to get a feel for them."

"Does the phrase what a crock mean anything to you?"

"Good-bye, Bruce."

"Wait." Pause. Then Bruce said, "Something serious is going down here, right?"

"Clu Haid has been murdered. Esperanza's been arrested for the crime. I'd say that's pretty serious."

"There's more to it. Tell me that much. I won't print it, I promise."

"Truth, Bruce? I don't know yet."

"And when you do?"

"You'll be the first to know."

"You really think Esperanza's innocent? Even with all that evidence?"

"Yes."

"Call me, Myron. If you need anything else. I like Esperanza. I want to help if I can."

Myron hung up. He looked over at Win. Win seemed in deep thought. He was tapping his chin with his index finger. They sat in silence for several seconds.

Win stopped tapping and asked, "Whatever happened to the King Family?"

"You mean the ones with the Christmas specials?"

Win nodded. "Every year you were supposed to watch the King Family Christmas Special. There must have been a hundred of the buggers-big Kings with beards, little Kings in knickers, Mommy Kings, Daddy Kings, Uncle and Aunt and Cousin Kings. Then one year-poof- they're gone. All of them. What happened?"

"I don't know."

"Strange, isn't it?"

"I guess."

"And what did the King clan do the rest of the year?"

"Prepared for the next Christmas special?"

"What a life, no?" Win said. "Christmas passes, and you start thinking about next Christmas. You live in a snow globe of Christmas."

"I guess."

"I wonder where they are now, all those suddenly unemployed Kings. Do they sell cars? Insurance? Are they drug dealers? Do they get sad every Christmas?"

"Yeah, poignant point, Win. By the way, did you come down here for a reason?"

"Discussing the King Family isn't reason enough? Weren't you the one who came up to my office because you didn't understand the meaning of a Sheena Easton song?"

"You're comparing the King Family to Sheena Easton?"

"Yes, well, in truth, I came up here to inform you that I quashed the subpoenas against Lock-Horne."

Myron shouldn't have been surprised. "The power of payoffs," he said with a shake of his head. "It never fails to amaze me."

"Payoff is such an offensive term," Win said. "I prefer the more politically correct assisting the contribution-challenged" He sat back, crossed his legs in that way of his, folded his hands on his lap. He gestured at the phone and said, "Explain."

So Myron did. He filled him in on everything, especially on the Lucy Mayor incident. When Myron was finished, Win said, "Puzzling."

"Agreed."

"But I am not sure I see a connection."

"Someone mails me a diskette with Lucy Mayor's image on it and a little while later Clu is murdered. You think that's just a coincidence?"

Win mulled that over. "Too early to tell," he concluded. "Let's do a little recap, shall we?"

"Go ahead."

"Let's start with a straight time line: Clu gets traded to New York, he pitches well, he gets thrown out by Bonnie, he starts collapsing, he fails a drug test, he desperately searches for you, he comes to me and withdraws two hundred thousand dollars, he strikes Esperanza, he gets murdered." Win stopped. "That sound fair?"

"Yes."

"Now let's explore some possible tangents from this line."

"Let's."

"One, our old fraternity chum Billy Lee Palms appears to be missing. Clu purportedly contacted him shortly before the murder. Aside from that, is there any reason to tie Billy Lee into all this?"

"Not really. And according to his mother, Billy Lee isn't the most dependable tool in the shed."

"So maybe his disappearance has nothing to do with this."

"Maybe.

"But that would be yet another bizarre coincidence" Win said.

"It would at that."

"Fine, let's move on for the moment. Tangent two, this Take A Guess nightspot."

"All we know is that Clu called them."

Win shook his head. "We know a great deal more."

"For example?"

"They overreacted to your visit. Tossing you out would have been one thing. Roughing you up a bit would have been one thing. But this sort of interrogation complete with knife slashes and electrocution-that's overkill."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that you struck a nerve, poked the hive, stirred the nest, choose your favorite cliche."

"So they're connected into all this."

"Logical," Win said, again doing his best Spock.

"How?"

"Heavens, I haven't a clue."

Myron chewed it over a bit. "I had thought maybe Clu and Esperanza hooked up there."

"And now?"

"Let's say they did hook up there. What would be the big deal about that? Why the overkill?"

"So it's something else."

Myron nodded. "Any more tangents?"

"The big one," Win said. "The disappearance of Lucy Mayor."

"Which happened more than ten years ago."

"And we must confess that her connection is tenuous at best."

"So confessed," Myron