Chapter 15: Carrow Street

The detective came to the yard office on Wednesday morning with a recorder the size of a matchbook.

He sat in the visitor's chair and did not look at the daybed.

"Chase Loomis paid two new men," he said. "Not Tilghman men. We know where they're staying."

"Then arrest them," Clara said.

"For what? They haven't done anything. Even Loomis hasn't. A text with a street name in it is a street name."

Clara looked at the calendar on her mother's wall.

"You want him to say it out loud," she said.

"I want him there. I want him to say it where a microphone can hear."

"And I'm the reason he'd come."

The detective was quiet for a moment.

"Your husband asked me to tell you he is not allowed to ask you for anything. He wanted me to say that exactly."

"Then he's learning."

"Mrs. Tilghman, I'm not going to put you in that alley."

"You don't have to," Clara said. "I know the way."

She called Alexander from the yard telephone at noon.

It rang once.

"Clara."

"Friday at ten. Carrow Street, behind the garage. I'm going to stand in the alley."

He did not speak.

She waited for the argument, and it did not come.

"You'll stand at the mouth of it, on the street side," she said. "Not inside, and not near me. If I say your name, you can come in. Not before."

"Yes."

"You don't want to argue?"

"I want to do a great many things," Alexander said. His voice was even. "None of them are what you asked."

Her hand was not steady on the receiver.

She put it down without saying goodbye.

On Friday it rained a little, a thin cold drizzle that made the yellow light over the alley swim.

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