"So you haven't done much?"

"No. My stuff won't get here until tomorrow afternoon. I don't know where we'll find a place to do our thing; this joint is like a zoo with honking horns and either back-fires or gunshots!"

"Bet you're glad you flew out there. How is Howie?"

"In dream land, or Oz, or somewhere over the rainbow, except his mom just drifted into a coma and her husband acts like a dick and wishes Howie would take the next coach out of Dodge."

"And Julie?"

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"As soon as she got here, she and Howie had to go private and talk things over and test the bed springs. Then she got a phone call from some Boston cop saying some apparently blind burglar thought her apartment was a rich gal's pad and trashed it. They didn't even take anything, from what she heard. Still, you'd have thought she'd lost the Hope diamond the way she carried on. She's convinced it's someone looking for Howie. We tried to tell her that's just nonsense. No one's looking for her, but she won't buy it."

My heart was beating like a Gene Krupa solo. "I'll talk to you tomorrow," I said, having trouble getting the words out.

I stayed downstairs for another hour until Betsy came looking for me. She sat down and took my hand.

"I was asleep and dreaming. It was New York and raining pussies and puppies and I was on a street corner with cabs going by one after the other. I didn't know if I'd catch a cab or a bus would hit me. I woke up and you weren't there and it scared me."

"I think the bus is on its way," I said. I reluctantly told her of Quinn's phone call, the Boston break-in and my fears, shared, apparently by Julie. Howie and Quinn dismissed a break-in at Julie's apartment as a random act of mischief as they were unaware she had perhaps spilled the beans by entering the contest. I wasn't a strong believer in coincidences.

"Do you think it was him?" Betsy asked, wide eyed.

"Howie is the soothsayer, not me," I said and repeated my thoughts.

"Can he really be that close, Ben?" She sat in my lap and hugged me tightly.

"Howie and Quinn, and Martha too; they don't know what Julie did so they can't see the possibility of a connection to Julie. I'm just wondering if we should tell them, for their own protection."

"That would devastate Howie."

I looked at my wife intently. "You were singing a different song a few hours ago? Weren't you calling Julie a bitch and me a damn fool for bailing her out?"




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