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who pushed poison heroin on his daughter after she died from shooting up pure uncut?”
    â€œI think so …”
    Amy said, “You couldn’t hardly forget it. Diego Vasquez seems to make damn sure he’s on the front page every time he wipes somebody out.”
    Roger went to the refrigerator. “I got time for another one, don’t I? No, he got all the way to the top that time. Not just the street pusher but the one the cops don’t never reach—the one that was financing it. Some real estate honcho up there.”
    Amy made a baby-faced smile. “Just like in the movies. Self-defense. Vasquez left that old boy in Denver dead on the living-room carpet with three forty-five Colt bullets inside of him.”
    â€œThey dug a couple of thirty-eight slugs out of the ceiling plaster,” Roger said. “And there was this thirty-eight automatic in the dead fella’s hand. Fired twice. Everybody knows Vasquez just planted it that way after he killed that old boy. See, they never could have convicted the fella in court. That’s the way Vasquez earns those five-figure fees.”
    Mathieson said, “Whatever happened to the days when there was a difference between the good guys and the bad guys? That’s what tastes sour to me—how could a religious man like Sam Stedman hire a cold-blooded killer?”
    â€œDidn’t you ever see none of them Westerns where the sanctimonious town dads hire the gunslinger to clean up the town for them? Same fuckin’ thing, ain’t it?”
    â€œOh, hell, Roger.”
    â€œYou’re an old-fashioned moralist, Fred.”
    Jan emerged from the dining room. “It’s on the table. Move it or lose it.”
    3
    The Gilfillans left at midnight and there was the customary flurry of clearing up because Jan couldn’t stand to face messes in the morning and the cleaning lady wasn’t due again until Monday. Mathieson cleared the table while Jan loaded the dishwasher and then it was half past twelve and they slouched into the Pit for their nightcaps.
    â€œCointreau?”
    â€œYes, fine.”
    He poured himself a Remy Martin and carried the drinks to the couch. “I’m already a little squiffed. Ought to go on the wagon.” He stood sipping the cognac. “You know I really should sign up with a health club. The old pot’s growing. I need to get rid of fifteen pounds of this flab and get some decent exercise.”
    â€œYou don’t look so bad for an old-timer.” She gave him a distracted glance.
    â€œWell you get past forty, you need to start looking after yourself. I see myself five years from now gone to pot and gone to seed. I get nightmares about turning into a slob like Phil Adler.”
    â€œYou won’t. You’ll always be long and lean. You’re like Roger—lanky bones.”
    He slapped his paunch dubiously. Then he said, “He wants to buy me out.”
    â€œ Roger does?”
    â€œPhil Adler.”
    She carried her drink around the room, shifting little things, testing for dust with a fingertip. Mathieson sat down.
    â€œHe sprang it on me this afternoon. He wants to dissolve the partnership.”
    â€œWhatever for?”
    â€œI think he’s restless. He’s been bitten by the big-shot bug. A lot of agents have become producers. Phil always hates to be left out.”
    She sat down across the room, the drink in both hands. “Are you going to sell out to him?”
    â€œHe only sprang it on me tonight. That’s why I was late. I haven’t had time to think about it.”
    â€œWhat was your first reaction?”
    â€œYou can’t always go by that.”
    â€œSometimes you can.”
    â€œWe did that once. You remember what happened.”
    Her fingers crept under the neckline of her dress to pluck at something awry. “In the long run it worked out. You enjoy what you’re doing now—more than you did when you were