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afternoon. Something about a performance DeGrew had played for below union scale, according to the witness. Crane’s band is on the captured boat, I believe.”
    He coughed delicately. Burlingame moved the ashtray containing his fuming pipe to the other side of the desk.
    â€œThe bullet to the head wasn’t unique,” Klegg continued. “The burned body was. Organization contract killers like to have their victims identified as an object lesson. Independents without protection prefer to cover their tracks. There aren’t many independent professionals in this area, and there is only one who fits the description our witness provided.”
    â€œWho is …?” the FBI man prompted.
    The lawyer sat back, displaying his dentures.
    Burlingame knocked out his pipe. “I’m not saying I buy any of this. In any case, reciprocation on my part would depend on results. Are you offering me the killer’s name?”
    â€œI think we agree that that alone wouldn’t free my client. I’m just confirming his ability to aid in this matter. We—that is, my client—would of course provide the personnel.”
    â€œYou want me to grant official status to a criminal body?”
    â€œNo deputizing or anything like that. We’re offering competent civilian service in return for what we request.”
    â€œNo wildcatting? Your people would work closely with ours?”
    Klegg fingered the knot in his silk tie. “‘Wildcatting,’ as you term it, is what gives us our special advantage. I’m hardly suggesting something without precedent, Mr. Burlingame; consider the late Messrs. Luciano and Giancana.” He rose, lifting his briefcase. “I’ll be outside admiring your attractive secretary while you gentlemen discuss the propositior. Without meaning to rush things, I’ll just point out that you have but sixty-three and one-half hours left.” He went out.
    After three minutes they called him back in.
    The Visitors’ Room at the Milan Federal Correctional Facility was bland but not unpleasant, with beige walls, freshly waxed linoleum, and a printed list of rules posted within view of the bare table in the center with a chair on either side. A guard opened the door for a middle-aged man whose startlingly black hair and denims made him look years older than he was, then closed it behind him, the guard remaining outside but watching through the gridded glass in the door. Howard Klegg was seated at the table, looking as he had earlier that morning in Randall Burlingame’s office.
    â€œIt’s on, Michael,” he said.
    Michael Boniface nodded, lowering his bulk into the other chair. “Get me Macklin.”

CHAPTER 5
    Peter Macklin hated small towns.
    They weren’t as bad as they once were. Strange faces no longer drew much attention now that people were moving every few years. But the old posse-consciousness still lingered in these tight communities, and you could never predict what a bystander was going to do when you made your move. That crowd-fear factor he relied upon in the cities was an empty equation once the population dipped below twenty thousand.
    It didn’t help that he had had to do most of the groundwork on this one, letting his face and figure become familiar to the residents of this farming village forty miles west of Detroit while he nailed down his subject’s routine. The advance man they had sent had made perhaps two trips, staying a couple of hours each time, and evidently decided that because the subject did roughly the same things at roughly the same time both days, the rest of his week was identical. Three pages into the briefing packet, Macklin had broken out his walking boots.
    Which was nothing new. He had two telephone lines running into his Southfield home, one of which was unlisted, and every time that one rang—never more than once a month, and it was often silent for six—he knew he was in for