Constantine nodded. “Today was a nice one. I was down at Chesapeake Beach this morning, looking out at the bay.” He had sat there on a bench, in fact, for several hours, staring out at the sun-whitened water, the bay at that point expansive as the ocean.

“You from down this way?” the old man said.

“No.”

“Where you coming from?”

Constantine stretched his legs, watched the trees blur by. “I was in Annapolis for a couple of days. Had a line on a job there.”

“What kind of work?”

“Driving a man around town. A man who had money. A little bit of caretaking, too. That sort of thing.”

“A driver, huh?” The old man looked Constantine over, then returned his eyes to the road. “Didn’t work out?”

Constantine checked the old man’s windbreaker, his worn Wranglers. “Let’s just say the guy wore pants with whales on ’em, wore his sweaters tied around his neck. The old-money-and-marina crowd. It wasn’t my stick.” He sighed, squinted, and drummed the dash with his fingers. “Hitched out of Annapolis this morning, ended up in Chesapeake. I picked up a map there and saw that I was headed into a dead end. Here I am, looking to get out.”

The old man took one hand off the wheel and stretched it to the right. Constantine shook it.

“My name’s Polk.”

“Constantine.”

“Just Constantine?”

“That’s right.”

“I knew a Constantine once. A Greek.”

“I’m not Greek.”

Polk kept on: “Course Ms own people never called him Constantine. They called him Dean, some of ’em called him Dino. But I always called him Connie, and he didn’t seem to mind. You don’t mind if I call you Connie, do you?”