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door in the middle of the night does little to make you think you’re going to be getting much sleep after they’re gone. And indeed I didn’t. They told me that, according to a reporter friend of my brother’s, Jake and he were having lunch in a pub downtown two days earlier when Jake received a page. He went to a pay phone, made a call, and left quickly, telling the reporter he’d see him back at the Beacon ’s offices in two hours. He didn’t make it. And he didn’t make it to work the next day. Or ever again.
    He was gone for good, it seemed. And it started with a single phone call. For the second time, fate had turned my life inside out. It didn’t just throw me a curveball—it sizzled a fastball into my ear.
    I rubbed my eyes and focused on the Redekov case file sitting on my desk in front of me. Thinking about the past wasn’t going to do me any good in my trial preparation. I realized I’d been staring at the file for an hour but hadn’t read a single word. My intention that night had been to try to put the mystery of the homeless man out of my mind, at least for the night and concentrate on Vasily Redekov. I called Jessica and told her I couldn’t meet for dinner. I planned to work late that night, plug away on the case some more on Friday, then spend the rest of the weekend at the office.
    That was my plan at the time, anyway.
     
    * * *
     
    I started looking for the homeless man around ten o’clock that night. Armed with a cup of coffee to fight off the chill in the air, I began to walk the streets I thought might be home to the homeless. I soon found I had very little idea where to start. To my shame, I realized I’d never paid much attention to the homeless I passed every day. Then I remembered sometimes seeing people lounging in doorways asking for money on Cambridge Street, so I headed in that direction, toward the Charles River.
    As I walked, leaving Boston’s financial district behind, I began to feel that damned prickling sensation on the back of my neck. Cambridge Street was quiet. Nearly deserted, in fact, which didn’t thrill me. But I was even less thrilled when I turned to look behind me and saw a figure melt into the shadows of a doorway two blocks back. Or I thought I did.
    I began to sweat as I watched the doorway for five full minutes without seeing a hint of movement. I’d imagined it, of course.
    I wished Dr. Fielding were with me then. He never believed me when I talked about being followed, which can be both comforting and frustrating as hell. But he usually made me feel better, at least for a while.
    Continuing down Cambridge Street, I thought I heard footsteps behind me now and then, but when I turned around, I saw no one. There were a few other people on the street who clearly were not following me, and I ignored them. But those footsteps still bothered me, as they always did when I imagined hearing them. I hated being a little nuts.
    I stopped at the end of Cambridge, right near the Charles River, in sight of the concrete staircase that curved up in a gentle spiral from the ground and spanned over Storrow Drive before curving to the ground again on the other side. I stood for a moment in the comforting, brightly lit doorway of a corner convenience store. Here there was light. Across the street, where the stairs met the ground, there were shadows. Within the shadows I thought I saw movement. For a long moment I had trouble coming up with a good reason to go from here to there. Then I thought of Jake and my feet began to move without me even telling them to.
    I’d like to say I honestly wasn’t nervous about approaching the darkness under those concrete stairs. I can’t. I stopped just before passing into the shadows under the bridge, my heart thumping loudly enough for me to wonder if someone had a boom box under there. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness in front of me, I watched indistinct forms slowly take shape, turning into a stack of cardboard boxes, a pile of