing off as some kook slaying, or better still, you could let
Graves be the fall guy. As long as it couldn‟t be proven, he didn‟t give a damn. He never even denied
killing Cherry McGee, even though it was Tagliani who had the job done. And Stick cased that setup
by hijacking Graves‟ cocaine shipment. That provided the final motive, if one was needed at all.”
Doe stared at me, her expression changing from bewilderment to disbelief.
“That‟s just plain crazy,” she said. “Isn‟t that so, Mr. Stoney?”
Titan sneered at the idea.
“I‟ll admit, it was a rather naive notion on your part,” I said. “It‟s understandable, though. You
thought you were still playing by your rules; if you need to get rid of someone, do it the quickest way
possible, like framing Tony Lukatis because he was a potential threat to Raines. Or suggesting Stick
use him on the hijacking run and then get rid of him. Graves‟ people and Tony were both shot with
the same gun—Stick‟s. Aw, hell, I guess when you‟ve run a town for forty years, playing God comes