The Dodge stopped fighting the curve and plunged over a low embankment to another level, into a stream of traffic going the opposite way. Brakes and tires shrieked. Then came the inevitable rending crash.

Shayne was well past. He left his Buick on the approach to the 12th Avenue ramp, lights blinking, and worked his way back on foot along the divider, to see if there were any survivors. A siren screamed above on the Expressway. A crowd was beginning to gather when Shayne reached the wreck. By some miracle, it was only a one-car accident. The Dodge had rammed a concrete pillar, folding shut on the two men trapped inside. At some point the big man in the back seat had been jolted part way out the broken window, and the impact with the pillar had dragged him back in. He was beyond help. The concrete was slick with blood.

Shayne looked in at the driver. He was a boy in his early twenties, with a blotched complexion. He was skewered on the broken steering post.

Shayne went for his Buick. By the time he circled back to the scene the cops had arrived, including one he knew, a red-faced veteran named Squire. The redhead nodded to him.

“Anybody live through it?”

“God, no,” Squire said. “The one in front we’re going to have to take out with a can opener.”

“I suppose it’s a stolen car?” Shayne said casually.

Squire’s eyebrows rose. “Yeah. My partner spotted it right away. He’s a memory nut, thinks if he recovers enough stolen cars they’ll make him detective. Little does he know.” He fished out a cigarette. “You have anything to do with this, Mike?”

“I walked in on something out on the bay. I don’t know what, except that they didn’t want to be bothered. They got away from me there but I picked them up again on the causeway. Believe it or not, that’s all I know.”