"Anything you get back you can keep. As a bonus. On top of your fee." She patted her purse. "Which I have right here."

Jack considered. Finding Gerhard seemed doable. Brace the guy and get him either to finish what he'd started or return the retainer. Or tell Jack what he knew about Bethlehem so Jack could pass it on to Christy.

Piece of cake.

Yeah,sure.

But Jack had to admit Christy had piqued his curiosity about this Jerry Bethlehem. What games had he designed? Shouldn't be too hard to track that down. A Google or two would probably do it.

Christy Pickering was staring at him, a pleading look in her big blue eyes.

"Can you help me? Please?"

Oh, why not? He needed something to do. A small project like this was perfect. Take a couple of days, tops.

"Okay, I'll give it a shot."

"Thank God! Thank you!"

"Don't thank me yet. I'll take the Gerhard angle and that's all. Here's how we'll work it…"

7

Back in the saddle, Jack thought as he strolled up Central Park West. For only a short ride, true, but it felt good.

When he reached the museum he stood aside to let a horde of school kids crowd through an exit door in a brownstone arch and swarm toward their idling yellow buses. Once they were past he headed for the museum offices. The receptionist remembered him and passed him through.

On the way up the stairs he checked his watch. A little after four. The prof had had almost three hours with the Compendium. Jack knew he was going to face pleas for more time but he'd done his good deed for the day-week-year-whatever. Time to collect his book and go home.

Again came the thought about letting the old guy keep it longer, and again he pushed it aside. He'd needed the Compendium once. Never knew when he might need it again.

He knocked on Dr. Buhmann's door, then opened it—and froze on the threshold.

The prof sat slumped forward in his chair, his arms hanging limp at his sides, his right cheek against his desktop.

Jack leaped to his side.

"Doc!" He shook his shoulder. "Doc, you okay?"

But he wasn't okay. The chair rolled back and the old man would have tumbled to the floor if Jack hadn't caught him.

"Christ!"

Emaciated though he was, he was still dead weight. As Jack eased him to the floor he noticed he was still warm. And when he stretched him out on his back he saw him take a breath.

Still alive.

But what had happened?

He did a quick search for a wound or a bump on the head but found nothing. Then he noticed how the right side of the prof's face sagged, compared to the left.

Stroke?

He jumped up and dashed into the hallway.

"Hey! Anybody here? We've got a problem!"

An elderly woman stuck her head through a doorway. "What's the matter?"

"Doctor Buhmann. Something's wrong with him."

"What?" She hurried toward him. "Where?"

Jack stepped aside to let her see. "I think he's had a stroke."

"Oh, dear!" The woman jammed her hand against her mouth. "I'll call nine-one-one:

f"

As she hurried back into the hall, Jack dropped to a knee beside the prof.

Yeah. Still breathing.

Eye level with the desktop now, he glanced across it. He saw a couple of sheets of paper, but no book.

"Oh, hell!"

He jumped to his feet and searched the desk and the area around it. No Compendium, but he did find a couple of Xeroxed sheets. One was filled with the squiggles they'd seen earlier, the other showed a strange design surrounded by its own squiggles.

What was it? Some sort of spider? But it had only six legs.

As he stared at the figure, a strange feeling stole over him. He was sure he hadn't seen this thing before, but it seemed familiar. It triggered an odd twinge inside, as if something he hadn't been aware of, something sleeping within him had stirred.

Then he realized what these sheets meant.

"Oh, hell!"

The prof had promised no copies, but obviously he hadn't kept his word. Bad enough. But what had he done with the damn book?

Or had somebody stolen it?

He checked the prof again and found no sign of injury. But no sign of the book either.

Jack folded and pocketed the sheets, then waited for the EMTs to show.

What had happened here?

8

He hung around until the prof had been wheeled away. When everyone else followed the stretcher down the hall, Jack stayed behind and searched the office, opening every drawer and checking all the shelves. A book that size would be hard to hide and, with its metallic cover, even harder to miss. But he came up empty. No Compendium ofSrem.

Out in the hall he drew one of the secretaries aside. She was young with black-dyed hair, dark mascara, and pale makeup.

"I brought in a book for Doctor Buhmann earlier. He was going to look it over and then, um, give me his opinion on it."

"I'm afraid I can't let you take anything from his office."

Jack had seen that coming, but it was a moot point at the moment.

"I can understand that, but the problem is, I don't see the book anywhere."

"What did it look like?"

"Not like any other book you've ever seen. You'd remember if you saw it."

She shook her head. "I did see him bring a book to the copier, but I didn't get a look at it. And I know he didn't leave it there because I used the copier right after him. I saw him go straight back to his office. So it has to be there."

"It's not. Trust me."

She frowned. "Are you saying it was stolen?"

"I left him reading it at his desk. I come back and find him out cold and the book gone. What would you think?"

She made no reply, but something in her eyes…

He said, "Have you had other things go missing lately?"

"Maybe you'd better talk to Security."

Just about the last thing Jack wanted to do, but he didn't see that he had much choice.

9

Dark had fallen by the time Jack made it back to Gia's. No sign of the watcher—not that he'd expected any. But inside he found Gia sitting in the library with a familiar-looking woman—slight with fine pale features and glossy black hair.

Alicia Clayton, M.D., medical director of the St. Vincent's Center for Children with AIDS. The sight of her banished thoughts of men in homburgs and stroked-out professors.

Smiling, she rose and hugged him.

"Long time, Jack."

True. Well over a year since she'd hired him to retrieve some Christmas toys stolen from the center, then again for a more personal problem echoing from the horrors of her childhood.

"How're things at the center?"

She shrugged. "You know how it is: Never good, but not as bad as it could be."

Jack nodded. When dealing day after day with kids with AIDS… maybe that was the best you could hope for.

"What brings you uptown?"

"Me." Gia rose from her chair and stepped toward them. She looked tired. "She wants me to go back to volunteering at the center."

Gia used to be a regular down there, holding and rocking and feeding the AIDS infants. She'd stopped with the pregnancy. But now…

"How do you feel about that?"

Gia shrugged. "I don't know if I'm ready."

"Well, only you can decide that," Alicia said. "But your visits brightened many a little life."

Gia bit her lip. "Yes, well…"

Alicia slipped her arms around her. "When you're ready for us, we're ready for you."

Gia returned the hug without speaking. Alicia broke it off.

BLOODLINE 41

"Gotta go. I'm dragging Will to a fund-raiser ior the center."

"Will the cop?" Jack said. She was still going out with Detective Will Matthews?

Alicia laughed. "Don't worry. I've never mentioned you."

Gia was lifting the tea tray from the table.