Jay shrugged. "Out." She had him there, but he was damned if he was going to admit it. "Seems to me you got another candidate who's a lot riper than Elmo."

Captain Angela Ellis slammed down the stapler and blew a long plume of smoke across the room. 'Ah. Right. The ace-of-spades killer." She didn't sound impressed. "We're going to find Elmo," she promised, crushing out her cigarette. 'And when we do, five'll get you ten it turns out your dwarf pal dropped that card. You can buy a deck of playing cards at any five-and-ten. You're supposed to be a bright boy, Ackroyd. Figure it out for yourself."

"Maybe I will," Jay said.

Angela Ellis didn't like that one bit. Her bright green eyes narrowed as she stood up. "Lemme make one thing real clear. I don't like PIs. And I don't like aces. So you can probably guess how I feel about ace PIs. You start getting in our way on this one, you can just kiss your license good-bye."

"You're beautiful when you're angry," Jay said.

Ellis ignored him. "I don't like bodies cluttering up my precinct either."

"You must be unhappy a lot of the time," Jay said as he headed for the door. He paused in the doorway to study her little glass-walled cubicle. "This really where they killed Captain Black?" he asked innocently.

"Yes," she snapped, irritated. Jay figured he'd hit a sore point. Knowing the NYPD, they probably hadn't even gotten her a new chair. "What the hell are you doing?" she said.

"Getting a good picture of the place in my head," Jay said. He smiled crookedly and made his right hand into a gun, three fingers folded down, thumb cocked like a hammer, index finger pointed at Angela Ellis. "I'm a good boy, Captain. If I bump into your killer, I'll want to send him right here to you."

She looked puzzled for a moment, then flushed when she remembered what he could do. "Aces," she muttered. "Get the hell out of here."

He did. Kant and Maseryk were back in the squad room. "Captain on the rag?" Jay asked as he passed. They exchanged looks and watched him leave. Jay went out the front door, walked around the block, went back in, and took the steps down to the basement.