"Chilly out there tonight, isn't it?" she said. Her voice was toneless. She didn't look up at him. "Two thirteen," she said, and turned to the cubbyholes on the wall behind her to fetch his key.

Weiss had a knack for reading people. He could tell what they were thinking. He could often guess what they would do. Sometimes the smallest gesture could give him what he needed.

Now, for instance, he could see that the woman behind the counter was scared.

He took the room key from her pale fingers. The woman pressed her lips together. It looked like she wanted to say something, to tell him something, to warn him maybe about what was waiting for him upstairs. But how could she? How could she know who the good guys and bad guys were, what was safe, what wasn't? It was smarter for her to just keep her mouth shut. So that's what she did.

Weiss smiled at her with one corner of his mouth. He wanted her to know it was all right. "Good night," he said.

The woman tried to answer, but it didn't come off.

Weiss moved away from her. He walked to the wooden stairs. He felt the woman watching him as he went. The hotel windows knocked and rattled in the wind. He climbed heavily up to the second floor.

He trudged along the second-floor gallery. He shifted the room key into his left hand. His right hand slipped inside his overcoat, inside his tweed jacket, to his shoulder holster. He wriggled out his old snub-nosed. 38. It wasn't much of a gun, a real antique at this point. A relic from his days on the SFPD, back before they shifted over to the Berettas. Slow and inaccurate, it wouldn't be much use against the man who was after him. The man who was after him was a professional, a genuine whack specialist. If he wanted Weiss dead, he would make Weiss dead, ancient. 38 or no. Still, Weiss liked the feel of the gun in his hand. Better than nothing. He kept it pressed against his middle as he went down the gallery.