In the alley behind the club, I found the back door to the place. I’d been here dozens of times before, when Stan had sent me to collect protection from the club’s old owner, so I knew the layout of the place fairly well.

I didn’t want to walk in on a party, so I pulled over an empty metal trash can and used it to boost myself up and look in Mercury’s office window. It was empty. I pushed at the glass, but the window was locked. I climbed down and drew back a foot, ready to kick in the door, but I stopped myself. I tried the knob. It was open. I pushed the door in with an ugly metallic squeal of hinges.

Nobody came to investigate.

The office was like I remembered it, and if Mercury had any ideas for decorating the place, he hadn’t implemented them yet. I searched the room, the top of his desk, not thoroughly, just to see if anything looked important. Nothing did. I scouted behind the heavy curtain that hid the bar. That would be my spot.

Sirens in the distance, fire trucks.

I cracked open the door, looked down the hall past the restrooms into the club. There wasn’t much to see. The sirens were right in front of the club now. I heard footsteps at the far end of the hall, so I closed the door. I took my place behind the curtain, drew one of the Minelli cannons, and stood ready.

Three hoods shuffled into the room with Mercury. I watched them from the crack in the curtain. I’d been doing a lot of sneaking around lately. The hoods were typical low-forehead bruisers: polo shirts, bellies hanging over chinos, gold chains. Fifty-dollar haircuts on ten-dollar heads. The bulges under their windbreakers made them dangerous.

Only Lloyd Mercury stood out, lithe and sharp, straight and lean as a knife blade. He moved with the graceful and deadly precision of a jungle cat.

One said, “Hey boss, let’s get a drink. How ’bout a pitcher of Bloody Marys? Me and Lenny had a late night.” I saw him start for my spot.

My heart stopped a second to see what was going on. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

“Don’t even start,” Mercury told his henchman. “I need you straight when the Minelli brothers arrive. Freddy didn’t quite sound right on the phone. I have a strange feeling.”

“What about that fire?”

“I don’t know. Vandals. Kids maybe?”

“It just seems kind of funny, that’s all.”

Mercury scratched his chin. “Okay. You and Dale stay out front and watch the street. Lenny, check the kitchen. And leave the box here.”

The one called Lenny handed Mercury a metal box, which he in turn put in the bottom drawer of his desk. The box looked just big enough to hold twenty thousand if the bills were large. My escape money.

When Mercury’s boys had gone, I stepped out from behind the curtain and made sure Mercury saw I was pointing a gun at him.

He startled maybe a tenth of a second before a slow, thin smile spread across his face. “Hello, Swift.”

“Let’s keep it quiet. We need to have a little conversation without Lenny and the others.”

“If you like.”

“Get your hands on the desk.”

He put them on the desk, palms down.

I backed up to the door, looked in the hall. All clear. I closed it again and locked it.

“Tell me about Alan Jeffers.”

“What about him?”

“Don’t fuck with me. I already killed three guys this morning.”

He nodded, looked at me carefully. “You got the Minelli brothers.” It wasn’t a question.

I shrugged. “It got messy.”

“Who was that on the phone?”

“Freddy.”

I saw him thinking, then his smile grew. “Well played.”

“Jeffers,” I prompted.

“What’s to tell?”

“Tell it like a little story. I want details.”

He shrugged, keeping his hands on the desk, fingers spread. “Once upon a time there was a crime boss named Beggar Johnson. He had an accountant write columns of numbers of everything he did illegally into little books. One of Beggar’s men-at-arms- Myron- betrayed him. The evil FBI had cast a spell over Myron to snatch the books away from Arthur.”

“Arthur?”

“Arthur Angus,” said Mercury. “Beggar’s accountant.”

That explained the initials A. A. on the briefcase. “Keep talking.”

“So this disloyal Myron person made off with the secret books to the faraway land of Orlando, where he sought refuge with his kinsman, Kyle Donovan, owner and operator of the dubious establishment known as Toppers. Here he was to meet with federal agents to turn over his prize and keep himself out of the terrible big house.”

“I asked you about Jeffers.”

“Patience.” Mercury’s smile never budged. “I’m getting to him.”

“Okay then.”

“The FBI, being creatures of habit, cast the same spell over Alan Jeffers that they cast over Myron. They told Jeffers he couldn’t very well be able to enjoy his house and his nice car and his time-share in Boca or be able to put his MBA from Rutgers to any good use if he landed himself in a federal penitentiary. To appease the government men, Jeffers promised to sacrifice these books once they came into his possession.”

“I know all this already.”

“Indeed. But did you know that the FBI agents who cornered Jeffers and threatened him with jail were in fact suspended?”

“What do you mean?”

“Suspended,” repeated Mercury. “From duty. It seems they were under suspicion for taking bribes. They figured, I think, that their careers as G-men were over, and decided to fund their retirement by extorting money from Beggar. Their names are-”

“Styles and Novak,” I said.

Mercury’s smile faltered only a second. “I underestimated you, Mr. Swift. I see you’re keeping abreast of current events.”

“I get around.”

“Then you probably know the name of the third officer who was suspended.”

I frowned, decided to take a guess. “Dunn.”

Mercury laughed. “That Boy Scout? Hardly. I see you don’t quite have all the details, do you?”

“Why don’t you fill me in?”

“I believe you remember Jeffers’s attractive assistant Tina.”

My eyes went big. “She’s an agent?”

“She weaseled her way into Jeffers’s good graces as part of a legitimate undercover investigation. Once she learned there was a buck to be made from blackmailing Beggar, she conned Styles and Novak into going along with her. They figured Beggar would pay a cool million to stay out of jail and keep his organization intact.”

That explained just about everything. If Tina and her chums were running a sting on Jeffers, then she wouldn’t have told Dunn about my bringing the books that morning. That’s why Dunn didn’t search my car or demand the books, didn’t even ask me about them. And Jeffers thought Tina, Styles, and Novak represented the FBI. He’d hand the books right over to Tina if he could just get his hands on them. He’d be too afraid to do anything else.

“You look a little worried,” said Mercury.

“I’m just figuring some things out.”

“You don’t like my story?”

“Keep going. You’re telling it good.”

“There’s really not that much more to it,” said Mercury. “Except for one small matter. Beggar still doesn’t have his ledgers. You have them. This will not do.”

“What do you propose we do about it?”

“In this desk is a metal box,” said Beggar. “In the metal box is twenty thousand dollars in cash. It was meant for the Minelli brothers. They are no longer in a position to spend it. How about I hand it over to you?”

“In exchange for what?”

“Two things.” He held up one finger. “First, you immediately hand over those accounting ledgers. We can tuck them in a nice safe spot and finally stop worrying about them.” He held up another finger. “Second, you leave town. We don’t care where you go, but go far and don’t come back. Beggar doesn’t want any of Stan’s old crew cluttering up the place.”

I looked at him a second, still pointing the gun. Lloyd Mercury was one slick number. And because of that I didn’t trust him, not an inch. He’d put a slug in my back the first chance he got in spite of whatever agreement we made now. And I never forgot for a second what Bob Tate looked like with that bullet hole in his head. Mercury had done that, or at least ordered it.