There was no one on the fifth landing, or the sixth. He was on his way to the seventh and final landing when he heard the cough again.

Only this time it had come from below him.

He looked down. The fire escape was bars and metal mesh, without a single shred of cover anywhere on it. And yet, unless the mugger was also a ventriloquist, Fierenzo had somehow walked right past him.

He was back on the fifth landing, looking for something—anything—out of the ordinary, when something like a movement at the building side of the landing caught the corner of his eye.

He looked quickly in that direction, but there was nothing there but more mesh and wall. He was staring at the spot when the movement came again, a subtle rippling in the pattern of the building's brickwork. His eyes seemed to refocus themselves....

And there, tucked into the angle between the mesh and the wall was a vague, half-curled-up outline of a human being.

He had no memory later of having drawn his gun, but suddenly it was in his hand. "Freeze!" he snapped at the outline, wondering fleetingly if this was what it was like to go insane. "Police. Let me see your hands."

For a handful of seconds nothing happened, the pause giving Fierenzo time to notice both the irony and the absurdity of his standard cop's command. Show me your hands, he said to the invisible man.... The outline quivered with another cough; and then, like a window curtain being pulled back, the image hardened and solidified.

And there on the landing lay a short, stocky young man, curled around himself against the cold, gazing at Fierenzo with half-hooded blue eyes. His shirt beneath a thin jacket was stained dark with dried blood. "Who are you?" he asked hoarsely.

It took Fierenzo two tries to find his voice. "Detective Sergeant Thomas Fierenzo, NYPD," he said, squatting down beside the man. "Who are you?"

The man's eyes dropped to the gun in Fierenzo's hand, and he smiled weakly. "You won't need that," he said.

"Probably not," Fierenzo agreed, slipping the weapon back into its holster. Judging from the man's drawn face and half-closed eyes it was clear he wasn't in any shape for a fight. More importantly, both his hands were in sight and empty. "What's your name?"

The man took a careful breath, as if still uncertain of the state of his lungs. "Jonah," he said. "Who are you working for?"

"I already told you," Fierenzo said. "The police."

"I mean who are you really working for?" Jonah asked, his face hardening. "Cyril, or Aleksander?"

"My boss is Lieutenant Cerreta, 24th Precinct," Fierenzo said stiffly. "If you're implying—wait a second," he interrupted himself as his numbed brain began to catch the rails again. "Cyril? As in...

Cyril?"

For a moment Jonah stared at him with an expression that made Fierenzo wonder if he ought to rethink the man's threat potential. Then the look faded, and the eyelids half-lowered again. "You're not with them," he said, breathing hard as if the simple act of giving Fierenzo a hard stare had worn him out. "But you do know them?"

"By reputation only." Fierenzo cocked an eyebrow. "I haven't met Melantha yet, either."

He'd hoped dropping the girl's name would spark a reaction. He hadn't been prepared for quite the reaction he got. Jonah's eyes snapped fully open, his throat suddenly tight. "Where is she?" he demanded, his right hand groping to a grip on the lapel of Fierenzo's coat.

"None of that," Fierenzo warned, grabbing the other's hand and starting to pry the fingers away.

Jonah's left hand lifted—

And to his astonishment, Fierenzo found himself looking down the muzzle of the strangest-looking gun he'd ever seen.

"Take it easy," he said quickly, abandoning his efforts to pry Jonah's hand away from his coat. "I already said I haven't met her. I don't know where she is, either."

For a moment Jonah didn't move. His weapon, Fierenzo noted distantly, looked more like an elaborately carved judge's gavel with flattened sides and a shortened grip than a real handgun. But there was no mistaking the purpose of the small hole pointing at the detective's face.

And then, to his relief, Jonah's right fingers loosened their grip on his coat, the hand falling limply onto the landing. "She has to be all right," he murmured. His gun-hand wavered away from the detective's face, opening as he let go of his gun.

Fierenzo was ready, darting his hand down to catch the weapon before it fell onto the landing. But his hand caught nothing but empty air. "I'm sure she is," he said absently, his eyes searching vainly for the gun. Still, with appearing and disappearing men, what was the big deal about appearing and disappearing guns? "Right now, we have to get you to a hospital."

"No!" Jonah insisted, grabbing weakly at Fierenzo's hand as he reached for his cell phone. "No hospital. If you take me there, they'll find me."

"We can put you under police protection," Fierenzo assured him. "You'll be perfectly safe."

"Aleksander will walk right past them," Jonah said wearily. "He'll ask nicely, and just walk on past."

Fierenzo opened his mouth... closed it again. Cyril had walked past the doorman and super in the Whittiers' building simply by asking. Did Jonah think cops would behave the same way if Aleksander showed up and also asked nicely? Apparently, he did.

And he might be right. "You still need medical attention," he said.

Jonah shook his head. "All I need is food and rest."

"What, from that?" Fierenzo countered, gesturing to the blood-encrusted shirt.

"It happened Wednesday night," Jonah said. "If it was that bad, I should already be dead."

He had a point, Fierenzo had to admit. "I'll make you a deal," he said. "If you can get down the fire escape without bleeding, blacking out, or coughing up blood, I'll take you somewhere besides a hospital. Otherwise, it's straight to St. Luke's. Agreed?"

Jonah gazed at the detective a moment, as if weighing the other's trustworthiness, then nodded.

"Agreed."

"Good," Fierenzo said, straightening up and extending a hand. "Let's get you out of the cold."

Jonah was built like a wrestler, and felt like he weighed as much as two of them. Fortunately, once Fierenzo got him on his feet he was mostly able to navigate on his own. They made it down the fire escape, and Fierenzo left him in the alley while he retrieved his car.

"Where are we going?" Jonah asked when they were finally on their way.

"My apartment near Lincoln Center," Fierenzo told him. "My family's visiting relatives in Illinois, so it'll just be the two of us."

"Sounds good," Jonah said. Already his breathing sounded better, Fierenzo decided. At the same time, he seemed considerably sleepier than he had on the fire escape.

And in fact, before they even hit the next street, he was snoring away.

Fierenzo grimaced. Lieutenant Cerreta, he suspected, would have a world-class fit when he found out about this. But if it finally gave Fierenzo a handle on the case, it would be worth it.

In the meantime, he still had the Whittiers to deal with. With a little luck, maybe he would have their set of puzzle pieces in hand by the time Jonah was ready to give up his.

And with a little more luck, maybe the two sets would actually fit together.

Fishing out his cell phone, he popped it open. Time to check Powell's progress with the Whittiers'

cab.