Pop Goes the Weasel

me. But I’d already decided the best thing would be to get away from here, cool down, then figure out a plan to move forward.
    As I headed out of the building, another detective stopped me. “They’re over at Hart’s bar,” he said. “Sampson said to tell you they reserved a seat for you.”
    Hart’s is a very seedy, very popular gin mill on Second Street. It isn’t a cops’ bar, which is why some of us like it. It was eleven in the morning, and the barroom was already crowded, lively, even friendly.
    “Here he is!” Jerome Thurman saluted me with a half-full beer mug as I walked inside. Half a dozen other detectives and friends were there, too. The word had gotten around fast about the suspensions.
    There was a whole lot of laughter and shouting going on. “It’s a bachelor’s party!” Sampson said, and grinned. “Got you, sugar. With a little help from Nana. You should see the look on your face!”
    For the next hour and a half, friends kept arriving at Hart’s. By noon the bar was full, and then the regular customers started coming in for their lunch-hour nips. The owner, Mike Hart, was in his glory. I hadn’t really thought about having a bachelor’s party, but now that I was in the middle of one, I was glad it happened. A lot of men still guard their emotions and feelings, but not so much at a bachelor’s party, at least not at a good one thrown by the people closest to you.
    This was a good one. The suspensions that had been handed down earlier that morning were mostly forgotten for a few hours. I was congratulated and hugged more times than I could count, and even kissed once or twice. Everybody was calling me “sugar,” following Sampson’s lead. The “love” word was used, and overused. I was roasted and toasted in sentimental speeches that seemed hilarious at the time. Just about everybody had too much to drink.
    By four in the afternoon, Sampson and I were steadying each other, making our way into the blinding daylight on Second Street. Mike Hart himself had called us a cab.
    For a brief, clear moment, I was reminded of the purple and blue gypsy cab we were looking for — but then the thought evaporated into the nearly white sunlight.
    “Sugar,” Sampson whispered against my skull as we were climbing into our cab, “I love you more than life itself. It’s true. I love your kids, love your Nana, love your wife-to-be, the lovely Christine. Take us home,” he said to the driver. “Alex is getting married.”
    “And he’s the best man,” I said to the driver, who smiled.
    “Yes I am,” said Sampson. “The very best.”

Chapter 43
    ON THURSDAY NIGHT, Shafer played the Four Horsemen again. He was locked inside his study, but through the early part of the night he could hear the sounds of his family throughout the house. He felt intensely isolated; he was nervous, jittery, and angry for no apparent reason.
    While he waited to log on with the other players, he found himself thinking back to his wild car ride through Washington. He relived a particular feeling over and over: the imagined moment of sudden impact with an unmovable structure. He saw it as blinding light, and physical objects, and himself , all shattering like glass and then becoming part of the universe again. Even the pain he would feel would be part of the reassembling of matter into other fascinating forms and shapes.
    I am suicidal , he finally thought. It’s just a matter of time. I really am Death .
    When it was exactly nine o’clock, he began to type in a message on his computer. The other Horsemen were on-line, waiting for his response to the visit and warning by George Bayer. He didn’t want to disappoint them. What they had done had made him even more enthusiastic about playing the game. He wrote:
    STRANGELY, DEATH WASN’T SURPRISED WHEN FAMINE APPEARED IN WASHINGTON. OF COURSE HE HAD EVERY RIGHT TO COME. JUST AS DEATH COULD GO TO LONDON, OR SINGAPORE, OR MANILA, OR KINGSTON, AND PERHAPS DEATH WILL PAY ONE OF YOU A VISIT SOON.
    THAT’S THE BEAUTY OF THE GAME WE PLAY — ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN.
    ULTIMATELY, THE ISSUE IS TRUST, ISN’T IT? DO I TRUST THAT YOU WILL ALLOW ME TO CONTINUE TO PLAY THE FANTASY GAME AS I WISH? AFTER ALL, THAT IS WHAT MAKES THE GAME DISTINCTIVE AND ALLURING: THE FREEDOM WE EXPERIENCE.
    THAT IS THE GAME NOW, ISN’T IT? WE HAVE EVOLVED INTO SOMETHING NEW. WE HAVE RAISED THE TABLE STAKES. SO LET’S HAVE SOME REAL EXCITEMENT, FELLOW HORSEMEN. I HAVE A FEW IDEAS TO TRY OUT ON