We sat on a leather sofa in front of a big window in the lobby area on the top floor of the Time Warner Center and looked out at Columbus Circle and the park beyond.

"Okay," Lionel said. "You got me. Yes, I patronized April Kyle regularly, when she was a working girl. Tell me you don't do that."

"I don't do that," I said.

"You married?"

"Sort of," I said.

He frowned at the sort of but didn't comment.

"Well," Lionel said, "I started out just because she was, you know, good."

I nodded.

"But"-he shook his head in an open, man-to-man way-"it's like some Broadway musical, you know? I fell for her."

I nodded.

"I'm still crazy about her," he said.

"How's she feel?" I said.

"Same way," he said. "We're crazy about each other."

"Which is why you hired Ollie DeMars," I said, "to put her out of business."

Farnsworth shook his head slowly.

"No, no," he said. "You don't get it. We're in business together. That place is just the first in a chain of what I like to call boutique whorehouses we were planning to start."

"Oh," I said. "That's why you hired Ollie DeMars to put her out of business."

Lionel shook his head again and looked at me as if I were a small boy.

"You'd never make it in the fast-shuffle business," he said. "You think too straight ahead."

"If at all," I said.

"We were scamming the madam, Utley. We pulled this scheme together to give her a reason to let go of the business and not require her money back. You unnerstand? Then we'd take it over, and that's all she wrote."

"So this is all just a con so that you and April can steal the business from Mrs. Utley."

"Steal's a little harsh. We'll develop it," he said, "beyond what she could imagine."

"And the mansion in Boston is your pilot program," I said.

"You bet," he said. "You like the mansion concept. My idea. We're going to call it Dreamgirl. The Dreamgirl mansions? You dig? And we'll have a tagline. Love like a playboy. You like it? Love like a playboy at the Dreamgirl mansion in… and you fill in the city. Huh? When it's up and really rolling, we can franchise the concept and sit back and collect the franchise fees."

"What if they don't pay the fee?" I said. "Not everybody who wants to franchise a whorehouse is a fully responsible citizen."

"We'd provide for that. I was going to use Ollie, but I guess I'll have to find someone else. That's not hard. There are always Ollies."

"So this being the case, and you and April being closer than clams in a cozy chowder," I said, "how come she hired me to make it all go away."

"Smoke screen," Farnsworth said.

"Not such a good one," I said.

"I know, we tried to get too cute. April said she could control you, and…" He shrugged. "I figured you were just another retired cop fleshing out his pension."

"And how do we feel about the hooker that got beat up on her way home from the movies one night."

"I heard about that. April was furious. Like I told her, my instructions to Ollie was that nobody get hurt. Ollie went too far, and I spoke to him about it and warned him against doing that again."

"Probably terrified him," I said.

Farnsworth shrugged.

"I was his employer," he said. "He followed my instructions or we got somebody else to do the work."

"A hard man is good to find," I said.

"Hey," Farnsworth said. "That's pretty clever. You make that up?"

"No."

He thought about it for a minute, and then laughed and patted his hand on the leather couch seat a couple of times.

"I'll bet some hot broad made it up," he said.

"Sure," I said. "That's probably what happened."

"A hard man is good to find," Farnsworth said. "That's great."

"Do you have a financial position in this enterprise?" I said.

"Sure, me and April are partners, everything's fifty-fifty."

"So how much you invested so far?" I said.

"Haven't needed to so far. We're sort of dining on Utley for the time. But I got some investors lined up, and when we start expanding, I'll be bringing in a lot of money. Want to jump in?" he said. "Chance to get in on the ground floor."

I shook my head.

"We're gonna be rich," he said. "Don't say I didn't give you your shot."

"Okay," I said.

"Maybe it should be Live like a playboy," Farnsworth said. "Or Live and love like a playboy."

"Or," I said, "how about, I'll spend my life in litigation over trademark, infringement."

"What copyright?" he said.

I shrugged.

"Just kidding around," I said.

We were quiet then, looking out the window past Columbus Circle, where there was still construction going on. And down 59th Street, where for several blocks it was called Central Park South. I didn't believe everything he was saying. But I wouldn't have believed everything he said if he told me the time. There was enough there that might be true for me to take back to April. I stood.

"Have a swell day," I said and turned and left him.

For the moment, at least, I'd had enough of the egregious bastard.

The first thing April did was cry. We were sitting in her front parlor when I told her what Lionel Farnsworth had told me. I was halfway through when she began to cry. It was controlled at first, as if it were a ploy. But then it got away from her, and by the time I was through with Lionel's story, she was into a sobbing, shaking, nose-running, chest-heaving, gasping-for-breath, flat-out-crying fit.

"I gather I've touched a nerve," I said.

She sobbed. Her eyes were swollen. Her makeup was eroding. Except for the paroxysms of her crying, she was inert in her chair.

"Is Lionel telling me the truth?" I said.

She kept crying. She was hugging herself. Each sob made her body shudder as if it hurt. I waited. She cried. I was pretty sure I could wait longer than she could cry.

I was right.

After a time the crying slowed to heavy breathing. She sat silently for a time, then stood suddenly and walked out of the room. I waited some more. Dust motes danced in the oblique morning light. After maybe fifteen minutes, April came back into the room. She had probably washed her face in cold water and put on new makeup. Her eyes looked better.

She sat back down in the same chair and folded her hands in her lap and looked at me.

"In my whole life," she said softly, "I have never met a man that didn't betray me."

I wanted to claim an exclusion. But she seemed to be musing. And I thought it wise to let her muse.

"My father," she said. "Mr. Poitras. Rambeaux. Now it's Farnsworth."

I nodded.

"I guess I am not good at picking men."

"Maybe it's not a skill," I said.

"What do you mean."

"Maybe you do what you need to do."

"Oh, God," she said. "Just what I need right now, an amateur shrink."

"I know a professional one," I said.

"Fuck you," April said.

"Oh," I said. "Good point."

"I don't need some whacked-out therapist to tell me my life has sucked."

This wasn't an argument I was going to win today. I let it slide.

"So how much of Lionel's story should I believe?" I said.

She shrugged and didn't answer.

"Can I take that to mean all of it."

"No."

"How much?" I said.

"I don't want to talk about it," she said.

I nodded.

We were quiet.

After a while I said, "Is there anything you want me to do before I leave?"

"Leave?"

"Yeah."

"You mean for good?"

"For a while," I said.

"You too," she said.

"Me too what?"

"You bastard," she started to cry again. "You fucking bastard."

"April," I said.

"Bastard, bastard, bastard."