uke and I found
ourselves in my apartment again. The ice in our drinks had melted, so
I dumped them and prepared fresh ones. The Duke took his, drained half
of it in three fast swallows, and said: "Ahhhhhh! I needed that."

We heard a key in the door, and His Grace looked at me.

"That's my son," I said. "Back from his date."

Steve came in looking happy. "You still awake, Dad? A cop ought to get
his sleep. Good morning, Your Grace. Both of you look sleepy."

Stevie didn't. He'd danced with Mary Ellen until four, and he still
looked as though he could walk five miles without tiring. Me, I felt
about as full of snap as a soda cracker in a Turkish bath. The three
of us talked for maybe ten minutes, and then we hit the hay.

* * * * *

Three and a half hours of sleep isn't enough for anybody, but it was
all we could afford to take. By eight-thirty, the Duke and I were in
my office, sloshing down black coffee, and, half an hour after that,
we were cruising up Amsterdam Avenue on the second day of our hunt for
Mr. Lawrence Nestor.

Since we were now reasonably sure that our man was in the area, I
ordered the next phase of the search into operation. There were squads
of men making a house-to-house canvass of every hotel, apartment
house, and rooming house in the area--and there are thousands of them.
A flying squad took care of the hotels first; they were the most
likely. Since we knew exactly what day Nestor had arrived, we narrowed
our search down to the records for that day. Nestor might not use his
own name; of course, but the photograph and description ought to help.
And, since Nestor didn't have a job, his irregular schedule and his
drinking habits might make him stand out, though there were plenty of
places where those traits would simply make him one of the boys. It
still looked like a long, hard search.

And then we got our break.

At 9:17 am, Lieutenant Holmquist's voice snapped over my car phone:
"Inspector Royall; Holmquist here. Child missing in Riverside Park.
Officer Ramirez just called in from 111th and Riverside."

"Got it!"

I cut left and gunned the car eastward. I hit a green light at
Broadway, so I didn't need to use the siren. Within two minutes, we
had pulled up beside the curb where an officer was standing with a
woman in tears. The Duke and I got out of the car.

We walked over to her calmly, although neither one of us felt very
calm. There's no point in d