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“I’ll be in touch.”

“All I care about is Chrissie, Mr. Boll.”

“I understand. I have a daughter too. I can’t even imagine how you must feel. But you stay true to me and you two will be eating ice cream sundaes by Wednesday night.”

The outside bench was getting chilly so I walked over to Grand Central just to warm up. I went upstairs there to the steak house and ordered a porterhouse steak, medium well, with thick fries and French beans.

“Hello?” a jaunty voice answered on the other end of my third and final phone call.

“Was that you last night or just a dream?” I asked.

“Was I handsome and witty?”

“I guess.”

“Then that was me. What can I do for you, Joe?”

“What do you know about Augustine Antrobus and William James Marmot?”

“This is that Free Man thing, right?” Gladstone Palmer surmised. “Joe, you cannot exonorate a man who killed two cops. Sherlock Holmes couldn’t do shit like that.”

“I know,” I said. “And I accept it. But you know I stepped on a few toes before you enlightened me, and now I have to do some housekeeping.”

“You’ll stop trying to get Man exonerated?”

“If Convert stays off my ass.”

“I’ll send you what files we have by e-mail. But, Joe.”

“What?”

“I can’t save your ass every time you step out of line.”

The files came before my steak. I couldn’t read them on my cheap phone, but that didn’t matter. I forwarded them to Mel with a note and started on my steak.

They seated me next to the outer wall of the dining area. From there I could look down on the rotunda as thousands of commuters, civilians, cops, and some crooks passed through. There rose a senseless, very human hubbub from below while I ate my red meat and plotted against the state.

“Ferris,” he answered on the third ring.

“Hello, Mr. Ferris. Joe Oliver here.”

“Hello, my boy. How are you?”

“It’s the fifteenth round of an old-time boxing match,” I said. “I’ve lost every minute of every round up till now, but I think I finally see a way to get my hook past his defense.”

“It’s hard to find the torque to hurt a man that late in the fight,” the world-wise multibillionaire opined.

“Don’t I know it.”

“What can I do for you, son?”

“Is there some music event going on tonight that you’d like to see with my grandmother?”

“There’s an invitation I have to hear three of Mozart’s four-handed sonatas in the upstairs chamber at Carnegie Hall.”

“If you want I’d be happy to go with you and bring my grandmother along.”

“That would be wonderful.”