The second book in the Laszlo Kreizler and John Schuyler Moore series, 1997

June 19th, 1919

There’s likely some polished way of starting a story like this, a clever bit of gaming that’d sucker people in surer than the best banco feeler in town. But the truth is that I haven’t got the quick tongue or the slick wit for that kind of game. Words haven’t figured much in my life, and though over the years I’ve met many of what the world counts to be the big thinkers and talkers of our times, I’ve stayed what most would call a plain man. And so a plain way of starting will suit me well.

The first thing to do, along these plain lines, is to say why I’ve closed the shop up and come into the back office on a night when there’s still plenty of business that might be done. It’s a fine evening, the kind what I used to live for: a night when you can take in all the affairs of the avenue with nothing more than your shirtsleeves for cover, blowing the smoke of a dozen good cigarettes up to the stars above the city and feeling, on balance, like maybe there’s some point to living in this madhouse after all. The traffic-gasoline-powered automobiles and trucks these days, not just clattering old nags dragging carriages and carts-has slowed quite a bit with the passing of midnight, and soon the after-supper ladies and gents will be over from the Albemarle Hotel and the Hoffman House to pick up their fine-blended smokes. They’ll wonder why I’ve closed early, but they won’t wonder long before heading for some other shop; and after they’ve gone, quiet will settle in around this grand Flatiron Building with a purpose.