"Will you be back in the office before the weekend?" asked Arlene as Kurtz opened the rear door.
"Probably not."
"Anywhere I can reach you?"
"You can try Pruno's e-mail in the next hour or so," said Kurtz. "After that, probably not. I'll give you a call here at the office before the weekend."
"Oh, you can call here Saturday or Sunday, too," said Arlene. "I'll be here."
But Kurtz was out the door and gone and the sarcasm was wasted.
CHAPTER THREE
Kurtz liked Buffalo winters because the Buffalonians knew how to deal with winter. A few inches of snow—snow that would paralyze some wussy city such as Washington or Nashville—went all but unnoticed by Buffalo residents. Plows plowed, sidewalks got shoveled early, and people went on about their business. A foot of snow got people's attention in Buffalo, but only for as long as it took to push and plow it into the ten-foot-high heap of earlier-plowed snow.
But this winter had been a bitch. By January first, more snow had fallen than in the previous two winters combined, and by February, even stoic Buffalo had to shut down some schools and businesses when snow and consistently low temperatures kept blowing in off Lake Erie almost daily.
Kurtz had no idea how Pruno and some of the other winos who refused to stay in shelters more than a few of the worst nights managed to survive such winters.
But surviving the winter was Pruno's problem. Surviving the next few days and weeks was Kurtz's problem.