He passed a hair salon called Snip Away, which sounded more like a vasectomy clinic than a beauty parlor. The Snip Away beauticians were either reformed mall girls or guys named Mario whose fathers were named Sal. Two patrons sat in a window—one getting a perm, the other a bleach job. Who wanted that? Who wanted to sit in a window and have the whole world watch you get your hair done?

He took an escalator up past a plastic garden complete with plastic vines to the crowned jewel of the mall: the food court. It was fairly empty now, the dinner crowd long since gone. Food courts were the final outpost of the great American melting pot. Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Mexican, Middle Eastern (or Greek), a deli, a chicken place, one fast food chain like McDonald’s (which had the biggest crowd), a frozen yogurt place, and then a few strange offshoots—the ones started by people who dream of franchising themselves into becoming the next Ray Kroc. Ethiopian Ecstasy. Sven’s Swedish Meatballs. Curry Up and Eat.

Myron checked for numbers on the seven phones. All had been whited out. Not surprising, the way people abused them nowadays. No problemo either. He took out his cellular phone and punched in the number from the Caller ID. A phone starting ringing immediately.

Bingo.

The one on the far right. Myron picked it up to make sure. “Hello?” he said. He heard the hello in his cellular phone. Then he said to himself through the cellular, “Hello, Myron, nice to hear from you.” He decided to stop talking to himself. Too early in the evening to be this goofy.

He hung up the phone and looked around. A group of mall girls inhabited a table not far away. They sat in a closed circle with the protectiveness of coyotes during mating season.

Of the food stands, Sven’s Swedish Meatballs had the best view of the phone. Myron approached. Two men worked the booth. They both had dark hair and dark skin and Saddam Hussein mustaches. One’s name tag read Mustafa. The other Achmed.

“Which one of you is Sven?” he asked.

No smiles.

Myron asked about the phone. Mustafa and Achmed were less than helpful. Mustafa snapped that he worked for a living, and didn’t watch phones. Achmed gestured and cursed him in a foreign tongue.

“I’m not much of a linguist,” Myron said, “but that didn’t sound like Swedish.”

Death glares.

“Bye now. I’ll be sure to tell all my friends.”

Myron turned toward the table of mall girls. They all quickly looked down, like rats scurrying in the glare of a flashlight. He stepped toward them. Their eyes darted to and fro with what they must have thought were surreptitious glances. He heard a low cacophony of “ohmygod!ohmygod!ohmygod!he’scomingover!”

Myron stopped directly at their table. There were four girls. Or maybe five or even six. Hard to say. They all seemed to blend into one another, into one hazy indistinct mesh of hair and black lipstick and Fu Manchu–length fingernails and earrings and nose rings and cigarette smoke and too-tight halter tops and bare midriffs and popping gum.

The one sitting in the middle looked up first. She had hair like Elsa Lancaster in The Bride of Frankenstein and what looked like a studded dog collar around her neck. The other faces followed suit.

“Like, hi,” Elsa said.

Myron tried his most gentle, crooked smile. Harrison Ford in Regarding Henry. “Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?”

The girls all looked at one another. A few giggles escaped. Myron felt his face redden, though he wasn’t sure why. They elbowed one another. No one answered. Myron proceeded.

“How long have you been sitting here?” he asked.

“Is this, like, one of those mall surveys?”

“No,” Myron said.

“Good. Those are, like, so lame, you know?”

“Uh-huh.”

“It’s like, get away from me already, Mr. Polyester Pants, you know?”

Myron said “uh-huh” again. “Do you remember how long you’ve been sitting here?”

“Nah. Amber, you know?”

“Like, we went to the Gap at four.”

“Right, the Gap. Fab sale.”

“Ultra sale. Love that blouse you bought, Trish.”

“Isn’t it, like, the total package, Mindy?”

“Totally. Ultra.”

Myron said, “It’s almost eight now. Have you been here for the past hour?”

“Like, hello, anybody home? At least.”

“This is, like, our spot, you know?”

“No one else, like, sits here.”

“Except that one time when those gross lame-os tried to move in.”

“But, like, whoa, don’t even go there, ’kay?”

They stopped and looked at Myron. He figured the answer to his prior question was yes, so he plowed ahead. “Have you seen anybody use that pay phone?”

“Are you, like, a cop or something?”

“As if.”

“No way.”

“Way.”

“He’s too cute to be a cop.”

“Oh, right, like Jimmy Smits isn’t cute.”

“That’s, like, TV, dumb wad. This is real life. Cops aren’t cute in real life.”

“Oh, right, like Brad isn’t totally cute? You, like, love him, remember?”

“As if. And he’s not a cop. He’s, like, some rent-a-uniform at Florsheim.”

“But he’s so hot.”

“Totally.”

“Ultra buff.”

“He likes Shari.”

“Eeeuw. Shari?”

“I, like, hate her, you know?”

“Me too. Like, does she only shop at Sluts ‘R’ Us, or what?”

“Totally.”

“It’s, like, ‘Hello, Dial-a-Disease, this is Shari speaking.’ ”

Giggles.

Myron looked for an interpreter. “I’m not a cop,” he said.

“Told you.”

“As if.”

“But,” Myron said, “I am dealing with something very important. Life-and-death. I need to know if you remember anyone using that phone—the one on the far right—forty-five minutes ago.”

“Whoa!” The one called Amber pushed her chair back. “Clear out, because I’m, like, gonna barf for days, you know?”

“Like, Crusty the Clown.”

“He was, like, so gross!”

“Totally gross.”

“Totally.”

“He, like, winked at Amber!”

“As if!”

“Totally eeeuw!”

“Gag city.”