A twenty, keep it, was the reason.

Fuckers always tipped big, but this? All that smiling, must be celebrating something.

The cop looked into his empty coffee cup.

Then something came out from under the table.

His gun.

He was smiling at Terrell again. Showing him the gun!

The cop's arm stretched.

Terrell's bowels gave way as he ducked under the table, not bothering to push down on Germadine's head though he'd had plenty of practice doing that.

The other patrons saw Terrell's dive. The transsexuals and the drunken long-haul truck driver behind them and the toothless, senile, ninety-year-old man in the first booth.

Everyone ducked.

Except the Ethiopian waitress, who'd been talking to the Filipino cashier. She stared, too terrified to move.

Nolan Dahl nodded at the waitress. Smiled.

She thought, A sad smile, what's with this guy?

Nolan closed his eyes, almost as if he were praying. Opening them, he slid the nine-millimeter between his lips and, sucking like a baby, fixed his gaze on the waitress's pretty face.

She was still unable to move. He saw her terror, softened his eyes, trying to let her know it was okay, the only way.

A beautiful, black, final image. God this place smelled crappy.

He pulled the trigger.

2

Helena Dahl gave me a mourner's account. The rest I got from the papers and from Milo.

The young cop's suicide merited only two inches on page 23 with no follow-up. But the flash-point violence stayed with me and when Milo called a few weeks later and asked me to see Helena, I said, “That one. Any idea yet why he did it?”

“Nope. That's probably what she wants to talk about. Rick says don't feel obligated, Alex. She's a nurse at Cedars, worked with him in the E.R. and doesn't want to see the in-house shrinks. But it's not like she's a close friend.”