"Sorry," said Carlos with a shrug.

I wish I could tell you that when I pushed my way through the shiny steel revolving door and stepped out to the street, I felt relieved. Truth is, I was as frightened as Montrose and Barry Neubauer wanted me to be. Suddenly my threats against Neubauer seemed ridiculous and hollow. I knew I'd done the right thing upstairs, so why did I feel like such a fool?

I walked in a daze over to the New York Public Library and the beautiful paneled reading room where I used to ponder my future when I took the train into the city while I was still in high school.

I wrote a letter to the Mudman. I passed along the news that his old prosecutor finally seemed willing to submit the nineteen-year-old evidence from his case for DNA testing. I wished him luck and told him to stay in touch if he could.

I called Pauline from a pay phone, but I got voice mail and couldn't bear to leave a message.

Then I walked across town to Penn Station and crawled home to Montauk one more time. The whole way home I kept trying to solve the same riddle. What can I do to make this right?

FENTON HOISTED HIS GLASS and toasted my sudden exit from the fast lane. "You did good, my son. You've come back down to our level, maybe a little lower."

"We missed you," said Hank. "Welcome back to the real world."

It was Friday night at the Memory Motel. The membership of the Townie Benevolent Association was present and accounted for, and with the date set for the inquiry, there was a certain defiant joie de vivre.

In this group, my unemployment was hardly cause for sympathy. Despite the biggest economic boom in history and the fact that an obscene amount of that money was being frittered away in our backyard, very little was trickling down to us.

As we compared notes, it became clear we were all on the same blacklist. We weren't paranoid, either: somebody was out to get us.

"I've been knocking on doors all over town and can't get a thing," said Hank. "Even places like Gilberto's, which I know is hiring, won't touch me."

"Some bastard has been cutting my nets," said Fenton. "Do you know how hard it is to repair a net? Not to mention that I'm afraid to go out on the boat alone."

"My story is even worse," said Marci, "because it involves me. Two weeks ago this parking-space monger on Georgica Pond commissions me to build the Hamptons ' first authentic maze. Last night he calls and tells me he's awarding the project to Libby Feldhoffer. He was told that if he stuck with me, the planning and zoning board would never approve it."

"Libby Feldhoffer!" said an outraged Molly. "Her work is so pedestrian."

"I knew you'd be there for me, sweetheart."

"I didn't want to tell you, but this morning someone canceled their eleven-thirty at the last minute," said Sammy to a round of boos.

Under the circumstances, I was almost glad to have finally shed my golden-boy bloom. I drained the dregs of our pitcher and was on my way back with a refill when Logan, the Friday-night barkeep, handed me a large manila envelope.

"For me?" I asked. "From who?"

"A guy dropped it off. Said it was for all of you."

"You know him?"

"I've seen him around, Jack. He tried to order a martini once."

I returned to our table. "We've got mail."

I gave the envelope to Molly, and was refilling mugs when she flung it across the table.

"I don't know if I'm up for this whole thing anymore, Jack. Actually, I'm not. This is creepy. It's way beyond creepy. Will you look at this!"

The envelope held six pictures, one of each of us. Fenton sitting on the deck of his trawler at dusk. Sammy drinking coffee in the Soul Kitchen. Me getting off the Beemer in my driveway. The shot of Hank showed him racing across our lawn with a defibrillator. One of Marci with her maze client, just before she got dumped.

In every photo we were shot alone, and from behind. Just to remind us how vulnerable we were. Molly's picture set the standard. It was an extreme close-up of her asleep in bed. The photographer couldn't have been more than a foot away.

Under each picture were numbers: 6-5, 4-3, 10-1, 3-1. There was no note.

ABOUT MIDNIGHT a boisterous pack of outsiders spilled into the Memory. The front of the bar, "our" bar, was suddenly awash with strained smiles, fake laughs, and shrill squawking into cell phones.

"What a dive – I love it!" shouted one particularly enthused newcomer. "Fuck you, too," retorted an in-house wit.

"Check this out," said Marci, pointing to a tanned figure sipping a sea breeze at the center of the clamor. "That's Horst Reindorf."

Reindorf, a former professional bodybuilder, had starred in more than a dozen hit movies. His latest, and Neubauer's first foray into film production, Intergalactic Messenger Boy, was being released the next Friday in 25,000 theaters. "And there's Dennis Soohoo, who plays his Tonto-like sidekick," added Marci as the actors posed for a picture.

"I guess somebody around here watches the E! channel," said Sammy.

"Like you don't?" Marci snapped back.

"I don't watch it. I live it."

"Someone at the Beach House probably suggested a great little townie bar," I said. "Told them it would be good for a hoot."

Horst Reindorf had taken his sleeveless T-shirt off and was twirling it over his head. Dennis Soohoo had grabbed a cute girl, who happened to be Gidley's young cousin. Thank God, she pushed him away. One of the entourage's female members climbed up on the bar and started to dance.

"If Barry Neubauer is going to mess with us," said Gidley, "it's time we return the favor. We don't crash his parties. He should know enough not to crash ours."

"I don't think that's such a smart idea," said Molly. "Seriously, Fenton."

"I'm sure you're right," said Gidley as he stood and began working his way through the thicket. Hank, Sammy, and I got up to follow. What choice did we have?

We didn't realize that Gidley was preparing to assault the social summit with as much confidence as Sir Edmund Hillary's assault on Mount Everest. To his right, a party photographer was positioning an executive producer for a candid shot with Reindorf and Soohoo. At the last minute, Gidley squeezed into the viewfinder. He threw a beefy arm around the Dorfmeister.

"I can't believe you're here at the Memory!" Gidley shouted. The subtext was, where you're not wanted!

"Excuse me," said the photographer, "we're shooting for Vanity Fair."

"We might as well get one of me and my new best friend," said Horst, with his trademark toothsome grin. "You a fisherman? Smells like it."

"Thank you much, Horst," said Fenton. "I am a fisherman. Fourth-generation."

"Somebody get this asshole away from Horst," said one of the studio junior executives.

The regulars knew something was up. The room tightened around the celebs and their hangers-on. "Mr. Photographer, could you take two in case one doesn't come out?" said Fenton. "It's not every day you get a picture of yourself beside the phoniest asshole in all of show business. And a friend of the sleazy Neubauers to boot."

The next couple of minutes were a blur. Reindorf grabbed Gidley by the throat. Fenton, his crazed grin gone, came over the top with an unscripted punch, complete with convincing sound effects. He caught the action hero on the bridge of his nose. Real blood spattered everywhere.

"My God, what are you doing?" shrieked a shiny black-clad publicist. "That's fucking Horst Reindorf!" In a gesture that was way beyond the call of duty, she threw herself at Fenton and pummeled him so ferociously with her Palm Pilot that Horst was able to retreat and slip out a side door.