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you.”
    Earl made a gesture with his huge right hand, moved a lot of air with it, moved it too close to Jack’s face. Jack held his temper.
    “Pennies. An insult. I’ve been contacted by a collector in Mexico, a retired Mexican cavalry officer. An old friend of the family. We’ve talked it over, and I know he’d value it, he’d ensure its intact survival for another hundred years. The problem is getting the collection to the buyer. It’s rather large and needs to be shipped with care, by a professional.”
    “Large shipments of weapons must be reported to the ATF, even in-state. I keep them informed because they demand it. You do it or I do it. I won’t ship weapons across the street without doing the paperwork. Mr. Pike, I sympathize. I don’t like the nanny state any better than you do. But the law is clear. I break it, I get caught,I lose my license, lose my business, maybe go to jail. Can’t do it. Sorry.”
    Pike didn’t seem fazed.
    “I’ve done some research on the issue. Collections of historical pieces do not need to be completely itemized for the ATF. You can declare key elements of the collection and refer to other items as attachments and accessories. As long as the basic declaration is accurate in principle, the ATF will never question it. They’re understaffed, anyway—they have less than two thousand agents nationwide, and few of them are field agents. Most of those have been directed to monitor gun shows and do random inspections on licensed dealers. The ATF management is busy supporting class-action suits against the gun manufacturers or helping to rape the cigarette companies. You could very accurately say that the attention of the ATF is likely to be elsewhere. And I am prepared to pay whatever is required to move this collection safely. Whatever.”
    Jack took a long calm look at the man’s face. Pike did not flinch or break eye contact.
    “What are we talking about here, Mr. Pike?”
    “Business. Simply business. You have a service for which I am prepared to pay well. I would expect to pay an administrative fee. Well beyond the standard rates. You understand?”
    Jack looked away from the man, scanned the parking lot. They were in the open, under a broad, arched wooden shelter in front of the Frontenac. The parking lot was full of cars. It was a bright clear day. Any one of those cars could be crammed with federal agents with minicams, directional mikes. Mr. Pike here could have more wiring in his underbra than Diane Sawyer. Jack felt his heartbeat increasing. This might be a federal sting. Or not.
    “Maybe we should talk about this somewhere else?”
    Earl’s face grew redder, and his eyebrows knotted across his forehead. He squinted out at the sun-bleached lot.
    “Yes. Perhaps we should.”
    GREENWICH VILLAGE
NEW YORK CITY
1710 HOURS
    The place on Gansevoort was lit like an Anne Rice novel, but smelled worse. It was a little after five, but it was already packed. By the time Casey and Levon had extracted Tony LoGascio from the place, Two-Pack was bailing out of the neighborhood at a dead run.
    They tossed Tony LoGascio into the back of the unit and threw him a blanket, since all he was wearing was a kind of black latex jockstrap and a pair of floppy rubber leggings tied to a belt around his waist. His torso was thin but well muscled, his skin milky white and covered with spidery veins. His hair was long and fine as black silk. He came across as a homeless ferret with a skin disorder.
    “So what’s this bullshit about a sodomy charge?” he says, taking a major attitude right off the mark.
    “In a minute,” says Casey. “While we’re here, what can you tell us about a snatch, happened up in Harlem today?”
    He made the kind of face you make when you’re giving something very serious and intense thought. He shook his head, eyes very wide. The Wagner Houses thing? Oh goodness. He heard all about it on the radio. Terrible thing. Times we live in. Man, I really wish I could