“Guilty,” he said, his smile automatic, his hand shooting out and shaking hers, even though she had not offered it.

“I’m a private investigator in Baltimore. I’m trying to identify a girl who might be connected to a bar on Hollins Street -”

“I never touched her!” He threw his hands up in the air in mock innocence, still smiling.

“I guess that would be funny,” Tess said, “if she weren’t actually dead.”

Vasso had the decency to look embarrassed. “I’m sorry, when you said identify, it didn’t occur to me…I didn’t think you meant…”

Tess waited, letting him twist and stammer a little longer.

“The bartender at Domenick’s said he didn’t recognize her from the sketch I have. I went to see the owner, only to find out he’s been dead for almost a year. The widow never knew he had a bar. And, although you were his lawyer at the license hearing, she never heard of you either.”

Vasso looked around. A reflexive gesture for him. His eyes were probably always sliding from side to side, making sure no one more important had come into the immediate vicinity. Tess saw a bald man bent over a piece of paper several tables away, doodling on the back of a receipt with an old-fashioned fountain pen, but the restaurant was otherwise empty.

“Let me buy you lunch.”

“This really won’t take very long,” Tess said.

“Better yet. Then we can talk about more interesting things. Look, I don’t like to eat alone. Since the rules changed, and I’m not allowed to treat our public officials unless they declare it on their ethics forms, it’s harder for me to find someone to keep me company. Please, have a seat.” He gave her a shrewd look. “It doesn’t hurt anyone to be seen with Arnold Vasso.”

They were definitely being seen, and not just by the lunchtime crowd on Main Street, a mix of tourists and government workers. Tess had the feeling that the waiters were speculating on Vasso’s business with a woman who clearly was not one of his monied clients. Given the mix of people that Annapolis attracted, it was an informal town, so her jeans and turtleneck sweater were not out of place here. Still, she felt odd, sitting across from Vasso in his expensive blue suit. Expensive, but tight.

“That guy over there?” Vasso asked out of the corner of his mouth.

“Yes,” Tess said, glancing back at the bald man, who continued to doodle with small, tightly controlled strokes, as if he were working on an elaborate design.

“Meyer Hammersmith. You know him?”

“Know of him.”

“I can’t believe he’s working for Kenny Dahlgren. Hammersmith’s a classic limousine liberal, while Dahlgren’s the kind of Democrat who’d be at home in the far right wing of the Republican party. Politics makes-”

“Strange bedfellows?” Tess offered.

“No. I was going to say politics makes me hungry. What are you having?”

They ordered, and Vasso seemed almost amused at the amount of food Tess required. In fact, now that she was sitting across from him, Vasso seemed amused by everything Tess said and did.

“Are you really a private investigator?” he asked.

“Yes. I got my license by apprenticing with a former policeman.” A former policeman who did nothing more than lend his name, Keyes, to her business and take a small commission at month’s end.

“Gun and badge and everything?”

“Not a badge,” she corrected. “A license. But a gun. A thirty-eight Smith and Wesson.”

“Do you have it with you right now?”

“Are you crazy?”

“Just curious. I don’t think I’ve ever met one of you before. Except in divorce cases, you know. The usual surveillance thing. I hired one for my second divorce. I’ve been divorced four times. Now ask me how many times I’ve been married.”

Tess was feeling agreeable. “How many times have you been married?”

“Three!” He smacked the edge of the table, pleased with himself. When Tess didn’t laugh, he added helpfully. “It’s a joke. My last marriage was so bad, I always say I divorced her twice, just to make sure.”

“But that’s not the one where you used the private detective.”

“No, that one wasn’t about cheating. It was just about hating each other’s guts.”

A fragment of a story came back to Tess, something about Vasso breaking into an ex-wife’s house and leaving behind a large hog in gastric distress. By the time his wife returned late that evening, the carpeting throughout the first floor of the home was ruined. He had avoided criminal charges, though. His wife had ended up selling the house, at a loss, so Vasso was out a good chunk of the equity. But that hadn’t been the point for him. Winning had been the point and, according to his internal scoreboard, Vasso had done just that.

Vasso was now looking intently at Tess’s hands, which embarrassed her. Even facedown on the white tablecloth, so her rowers’ calluses were hidden, they were not her best feature. As short as she kept her nails, they always looked a little ragged. She put them in her lap, beneath the tablecloth.

“You’re not married,” he said. “See? I could be a detective, too.”

“Maybe I just don’t wear a ring.”

“Women always wear their wedding bands.”

“Maybe the fifteen-karat diamond is loose in the setting and I dropped it off at a jewelry store to have it repaired.”

“I don’t see you with a big diamond.” Vasso studied her. “Because I don’t see you keeping company with the kind of men who can afford big diamonds. But you could, if you wanted to. In fact, maybe you’d be interested in meeting some of my clients during the session. Some of the ones who come in from out of town, don’t know anybody in the area. I give a little party in January, you should drop by.”

Was Vasso trying to pimp her? Tess decided not to think about it. “So, Lawrence Purdy, owner of Domenick’s. Ring a bell?”

“Not really. I probably did it as a favor, you know. Stepped in, helped out a friend.”

“Who?”

“I have a lot of friends. I have a lot of friends because I don’t tell their business to just anyone who drops by. Lawmakers have to make disclosures, I don’t. But it wasn’t a big deal. A guy needed a license to run a bar, that’s all. I went before the commission with him.”

“So why doesn’t his wife know about this, or you?”

“Look, liquor laws are crazy-”

“I know, my father is a city liquor board inspector.”

Vasso gave her a hard look. “So you know. Law says you have to live in Baltimore City if you want to own a bar in Baltimore City. Is that fair? Is it even constitutional? Or maybe you had a little youthful indiscretion, ended up with a rap sheet. Law says you can’t own a bar in that case, either. So there are owners, and there are owners of record. I’m sure the gentleman whose name appeared on the license was the owner of record.”

“But he’s dead.”

“I guess the city liquor board doesn’t stay on top of its paperwork. But you can ask your daddy all about that.” Vasso squinted at her again. “Patrick Monaghan, right? Tight with Senator Ditter? Related somehow to old Donald Weinstein, as I recall.”

“My mother’s brother.”

Vasso smiled knowingly. “He was good, your uncle. You know, with that kind of pedigree, I’d think you’d be down here. I could see you as a lawyer on one of the committees.”

“That would require going to law school.”

“Then you could be a lobbyist. Although I suppose you’d be one of the do-gooder kinds. Not much money in that, but with the right wardrobe, you could do all right.”

“Sure, as long as I let the committee chairman grab my knee under the table.” One of the state’s most powerful delegates had done just that and lost the judgeship he so coveted, only to be re-elected to the General Assembly. “Do you think that’s what the early Marylanders were thinking when they chose ‘Womanly Words, Manly Deeds’ as the state motto?”

“Here’s the thing.” Vasso had a piece of lettuce half in, half out his mouth, but he didn’t seem to notice. “If some senator wanted to grab my dick before he voted for one of my bills, I’d say ‘Help yourself.’”