in the papers until a real strike comes
along, but the word gets out anyhow, as it always does."

"Makes driving tough," Malone said.

"People can make better time on their hands and knees," the cabbie
said, "with the cops pulling a strike. They concentrate on big items
now, and you can even smoke in the subways if you can find a subway
that is running."

Malone stopped to think how much of the city's income depended on
parking tickets and small fines, and realized that a "strike" like the
one the police were pulling might be very effective indeed. And,
unlike the participants in the Boston Police Strike of sixty-odd years
before, these cops would have public sentiment on their side--since
they were keeping actual crime down.

"How long do they think it's going to last?" Malone said.

"It can be over tomorrow," the cabbie said, "but this is not generally
believed in the most influential quarters. Mayor Amalfi and the new
Commissioner try to straighten things out all day long, but the way
things go straightening them out does no good. Something big is in the
wind, friend. I--"

* * * * *

The cab, on Second Avenue and Seventeenth Street, stopped for a
traffic light. Malone felt an itch in the back of his mind, as if his
prescience were trying to warn him of something; he'd felt it for a
little while, he realized, but only now could he pay attention to it.

The door on the driver's side opened suddenly, and so did the door
next to Malone. Two young men, obviously in their early twenties, were
standing in the openings, holding guns that were plainly intended for
immediate use.

The one next to the driver said, in a flat voice: "Don't nobody get
wise. That way nobody gets hurt. Give us--"

That was as far as he got.

When the rear door had opened, Malone had had a full second to prepare
himself, which was plenty of time. The message from his precognitive
powers had come along just in time.

The second gunman thrust his gun into the cab. He seemed almost to be
handing it to Malone politely, and this effect was spoiled only by
Malone's twist of the gunman's wrist, which must have felt as if he'd
put his hand into a loop tied to the axle of a high-speed centrifuge.
The gunman let go of the gun and Malone, spurning it, let it drop.

He didn't need it. His other hand had gone into his coat and come out
again with the .44 Magnum.

The thug at the front of the car had barely realiz