So far, thought Dooley, it's been about as much fun as a funeral. Welcome home.

        Dooley was the only one left in the café, sitting with his thoughts, a stranger in a strange land. He would rather have been in a bar but he had had the sense to avoid that tonight; one hangover in twenty-four hours was enough. Where he would really rather have been was at Kathleen's kitchen table, or Kevin and Mary's, but he wasn't ready for that. Why not, he couldn't say. But six times in approximately forty-eight hours he'd had the phone receiver in his hand and the coins ready to go in the slot, and every time he'd hung up again and put the coins away. Dooley was starting to think the whole thing was a mistake.
           "Sir? I'm afraid we're closing." The pretty blonde behind the counter gave him a quick smile, apologetic and a little nervous, as she said it.

        Dooley got up from the table and carried his empty cup toward the bus tray. The blonde intercepted him and gave him the smile again as she took the cup from his hand. She had warm brown eyes and Dooley thought she looked like the type who might be willing to sit over a cup of coffee and listen as he poured his heart out. Suddenly there was nothing in the world he would have liked better but it was closing time and he could see he made her nervous. It was a lonely place to have to work late at night, up here on the fifth level of the mall, and Dooley wondered if the security guard he'd seen down at the street entrance ever found the initiative to take a ramble to the top. "Thanks," he said. "Sorry to hold you up."

        "That's OK, I have to be here anyway. G'night." She gave him that smile again and Dooley left, wondering why he couldn't talk to people anymore. He was back in a place where everybody spoke English, but for all the good it was doing him he might as well be in China.

        The mall was a gutted warehouse five stories high, shops around a central core open all the way up to a skylight, with the ramp winding around the well and a bank of elevators shooting up one side. The other shops were already shuttered. Dooley headed for the ramp, thinking he could pick up a pint of bourbon after all, see what was on cable at the Holiday Inn, put off a decision till tomorrow.

        Dooley had been a cop, and he still saw things through a cop's eyes. So when the two bad guys came up the ramp past him toward the top level of the mall, he noticed. There was no doubt they were bad guys; even after eight years away Dooley could tell, without thinking about it. Maybe the tattoos, murky blue tattoos that shouted jailhouse; maybe the general style, Latin gang-banger chic with the baggy pants and close-trimmed goatees. Maybe the careful avoidance of his eyes.

        Dooley worried about it for the time he took to go down one level, thinking he was wrong, he was on edge, it was not his god damn job any more. And when he reached the elevators he punched the button and stood listening while a car whined up the glassed-in shaft toward him. He took it back up to the fifth level and stepped off, hearing nothing that alarmed him. He walked back around to the café and saw the steel latticework shutter over the entrance halfway down, as the pretty blonde had pulled it when he left the place; there was no sign of the bad guys.

        Dooley couldn't see the blonde or anyone else inside, just the long counter with the espresso machine and the bottles of Italian syrup arrayed behind it, the bench along the wall, the bags of beans stacked on display. There were whispers and a scuffling noise from the back room of the café, out of sight around a corner at the rear.

        Dooley ducked under the shutter and walked quickly toward the back. The big one came around the corner with a startled look on his face, maybe six-two, two hundred and forty pounds of overfed delinquent quickly zipping up his pants, and his eyes lit up as he saw Dooley approaching. "We got company," he said.

        Dooley said nothing. He made no move, no gesture other than to keep walking; when the big one saw how it was going to be he just stepped into his path and reached out to grab his shirt. Dooley sagged, making the punk take his weight on the outstretched arm, and then reached out and grabbed a handful of testicles through the loose jeans.

        The punk managed to deliver one shot to Dooley's head, but then he screamed and let go fast as Dooley squeezed. The punk was beating on his back but Dooley was doing bad damage, and after a couple of seconds he let go and the big punk sank to his knees as the little one came around the corner. Chairs were falling over and somewhere just around the corner the woman was screaming now with every breath, help me, help me, help me.

        The little one had a knife, a six-inch stiletto switchblade which he had probably been holding to her throat; when he saw his partner on the floor bellowing like a gelded steer, he came at Dooley with the knife waving, back and forth in front of him like radar. He had a Kings crown tattooed on his knife arm and a teardrop inscribed under one bloodshot eye. Dooley had picked up a chair and as calmly as he could with adrenaline jacking him up he said, "You drop the knife and run, we'll call it quits. Otherwise I'm going to kill you and that's a promise."

        "You got it the wrong way around, motherfucker." The punk was scrawny, an abused and twisted whippet, and his code said you never ever backed down from anyone. He made a lunge and Dooley parried with the chair, backing away a step or two. The punk kept coming; Dooley led him down the long counter toward the exit. Behind the little punk he saw the big one crawling, moaning now, and then the terrified blonde staggered into view, bouncing off tables; they'd gotten her pants off and she was bleeding from the nose.

        The punk with the knife knew more people had to show up soon and it was time to ditch his partner and run. Dooley hit the lowered shutter with his back, ducked and backed out onto the concourse. He gave the punk enough space to encourage him to come out, then jumped forward as the buzz-cut head with the rat-tail in back emerged, vulnerable for one crucial second, and brought the chair down hard. It caught more shoulder than head and the punk went to his knees but kept the knife; Dooley backed away, giving him a chance to say uncle. Instead he charged again, and Dooley had to jam the chair down on top of him; that was enough for Dooley. He jettisoned the chair and picked the punk up by the rat-tail and the back of his waistband. Dooley spun like a hammer thrower, the punk taking a pointless swipe with the knife, finding nothing, and then screaming NO as he saw where Dooley was taking him.

        The punk's heels hit the railing as Dooley swung him out over the void and he tumbled as he fell, clawing at the air and working his legs like a long jumper straining for the extra inch; his scream filled the gallery, all the way down. He hit the umbrella over one of the tables on the food court five stories below. In a cartoon he would have bounced off and landed on his feet but this was real life; neither the umbrella nor the table slowed him much and they collapsed with a booming crash that masked the sound of the punk's head cracking on the tiles. The punk had let go of the knife in mid-air, and it hit the floor and bounced at the same time he did, proving Galileo right once again.