Mr. Murder

absolutely no record that the call had been made. The violated phone company would never issue a bill for Oslett's call to New York because they would never know that it had been placed using their system.
        He spoke freely to his New York contact about what he had found at the rest stop, with no fear that he would be overheard by anyone, because his phone also included a scrambling device that he activated with a simple switch. A matching scrambler on the home office phone rendered his report intelligible again upon receipt, but to anyone who might intercept the signal between Oklahoma and the Big Apple, Oslett's words would sound like gibberish.
        New York was concerned about the murdered retirees only to the extent that there might be a way for the Oklahoma authorities to link their killing to Alfie or to the Network, which was the name they used among themselves to describe their organization. "You didn't leave the shoes there?" New York asked.
        "Of course not," Oslett said, offended at the suggestion of incompetence.
        "All of the electronics in the heel-"
        "I have the shoes here."
        "That's right-out-of-the-lab stuff. Any knowledgeable person who sees it, he's going to go ape-shit and maybe"
        "I have the shoes," Oslett said tightly.
        "Good. Okay, then let them find the bodies and bang their heads against the wall trying to solve it. None of our business. Somebody else can haul away the garbage."
        "Exactly."
        "I'll be back to you soon."
        "I'm counting on it," Oslett said.
        After disconnecting, while he waited for a response from the home office, he was filled with uneasiness at the prospect of passing more than a hundred black and empty miles with no company but himself and Clocker. Fortunately, he was prepared with noisy and involving entertainment. From the floor behind the driver's seat, he retrieved a Game Boy and slipped the headset over his ears. Soon he was happily distracted from the unnerving rural landscape by the challenges of a rapidly paced computer game.
        Suburban lights speckled the night when Oslett next looked up from the miniature screen in response to a tap on the shoulder from Clocker. On the floor between his feet, the cellular phone was ringing.
        The New York contact sounded as somber as if he had just come from his own mother's funeral. "How soon can you get to the airport in Oklahoma City?"
        Oslett relayed the question to Clocker.
        Clocker's impassive face didn't change expressions as he said, "Half an hour, forty minutes-assuming the fabric of reality doesn't warp between here and there."
        Oslett relayed to New York only the estimated traveling time and left out the science fiction.
        "Get there quick as you can," New York said. "You're going to California."
        "Where in California?"
        "John Wayne Airport, Orange County."
        "You have a lead on Alfie?"
        "We don't know what the fuck we've got."
        "Please don't make your answers so darn technical," Oslett said.
        "You're losing me."
        "When you get to the airport in Oklahoma City, find a news stand. Buy the latest issue of People magazine. Look on pages sixty six, sixty-seven, sixty-eight. Then you'll know as much as we do."
        "Is this a joke?"
        "We just found out about it."
        "About what?" Oslett asked. "Look, I don't care about the latest scandal in the British royal family or what diet Julia Roberts follows to keep her figure."
        "Pages sixty-six, sixty-seven, and sixty-eight. When you've seen it, call me. Looks as if we might be standing hip-deep in gasoline, and someone just struck a match."
        New York disconnected before Oslett could respond.
        "We're going to California," he told Clocker.
        "Why?"
        "People magazine thinks we'll like the place," he said, deciding to give the big man a taste of his own cryptic dialogue.
        "We probably will," Clocker replied, as if what Oslett had said made perfect sense to him.
        As they drove through the outskirts of Oklahoma City, Oslett was relieved to find himself surrounded by signs of civilization-though he would have blown his brains out rather than live there. Even at its busiest hour, Oklahoma City didn't assault all five senses the way Manhattan did. He didn't merely thrive on sensory overload, he found it almost as essential to life as