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strange that in neither circle could he admit he was in the other.
    The divisions were not as clear anymore. There were no lines of men in blue—there were only men then—and angry crowds in paisley. And it was a good thing. None of them, neither side, could have stood it much longer. Still he realized that he missed the feeling that came with it—a feeling that he was somehow special. “Special?” he asked aloud. He looked around to make sure there was no one to answer, then snorted and leaned back in the green swivel chair and stared up at the seasick green ceiling.
    When
Katherine
returned, her wet hair was shiny and flat against her scalp, and her face had regained some of its color. She was pretty out of uniform, he thought. She was pretty enough in it.
    “I’ll wash this and bring it back to you,” she said, meaning the towel under her arm.
    “That’s not necessary.”
    “I want to. I think you saved my life. I can’t believe how much better I feel.”
    “You look like a million.”
    “I look like a drowned rat.”
    “Hardly. What do you say we get out of here?”
    They walked through the garage to Cherry Street and then up the steep hill toward the freeway that separated the downtown from the neighboring hill above it. There was free parking beyond the freeway underpass, and the cops working headquarters laid claim to it with one shift slipping in when the previous one left. Their steps became slow and exaggerated as they climbed the hill, and each began to reach deeper for breath. The sunshine was in their faces.
    It was September weather, and he especially liked Septembers. There was something left of summer, but the air was sharper in the mornings and gave notice to prepare for winter. He had nothing to prepare. Still the warm afternoons of September seemed like a time of grace.
    He lived a few miles northwest of downtown. The street to his house dropped precipitously from the arterial road and passed new big homes carved into the hillside. Each of the new houses stretched for a glimpse of Elliott Bay that began at the end of the road. His house was on the beach, one of a dozen or so built as summer houses in a protected cove back in a time when the three-mile trip to Magnolia Bluff was an excursion out of the city.
    “What a great place!” she said when she turned into his driveway off the remaining single lane.
    “I bought it ten years ago. It was a bad time for real estate. Good for me, though. I couldn’t touch it now.”
    “I believe it,” she said.
    “The real estate guy said I should tear the house down and build something suitable for the location. He didn’t know it took every penny I had just to make the down payment.”
    “Why would you want to tear it down?”
    “You should have seen it. There isn’t much left of the original house, but the view hasn’t changed.”
    “It’s fantastic,” she said.
    “Come on, I’ll show you around.”
    He opened the front door and escorted her through the house to the deck in back. They stood at the railing and looked out to the water, which was now smooth in the quiet lazy weather.
    “So this is where you bring that kayak,” she said.
    “In good weather. When it’s too rough, I go down a little ways where there’s more beach. Those rocks can make a rough landing.”
    He pointed to the rocky beach below that reached out to a sliver of sand.
    “The water is so calm.”
    “There’s no wind. Believe me, it can change. When the tide comes in, there’s hardly any beach here. You can’t get here from anywhere else.” He pointed to a solid rock bluff that rose out of the water to the west. “That rock is our Gibraltar .”
    “You can see the buildings downtown, but it seems so far away.”
    “That’s why I like it. Sit down,” he said, pointing to the deck chairs. “What can I bring you?”
    “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Whatever you have.”
    “Whiskey or vodka?”
    “Whiskey would be fine.”
    “I have beer,