The Face

this evening of all evenings, daunted him.
        During just one minute of conversation with any brother in the badge, regardless of how artfully Ethan tried to wear a happy face, he’d reveal himself to be deeply troubled. Then no self-respecting cop would be able to resist working him, either subtly or obviously, for the source of his worry.
        Right now he didn’t want to talk about what had happened to him. He wanted to think about it.
        Well, that wasn’t entirely true. He would have preferred denial to thought. Just forget it had happened. Turn away from it. Block the memory and get drunk.
        [228] Denial wasn’t an option, however, not with the three silvery bells from the ambulance glimmering on the bar beside his glass of Scotch. He might as well try to deny the existence of Big Foot with a Sasquatch sitting on his face.
        So he had no choice but to dwell on what had happened, which led him immediately into an intellectual dead end. He not only didn’t know what to think about these weird events, he also didn’t know how to think about them.
        Obviously he had not been shot in the gut by Rolf Reynerd. Yet he intuitively knew the lab report would confirm that the blood under his fingernails was his own.
        The experience of being run down in traffic and broken beyond repair remained so vivid, his memory of paralysis so horrifically detailed, that he could not believe he had merely imagined all of it under the influence of a drug administered without his knowledge.
        Ethan asked the bartender for another round, and as the Scotch splashed over fresh ice into a clean glass, he pointed to the bells and said, “You see these?”
        “I love that old song,” the bartender said.
        “What song?”
        “ ‘Silver Bells.’ ”
        “So you see them?”
        The bartender cocked one eyebrow. “Yeah. A set of three little bells. How many sets do you see?”
        Ethan’s mouth cracked into a smile that he hoped looked less demented than it felt. “Just one. Don’t worry. I’m not going to be a danger on the highway.”
        “Really? Then you’re unique.”
         Yeah, Ethan thought, I’m nothing if not unique . I’ve died twice today, but I’m still able to handle my booze, and he wondered how quickly the bartender would snatch the drink from him if he spoke those words aloud.
        [229] He sipped the Scotch, seeking clarity from inebriation, since he couldn’t find any clarity in sobriety.
        Ten or fifteen minutes later, still cold sober, he caught sight of Dunny Whistler in the back-bar mirror.
        Ethan spun on his stool, slopping Scotch from his glass.
        Threading his way among the tables, Dunny had almost reached the door. He was not a ghost: A waitress paused to let him pass.
        Ethan got to his feet, remembered the bells, snatched them off the bar, and hurried toward the exit.
        Some patrons were visiting from table to table, standing in the aisles. Ethan had to resist the urge to shove them aside. His “Excuse me” had such a sharp edge that people bristled, but the expression on his face at once made them choke on their unvoiced reprimands.
        By the time Ethan stepped out of the bar, Dunny had vanished.
        Hurrying into the adjacent lobby, Ethan saw guests standing at the registration desk, others at the concierge desk, people walking toward the elevator alcove. Dunny wasn’t among them.
        To Ethan’s left, the marble-clad lobby opened to an enormous drawing room furnished with sofas and armchairs. There, guests could attend high tea every afternoon; and at this later hour, drinks were being served to those who preferred an atmosphere gentler than that in the bar.
        At a glance, Dunny Whistler couldn’t be seen among the crowd in the drawing room.
        Nearer, to Ethan’s right, the revolving door at the hotel’s main entrance was slowly turning to a stop, as though someone had recently gone in or out, but its quadrants were deserted now.
        He pushed through the door, into the night chill under the roof of the porte-cochere.
        Sheltering their charges with umbrellas, the doorman and a busy squad of parking valets escorted visitors to and from arriving and [230] departing vehicles. Cars, SUVs, and limousines jostled for position in the crowded hotel-service lanes.
        Dunny wasn’t standing with those who were waiting for their cars. Nor did he