about the market.
There were many different approaches and specialties: day trading,
intermediate and long term investing, stocks, bonds, currencies, and
commodities. Sperandeo was someone he could relate to personally, a
maverick.

There were other market gurus who made sense to him--John Train and
Warren Buffett, especially. They espoused a long-term strategy: think
before you buy, and then, once having bought, continue to buy on dips
and hold unless the company changed fundamentally for the worse.
Sperandeo was more of a trader. Joe was torn between the two
approaches. Discount brokerages had just become available on the
Internet; one could trade without having to actually live in New York.
On line discussion groups argued about stocks 24 hours a day. He
decided to buy a computer.

Three hours later Joe paid the cab fare and carried his new system up
to the apartment, one box at a time. He had it working in an hour and
went to bed pleased with himself.

The following day he opened an account with a service provider for
Internet access. There was an e-mail message from Kate waiting at his
old address in Maine. Joe had agreed to pay Kate's mechanic $30 a month
to store the truck and had asked him to go over it, change the oil, and
do whatever needed doing. Joe replied that the check would be in the
mail and wished her a Happy New Year. The Internet is amazing, he
thought. The message was in Maine; Kate was in Seattle; he was in
Honolulu and could be anywhere.

"Damn, Batman, we're global!"

On impulse, he found a number listed for W. Soule and called her on the
old fashioned telephone. After a recorded message and a beep, he said,
"Mo, this is Joe Burke. I'm having adventures. Want to have lunch?" He
left his number and hung up. When he returned from a walk, the red
message light was blinking.

"Joe, thanks for asking, but, no . . . I'm not an adventure." She made
an amused sound. "Call me again sometime when you've grown up." Click.
Joe called back immediately.

"Hi, I grew up," he said when she answered. "A woman on TV just
explained it to me. You have to transcend the grieving child within."

"Hmmm," Mo said.

"Pie," Joe continued, "what's the name of that place on Hausten Street
where they have great pie? The place with a fish pond. The Willows.
Back in time."

"I'm afraid you'd have to go back in time to eat there; they closed two
or three years ago."

"Damn. How about Keo's? Tomorrow, 12:30 or th